When employees feel slighted, they work less • Hacker News Board

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#111

Post by Sharlin » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:25 PM UTC

andsoitis wrote: post #101

pinnochio wrote: post #21

There's a lot of jeering, I suspect at the headline more than anything, but having documented research can be helpful in changing management behavior. The changes in employee behavior documented here are not ones that managers would easily connect to their past behavior, such as a late birthday recognition. When you train a dog, you have to give a reward very soon after the desired behavior, otherwise the dog won't a…

> late birthday recognition. if someone is going to feel slighted and similar things add up to them working less, they probably are not a great colleague to begin with. What matters more are: assignment to rewarding work, get paid top dollar, not be bored, get recognition for success, coaching on career growth, given leeway to make mistakes, not overlooked for promotion, etc. Now, as a people manager, if you're not s…

Being primarily interested in money and career advancement would also make you not a great colleague in many people’s eyes. It’s rather subjective.

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#112

Post by nuancebydefault » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:30 PM UTC

hypeatei wrote: post #64

Maybe I'm a bit jaded, and corporate environments have taken their toll, but I see the employee-manager relationship as adversarial by default. Whether my boss wishes me happy birthday or not doesn't move the needle much. I'm there to contribute as an individual and he's there to answer to his boss about staffing, budgeting, and performance. Although, I do feel slighted when a manager acknowledges the absurdity of al…

> see the employee-manager relationship as adversarial by default.

I don't see how anyone can be happy in their job if that were the default. Maybe I am naive or lucky, but I have a very goed relation with my boss, as well as with the boss above.

When that condition is not fulfilled, i definitely tend to slack off and I will eventually leave. I believe such should be the default.

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#113

Post by tjpnz » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:33 PM UTC

javier2 wrote: post #34

Lord-Jobo wrote: post #12

Lots of “no shit” in these comments makes me wonder how many VP level managers you guys have interacted with. Maybe it’s just my location, but this is one of those things that legitimately NEVER makes it through to upper managers. When they tell their base managers to crack the whip and force them to give the whole “you are not working hard enough, tighten up. Shorter lunches, clock in 5 minutes early, etc” speech to…

Yup. We just lost our "slightly below average" developers, but he was a nice guy and tries to deliver. But they have been slow to replace him, and now we are likely looking at 3 months before a new hire will just be in place, plus the new hire will not have the three years worth of experience the other guy had, so their project will likely be slower than at it already was for the rest of the year.

You're missing the person hours lost in hiring the new member.

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#114

Post by grayhatter » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:33 PM UTC

gorgabal wrote: post #108

grayhatter wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Have we got to the point where we need an article telling us that slighting people doesn't help their motivation? American culture is unfortunately permeated with examples, and habits, and expectations around punishing the behaviors you'd want to see. I see subtle things like that all the time. So while I doubt anyone who stopped to actually think about the concrete implications of their behavior, more specifically…

> You can train a human using the exact same skills you use to train a dog. Depending on the context, this can traumatize a human though. This idea has been the basis for both gay conversion therapy and applied behavior analysis. The latter I have had the misfortune to directly experience myself.

You don't think those same things traumatize the dog too? There's a reason why all reputable dog trainers advocate exclusively positive training methods. It's because training with exclusively positive feedback is not only most likely to get the behavior you want. It critically avoids destabilizing the dog. Negative reinforcement learning does works, but it also leads to anxiety, and "reactionary outbursts". i.e. the dog learns to become afraid, and is more likely to bite you. Only abused dogs bite their pack in fear. Just like only abused humans attack their community.

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#115

Post by sudonem » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:35 PM UTC

tarkin2 wrote: post #35

mejutoco wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When you train a dog, you have to give a reward very soon after the desired behavior, otherwise the dog won't associate the reward with the behavior Regarding dog training, one can use a placeholder for the reward. This is useful, for example, if you want to reward a dolphin jumping through a hula, because you will not be able to give the reward at that moment, but for example, you can say "yes!" or use a clicker a…

Have we got to the point where we need an article telling us that slighting people doesn't help their motivation? Perhaps the answer is yes when we also compare a worker's motivation to a dog's motivation seemingly without irony.

Given that many organizations literally refer to their employees as “Resource Units” literally abstracting away their humanity I’m going to say… yes. We are at that point (and have been for quite some time).

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#116

Post by catlifeonmars » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:36 PM UTC

tarkin2 wrote: post #35

mejutoco wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When you train a dog, you have to give a reward very soon after the desired behavior, otherwise the dog won't associate the reward with the behavior Regarding dog training, one can use a placeholder for the reward. This is useful, for example, if you want to reward a dolphin jumping through a hula, because you will not be able to give the reward at that moment, but for example, you can say "yes!" or use a clicker a…

Have we got to the point where we need an article telling us that slighting people doesn't help their motivation? Perhaps the answer is yes when we also compare a worker's motivation to a dog's motivation seemingly without irony.

> When you train a dog, you have to give a reward very soon after the desired behavior, otherwise the dog won't associate the reward with the behavior. Likewise, a manager is not going to associate a slight towards an employee with an increase in absenteeism or lower productivity that happens days and weeks later.

Note that GP is comparing the _managers_ motivation to a dog’s motivation, not the worker. It’s about a delayed feedback loop to the manager, who won’t connect the punishment (lower productivity) with the bad behavior (slighting the employee).

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#117

Post by dghlsakjg » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:40 PM UTC

nsgi wrote: post #25

As a Brit, the birthday card example feels oddly American. The effect seems plausible, but the UK equivalent slight would be something much more informal

The example wasn’t about birthday cards specifically in my reading. The example was more about a manager selectively deprioritizing/violating a policy that exists for the sole benefit of the employee.

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#118

Post by njhnjhnjh » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:40 PM UTC

educasean wrote: post #80

njhnjhnjh wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Perhaps it may help to work on your social skills with more intent. People who often find themselves disrespected at work aren't always bad performers but they do tend to have large social blind spots they themselves aren't aware of.

[dead]

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#119

Post by metalman » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:40 PM UTC

As a small business owner who often has to deal with that worst possible ratio 1:1 for management/employee, I can promise you that emoloyees are premptivly looking for reasons to get there digs in, and often show up enacting vengence? in the form of vandalism from day 1. As I have never taken shit from an employer, I walk out and get another job imediatly, I have no sympathy for passive agressives whatsoever and despise the world we have built that can absorb the damage and still net a profit, which of course does not work for small business, so I am becoming very up front with prospective hires, and forceing a conversation about personal expectations and needs, which is very challenging as they have been trained to say whatever is needed to get hired, NOW!, and worry about anything else later.

Re: When employees feel slighted, they work less

#120

Post by catlifeonmars » Sat, Jan 24, 2026, 4:41 PM UTC

nuancebydefault wrote: post #112

hypeatei wrote: post #64

Maybe I'm a bit jaded, and corporate environments have taken their toll, but I see the employee-manager relationship as adversarial by default. Whether my boss wishes me happy birthday or not doesn't move the needle much. I'm there to contribute as an individual and he's there to answer to his boss about staffing, budgeting, and performance. Although, I do feel slighted when a manager acknowledges the absurdity of al…

> see the employee-manager relationship as adversarial by default. I don't see how anyone can be happy in their job if that were the default. Maybe I am naive or lucky, but I have a very goed relation with my boss, as well as with the boss above. When that condition is not fulfilled, i definitely tend to slack off and I will eventually leave. I believe such should be the default.

The relationship between owners and workers has always been extractive. The adversarial relationship is built in. That doesn’t mean that you can’t have a good relationship with your employer, but there is always a conflict of interest, so to speak.

I’ve had great relationships with my bosses, but they’re always under pressure to extract more work from the workers. In turn, their bosses are also pressured to do the same.

So yes, it’s not the default and you and I have both been lucky.