The slow and listless worker is the first one to be
laid off. And the quick and alert worker is the
first to be given a higher position. Two-thirds of "Promotion" consists of "motion." Dare to be
wise; begin! He who postpones the hour of
working rightly is like the rustic who waits for
the river to run out before he crosses it; so if
you're waiting for something to turn up, why not
start on your own shirt-sleeves! An opportunist
is a man who makes hay from the grass that
grows under his feet!
If you work for a man, in heaven's name work
for him: speak well of him and stand by the
institution he represents. Remember, an ounce
of loyalty is worth a pound of cleverness.
If you must growl, condemn, and eternally find
fault, why not resign your position? And when
you are on the outside damn to your heart's
content, but as long as you are part of the
institution, do not condemn it; if you do the
first high wind that comes along will blow you
away and probably you will never know why.
A perpetual holiday is a good working
definition of hell!
Not reality these days. Those who kiss up and back stab get the promotions, and those who manage to shuffle work to others (appearance) keep their jobs. I was "down hill" of those shufflers; I did the work and still got laid off. Those who cheated got ahead.
I once saw a person do nearly everything wrong, and this person not only was highly rewarded in his pay check, but was given a giant screen TV for it by the company. How do I know he did nearly everything wrong? I was moved into another department because I couldn't compete with this person; in the new department, I was tasked with fixing all of his mistakes.
Your premise is what the business world used to be, but hasn't been in years. "Work hard, keep your nose clean, and you'll get get ahead!" is gone in the wake of "cheat your way to the top" in the Enron/MCI/Tyco and now HP world. Ethics are a quaint thing of the past. It's about numbers - push as many as you can, and then if it needs fixing, it won't be counted against you as a mistake.
Honesty is not rewarded in this day and age - it is highly frowned upon, which is strange considering employers are asking in personality tests, "have you ever stolen anything?" Why ask the question when the corporate culture endorses it with its own policies?