Readers Weigh In on Bullying Bosses

I read an article recently of treating one's boss w/ respect even though he/she is not liked bc it is the boss who determine's one's promotion and raise! They didn't mention in the article of what steps to take to get an unreasonable A**hole boss who micromanages constantly, blames meanly and never praises, promises to become nice and doesn't, or tells a subordinate to do something illegal and dangerous as well as unreasonable!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHY THE HELL DO THESE SCUMMY CREATURES EXIST AND WHY ISN'T THERE A STRICT LAW TO GET RID OF THEM FOR GOOD OR PUNISH THEM SEVERELY!? I once had an a**hole, bi**h boss who always critiziced me, looked over my shoulder, and told me to do something illegal and unreasonable, and would always act like a big hypocrite!!! What is the very first thing to do to can these bad bosses once you smell something mean and even if you try to be nice and work w/ them they're still unreasonable?!!!! I hope this lady is dead bc of her disgusting character and I am so glad she left this organization after her nasty, unprofessional, hypocritic behavior!!!!! Honestly, good people must stay and the bad people ought to leave!

I just went to seminar on office bullies. First you have to try and figure out why this person is a bully. In some cases they do not know they are one Wall St. is filled with those. The other is he/she could be working for weak management and is scared for his/her job. Sometimes there are strange reasons like you could remind your boss of a sibling they had an issue with and they bully you b/c of it. Many times bullies outside of the office have no social skills and were probably always odd. I also think many people are good at tasks but should never manage people. I have seen that many bullies are insecure and then become micromangers. I had a boss like this and over time all that worked for her left and she was demoted and left. Thankfully, they do get their days too. For the ones that are well positioned, then a group maybe should go into HR and issue complaints. I think there may be safety in numbers and then HR can confront them or try and do something. They know people will leave and recruiting costs are high. Also, it is a small world in finance and word will get out about a bad manager. The corporate world is getting rougher and in the end you may have to get a new job.

Your first step is to determine how you feel about your current employment position. Do you like it or do you love it? If you love it, then stay and work with your super. You can approach him on a calmer day to discuss your concerns or you can have an intermediary and set up a meeting to discuss your concerns. You could also start speaking in normal tones and then reduce it to a whisper which would typically force him to bring his voice down. In either case, no job is worth your self-respect. I usually approach a meeting with pretty much anyone with a list of bullet points to discuss. For grievances, I open the discussion with a question such as (to your boss) Is there anything that you would like to discuss relating to this particular grievance? If the answer is yes, now the conversation is in discussion mode. If the answer is no, then you should speak upon your topic going through your talking points. By the way, management shouting at you is not good. The one thing that I found awesome is that when you are assertive (not aggressive) e.g. become good at standing up for yourself and your beliefs, no one shouts at you. You should consider stress management and assertive classes.

If you know that the unreasonable boss will always be at the firm, your best option may very well be to resign as soon as practicable. That's exactly what I and several others did due to the unreasonable boss that we had at a successful M&A boutique in San Francisco.