If we learned anything from watching 16 days of Summer Olympics in Beijing, it’s this (somewhat reductionist) statement: The Chinese have been around for a long time and have invented lots of important stuff. Take the philosophy of yin and yang, which says that there are connections in the world that create two mutually correlated opposites. Think hot and cold, smart and dumb, procedural and strategic, Meryl Streep and Lindsay Lohan.

This got me to thinking: If yin in the workforce is employee engagement, which is about getting more discretionary effort, emotional attachment and personal commitment from workers,  then what is the opposite of that? What’s the yang?

I’m not sure I can define the opposite of employee engagement, but I know it when I see it. Today I see it in the stories about the workforce at troubled financial services firm Lehman Brothers.

Lehman, to put it mildly, is melting down. The venerable Wall Street firm was founded in 1850 and says that its mission is “defined by our unwavering commitment to our clients, our shareholders and each other.” But it’s clearly wavering. The credit and banking crisis has driven its stock price from $16 a share last week to around $4 today. Lehman seems to be following in the footsteps of Bear Stearns, and according to The New York Times, workers are struggling to deal with the notion that Lehman as it currently exists may not be long for this world.

“Everyone is walking around like they have just been Tasered,” said one Lehman employee, who, like many interviewed for an article in The New York Times , declined to be named because he was not authorized to talk publicly. “Everyone was always hoping we would pull through. Now, that is not really an option.”

And here’s how the yang of employee engagement looks, as described by the Times: “On Lehman’s third- and fourth-floor trading floors overlooking Broadway’s lights in Midtown Manhattan, traders continued working at their terminals, or at least were giving the appearance of doing so. At the same time, many polished their résumés and contacted recruiters.”

There’s also an object lesson here that you’ve heard before but bears repeating: Don’t invest too much of your future in your company’s stock. “[One] employee who left Lehman earlier this year lamented that he had put enough faith in the firm to retain shares—a decision he is paying for,” the Times noted. He told the Times simply: “My children’s education fund is wiped out.”

Employee engagement? There’s none of that today at Lehman Brothers, only shock, fear, some loathing and surely the clear understanding that no matter how committed you are to the company and its culture, once things go bad, none of that really matters anymore. When a company melts down, everyone in the workforce gets cooked with it.