- PARIS -- Those who dedicate
their professional lives to idleness should do so with discretion if they
hope to keep their jobs.
-
- This is one useful message in Hello Laziness - The Art
and the Importance of Doing the Least Possible at the Workplace, an anarchic
anti-business bible published in France.
-
- It is advice the author, Corinne Maier, a senior economist
at Electricite de France, failed to follow. She faces a disciplinary hearing
next month, accused of attempting to "rot the system from within".
-
- The book, Bonjour Paresse (a nod to Francoise Sagan's
50s novel, Bonjour Tristesse or Hello Sadness), pledges to explain why
it is in your interest to do the least work possible and will tell you
how to damage the system from within "without appearing to do so".
-
- An antidote to the recent rash of US-import, career-enhancing
self-help books by business management gurus, it rails against corporate
culture and preaches a philosophy of active disengagement.
-
- It is an elegantly written call to arms to the "neo-slaves"
of middle management and the "damned of the service industry",
condemned to dress up as clowns all week and waste their lives in pointless
meetings.
-
- Maier cites the recent wave of financial scandals in
French business, and argues that since careers are at risk and pensions
under threat, employees should shake off their shackles of loyalty and
start "footling around" during office hours.
-
- Her publisher, Editions Michalon, said that the book
did not target EDF, and its hyper-sensitive response only served to confirm
the totalitarianism reigning in big business.
-
- Maier, who works part-time, has been with EDF for 12
years. She said she wrote the book on her days off.
-
- France's unions yesterday rallied to her cause, saying
EDF was threatening free speech.
-
- "They cited the pettiest offences in the letter
summoning me to face a disciplinary review," Maier said. "The
real reason is that they don't like my book."
-
- EDF refused to comment on "an ongoing disciplinary
procedure", but indicated it was angry at the book mentioning that
Maier was an employee.
-
- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2004 http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/story/0,11882,1270403,00.html
|