A French economic advisor’s tongue-in-cheek attack on corporate culture went largely unnoticed when published in May. Corinne Maier’s Bonjour Paresse (Hello Laziness) is subtitled The Art and Necessity of Doing the Least Work Possible for Your Employer, and her employer is not amused. The author’s upcoming disciplinary hearing has both the press and the unions coming to her defense. One U.K. article calls the book “an elegantly written call to arms to the ‘neo-slaves’ of middle management … condemned to dress up as clowns all week and waste their lives in pointless meetings.” (If you parlez francais, this article in Ici will tell you more.) Mme. Maier’s next book may well be Bonjour, Reprint: The Art of Letting Your Employer Prove You Were Right.
