micromanage. verb. : to manage especially with excessive control or attention to small matters that is not wanted or causes problems. to direct or conduct the activities of a group or an enterprise by paying attention to minute details.

What matters most of all in this age is efficiency and high productivity. Little do large conglomerates and organizations care on quality and outcome, as they rather focus on quantity and quickness. To push this ideal, a structure, no, an hierarchy is placed upon companies to command fear and silence from its employees. The less people talk, the less people think outside the box, the less variance there is, the better it is for the company. This is done through a process of management where individuals breathe down their subordinates necks, always watching, always ready to correct, always read to ridicule. The process of creating a product or a service is not done with fun, it does not require socializing, and most importantly and shouldn't call for anyone's opinion.

Today, mistakes were unfortunately made at the workplace. I observed how my leadership was quick to outwardly discipline employees publicly in front of everyone, making a spectacle of the very small things that were done incorrectly. Why should a correction be made private? Who would bother to kindly pull someone to the side to discuss the errors made gently, to point out what could have been done better with patience? Not here, no. Here, it is easier to make everyone too afraid to ever make a mistake. It is more efficient to lead with this sort of terror rather than a gentle voice. Gentleness doesn't exist in this cutthroat world anymore. All there is, is output. All there is, is results. All there is... is submission.

Eventually there will be a person or two who tires of this. Who stands up, saying that they will quit or that they have had enough. They'll leave, then their position will be listed somewhere for less than what the previous employee was paid to yank someone else in who desperately needs the opportunity. The unfairness continues, and so does the dissatisfaction and the exhaustion. Maybe there would be someone who voices their thoughts, only to be humiliated by their own leadership into thinking that they are wrong, that they are stupid, that they are nothing but their role. Another cog in the machine, another piece to the system. They'll make us believe that that is all we will ever be so that we will never leave.

How many of us have the luxury of leaving? How many of us have the courage to stand up? Why is it easier to put our heads down and do the work?

There are no answers to this. Not easy ones, at least. It's a little funny to think of these same managers once in a role similar to ours, where they had to say nothing and do only what they were told. By being good, by being complacent, by being obedient, the reward is the so-called responsibility of existing behind their subordinates backs forever. To uphold the values and goals of the company above their own morals and beliefs. To ask questions like, "don't you already know how to do this?" or "I thought you were already trained how to do that" or maybe even "how could you not know how to do this properly?" when in the end, aren't they also responsible for our success? Aren't they also supposed to direct, to push, to lead?

I write this in frustration but also in shame. I write this as one who stood at the precipice of breaking the silence, but kept his mouth shut. I saw others hold back as well. Are we all cowards? Are we broken? Do we not wish to have a say?

The way the world works is that those who find their way up the hierarchy ultimately win the most. Life gets easier when you climb up, they say. Work harder! Sacrifice more! Be less of yourself, be the one to push destructive narratives and processes, be the one with the whip. Only then can you find true success! A better paycheck, a better life, locked behind caring less for what makes you, you.

Truly I cannot find myself to hate those who need to work their absolute hardest for a better life. We're all trying to do so. I'm frustrated that it gets to the point where we cannot simply try to be kind to each other, to better each other in ways that are empathetic and inspiring, to motivate instead of tear down. I am saddened that criticism is dealt hand in hand with shame rather than constructive thoughtfulness. It's easy for me to write here and say that ego runs the world when I have the nerve to criticize and lament about things behind the safety of my site. Is it right for me to hope and wish for better? Do I get to claim that when I have done nothing myself?

This man is at a loss.