Meet the Stepford Employees

Spectator

08-07-2025

In my first 'proper' job after university, selling advertising space for a well-known motoring magazine in the early 1990s, one of the few things that alleviated the utter tedium was the banter. Some of the quickfire repartee was ingenious. We were nearly all graduates, intelligent and articulate. Someone would occasionally overstep the mark, but we were civilised people and so self-regulating. We knew what was acceptable and what wasn't. But for the most part, anything went. We didn't need an HR function, because, in those days, were weren't 'resources', so we didn't need someone to police our behaviour.
Lunch was often liquid, nearly everyone smoked in the office, and on Friday evenings, we'd head straight to the pub and get wrecked. Our weekends were spent drinking and taking all manner of recreational drugs, and we'd appear on a Monday morning barely able to function. But we were young and having fun.
Eventually, I was sacked for making repeated calls to a premium-rate number that provided updates on the First Gulf war, as well as tardiness, and generally treating the whole thing as a joke. I had subsequent jobs where bantz was pretty much unregulated. The only boundaries were self-imposed ones of taste and decency. But since the mid-2000s, I've observed with growing unease the slow but inexorable rise of a phenomenon known as 'the Stepford Employee'.
The Stepford Employee is characterised by their conformity and submissiveness. Named after the Ira Levin novel and film adaptations The Stepford Wives – in which men in a suburban American town are married to docile female robots – these corporate drones have seemingly abandoned independent thought or action. Their passivity makes them afraid to speak up or offer any opinion. They suppress their individuality to fit in and avoid conflict or disapproval. As for banter, forget it – the office is now a fun-free, Puritan-like environment.
Instead of chit-chat, we're limited to pleasantries exchanged at the beginning and end of the day. Any talk in between is strictly work-related. Vernacular English has been replaced by more formal language, thus reducing the opportunities for wordplay. Office jargon is intoned mantra-like with the kind of reverence usually reserved for the spiritual. Social events are awkward affairs, with polite conversation replacing raucous laughter.
At a recent conference, a girl turned to me bright-eyed at the start and said, without any trace of irony: 'Are you excited?' I didn't know what to say. A simple 'no' would have been churlish. Besides, she was young and enthusiastic, and I didn't want to burst her bubble. So, I said, obliquely, 'I'm sure it will have its moments.' After listening glassy-eyed to the mangled syntax of the CEO's homily – and several dull presentations – we broke for lunch. Our new director spotted me and came bouncing over like Tigger after a generous line of coke. My face froze into a rictus smile. He had the gleam of a religious convert in his eye, and I was forced to listen to him wax enthusiastic about the latest dreary initiatives for half an hour. His enthusiasm for the mundane alarmed me. If he was faking it, he was bloody convincing.
So, what or who is to blame for this? The overreach of human resources (or 'human remains' as I've heard it called rather aptly), government legislation, micromanagement, fear of being called out for triggering someone, or worse, being cancelled? About once a quarter, I meet up with a group of former colleagues, intelligent individuals who are skilled in their respective fields. Being middle-aged, they also have a healthy sense of irony, so, for an evening, we're gloriously free of the usual oppressive restrictions. The no-holds-barred conversation is like breathing deep gulps of fresh air after being starved of oxygen. Back in the office the following day, I have to remember to keep it zipped, lest I reveal myself to be a horrid old reactionary.
These days, if you have a keen sense of the absurd – or any intellectual curiosity – it's best kept to yourself. It will only get you into trouble. Quiet conformity is what's expected. On the few occasions I've detected signs of unorthodoxy in others and tried to engage them in proper conversation, their eyes have searched mine pleadingly, semaphoring: 'Please don't say anything.' And so, they've been able to maintain the pretence of being a true believer.
Despite the unnerving degree of quiescence seen in the workplace, Gallup's 2024 State of the Global Workplace report suggests it's not leading to increased productivity. According to the report, employee enthusiasm dropped to just 21 per cent, at a cost to the global economy of $438 billion.
My tongue-in-cheek suggestion is that each organisation should have its own jester or holy fool. Someone who can say what the rest of us are thinking without getting into trouble: 'Sorry, chief, but that's bullshit.' After all, how often are any of us brave enough to point out to the emperor that he isn't wearing any clothes?
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the film One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Based on Ken Kesey's 1962 novel of the same name, it depicts the protagonist, Randle McMurphy, played by Jack Nicholson, as a psychiatric patient who constantly challenges the authority of the hated Nurse Ratched. His antagonising of her – drinking, running card tables, smuggling in prostitutes – eventually leads to his lobotomisation. As a commentary on institutional power, the dehumanising effects of conformity, and the struggle for individual freedom and identity, it remains frighteningly germane.
If this severing of the prefrontal cortex were to end, not only would we be happier, but we'f also be more productive. Gallup's report claims that if workforces became fully excited about thier jobs, the global economy could grow by $9.6 trillion.
At one point, Randle McMurphy says: 'You know, that's the first thing that got me about this place, that there wasn't anybody laughing. I haven't heard a real laugh since I came through that door, do you know that?' So, let's stick it to the Nurse Ratcheds of this world and bring fun and laughter back into the workplace. Throw off the shackles that restrict creative thought and encourage freedom of expression once again. But maybe we should leave the gaming table and prostitutes where they belong – that might be a step too far.