“Rethinking Work” – in collaboration with Sciences Po and Le Monde

This award opens a window on the world of work through three different books. What can we learn from these excellent 2023 selections?

Through different means, these three books highlight the complexity of the professional environment and the importance of preserving a level of quality. Time is a recurring issue: either not enough in Le travail pressé (by Corinne Gaudart and Serge Volkoff, winners of the 2023 prize), which is detrimental to the creation, creativity and innovation; or too long in Le deuxième corps (by Karen Messing), where studies point to the urgent need to adapt machines and conditions to the female body; or by transforming time into an ally of maintenance, by stopping constant replacement and over-production, and taking the time to care for things (by Jérôme Denis and David Pontille).

Henri Bergeron, CNRS research director at Sciences Po, adds his own analysis to these insights. What is the cause of this deterioration in the professional sphere? Many cite a lack of purpose. Henri Bergeron, on the other hand, suspects a deterioration in cooperation, with several explanatory hypotheses:

• Lack of projection: as the workforce finds it increasingly difficult to project themselves into the future, they feel safe in the “here and now”, withdrawing into themselves, leaving no room for cooperation.
• Increasing workloads, leading to anxiety, a need to sort out emotions and,  consequently, a withdrawal into oneself.
• The constant demand for coordination, which implies organizational efforts, and therefore an increase in rules and technologies, leading to greater complexity and as a consequence, a loss of meaning, all washed down with disillusionment and moral exhaustion.

While preserving cooperation proved so important during the Covid lock-down, Henri Bergeron deplores its decline today.

Echoing the message conveyed by this analysis, Michel Mornet, co-founder of Turningpoint, reminds us of the importance of placing the employee at the heart of the company’s challenges, as an end in itself rather than a means to an end.