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How to Stop Creativity: A Lesson in Bureaucratic Absurdity

Posted by
Walter

It was a day like any other in my restaurant, at least until a young cook on his first work experience decided to take some rather unexpected liberties. With a sense of hubris, confidence, and arrogance one can only attribute to youth and inexperience, he unilaterally appointed himself as the new sous-chef in my kitchen. With an air of insolence, he even asked me to remove my knives from the magnet to make space for his own.

Naturally, confronted by this capricious attitude, our professional relationship didn’t even leave the starting block—it ended before it could begin. It was clear that his personality was an indication of a disharmonious union in an environment where we nurture creativity and open collaboration in the kitchen. However, here in Geneva, as is customary, when someone is unhappy with the end of an employment relationship, they don’t just leave; they always find a way to complicate matters.

Due to his lack of self-awareness and immaturity, the gentleman was incapable of acknowledging the real reasons for his dismissal. Instead, he lodged a complaint with the labor inspection office, claiming the reason was having to engage in the team's group chat over the weekend. A moot point, as for me and my team, creativity is not restricted to working hours. We use the group chat as a creative laboratory—to exchange ideas, come up with menus, share recipes and inspirations, and anything that can enrich our work in the kitchen. For him, this became a pretext: he claimed that using the chat outside working hours was a form of exploitation, though he was not obliged to engage in conversations over the weekend.

One day, an inspector showed up at my office. After a sermon on managing personnel, the focus shifted to the chat. He sternly explained that “you cannot send messages outside of working hours.” I was immediately taken aback: how can creativity be held hostage to a clock? The tool we had created was nothing more than a way to keep inspiration flowing, allowing ideas to move freely among all members of the team.

But the real blow came with his final statement: “You should limit your creativity to working hours.” In that moment, I was dumbfounded. The absurdity of the situation hit me like a bolt of lightning: I imagined my creativity locked in a cabinet, ready to come out only from 9 to 5. And yet, this Kafkaesque story didn’t end there: the young cook, not satisfied, decided to take me to civil court, turning this farce into a real trial.

The Paradox of Bullshit Jobs: When Uselessness is Rewarded

This incident led me to reflect on a concept that David Graeber described so well in his book Bullshit Jobs: there are jobs that exist solely to give the illusion of utility, keeping people busy with tasks that produce nothing significant. These are jobs that create bureaucracy for bureaucracy’s sake, that exist only to justify a paycheck and that, if eliminated, would make no real difference in the world.

Thinking about it, I realized that, paradoxically, the young cook, with his self-importance and decision to anoint himself as sous-chef, was already behaving as if he were trapped in a bullshit job. Instead of seeing the kitchen as a place for growth and creative collaboration, he treated it as a hierarchical ladder to climb as quickly as possible, measuring his value by the title he carried and by the space he could conquer on the knife magnet.

But it was the intervention of the labor inspector that floored me—the realization that even the system around us rewards this type of attitude, devoid of context. The bureaucracy that surrounds us seems designed to encourage inefficiency, discourage innovation, and push us toward conformism that stifles creativity. I was told, very clearly, that one cannot be creative outside of working hours, as if creativity were something that could be switched on and off at will.

Matrix and Creativity as the Red Pill

This made me think of Matrix, the cult film that explores the idea of living in a controlled illusion. In that world, the protagonist Neo must choose whether to take the blue pill, which would allow him to continue living in a safe but false dream, or the red pill, which would open his eyes to the truth, no matter how uncomfortable and difficult.

In my restaurant, creativity is our red pill. It is what makes us see the culinary world differently, fostering experimentation and innovation, and challenging conventions. But the creativity here extends far beyond the creation of dishes—it’s the blueprint of the entire concept. After all, we are the only fine dining restaurant in the world that opens its doors every evening to serve the homeless. Creativity in my restaurant also drives our efforts to maximize environmental impact, reduce waste, and promote social inclusion in ways that break the mold of traditional dining establishments.

But just like in Matrix, not everyone is ready to accept this truth. Some prefer to remain trapped in a static system, like the young cook who didn’t want to face the uncertainty and complexity of a creative and dynamic kitchen. Just like Cypher, who prefers the virtual “steak” of Matrix rather than confronting the harshness of reality, some workers, including chefs, choose to ignore the opportunity to explore creative potential and remain trapped in a meaningless job.

And here’s the irony: 20 years after the movie, you can now actually find synthetic steaks on supermarket shelves. Cypher’s dream of a fake but tasty steak has come full circle in our reality. It seems that even in our world, some prefer a comfortable illusion over the challenges of embracing the real, whether it’s in the kitchen or in life.

Cypher’s Choice: Betraying Creativity for Comfort

In Matrix, Cypher represents those who, while knowing the truth, prefer to return to the illusion in order to live comfortably, numb to the challenge of change. And just as Cypher chooses to betray Neo and the others to return to Matrix, some of my team members choose to “betray” the creative process because it is easier to stay within their comfort zone. Add to this the bureaucracy that supports and legitimizes this choice, promoting the idea that work must be confined within rigid boundaries and that creativity must be regulated like any other activity.

Here, the control system becomes the true enemy of creativity. Limiting creativity to working hours is like forcing the blue pill on those who have already chosen the red one. It means depriving people of the ability to see the world through a different lens, to experiment with new ideas, and to push beyond the boundaries of the imaginable.

Bullshit Jobs and Cypher: Two Sides of the Same Coin

This is where the concept of bullshit jobs and Cypher’s character overlap: both represent resistance to change and innovation. Bullshit jobs exist to give the illusion of productivity, but they create nothing of value. Similarly, Cypher prefers the safety of an illusory life over the unpredictable reality. And in my kitchen, as well as in the broader world of work, many prefer the stability of repetitive, safe tasks over the challenge of facing the complexity of creativity.

A Call for Boundless Creativity

This experience made me reflect on how difficult it is, in a bureaucratic and hierarchical system, to promote creativity without encountering resistance. But the truth is that creativity cannot be confined. It is a chaotic, unpredictable process that doesn’t respect working hours or bureaucratic rules. Trying to limit creativity is like trying to cage the wind: futile and counterproductive.

That is why I believe that, to build something truly meaningful, we must break the cycle of bullshit jobs and the Cypher mentality. We must embrace uncertainty and accept that creativity, though uncomfortable, is the only force that can lead to real innovation and systemic change. And above all, we must stop seeing work as a mere routine to follow and start viewing it as an opportunity to change, create, and transform the world around us.