The dreaded vote of confidence
From the world of sports comes a cogent reminder: if your superiors in a hierarchical organization find it necessary to give you a vote of confidence, you're 1000% toast. Bosses don't find it necessary to talk about how they're not about to fire you if they're not at least thinking about firing you. As this poor schmuck's almost certainly about to find out.
So why do organizations tend to lie so predictably with their "votes of confidence"? I suspect it's because truth is so toxic to hierarchies - specifically, to survival within the hierarchical power structure (which of course occasionally intersects with actual, you know, survival) that those with the skills to grab and hold power lie by reflex. I'm not kidding. Nor am I being hyperbolic. For once, agreed.
I'm inclined, in turn, at least to hypothesize that the reflex of lying within hierarchies - the necessity of lying within hierarchies - derives in turn from the simple truth of Hagbard Celine's Second Law: that communication occurs only between equals. Celine's Laws, like the memorable Hagbard himself, can be found in Roberts Shea and Anton Wilsons' marvelous Illuminatus! Trilogy. Which, though published in 1975, remains more pertinent than dated today. The truth of the Law can be seen from examination of what we laughingly call the real world.
If you've been in a subordinate relationship - Goddess love you if you've escaped that fate, and what's the air like on your planet? - whether in a job, school, or just to your parents, you early-on learned better than to tell the truth to those with the power to punish you, yes? For superiors, it can be dangerous to let the lesser life forms know the truth; hiding or otherwise manipulating the truth is crucial the default modern management tool of FUD; and truth, as information, is a valuable commodity, and not to be wasted on the lower orders. It's important for us to realize that for all the very real derelictions, vices and crimes alike, of the Government/Corporate Complex, a lot of the problems they cause us (not to mention themselves) spring from their nature as hierarchies.
Much of what we blame bureaucracy for (and it deserves much blame, to state the painfully obvious) actually arises from the nature of hierarchy. Meditate upon that, kiddies. Roll it around your tongue and reckon whether and how true it is.