This is the first in a series on dealing with a horrible boss.

If you work long enough you will come across the horrible boss. They are everywhere.

One survey found that 31% of all workers reported working for a horrible (“toxic”) boss. That’s nearly 1 out of 3, a high enough batting average to place a major league hitter in the top ten in the league.

Why there are so many horrible bosses

Horrible bosses are everywhere because of how easy it is to make one. Horrible bosses can be kind people who are poor at managing others. Or, they can be miserable people whose miserableness alone make them horrible bosses. Sometimes they are a mixture of the two.

Sometimes, bosses are misperceived as horrible because they push subordinates beyond where they would go on their own. Regardless, it’s the perception that affects how we react to those with whom we work.

Horrible bosses can ruin a work environment, make people hate their jobs, and hate coming to work. Horrible bosses are the nuclear weapons of workforce: they have the ability to destroy many lives.

Types of horrible bosses

There is the micromanager, the boss who cannot just give you responsibility but has to explain to you in excruciating detail how to discharge that responsibility. As a result, you feel more like a slave than an employee. 

Then there is his opposite: the absentee landlord. He provides no direction, no oversight, and no training but holds you to achieving all the goals he has given you. You are afraid to ask for guidance because you think he expects you to know, or you do ask and he berates you for wasting his time, or he gives you very general guidance that is little or no use.

There is aso the hyper-crit—not hypocrite–but the hyper critical boss for whom you can do nothing right. The hypercrit thinks he is just being demanding but all he does is criticize you. He only calls to your attention what you do wrong and not what you do well. As a result, you feel you can do nothing right and feel you are always on the verge of being terminated.

Any one of these could also be a yeller. I hear about these a lot in the legal profession. Perhaps because it is a high stakes, high stress profession litigators have no patience for subordinates who make their job more difficult and stressful, and they let them know it. 

Yellers can be found anywhere and everywhere. Maybe they are having trouble in their marriage, or their boss is putting pressure on them and they are afraid of getting terminated; regardless, rather than having a reasonable adult conversation they revert to intimidation and a raised voice.

The effect of the horrible boss

Regardless of which variation of the horrible boss you have come across you know they can make you dread going to work.

Much of my time counseling as an employment lawyer over the years has been helping people deal with horrible bosses. I have seen many quit their jobs because of a horrible boss, then come to me looking to sue, only to learn that by quitting they had given away any chance of winning their case.

The bottom line is that horrible bosses, real or perceived, are a real problem in the workplace.

Your career will include a horrible boss

Because of the proliferation of horrible bosses, it is inevitable you will come across one or more in your career.

How you respond will likely determine whether your career continues up and to the right, flatlines, or is severely interrupted by a termination or resignation because horrible bosses are like wrecking balls, and unless you learn how to work around them you may find yourself in the rubble.

If you are unable to solve the problem of the horrible boss, it will mean every time you come up against one you will have to complain to human resources (which as I will explain later almost never ends well) or resign. Neither way is the path of those who continue to advance in the careers and increase in authority and responsibility. 

The necessity of dealing with the horrible boss

Competent, successful people respond to the challenge of the horrible boss. Most CEOs of large of companies have had to deal with one or more horrible bosses in their careers and have usually done so successfully.

For Christians who recognize that more responsibility and authority equates to more earthly territory for the kingdom of God, complaining or resigning is usually not an option. Solving the problem of the horrible boss is not just a nice skill to have; it is imperative.

Explaining how to solve the problem of the horrible boss is the goal of this series. GS