It is a type of Social Engineering. Politicians are using this all the time. When one group is e.g. on strike, they ignore the 'problem' and wait until other affected groups start throwing rocks at them. Classic example of teachers striking everywhere on the planet. Politicians know that parents will revolt at some point.

This is a shitty CEO and an equally shitty HR director imho. You got problems with deadlines/projects?

Do a root cause analysis, find out what is wrong, fix THAT wrong thing. Don't ask Alice to threaten Bob!

I'm not arguing that. I'm merely saying that he is giving people the option to choose if they want to work like that. At least he's being direct instead of waiting until after the bonus is paid (or not), and then firing them without telling them the expectations. In truth, if I saw that, I'd probably walk right then and there, but there are people who like that environment, and it's their choice if they want to continue there.