THE FLOGGINGS WILL CONTINUE… Part II

Part II

In Part I of this series, I described several modern forms of workplace “flogging.” It wasn’t that the company’s leaders were bad people or intentionally trying to make work more difficult for their people. The floggings came from ordinary management decisions, communication breakdowns, unrealistic expectations, and promises that couldn’t realistically be delivered.

The question now becomes: What does all of that actually cost a business?

What’s interesting—and a little troubling—is that most of these situations aren’t created with bad intent. In fact, many come from managers and business owners who genuinely care about getting things done and treating their customers and employees well. They’re not trying to create a toxic environment. They’re trying to run a business.

But best intentions don’t cancel the impact. From the employee’s point of view, the experience feels the same. The message they hear isn’t, “We’re trying to improve the business.” It’s, “No matter what you do, it’s not quite right—and you should do more of it, faster.”

And that’s where the old line about flogging comes back into play. “The floggings will continue … until morale improves.” The real problem is that this approach doesn’t just affect employees. It has a direct impact on the business itself.

Over time, output doesn’t increase, it decreases or becomes uneven. People do just enough to get by, or they burn out trying to meet expectations that keep shifting or weren’t realistic to begin with. Quality becomes inconsistent, not because people don’t care, but because they’re working under conditions that make consistency difficult.

Unsurprisingly, morale takes a hit. And morale isn’t some soft, optional feature you can ignore. It shows up in how people talk to customers, how they solve problems, and how willing they are to work together and to go the extra mile when something unexpected happens, which it always does.

Then comes turnover. Good people—the ones who have options—eventually decide they’d rather work somewhere they can succeed without feeling like they’re falling short. Replacing them is expensive, time‑consuming, and disruptive. Most owners know that.

Fewer connect it back to the day‑to‑day “floggings” that helped drive those people out in the first place, often because they were blind to it.

And finally, it shows up in the numbers. As I’ve stated many times over the years, business performance follows the behavior of the people leading the business. Flogging (real or perceived) is a classic demonstration of that phrase.

Lower productivity, rework, customer dissatisfaction, and hiring costs all work their way onto the financial statements. Not always in an obvious, line‑item kind of way, but they’re there. Fortunately, recognizing the problem is usually harder than fixing it.

Most business owners don’t need to become different people. They simply need a better understanding of how their actions and decisions are experienced by the people doing the work.