Tech Gods: Work as the New Religion

Carolyn Chen was surprised by Silicon Valley. She expected it to be one of the least religious places. Instead, she found that among the tech executives she interviewed, that “it is one of the most religious places in America.” She argues in Work Pray Code that the “Gods” have merely been supplanted. With “Work” playing the evangelical, all-consuming role that was earlier assumed by churches, synagogues, mosques or civic institutions.

Like the authors of some of the more fascinating studies, Chen stumbled on this. So far, she has been a religion scholar. With a doctorate in Sociology from U.C. Berkeley, she had turned her scholarly lens on the complex interplay of race, ethnicity and religion. In earlier works, she explored Taiwanese religious experiences in America and the sustenance of faith traditions among second generation Latinos and Asian Americans.

While embarking on another study on religion, she realized, especially in the Silicon Valley and in some other high-performing corporate spaces, that the terrain had altered. Knowledge workers had not, as many would commonly assume, lost their religion. Rather, they had found it elsewhere. This was no longer about erosion, but about a strange sort of displacement that engendered changes not just in individuals, but in the surrounding ecosystem.

After all, if “God” was stepping into corporates, “He” was also getting a makeover. As Chen observes, the new avatar was whitened, scientized and secularized. As someone put it to Carolyn, “We steam clean the religion out of meditation.”

The Valley’s New Believers

Chen’s study was conducted between 2013 and 2017, and involved hundreds of interviews with a range of knowledge workers, tech experts, founders, venture capitalists and various service providers – including meditation gurus, mindfulness trainers, executive coaches, yoga teachers and Buddhist priests.

Many of her interviewees did not grow up in the Valley, but headed there for work. From other parts of America or from foreign countries (mainly South Asia and East Asia). In those places, they might have had stronger religious connections, especially if they were raised in the Midwest or in similar conservative belts. Moreover, they tended to be young, unmarried, highly educated, male, and predominantly White or Asian.

Like with many migrants, earlier ties with churches or other institutions had loosened after their move. This kind of disassociation from religion might have been driven by geographical, social and even logistical reasons.

Imbued with New Missions

Take for instance, an interviewee called John Ashton, who moved to the Bay Area from Georgia. He had been a devout, evangelical Christian, who had grown up going to Church. He was even the President of his Christian fraternity at college. But at the tech startup, he lost his religion. Chen argues that he converted to the religion of work.

He took to this new religion with the evangelical zeal he might have displayed during his church-going days. His main identity was now imparted by his workplace. The company he worked at was Harmonize, and employees called themselves Harmonizers. The mission had morphed: to convert disbelievers into ‘users.’ Time-tested strategies of charismatic priests could now be leveraged for capitalistic purposes.

In a similar vein, one of the founders describes himself as the “head pastor” and “quotes the Buddha more than he does Andrew Carnegie, Peter Drucker or Tim Ferriss…”

Using Spirituality to Drive Performance

While one understands why employees might seek a spiritual/religious purpose to fill personal voids, it’s intriguing why corporates – a.k.a. profit-seeking investors or goal-oriented senior leaders – usher religion or spirituality into the workplace. Human resource leaders, as Chen uncovers, have realized that mindfulness and meditation programs enhance employee performance and productivity.

In an era in which digital distractions are rising, there is perhaps a desperate thrust for techniques to foster focus and reduce stress. Moreover, such programs fulfill new-gen aspirations to discover purpose at work. As one business expert put it to the author, “Meaning is the new money.” Since in knowledge industries, workers are not viewed as costs, but rather as human assets, companies feel obliged to train, upskill, destress and reboot their workforces. Chen repeatedly heard Human Resource professionals declare that employees should bring their “whole selves” to work.

Hidden Costs of The New Faith

Net-net, this might sound like a win for all. Companies gain, and so do employees, so shouldn’t we champion this all-embracing, maternalistic role played by new-age workplaces? After foosball tables and swank game rooms, Mandala zones or Zen rooms seem like a commonsensical next step. But as a sociologist, Chen perceives gains and costs. While certainly some employees are going to feel better off in the short-term, there are attendant drawbacks.

For one thing, employees might be endangering their personal wellbeing by cultivating an overweening dependence on the workplace. After all, compacts between workers and companies are no longer secure. If one gets laid off (or quits), one might lose the very props one needs during times of distress.

Moreover, many of these employees no longer have the time (or the need) to cultivate other selves – as a partner or spouse, as a parent, as a friend, as a neighborhood volunteer, as a member of some church or synagogue. Workers are expected to spend much longer hours – either at the physical workplace or by being available online. From 40 hour workweeks in the 1950s, current tech worker workweeks range from 60 to 65 hours. Even the remaining 20 hours are often spent with partial attention on a workplace device.

When Time Shrinks Alternate Selves

Given the paucity of free-time or after work activities, the authors of another study found that “[for] many businesspeople, the corporation is the closest thing that they have to community after family.” The irony is that the more you earn, the harder you work.

Gradually this doesn’t feel like an imposition, but a choice. As sociologist Arlie Hochschild puts it, people actually prefer to fulfill their social needs inside the “managed cheer” of some company rather than “in the chaos and stress of home.” Work extracts more, but also bestows more. Robert Putnam, the American political scientist and author of the well-known Bowling Alone, observes that one of the fallouts is that people are marrying later, divorcing more and living in solitary situations.

Diminishment of Other Institutions

As Chen notes, this has a fallout on institutions too, who can no longer keep their doors open, because their most affluent and educated clientele no longer engage with them. The diminishment, especially of religious centers and community organizations, is stark. These practitioners, in turn, have no choice, but to enter the workplace – while also reorienting their programs to emphasize productivity and performance, rather than detachment, equanimity or compassion.

There’s also the question of what happens to folks – like lower-skilled employees, or the elderly, or the unemployed – who don’t have recourse to the resources offered by “Techtopia”?

While this study primarily centers around Silicon Valley, it has important ramifications for other places that tend to acquire Valleyesque features. For instance, in Bangalore, where many tech and back-office workers invest equally long hours, with similar expectations on performance and productivity. Moreover, the post-pandemic work-from-home trend can add interesting nuances to this study.

References

Carolyn Chen, Work Pray Code: When Work Becomes Religion in Silicon Valley, Princeton University Press, 2023