Executive Eye
Adrian Furnham on the use of aggressive language
Listen to how we talk about work. We “tackle” problems, “wrestle with” technology, market “aggressively”, make a “killing”, “capture” a market segment and hire staff that have “punch”. The language of work is the language of aggression, domination and control. Freudians see a basic aggressive urge behind all our work. They note that we try to control our environment so that we can overcome our fundamental insecurity about survival.
This is the fundamental reason why we work. Our drive to work is a way of compensating for our helplessness as infants. And this aggressive drive is reflected in our language in the workplace. Work language stresses an adversarial relationship with our physical, social and emotional environment. When we build things, we call it “work”. When the desired change is destructive, we call it “rage”.
All aggressive drives aim to transform the present state of something. But, say the Freudians, who love paradox, aggression can be both destructive and constructive. Hostile aggression, the more primitive form, focuses on negative change. Creative aggression, which aims to change the present to enhance or create future life, is what we mean by “work”.
The more aggressive, determined and single-minded we are about achieving our goals, the more effective we will be at work. If our aggression instinct is high, the purpose of the present is not that it should be enjoyed but that it should be acted upon. We manage the current state of affairs by controlling, changing and directing it. We think ahead, define the situation and make strategic plans. We “master” our brief, “master” our skills and attend “master” classes.
Our fundamental aims at work, agree sociobiologists, are survival and enrichment. When thwarted, frustrated and rendered ineffective, we express aggression, hostility and destructive rage.
It is therefore no surprise that we talk so much about stress at work. If work is a constant battle, it can easily lead to frustration and exhaustion. Indeed, anger, born of our frustrations or fears, is ever present in our lives: in addition to “work rage”, there is “air rage”, “supermarket rage” and “road rage”.
The point Freudians make is that, while rage is largely unconscious, it surfaces in our work idioms, adages and aphorisms. Past generations were probably more aware of work rage and understood better than we do the fact that work is often about survival. We may have sublimated all the rage into “stress talk” and the stress industry that lives off it.