James Schloeffel: co-author of 'Wankernomics' talks satirical look at modern office culture

White-collar workers will be familiar with workplace annoyances - including unnecessary meetings, corporate acronyms and an overuse of LinkedIn - and it's all been observed by a pair of Aussie comedians.

The duo put modern workplace culture under the microscope in their book - 'Wankernomics'.

Co-author James Schloeffel says he's spent a long time in the corporate world and he's used this book to discuss the issues he's observed over the years.

"But I think, also, it's a way for other people to have that therapy session too. It is quite cathartic, I think, reading this book."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
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Speaker 2 (00:16):
If you work in a white collar workplace, the chances
are that you have put up with more than your
fair share of corporate bs. You know what I mean,
the meetings that could have been emails, the stupid acronyms,
the mission statements, the LinkedIn. A couple of ossie comedians
have put together a highly tongue in cheek guide on
how to navigate modern office culture. Kids warning. It's called Wankonomics.

Speaker 1 (00:36):
The book.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
One of the authors is James Schleffel.

Speaker 3 (00:39):
Hi, James, Hi, how are you well?

Speaker 2 (00:42):
Thank you very much? So is the idea here that
you can basically rise through the corporate will just by
using stupid acronyms and jargon and looking like you know
what you're doing.

Speaker 3 (00:50):
Well, it's actually the only way that you can rise
through the corporate ranks, because look, it doesn't matter how
smart you are, Like you could have a PhD in
theoretical chemistry, but you're just not going to be matched
to the person in middle management who has an omni
channel thought leadership adiation solution that is going to cascade
to SLT for feedback. So this kind of language is

(01:11):
the key to surviving, if not thriving, in the corporate environment.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
I mean, you sound like you know what you're talking about.
Is this based on some real world experience or just
you've been observing this?

Speaker 3 (01:22):
It is based in real world experience. I did work
in the corporate world for a long long time, and look,
in many ways, Wangonomics is a bit of a therapy
session for me. It's a way for me to work
through the issues that I've built up over the years.
But I think also too, it's a way for other
people to have that therapy session too. It is quite cathartic.

(01:42):
I think reading this book, what is.

Speaker 2 (01:44):
The evil role that LinkedIn plays here?

Speaker 1 (01:48):
Well?

Speaker 3 (01:49):
Look, LinkedIn is a funny place, isn't it. It's actually my
favorite social media platform because it's this weird place where
everyone is inexplicably excited about everything, Like you know what
I mean, Like, it doesn't matter how mundane someone's day
has been, they will talk about their little achievements at work,
as with the excitement levels that they would usually only

(02:11):
muster when they're on class A drugs. So you know,
even if you've just you've just finished a report, you've
sent out a document. You need to be thrilled or
excited or ecstatic about it. That's that's what LinkedIn is.
It's a funny place.

Speaker 2 (02:26):
It feels to me like it's a very exclusive club
of people. I mean, even though it's very accessible, it's
a very exclusive club of people. Or at least they
like to think they're exclusive and special for using LinkedIn,
don't they.

Speaker 3 (02:37):
Well, you've got to make yourself sound sounds special. But
that's the key to it. So look, you would never
say something like on LinkedIn that you maybe worked in
a bar when you were at university. You would say
that you managed a portfolio of liquid assets.

Speaker 1 (02:51):
You know.

Speaker 3 (02:51):
That's the kind of that's the kind of wankery you
need on LinkedIn to give those kind of minor accomplishments.
Give them a bit of a bit of a push,
make them sound like they're something special.

Speaker 2 (03:03):
So what's the proportion do you reckon of, as you
call it, wankory. What proportion of whankori versus actual ability
do you need in order to succeed?

Speaker 3 (03:13):
Well, here's the funny thing, right, So we've done some research. Sorry,
we've made up some research that has shown that there's
about twenty percent of people in any given workplace that
have absolutely no idea what they're doing, totally out of
their depth. And we've all seen these people. They're usually
in senior management positions, and so they will use these

(03:35):
long winded words, overly complex sentences to give the impression
that they know what they're doing, because like instead of
saying I'm incompetent, you would say something like there are
a lot of moving parts, and then all of a
sudden everyone thinks that you're you're very, very clever. The
problem is, though, the language of that twenty percent then
very quickly spreads to the other eighty percent, a bit

(03:58):
like how a virus spreads. I mean, it's incredibly infectious
because you could have someone saying a phrase like circle
back at the start of a meeting, and the end
of the meeting, the three or four people are saying
circle back, and then by the end of the week,
the entire office is speaking like that. So it spreads
incredibly quickly, and unfortunately there's no vaccine for it.

Speaker 2 (04:19):
James, thank you very much, appreciate your time, very very much,
and your mutual hatred of our mutual hatred I suppose
of Lincoln James Schliffle, who was one of the authors
of wang Konomics. If you want to get it, you
could just go to the website wanconomics dot com and
it'll tell you where.

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