Anyone who truly cares about their work and their job, anyone who has an inherent desire to show up and do the best they can, anyone who has the beloved “Protestant work ethic,” will end up in a mad house.
The way to win is to simply stop caring. Nod enthusiastically as your boss pretends to care about you. Smile to anyone above you. Offload as much work as you can to other departments you know are also overworked and undertrained and won’t do the job correctly. Stop caring about the people you support, the company, or even your own perspective of being a hard worker that does what is right. Put 20% effort in at all times. Enthusiastically go along with whatever new initiative is that you absolutely know will fail, in fact, be a cheerleader for it! Tell all your colleagues how great and amazing it is you will be rewarded.
Adopt the mask that you initially judged other people for. Outwardly be a yes man. Inwardly, stop giving a single shred of attention to your job beyond what it takes to not get fired. Going above and beyond will do nothing for your career.
Being absolutely mediocre but pretending to be a sycophant will get you promotions and awards. Caring means you might actually try and solve problems or bring attention to leadership about why things don’t work. They do not want that. Being worried about your own quality of work and the people you support means you might express your workload is untenable and you need help, they don’t want that. So remove the human element completely. You are a salesman, not just for clients, but for every person you work with. Promise them the moon and deliver a brick of concrete, and tell them how much work and pride you put into it. To get to where they are, they also know to play the game, and will nod and pat you on the back and tell you what a good boy you are. And maybe even give you an award for it!
Schwab cares about appearances over absolutely everything else. Through the clients eyes means: make sure the client doesn’t see all of the absolute tu-ds that you deliver to them. Dress it up prettily. Tell them the diminished service and products and attention they get is actually for their benefit. And do the same for every single person you work with and for.