Customer Reviews

Bonjour Laziness: Jumping Off the Corporate Ladder

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This book is really eye opener. Of course, the thesis is not new. Of course - everybody knows Dilbert. But Dilbert is something a little bit different - a joke. True, this joke is about real world, real people - but it's a joke. Bonjour laziness is not a joke, this is a book that shows that different life, different kind of work is possible. Of course, what Ms Maier proposes is a provocation - let's try to pretend that we work. Why? because all of this, our bosses, our desks, our positions our visiting cards is just an illusion. Try to live real life, life for yourselves, not life for your company.
If you are trying hard to make a career you may not like this book.
But try to answer one question. Imagine you are 75 years old and you wonder what your life was for. What will be the answer? That you earned a couple of bucks for your company? That you became the youngest manager in your company? Or maybe you'd prefer: I was happy?

"Bonjour Laziness" goes against everything you've ever been taught about becoming a professional. Maeir encourages an anarchistic approach to corporate life, one which professes that the avoidance of responsibility and action is the best revenge against an oppressive bureacratic structure, and that increased job satisfaction will come with working less.

This is a book which is highly original, and probably one which some people will find disturbing because it goes so against the American work ethic of taking on more and more responsibility -- and that your success in life is dictated by the length of your title and the size of your paycheck. In that sense it is very European -- and of course very French, Maeir being a native of France -- but it also tries to take a broader view of why we work and what the end result is.

Maier saves her biggest rips at upper corporate management, accusing them of being relatively lazy, greedy users of the workforce. This is certainly Marxist in viewpoint, and her answer for what to do about it, is to slow the wheels of the corporate machine from within. Her points are not entirely false, but she does emphasize that the real work of companies are being done by those at the low end of the totem pole, something that's difficult to dispute.

Anyone hwo has worked for a large corporation can readily understand many of her points of view. The goal of corporate life is to conform, to impress your superiors and to fit in with a larger culture. Successfully doing so means getting more and more tangible rewards; the failure to do so will mean being expunged from the safe, secure world of the corporate family. For those who get their identity and self-worth from their careers, this is indeed a problem.

Maier is a good writer and has some very interesting and important points to make. It is questionable whether Americans will embrace her philosophy, in part because it goes so much against the grain of what our national identity is about. Still, for those with an open mind, her ideas are worth exploring, more in the context of whether it is possible to have a pleasant, enjoyable career within a large faceless bureacracy, than in trying to slow the machine down to a grinding halt.

This is a well written, well focused book, and while not everyone will agree with her points of view, Maier deserves much credit for putting them out there.

You have to give her credit. Corinne Maier takes a witty idea that could be articulated in under fifty words, and stretches it out into a full book. Perhaps this is part of the joke within a joke.

Maier convincingly writes that since the wage earner is the modern day slave, since work is not a place for fulfillment, and since what you do is utterly pointless, the most adaptive thing to be done to remain sane is to maintain the status quo: remain invisible, never take a position of responsibility, and become a parasite. After all, we are managed by " Homo economicus cretinus", so who will ever find out?

This would be a great little gift book for an executive who takes themselves way, way, too seriously. Then again, they probably wouldn't understand it. Better to circulate your copy amongst your fellow oppressed worker bees and giggle over your fourth coffee break of the day.

I enjoy a jaded take on the corporate life as much as any cube dweller. I figured that's what I was getting with "Bonjour Laziness." However, I should have checked it out a bit better before making my purchase, because it was ultimately a disappointing read.

This is a very cynical and depressing perspective on being a wage earner. A somewhat harsh indictment of a subject can work, but to avoid becoming an exercise in nihilism it needs two important counterpoints: 1) a sense of humor, and 2) reasonable alternatives. Scott Adams' "Dilbert" has the former, and books like "The Joy of Not Working" by Ernie Zelinski contain the latter. Unfortunately, "Bonjour Laziness" lacks either of these leavening qualities, and overall was a bummer (at least it was short). A bleak outlook that culminates with bullet points on resigning oneself to a life of job-related misery doesn't really do it for me. Even corporate slams like "The Office" and "Office Space" had happy endings.

This book was originally published in France. I happen to like France, and I have some great memories of interacting with the French in Paris. Therefore, I find it hard to believe that this is their defining sense of workplace destiny. There is a lot of history and beauty in Paris alone, and so many things to enjoy and experience either alone or with others. If the author had contrasted her negative view of the corporate grind with a "French Women Don't Get Fat" or "Sixty Million Frenchmen Can't Be Wrong" angle on finding happiness outside of the office, "Bonjour Laziness" would have been a better effort.

To be fair, the author does score some zingers, and possibly provides a glimpse into French corporate culture. Perhaps it reads better in French, and taps a Gallic sense of humor that got lost in translation to English. But as it stands, I'd recommend saying "au revoir" to "Bonjour Laziness."

It's not a self-help book but a look at the corporate world that, from my perspective after working at some major corporations, is dead on. Work within large corporate organizations is very much as she describes it. This book gets it right whether it is in France or the US. Corporate America is one strange place. This book is a great read and extremely funny! If it doesn't sell well in America it's because we take ourselves way too seriously.

Being pretty cynical, I loved the idea of criticizing the stupider things done in _SOME_ corporate settings: incompetent managers, the constant use of jargon, the endless meetings that achieve nothing, the highly paid consultants that add no value whatsoever, the leaders whose strategy consists of extrapolating current trends, golden parachutes, etc, etc...

Notice 2 things about what I just wrote:

First, this applies only to SOME companies. Most companies and workers are, at the least, relatively honest and competent. Second, it took me about 30 words to list these bad points.

The author, who is the co-worker from hell, uses 110+ pages of constant, bitter, complaints, about everything having to do with business, rarely getting into any specifics. She has absolutely nothing good to say about anybody and she implies that every company and manager is utterly corrupt, stupid and soulless. Heck, she even criticizes the French as being in general stupid and self-centered. She hardly even bothers telling you how to beat the system.

She just loooves name dropping: "as philosopher X said... blah blah blah..." to show how cultured and clever she is.

Of course, she doesn't propose any remedies. That's fine: I didn't expect, or want, a management handbook. But I did expect irony or satire, some finesse, some reasoned arguments. Decent prose even, occasional wit, chuckles. All I got was page after page of bitter, thoughtless, bile.

Example: "My classification of employees: the sheep, the troublemakers and the lazy..."

Another example, following a probably valid criticism of the lack of male input to household work: "luckily, we feel vindicated when we know that men have a shorter life expectancy and are 4x more likely to kill themselves than women. At least there is some justice".

I read it in French and the better parts of the book consisted of making fun of the use of English by French workers where French words would have done just fine. Between that subject dropping out in an English edition and the constant French cultural references, I doubt that translation has made this little gem any better.

This is a perfect book for a country with a persistent 10% unemployment rate, lots of public sector workers (like her) who go on strike all the time and a profound anxiety about its place in the modern world. Read Dilbert instead - it is perhaps too friendly to the corporate world (it runs in the business section!). But it sure is less shallow than this tripe. Or just look around for other books that criticize corporations, most of them are likely much better.

According to Corinne Maier job satisfaction will come with working less. Certainly at odds with the thesis that success in life is getting ahead in the corporate world and bringing home that fat paycheck.
Certainly, Maier won't agree with all the stuff you (might) have learned at business school. Especially, she won't agree with the thesis that the goal of life is to conform, to impress your superiors and to fit in with a larger (corporate) culture. In a nutshell, she thinks that this whole corporate culture is phony.

You might not agree with everything she says - but you should read the book anyhow! Who knows - it might be an eyeopener.

-Simon

"Lost in translation" comes to mind after having read this book. While many of the underlying themes ring true, the text comes across so flat to the point that the book was a chore to read. The Dilbert books convey many of the same points more humorously.

Warning: this book is not meant to be shared with others in the corporate office, especially with your boss. More humor than career guidance, for sure. I found this book daring, poignant and somewhat true. But often times I also found myself disagreeing. There are many great anecdotes, and some insightful "hmmms". It makes you think, but also chuckle. I've shared some of the findings with friends, and I've recommended the book to close colleagues.

Not quite sure what to write about this.
As one reviewer pointed out, maybe its meant to be funny in the French version.
To me, its OK, but way over the top. Let's be honest - there are lots of workers who own their own businesses, and I'd bet those people are the most fullfilled. If you can take your hobby or life's interest and turn it into a business or a living, well then - there's no beating that!
And then there are workers who work for a corporation, cubicle style, and still love their work. Kudos to them - they're lucky.
The next are the workers who don't particularly LIKE their work, but they're reasonably satisfied with their living and probably understand they're lucky to have their position. They take the living it gives them to pursue their interests or otherwise enjoy the life outside the office that it allows them to have. This is OK, too.
And lastly, there are the ones who hate what they do (or maybe just don't care much for it) but do it becasue they think they have to. They simmer over the things they don't like, bosses they think are idiots, all the corporate silliness (and, admittedly, there's a lot of that to be found) - but they never do anything to further themselves, and never bother to really look elsewhere, or educate themselves to get into something that DOES interest them. Consequently, they are miserable - and they keep themselves in the same old rut.
This last category is what Corrine Maier is talking about. She's funny at times, but after reading the whole book, it gets nothing short of depressing. Its a diatribe against "the system" and it will do you NO GOOD to read it if your in that last category already.
I'm sympathetic with the overall theme in a conceptual way. But it offers nothing that we don't already know.
Don't take this work seriously - and read it only if you have a good sense of humor.
(PS - ever wonder how much money she made off the book??? Ha! Now you understand the REAL lesson!)