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TechnoratiThe Wall Street Journal recently ran a story addressing the “culture of praise” that is becoming characteristic of the next generation of American workers.
The article reports that “corporations including Land’s End and Bank of America are hiring consultants to teach managers how to compliment employees… The 1,000 employee Scooter Store, Inc… has a staff ‘celebrations’ assistant whose job it is throw confetti – 25 pounds a week – at employees… The Container Store Inc. estimates that one of its 4,000 employees receives praise every 20 seconds through such efforts as its ‘Celebration Voice Mailboxes.’” Bob Nelson, a consultant specializing in “praise issues” counsels up to 100 companies each year. Nelson says “workers under 40 require far more stroking…they want near-constant feedback.” Nelson advises bosses: “If a young worker has been chronically late for work and then starts arriving on time, commend him.” Commend him?! How about reminding him of his obligations and responsibilities for which he receives a paycheck!
Steve Smolinsky, a marketing consultant who teaches MBA students at the prestigious Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, says that he and his colleagues feel hand-cuffed by the language of self-esteem. “You have to tell students, ‘Its not as good as you can do. You’re really smart, and can do better.’” Smolinsky says he enjoys giving praise when it’s warranted “but there needs to be a flip-side. When people are lousy, they need to be told that.”
The article’s author points out, “Childhood in recent decades has been defined by such stroking – by parents who see their job as building self-esteem, by soccer coaches who give every player a trophy, by schools who used to name one ‘student of the month’ and these days name 40.” What the article fails to identify is what produced this culture of superficial self-esteem building.
Christopher Lasch points out in his important book, The Culture of Narcissism, “The contemporary climate is therapeutic not religious. People today hunger not for personal salvation, but for the feeling, the momentary illusion, of personal well-being, health, and psychic security.” Following the eclipse of the Christian worldview that once shaped American life and culture, the “therapeutic” revolution of the sixties emerged to convince us that “personal happiness” was the ultimate goal of human life. This idea has only further encouraged the individual self to elevate his or her needs and interests above everyone else’s.
By replacing the former religious culture with today’s therapeutic culture we have unwittingly created the most narcissistic generation in American history. “For a multi-university study released this year, 16,475 college students took the standardized narcissistic personality inventory… Students’ scores have risen steadily since the test was first offered, in 1982. The average college student in 2006 was 30 percent more narcissistic than the average student in 1982.” (WSJ)
What precisely is this narcissism I speak of and how does the therapeutic sensibility contribute to its formation? In short, the advent of Freudian psychotherapy sought to liberate men from what it saw as outdated modes of thinking about such things as love, duty, self-sacrifice, and submission to higher authority. Under the Freudian premise “mental health,” which becomes the highest human goal, was defined as “the overthrow of inhibitions and the immediate gratification of every impulse.” Each person’s own desires and wants were given primacy over and above everything and everyone else, including God. Doing so, we were told, would make us “happy” and nearly every aspect of contemporary American culture has combined to reinforce this message.Continue »
