2023年经济学人 员工忠诚度是一种很傻的说法吗?

Business

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Bartleby

巴托比专栏

Is employee loyalty¹ silly?

员工忠诚度是一种有些傻的说法吗？

Job interviews are an opportunity to see allegiances shift in real time.

在求职面试中可以看到忠诚的实时变化。

A candidate will usually refer to a prospective² employer as “you” at the start of an interview (“What do you want to see from someone in this position?”).

在面试开始时，应聘者通常会把有望成为雇主的一方称为“您”(“您想从担任这个职位的人身上看到什么？”)。

But occasionally the pronoun changes (“We should be thinking more about our approach to below-the-line marketing³. Sorry, I mean ‘you’ should be”).

但代词也会偶尔发生变化(“我们应该更多地考虑我们的线下营销方式。不好意思，我是说‘您’应该”)。

That “we” is a tiny, time-travelling glimpse of someone imagining themselves as the employee of a new company, of a fresh identity being forged and of loyalties⁴ being transferred.

这个“我们”是一个细微的、穿越时空的一瞥，人们把自己想象成一家新公司的员工，正在构建新的身份，正在转移自己的忠心。

Loyalty is seen as a virtue⁵ in most situations: among friends, family and football fans.

忠诚在大多数情况下都被视为一种美德：在朋友、家人和球迷中都是如此。

Employee loyalty, however, is more complex. It is more transactional.

然而，员工忠诚度要复杂得多。它更具交易性质。

Friends don’t give each other performance reviews or fire each other for cost reasons.

朋友不会互相进行绩效评估，也不会因为成本而解雇对方。

It is less reciprocal.

员工忠诚度的互惠程度也比较低。

A worker can feel attachment⁶ to a company and a company can feel precisely⁷ nothing.

员工可以感觉到对公司的依恋，而公司可以无动于衷。

(Which is why people often feel more loyal to team members and individual bosses than to their organisations.)

(这就是为什么人们往往对团队成员和某个老板比对他们的组织更忠诚。)

And too much of it can impose high costs.

员工忠诚度太高还可能会带来高昂的成本。

Wage bumps and careers are built on people changing jobs.

加薪和建立事业是在换工作的基础上实现的。

According to the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, which tracks wage growth in America, in April job switchers were being paid 7.6% more than a year earlier; job stickers were being paid only 5.6% more.

根据追踪美国工资增长的亚特兰大联邦储备银行的数据，4月份，跳槽者的薪酬比去年高出7.6%，而未换工作者的薪酬仅高出5.6%。

A little promiscuity⁹ on the part of other people can help those who choose to stay where they are.

其他人在工作上稍微“寻花问柳”一下，这对那些选择保持现状的人可能有益。

A paper by Nathan Deutscher, a Treasury¹⁰ official in Australia, found that higher rates of job-hopping in local Australian labour markets were associated with faster wage growth both for workers who switched jobs and for those who did not.

澳大利亚财政部官员内森·多伊切尔的一篇论文发现，澳大利亚当地劳动力市场的跳槽率升高，无论是对换工作的人还是没有换工作的人来说，都与更快的工资增长有关。

Loyalty is nice; so is bargaining power.

忠诚是美好的，讨价还价的能力也是美好的。

Too much loyalty can harm workers in other ways.

过于忠诚可能会在其他方面损害员工的利益。

A piece of research published earlier this year by Matthew Stanley of Duke University and his co-authors tested how bosses felt about loyal workers.

杜克大学的马修·斯坦利和他的合著者今年早些时候发表了一项研究，测试了老板们对忠诚员工的看法。

The researchers asked managers how willing they were to ask a fictional¹¹ employee named John to work overtime¹² for no pay.

研究人员询问经理们，他们在多大程度上愿意让一位名叫约翰的虚构员工无偿加班。

If John was described as loyal, then bosses were happier to dump more work on him.

如果约翰被描述为很忠诚，那么老板们会更乐意把更多的工作扔给他。

The reverse also applied¹³: workers who did more work for no reward were more likely to be described by managers as loyal.

相反的情况也适用：做更多工作却没有得到回报的员工更有可能被经理描述为忠诚。

Dogs are known for their loyalty, remember, but not for their brains.

请记住，狗是以忠诚，而不是以有头脑著称的。

Employers tend to be clear-eyed about what generates loyalty.

雇主往往很清楚是什么产生了忠诚。

Retention¹⁴ bonuses are an admission that the best employees might need a little nudge to stay.

留任奖金就是在承认，最优秀的员工可能需要一点动力才能留下来。

Actual loyalty tends to get nugatory¹⁵ rewards: a week’s extra holiday for 25 years of service?

真正的忠诚往往会得到没什么价值的奖励：任职25年就能增加一周的假期？

Netflix encourages its employees to speak to recruiters so that they know their worth in the open market and so that it can respond with counter-offers (an approach that makes more sense when you are prepared to pay top dollar and less so if you are in the non-profit sector).

网飞鼓励员工与招聘人员交谈，这样他们就知道自己在公开市场上有多少价值，这样网飞就可以用条件更好的offer回复员工(如果你准备支付顶级薪资，这种方法才更说得通，如果你在非营利性行业，这个办法就不那么有道理了)。

Companies can nonetheless be wedded¹⁶ to the idea of loyalty.

尽管如此，公司仍然可以坚守忠诚的理念。

The group of employees who left Shockley Semiconductor¹⁷ Lab in the 1950s to found Fairchild Semiconductor was famously dubbed¹⁸ the “traitorous eight”.

20世纪50年代离开肖克利半导体实验室，然后创立了飞兆半导体的一群员工被戏称为“八大叛徒”。

Some of that attitude still prevails.

这种态度在一定程度上仍然盛行。

But unless you are a member of the mafia or a cleric, joining a competitor is neither treachery nor heresy¹⁹.

但除非你是黑手党成员或神职人员，否则加入竞争对手既不是背叛，也不是异端。

Indeed, boomerang hires—people who leave an employer and then come back—can offer a valuable blend of known quantity and new skills.

事实上，回旋镖招聘--离职的人又回到老东家--可以让已知数和新技能结合起来，这是非常有价值的结果。

Society can suffer if there is a surfeit²⁰ of employee loyalty.

如果员工的忠诚度过高，社会可能会受到不利影响。

A paper on whistle-blowing, published in 2019 by James Dungan of the University of Chicago and his co-authors, found that employees were more likely to report wrongdoing if their concern was fair treatment of people outside the organisation⁸ and less likely to do so if they were more motivated by loyalty.

芝加哥大学的詹姆斯·邓根及其合著者在2019年发表的一篇关于检举揭发的论文发现，如果员工关心的是公平对待组织外的人，那么他们更有可能举报不当行为，如果他们更多的是出于忠诚的动机，那么他们不太可能这样做。

Other research suggests that competitive situations can encourage loyal members of one group to cheat in order to best another.

其他研究表明，竞争环境会鼓励一个群体中的忠诚成员为了打败另一个群体而作弊。

Employee loyalty can be great.

员工忠诚可以是伟大的。

Companies want workers who feel committed to them, who are prepared to go the extra mile and not join a rival at a moment’s notice.

公司希望员工忠心耿耿，愿意付出额外努力，不会事先不打招呼就加入竞争对手的阵营。

Workers want to believe in and belong at a firm, confident that it warrants chunks²¹ of their finite time on Earth.

员工们希望能信赖公司并有归属感，相信自己将活在世上的有限生命中的大部分时间投入这份工作是正确的。

It is better all around, for job satisfaction and for performance, if employees stay put because they feel invested in their organisation than because they haven’t got a better offer.

如果员工留在原公司是因为他们觉得想要致力于组织的事业，而不是因为没有更好的下家，那么这种情况对各方都更好：包括工作满意度和工作绩效。

But loyalty in the workplace is a self-interested decision, not a moral one.

但职场中的忠诚是利己的决定，而不是道德上的决定。

It should be contingent²² on being treated well, not a habit that becomes harder to break.

是否忠诚应该取决于是否被善待，忠诚不是一个越来越难改掉的习惯。

Stay where you are because you like it, not because to leave would be immoral²³.

留在原公司应该是因为你喜欢这里，而不是因为离开是不道德的。

1 loyalty   

n.忠诚，忠心

参考例句：

• She told him the truth from a sense of loyalty.她告诉他真相是出于忠诚。
• His loyalty to his friends was never in doubt.他对朋友的一片忠心从来没受到怀疑。

2 prospective   

adj.预期的，未来的，前瞻性的

参考例句：

• The story should act as a warning to other prospective buyers.这篇报道应该对其他潜在的购买者起到警示作用。
• They have all these great activities for prospective freshmen.这会举办各种各样的活动来招待未来的新人。

3 marketing   

n.行销，在市场的买卖，买东西

参考例句：

• They are developing marketing network.他们正在发展销售网络。
• He often goes marketing.他经常去市场做生意。

4 loyalties   

n.忠诚( loyalty的名词复数 )；忠心；忠于…感情；要忠于…的强烈感情

参考例句：

• an intricate network of loyalties and relationships 忠诚与义气构成的盘根错节的网络
• Rows with one's in-laws often create divided loyalties. 与姻亲之间的矛盾常常让人两面为难。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 virtue   

n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力

参考例句：

• He was considered to be a paragon of virtue.他被认为是品德尽善尽美的典范。
• You need to decorate your mind with virtue.你应该用德行美化心灵。

6 attachment   

n.附属物，附件；依恋；依附

参考例句：

• She has a great attachment to her sister.她十分依恋她的姐姐。
• She's on attachment to the Ministry of Defense.她现在隶属于国防部。

7 precisely   

adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地

参考例句：

• It's precisely that sort of slick sales-talk that I mistrust.我不相信的正是那种油腔滑调的推销宣传。
• The man adjusted very precisely.那个人调得很准。

8 organisation   

n.组织，安排，团体，有机休

参考例句：

• The method of his organisation work is worth commending.他的组织工作的方法值得称道。
• His application for membership of the organisation was rejected.他想要加入该组织的申请遭到了拒绝。

9 promiscuity   

n.混杂，混乱；（男女的）乱交

参考例句：

• Promiscuity went unpunished, divorce was permitted. 乱交挨不着惩罚，离婚办得成手续。 来自英汉文学
• There is also no doubt that she falls into promiscuity at last. 同时无疑她最后也堕入性乱。 来自互联网

10 treasury   

n.宝库；国库，金库；文库

参考例句：

• The Treasury was opposed in principle to the proposals.财政部原则上反对这些提案。
• This book is a treasury of useful information.这本书是有价值的信息宝库。

11 fictional   

adj.小说的，虚构的

参考例句：

• The names of the shops are entirely fictional.那些商店的名字完全是虚构的。
• The two authors represent the opposite poles of fictional genius.这两位作者代表了天才小说家两个极端。

12 overtime   

adj.超时的，加班的；adv.加班地

参考例句：

• They are working overtime to finish the work.为了完成任务他们正在加班加点地工作。
• He was paid for the overtime he worked.他领到了加班费。

13 applied   

adj.应用的；v.应用，适用

参考例句：

• She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
• This cream is best applied to the face at night.这种乳霜最好晚上擦脸用。

14 retention   

n.保留，保持，保持力，记忆力

参考例句：

• They advocate the retention of our nuclear power plants.他们主张保留我们的核电厂。
• His retention of energy at this hour is really surprising.人们惊叹他在这个时候还能保持如此旺盛的精力。

15 nugatory   

adj.琐碎的，无价值的

参考例句：

• Your efforts shall have been nugatory.你的努力也就没有价值了。
• These are all nugatory comment.这些都是空洞的评论。

16 wedded   

adj.正式结婚的；渴望…的，执著于…的v.嫁，娶，（与…）结婚( wed的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• She's wedded to her job. 她专心致志于工作。
• I was invited over by the newly wedded couple for a meal. 我被那对新婚夫妇请去吃饭。 来自《简明英汉词典》

17 semiconductor   

n.半导体

参考例句：

• In the beginning,engineers hoped to use semiconductor lasers.在开始时，工程师们希望能够利用半导体激光器。
• The main agent of the company brand semiconductor sales.本公司主要代理各品牌半导体销售。

18 dubbed   

v.给…起绰号( dub的过去式和过去分词 )；把…称为；配音；复制

参考例句：

• Mathematics was once dubbed the handmaiden of the sciences. 数学曾一度被视为各门科学的基础。
• Is the movie dubbed or does it have subtitles? 这部电影是配音的还是打字幕的？ 来自《简明英汉词典》

19 heresy   

n.异端邪说；异教

参考例句：

• We should denounce a heresy.我们应该公开指责异端邪说。
• It might be considered heresy to suggest such a notion.提出这样一个观点可能会被视为异端邪说。

20 surfeit   

v.使饮食过度；n.(食物)过量，过度

参考例句：

• The voters are pretty sick of such a surfeit of primary sloganeering.选民们对于初选时没完没了地空喊口号的现象感到发腻了。
• A surfeit of food makes one sick.饮食过量使人生病。

21 chunks   

厚厚的一块( chunk的名词复数 )； （某物）相当大的数量或部分

参考例句：

• a tin of pineapple chunks 一罐菠萝块
• Those chunks of meat are rather large—could you chop them up a bIt'smaller? 这些肉块相当大，还能再切小一点吗？

22 contingent   

adj.视条件而定的；n.一组，代表团，分遣队

参考例句：

• The contingent marched in the direction of the Western Hills.队伍朝西山的方向前进。
• Whether or not we arrive on time is contingent on the weather.我们是否按时到达要视天气情况而定。

23 immoral   

adj.不道德的，淫荡的，荒淫的，有伤风化的

参考例句：

• She was questioned about his immoral conduct toward her.她被询问过有关他对她的不道德行为的情况。
• It is my belief that nuclear weapons are immoral.我相信使核武器是不邪恶的。