Competition, rivalry and envy at the workplace: a Lacanian perspective

Our goal in this article is twofold. Firstly, we wish to show that the management systems that are used in many organizations, by stimulating the performance of their employees and by trying to increase the competition between them, also lead to develop workplace envy. Secondly, we suggest that using a psychoanalytical framework based on the Lacanian theory can help us better understand workplace envy, in relation to both competition, rivalry, performance enhancement, as well as violence and destructiveness in the organizations.