Stakhanovite

In Soviet history and iconography, a Stakhanovite (or shock-worker) follows the example of Aleksei Grigorievich Stakhanov, employing hard work or Taylorist efficiencies to over-achieve on the job.

Stakhanov and other "model workers" were promoted in the press, literature, and film, and other workers were urged to emulate their heroic examples. In reality, the Stakhanovite movement was a propaganda maneuver. Where workers received the best equipment and most favorable conditions, the best results of course showed up. After Stalin's death, the artificiality of the movement was acknowledged, and it was replaced with so-called brigades of socialist labor. In 1988, the Soviet press unmasked the widely propagandized personal achievements of Stakhanov as puffery -- the production of his co-workers was added to his own total.