A nova velha roupa colorida: a cultura do management e as mídias digitais

Abstract

The present study searched to understand how the management culture, a set of assumptions disseminated by companies and present in the society, manifests itself in digital media. This culture has been pointed out as responsible for a series of negative impacts on the subjects, but has been studied predominantly in the print media. In this study, the focus is on the digital environment, more specifically on LinkedIn. Therefore, we analyzed 500 posts of five influencers elected by LinkedIn itself as Top Voices. These posts were submitted to content analysis, which allowed us to conclude that the contents maintain the prescriptive character of pop-management publications, with steps that seek to teach the subject, seen as the only one responsible for their own destiny, how to achieve success, well-being, and happiness in a process of self-entrepreneurship. The cult of entrepreneurship, the cult of performance, and the cult of positivity characterize these posts, showing that digital media disseminates and amplifies this culture, bringing to it (not so) new contours. We highlight the updating of the pillars of diffusion of this culture, with the emergence of edtechs (similar to business schools), influencers (corresponding to gurus), and the new digital format of magazines. In addition, it was possible to notice that the digital media is no longer a simple pillar, but now serves as a foundation on which the other pillars are structured and through which they spread this culture. Finally, a kind of light management was found, which uses positivity, emotions, and positive social values to propagate its ideology of control, intensifying the individualization of responsibilities for the subject and contributing to the strengthening of neoliberal rationality.