A MIDDLE manager is experimenting with being pleasant to his staff in a bid to improve their productivity, it has emerged.
Having noticed a connection between shouting at his staff and poor performance, middle manager Nathan Muir has decided to test the radical idea of being nice to them and complimenting their work.
Muir said: “I know, being in a good mood sounds like a counterproductive tactic for business development. But Google had some unorthodox approaches in the 90s and look at them now.
“I started by A/B testing a cheerful ‘good morning’ and ‘how are you’ to my colleagues as they slouched to their desks. Backs stiffened in terror plummeted by 12 per cent.
“Then at lunch I popped out to get a Colin the Caterpillar cake because it was probably one of their birthdays. After asking if this was some kind of trick and examining it for traces of poison, they greedily tucked in.
“Sadly though the results have been inconclusive. Now they waste as much time cheerfully dicking about in the kitchen as they used to spend crying in the bathroom, plus their work isn’t any better. From tomorrow it’s back to instilling terror.”
Accounts clerk Susan Traherne said: “I’m relieved Nathan’s reverting to abject misery. The whole team’s shattered from the paranoia of working under his clearly insincere positivity.”
