<human>: Before anyone tells me that I should be ashamed of myself, I don't want to *be* an evil manager, I want to know where and how evil managers learn their techniques.

I've worked under, and along side, a good number of managers who use devious and manipulative techniques to purposefully maximize employee stress levels and make them fearful about losing their jobs, in an attempt to raise productivity.  All of these managers have used very similar methods to demoralize and stoke fears, such as convincing employees that they're constantly having closed door meetings about them, starting rumors about hiring cheaper replacements, diminutive nicknames for their underlings, and creating competition amongst coworkers.  I even sat in on a meeting once where they were trying to design a "morale boosting" event but they wanted it be so pathetic that it would come off as cynical to the employees and have an opposite effect.

I doubt you can walk into Barnes and Noble and pick up a book describing how to manipulate and break the will of your staff, so, effectiveness aside, where do managers learn how to do this?  Are there any resources, or is this like an oral tradition passed down from manager to manager?  Has anyone here learned these methods from another manager?

Could you distill the essence of the text into 1-3 sentences?
<bot>: Some managers try to play head games with their employees to scare them into working harder and longer, and they seem to be very similar from company to company.  Where is this behavior learned?