Sisyphus in the workplace: the futile toil of work that creates no value

There is one indicator of a corporate crisis that does not appear in any set of financial statements: the pride with which people talk about how busy they are. In modern companies, everything that is visible – hours worked, emails sent, tasks completed – is measured, as if simply doing things automatically equated to creating value. That is the activity. The impact is another matter entirely. The most illuminating insight into this difference does not come from a management handbook, but from ancient Greece. The myth of Sisyphus. Condemned by the gods to push a boulder to the top of a mountain, only to see it roll back down again – and to start all over, every day, for eternity – Sisyphus is a true reflection of many organisations. Entire departments expend titanic amounts of energy on tasks that are wiped out every Monday morning, measuring success by the effort expended rather than by the goal achieved. The commitment is certainly there. It’s simply directed in the wrong direction. Sisyphus, in short, would have found a job easily in any modern company and would probably have been promoted by now.

In many organisations, a packed diary seems to be the ultimate status symbol. Saying ‘I’m swamped’ or ‘I don’t have a free slot’ has become a badge of importance, synonymous with indispensability in the corporate mindset. So, almost without realising it, we have confused efficiency with effectiveness. We have convinced ourselves that doing one thing well – quickly, accurately and on time – is enough. Only to discover later that that thing shouldn’t have been done in the first place.

On the other hand, the appeal of this approach is understandable: it’s visible. It’s straightforward, quantifiable and reassuring for management. The hours spent at a desk, the emails sent, the kilometres travelled by sales staff are ready-made, digestible figures that provide certainty for those in charge. Impact, on the other hand, is a promise that takes time to fulfil. It requires the ability to look beyond the quarter and, above all, demands the rarest of courage in corporate life: the often uncomfortable ability to say no.

With remote working and digitalisation, the culture of hyperactivity has simply shifted online and become more sophisticated: staying connected to signal a constant presence on company platforms, holding endless meetings without any decisions to be made, and producing documentation that no one will ever read, but which serves as proof that someone has been working hard. Some call it ‘the theatre of productivity’.

There’s the script, there are the actors, and there’s even an in-house audience. One thing is often missing: the impact on the market, and the cost goes far beyond the financial. It’s called ‘burnout from a lack of meaning’ – that draining feeling of doing a lot without making any difference. One of the most underestimated ills of the modern workplace.