Employee Recognition Programmes: An Immanent Critique

In this article I present a critical reading of employee recognition programmes. I utilize an immanent approach, drawing on the same principles that it is claimed underpin such programmes, namely the desire of needful subjects for recognition in the form of self-respect and esteem, and anticipation of the organizational relations prerequisite for such recognition. These principles are articulated through a reading of Axel Honneth’s critical theory of intersubjective recognition as a necessary condition for what he refers to as fulfilled self-realization and social freedom. In doing so, I suggest that, rather than facilitating the conditions and benefits of intersubjective recognition, internal tendencies towards reification, disrespect and compelled identification result in such programmes displaying pathologies that undermine the ontological conditions necessary for recognition to flourish, threatening both individual and organizational harm.