I'm a manager and recently had a meeting with the CEO. He starts off by showing me a video about navy seals and how they'd rather have an incompetent but trustworthy (bootlicker) team member than a competent one. He then proceeds to show me a plot chart with all of the management team members and where he thinks they fall on a scale of competence and trust. He has 3 people that no one in the organization trusts because they're incompetent as the people he thinks are the most competent and trustworthy. He follows that up by heavily implying that if I want further advancement in the company I need to be in his inner circle and I can achieve that by spending off work hours doing off work things with him. I'm now looking for a new job. FYI, I was in the quadrant that is competent but not “trustworthy.”
Corporatism is a disease!!!