The ice cream in the office kitchen was free. It was also locked.
Picture this. It’s your third commute of the week into an office no one really wanted to return to. You’ve just gotten off your fifth back-to-back Zoom call (four of which could have been an email) and all of which could have been done from home. But, you know, office culture. You’re desperate for something, even something small, to make it all feel worth it. A glimmer of hope, a moment of delight. Then you remember. There’s ice cream in the break room!
Your mind takes you all the way back to your childhood as you navigate the short walk through the maze of cubicles. Riding your bike, jumping through sprinklers … You can almost hear the faint melody of the ice cream truck as it turns the corner onto your street.
However, your trip down memory lane is abruptly shattered when you arrive to find that the ice cream freezer is locked. Not metaphorically. Literally. With a padlock.
The ice cream was in one of those freezer chests, like the ones you might find at a convenience store, with a sliding glass lid. Visible. Untouchable. A perk you could see, but not access.
Well, this is exactly what happened to me.
To add insult to injury, this former employer of mine kept that same break room stocked daily with coffee, tea, sparkling water, granola bars, candy, yogurt, fruit, nuts, you name it. They even had beer on tapavailable throughout the workday. But, inexplicably, the ice cream was only available on Thursdays.
As someone who spends a great deal of time advising corporate leaders on culture and workplace trust, I’m often asked what I believe most about the future of work. The question is usually asked by executives trying to make sense of a workforce that feels decidedly…different. More skeptical. Less patient. Harder to impress.
And every time, I think about that locked ice cream chest — and the larger truth it exposes.
What organizations offer matters, but what employees can consistently access matters more.
In 2026, the gap between what companies say and what employees experience has never been wider.
Trust in leadership continues to decline globally. Hybrid work has exposed inequities that used to stay hidden. And employees, especially as younger generations join the workforce, are no longer seduced by surface-level perks. That corner office that was once the envy of the world? No one cares.
As a result, the Gallup State of the Global Workplace research data tells us that employee engagement – meaning the involvement and enthusiasm of employees in their work and workplace — is stubbornly low, hovering around just 20 to 21 percent globally. Meanwhile, disengagement is costing the economy nearly $9 trillion annually, as stress and burnout increase exponentially.
The Microsoft Work Trend Index has repeatedly shown that employees don’t just want flexibility. They want autonomy, clarity, and trust. They want to know, “Can I access what you say is available to me?” The locked ice cream isn’t frustrating because it’s unavailable. It’s frustrating because access to it feels inconsistent and arbitrary.
This matters more than ever in a workforce that is already stretched thin. The modern workday now bleeds past 10 p.m. Yet, a 2026 workforce mental health report from Modern Health found that nearly nine in 10 employees say burnout is impacting productivity.
More than half report experiencing anxiety or panic-like symptoms at work, with 51 percent saying they cried due to work stress in the last 30 days. Fatigue lowers tolerance. When people are this taxed, they notice everything. And when access is inconsistent, restricted, or arbitrarily controlled, it creates strain that leads to something far more damaging than dissatisfaction.
Increasingly, employees are coping with such workplace-related strain in ways that should alarm every executive in America. Nearly two-thirds of workers report using substances after work to cope. In fact, more than half say they’ve used substances during the workday itself. Among Gen Z employees, 51 percent report using THC during the workday. Read that again. Employees are not just disengaging, they’re dysregulating.
Especially during Mental Health Awareness Month, those are realities we must sit with. Every May, organizations roll out wellness webinars, meditation apps, social posts, and carefully worded reminders that “mental health matters.” Yet many employees return from those webinars to environments defined by chronic stress, inconsistent expectations, performative care, and cultures that confuse surveillance with leadership. You cannot wellness-program your way out of a trust problem. And employees know the difference.
Burnout is not always the product of workload alone. Very often, it is the cumulative psychological exhaustion of navigating environments where trust feels inconsistent, access feels conditional, and care feels performative. Employees do not need another mindfulness seminar scheduled between back-to-back meetings. They need workplaces where dignity, trust, and access are not selectively distributed.
Because the ice cream is not the point. The illusion of generosity is. Edward Bernays, often called the father of public relations, built an entire career on the idea that perception can be engineered. That people can be made to feel something is abundant, desirable, even generous…whether or not it actually is. Bernays knew that the real power wasn’t in changing reality, but in shaping how reality is perceived. The problem is that today’s workforce no longer responds to perception. More than that, they’ve become far more literate in the gap between perception and reality.
When what leaders say doesn’t match what employees experience, people resolve the tension by trusting behavior over language. In other words, employees don’t believe what you say; they believe what your systems allow.
In fact, you can learn a lot about a leader or leadership team by what they hold tightly. And perhaps more importantly, by what they refuse to question. I call this the “Ice Cream Chest Challenge,” a simple test for leaders trying to understand why culture feels broken despite all the investment, programming, and perks.
Here’s how it works. Choose any workplace perk, policy, or cultural value your organization claims to prioritize and ask: Can employees consistently access it? Can they use it without fear of consequence? Is it clear, equitable, and easy to navigate? If the answer to any of those questions is “no,” it’s time to reevaluate.
Every organization has the equivalent of a locked ice cream chest. The benefit that exists on paper but feels conditional in practice. The policy that quietly communicates distrust. The symbolic gesture mistaken for support. Leaders have to be willing to identify it. Because if something exists more as a signal than an experience, employees will not experience it as culture. They will experience it as bad actors acting badly.
And not always because the decision itself is consequential, but because of what it represents. Do you ever stop to ask why?
It’s why culture isn’t built in mission statements. It’s built in moments. At a time when engagement in the U.S. has hit a 10-year low, the margin for performative culture has disappeared. If there is going to be a shift in the future of work, it won’t come from better perks or more polished messaging. It will come from leaders who are willing to examine the small decisions and explore the underlying systems. Until that happens, no amount of “delight” will fix what’s broken.
During Mental Health Awareness Month and beyond, leaders must ask themselves: Are we creating workplaces that actually support our employees, or are we simply branding exhaustion more compassionately? Otherwise, that “free” ice cream could end up costing your organization more than it can afford.
Because you don’t build culture by stocking the freezer. You build it by leaving it unlocked.
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