On 'Addressing Employee Complaints': "Every executive knows that employees love to complain.

And they will continue to complain as long as two conditions exist - one, they believe have a legitimate complaint, and two, they believe somebody cares and is listening. In The Art of Demotivation I give executives a strategy for dealing with employee complaints. It's called the a 'It Could Be Worse' programme.

"I was getting complaints from employees in the call centre. An employee was complaining that he was getting shocked when using the headset. It's only nine volts, it's not like it's a taser. I could waste thousands of dollars on unnecessary headsets. I had to remind them it could be worse. I got a brochure from an outsourcing company and left it in the break room. As you can imagine, it didn't take long before rumours began that I was going to outsource the call centre. As a result, complaints about headsets stopped.

It reminded employees that things could be worse, that if they didn't stop complaining, it probably would be worse."