Lab Rats: How Silicon Valley Made Work Miserable for the Rest of Us

by Dan Lyons Narrated by Dan Lyons

Overview

New York Times bestselling author Dan Lyons exposes how the "new oligarchs" of Silicon Valley have turned technology into a tool for oppressing workers in this "passionate" (Kirkus) and "darkly funny" (Publishers Weekly) examination of workplace culture.

At a time of soaring corporate profits and plenty of HR lip service about "wellness," millions of workers--in virtually every industry -- are deeply unhappy. Why did work become so miserable? Who is responsible? And does any company have a model for doing it right?

For two years, Lyons ventured in search of answers. From the innovation-crazed headquarters of the Ford Motor Company in Detroit, to a cult-like "Holocracy" workshop in San Francisco, and to corporate trainers who specialize in . . . Legos, Lyons immersed himself in the often half-baked and frequently lucrative world of what passes for management science today. He shows how new tools, workplace practices, and business models championed by tech's empathy-impaired power brokers have shattered the social contract that once existed between companies and their employees. These dystopian beliefs--often masked by pithy slogans like "We're a Team, Not a Family" -- have dire consequences: millions of workers who are subject to constant change, dehumanizing technologies -- even health risks.

A few companies, however, get it right. With Lab Rats, Lyons makes a passionate plea for business leaders to understand this dangerous transformation, showing how profit and happy employees can indeed coexist.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

A Guardian Best Book of 2019


An Inc. Magazine Best Business Book of 2018

"I loved Dan Lyons's book Disrupted. With Lab Rats, he takes his critique of the modern workplace to the next level, to show how Silicon Valley's sometimes disturbing ideas about how to treat employees now pervade many workplaces. This is a fascinating, thought-provoking, hilarious, and sometimes harrowing account of current work culture."—Gretchen Rubin, #1 NewYork Times bestselling author of The Happiness Project and TheFour Tendencies

"Dan Lyons's Lab Rats defies easy description. It is hilarious, but not funny. I sputtered laughing and choked crying (literally, not figuratively) as I read it. Yes, to an extreme, Lyons gives Silicon Valley the thrashing that it, alas, largely deserves. But in the final third of the book, he offers us an effectively illustrated way out—an approach to work and business that puts people first, profitably serves customers, and makes the world a little bit better in the process."—Tom Peters, NewYork Times bestselling author of In Search of Excellence

"A lively and spirited takedown."
—The Guardian

"[Lyons] argues persuasively.... A passionate indictment of brutal workplace culture."—Kirkus Reviews

"[A] darkly funny journalistic look at the contemporary workplace.... By turns sardonic and impassioned, this is an insightful and frequently entertaining guide to the increasingly bizarre world of Silicon Valley and the trends it spawns."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"[Lab Rats] exposes the junk science and questionable management practices that have migrated from Silicon Valley to the rest of the economy."—Knowledge@Wharton

"Fair warning: you may need an extra set of hands around while you're reading Lab Rats. You'll need them to help pick your jaw up off the floor."—Houston Style Magazine

"With Lab Rats, Lyons makes a passionate plea for business leaders to understand this dangerous transformation and offers a way out."—BookPassage

"This book should be required reading for anybody who thinks working for a startup in Silicon Valley would be fun."—TechNewsWorld

"Skewering corporate jargon, management science, and, worst of all, enforced fun, Lyons's waggish jeremiad lays out how the world of work has changed for the worse."—Tatler

"An entertaining polemic against the tech industry.... Instead of obsessing about unicorns (startup companies worth more than $1 billion), the author thinks the world should look for 'zebras,' which can turn a profit and improve society at the same time. Many modern workers will agree."—The Economist

"Lyons is a very funny journalist... Much of his polemic rings true."—The Financial Times

"Entertaining... A worthwhile and disturbing read."—Sunday Business Post

"Funny and frightening."
—Sunday Post

"Dan Lyons'... quest to understand the modern workplace has yielded an amusing but often harrowing report from the front lines."—Boston Globe

Library Journal - Audio

02/01/2019

Lyons (Disrupted: My Misadventures in the Start-Up Bubble) reveals his view of how the worst of the mercenary tech culture has resulted in the multi-trillion-dollar swindle of American workers in virtually every industry. Lyons's perspective is that today's new work culture celebrates overwork and stress and is led by people who care only about making money and venture capitalists and amoral investors who are solely focused on flipping businesses to make a quick buck. His primary concern is the effect on American workers of this empathy-impaired focus. Lyons's four factors that create worker unhappiness include money (low wages and raided pension funds), job insecurity (rapid turnover and capricious terminations), constant change (demeaning and pointless workshops and classes), and dehumanization (open office plans, no privacy). In the author's view, today's new tech-championed tools and models have shattered the once viable social contract between workers and management. While Lyons's findings will likely appeal to workers, his primary target audience includes leaders who buy into the latest fads for innovation and team building. Thankfully, Lyons closes with optimism about responsible business leaders who are building worker-friendly, inclusive, and diverse companies; college business courses that emphasize social responsibility; and socially conscious investment by well-intentioned rich people. The author's clearly enunciated, steady paced reading nicely highlights this material. VERDICT Essential for all libraries supporting business and management curricula. This work will appeal to fans of John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge's The Witch Doctors, David Craig's Rip-off!, and Matthew Stewart's The Management Myth. ["A must-read for tech entrepreneurs and anyone interested in the shifting dynamics of workplace culture": LJ 10/15/18 review of the Hachette hc.]—Dale Farris, Groves, TX

Kirkus Reviews

2018-08-20

How the tech industry, fueled by greed, is shaping workers' experiences across the business world.

Lyons (Disrupted: My Misadventures in the Start-Up Bubble, 2016, etc.), a former staff writer for HBO's Silicon Valley and technology editor at Newsweek, mounts a caustic critique of mercenary tech culture, which, he argues persuasively, is infiltrating many other businesses. "We have a new work culture," he writes, "that celebrates overwork, exhaustion, and stress," led by people who care about nothing but making money. "Instead of geeky engineers," he writes, "the industry draws hustlers, young guys who hope to get rich quick," financed by voracious venture capitalists. Most new startups "are terribly managed, half-assed outfits run by buffoons and bozos and frat boys, and funded by amoral investors who are only hoping to flip the company into the public markets and make a quick buck." After the VC's have taken their bounty, most startups never make a profit. But the author's focus is less on the viability of startups than the fates of workers, who are mercilessly exploited and so desperate that some kill themselves. Among the many tech oligarchs he condemns is Jeff Bezos, "a modern-day Ebenezer Scrooge," running sweatshops where workers do physically demanding jobs in unsafe environments, earn low wages, and are forced to be "permatemps" not entitled to benefits. Lyons cites four factors contributing to worker unhappiness: money (besides low wages, many big companies have raided their employees' pension funds); job insecurity (rapid turnover is encouraged, and workers are fired for capricious reasons); constant, random changes, including instituting cultlike philosophies and demeaning workshops, classes, and role-playing games; and dehumanization, such as open office plans where employees have no privacy and endure constant surveillance of their emails, chats, website visits, and even bathroom breaks. The author ends with a note of optimism: his discovery of a "quiet movement" of responsible business leaders building worker-friendly, inclusive, and diverse companies; business courses that emphasize social responsibility; and socially conscious funding by "well-intentioned rich people."

A passionate indictment of brutal workplace culture.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940173634948
Publisher:	Hachette Audio
Publication date:	10/23/2018
Edition description:	Unabridged

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