I’m not defending corporate culture, and it’s bullshit. But if you’re in a job that requires thinking, not just physical labour, there is a fair amount of research that’s shows that people do significantly better work when they have intrinsic motivations than extrinsic (like money).

Even if you’re doing a job you would quite today if you didn’t need the money, there’s probably a bunch of intrinsic motivations that are there, even if they’re small compared to “need cash”. Maybe you care about your teammates and don’t want to let them down (at least that one guy, the rest are dicks), maybe you have a sense of pride in your competence and don’t want to produce shit (pity that management get in the way most of the time) , maybe you want the company do be successful (because otherwise you’d have to get naothe job).

If you find genuine motivations, even if you have to be circumspect in how you express them, it’ll be easier for your bosses to trust you. If someone is honestly and openly saying they’re only here for money, then I can infer that they will do the least possible work that won’t get them fired. So I’ll need to constantly be supervising them and checking their work because if I don’t they’ll cut corners and ruin everything. I can’t let the talk to clients or even other staff because they could be hugely negative about the company and cause problems. It’s just not worth it. From the c-suite perspective, they know that everyone saying how important work is and how much they believe in the company are full of shit.