How to Demotivate Your Top Performers
A Manager’s Field Guide to Doing Everything Wrong (Without Even Trying)
Every manager thinks they know how to keep good people. This field guide proves otherwise, one devastatingly familiar mistake at a time.
Written as sincere management advice by a professional dog trainer who also spent over 30 years climbing the ranks of corporate management, this satirical guide walks readers through the exact behaviors that quietly drive top performers out the door: the vague feedback, the broken promises, the credit that lands on someone else’s desk, the open-door policy nobody actually uses. Each chapter draws an unsettling parallel between managing people and training dogs, matching temperament to handling style, reading the early signs of shutdown, and showing precisely how trust erodes long before anyone gives notice.
By the final chapter, the joke turns serious. The book names the real difference between a well-behaved employee and one who has simply stopped raising a hand, and asks which one is actually sitting on your team.
Funny, sharp, and a little too accurate for comfort, this is a book for anyone who has ever wondered why their best people leave, and for anyone brave enough to recognize themselves in these pages first.
By Joann Bertsche
Buy the ebook, paperback, or hardcover on Amazon
