DANGER: has your job become your identity?

Severance imagines a world where a surgical procedure splits a worker's consciousness into an "innie" that lives only at the office and an "outie" that lives at home. The show makes it clear that when work becomes the whole of a person's identity, even mundane data-filtering tasks feel like a never-ending birthday party that masks a deeper lack of meaning.

The article pairs that fictional warning with a real-world case study from the Financial Times review of Careless People, a memoir by former Meta policy employee Sarah Wynn-Williams. It details how Meta's leadership deliberately over-loads staff, uses endless perks as distraction, and designs a culture where the only metric of success is more work. The parallel between Lumon Industries and Meta is striking: both demand total compliance, discourage reflection, and turn employees into extensions of the company rather than whole people.

Citing David Graeber's "Bullshit Jobs" thesis, the piece argues that such environments create alienation and a sense that work has no purpose beyond sustaining a bureaucratic machine. When jobs feel meaningless, employees lose the ability to see the value of their contribution, leading to burnout and disengagement.

Will Storr's interview adds a human dimension: he describes how identity failure drives suicide and chronic pain, and how a clear sense of purpose at work can be a lifeline. Storr's message is that leaders must actively strengthen the link between a person's role and their sense of self, rather than letting work swallow the whole identity.

For technical leaders, the takeaway is practical. Examine your own organization's rituals, perks, and performance expectations for signs that they are masking a lack of meaning. Consider policies that give people agency-flexible schedules, transparent purpose statements, and the ability to request personal data-as ways to keep work from becoming a hollow identity trap.