EMPLOYERS say they are experiencing positive results after fitting their workers with shock-inducing electric collars.
The remote control, charged collars are designed to deliver a 'significant but non-fatal' jolt to subordinates who are under-performing, slow to learn or simply unlikeable.
Insurance call centre manager Tom Logan said: "The collars have improved performance significantly. And made my job more fun.
"I sit at a sort of console, where each numbered button corresponds to a cubicle. When I press one the relevant drone pops up like a pained gopher with a pathetic but gratifying yelp, and then jitters around in a puppet-like fashion before collapsing to the floor, often in a pool of his or her own urine.
"Of course it doesn't do them any harm, it's just how they learn. It's like the carrot and the stick, the stick being quite a lot of pain and the carrot being not getting thrown onto the street to rake through the bins and sleep under a tramp."
He added: "Before I was just a regional sales manager, now I am a merciless deity, and my minions dare not displease me or they shall feel my bottomless wrath. Would you like a Hobnob?"
Telesales operating unit Wayne Hayes said: "I have become a doubly incontinent, semi-human thing.
"But on the plus side, at least I feel something during the course of my monotonous, soul-grinding day, even if it is just a series of increasingly painful electric shocks."
He added: "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh! FUCK! Sorry, what I meant to say was 'I think it's helped me to become more customer-focused'."
