But why should anyone have to grind at a shit job? If your business can only survive by grinding people down, maybe society would be better off without it. If the only way we can get same day delivery is over the burnt-out, permanently injured ex-employees of a multi-national, is it really worth it? Maybe that start-up never should have made it. Maybe strong labor laws should have forced them to scale back their ambitions or close their doors.

If they were deemed useless, they wouldn’t become a target. The useless phrasing is more that their direction for the purpose of the company is useless overall. Line goes up isn’t always a reflection of how well the company is doing for itself and its customers. You are right that CEOs usually set how the company runs, as my work a few years ago transitioned to a new CEO after decades of the first, and it’s showing. What’s frustrating is when they continue to play off that they are the same company and policy to keep morale up, but it’s obvious things are different.