Now workers get to play bastard. Getting the boss to clean and press your gym clothes feels like karmic justice to the once downsized. Downsizing taught everyone that even the steadiest employers will turn on their own. Trendy workplace rhetoric about the permanence of continual change further weakens the links with workers. Like all good investors, workers are demanding higher pay to take on the higher risk of joining companies that cannot and will not guarantee them stability.
Employees are often the most cynical audience of all.
Employees' distrust has peaked at a time when human capital is more essential to business success than ever before. The rank and file have learned to make impermanence work for them. On average, the job turnover at Silicon Valley firms is between 25 and 30 percent a year. It increases the odds that you have a stake in a company that makes the moon shot. Yet, like all markets, the labor market will adjust and rebalance, and companies are already finding ways to tilt the balance of power back in their favor.