Ok, at one company morale was in the toilet so they brought in a communication expert to talk to everyone. The root problem, which was reiterated by employee after employee, was some major issues with senior management.
So what was the summation of the study? That the problem was too much complaining. And the company then fired the middle management (the people who had the thankless job of trying to keep things moving forward in spite of senior management) and told everyone that they needed to stop complaining.
Well... That definitely will stop the complaining for awhile. On the flip side, when things get so bad that senior management can't hide from it anymore, it will probably be so bad that it will mean the end of the company.
You can shoot the messengers and hide from facts for awhile. But when you do, you pretty much guarantee that you will be totally screwed when the problems become so bad that you can no longer stick your head in the sand. And yet… management will be shocked when it happens.
Of course, maybe senior management is right - the problem is that all the employees are negative and complaining all of the time. But if that is the problem - who's responsibility is it that the entire company operates that way?
(note: subject is a quote from Winston Churchill.)
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