To be clear, my headline is not calling for anyone’s actual death. I am not threatening anyone, nor am I encouraging any physical harm to come to anyone due to anything I did or do not say. However, I want to make abundantly clear that bosses and managers who abuse and use people should be shamed and rejected by society. Companies also need to start evaluating and understanding what a bad boss (a catch-all term I’m going to use for managers, bosses, or anyone responsible for managing people).
Thank you for another amazing piece. I work in an office that causes so much daily trauma we have begun to feel like we are the problem. We point all of this out and are told over and over we are wrong and this is the way... it's demeaning, disheartening, and it helps to know we're not crazy. I feel so hopeless every day at work, and my colleagues and I have experienced all of these (except the stapler). I hate this system but I have no idea how to fix it. I've given the intent vs. impact speech 1000 times but they continue to tell me I'm wrong and weak.
It is abuse. It is toxic. And it's slowly killing us.
In the best workplace I have worked in the answer to, "I didn't mean...." excuse was always- Impact not Intent. This was driven home in coaching, counseling and harassment training for leaders and employees. Also a zero tolerance policy was in place, if unprofessional or abusive behavior was observed (by anyone) or reported, there was an immediate investigation and follow up steps initiated.
"This is a real cause of the great resignation - a clear-set, obvious problem with many workplaces that is not being discussed with any seriousness, despite its commonality." I got the courage to leave a more than a decade's long position because of the pandemic. It forced me to decide if I wanted to die for my abuser or find the courage to live on in an unfamiliar place. The weight of the trauma I still carry, post-resignation, of my sadistic, abusive manager is only dissipating with time and weekly therapy sessions. I have PTSD flashbacks writing -emails- in my new position because my in my last position the very misplacement of a letter would mean public humiliation for your stupidity. Every word of your piece enraged me and depleted me. I have never felt so seen, and so exhausted at reliving my trauma through your words. The great resignation is a quiet war. And I silently watch the waves of workers join me -- leave their abusive bosses and toxic workplaces. And I wish for real change and personhood for workers in the future. We need more people like you to express the realities of what real, everyday people face. There needs to be a movement that isn't represented by the C-Suite in major publications.
Hear, hear, Ed. Right on, again. For me, and my own experience, here’s your bullseye: “…treating workplace abuse as a slightly annoying thing versus something that creates problems professionally and personally for the victims is irresponsible and harmful.”
My one reservation about this is its binary, black-and-white approach when humans are basically all shades of grey. And passive aggressiveness is about as grey as exchanges come.
One person's demanding boss coach is another person's jerk. How many of us have people we have a great distaste for whom others seem to not only tolerate but even appreciate? And vice versa. That dynamic is older than the first high school.
Maybe I'm just a pessimist about this, but the story of business is the story of society. There are no laws outlawing 'jerkness' for good reason: fundamentally you cannot legislate morality or being a "good person".
And while I appreciate the idealism of drawing perfect lines between acceptable and unacceptable behavior, all of us carry original sin into the office. We all make mistakes. We all are the victim of mistakes. We all have days where our father died and our spouse is distant and someone phoning it in at the office is the last straw to tip us over into uncharacteristic territory. Otherwise good people do bad things from time to time. All of them.
That doesn't excuse the most flagrant or problematic behaviors. Just that drawing hard lines in a binary fashion isn't nearly as simple as you make it out. This is why we have a court system with hoards of highly paid lawyers for contextual and situational interpretation.
"in the same way that bullying is categorically mishandled and misunderstood in schools, workplace bullying is almost never addressed" Thanks for another expose on bullying, including the APA report link. (odd how research is necessary with an ancient issue) While I think workplace bullying is only a part of the great resignation, it's probably the cause of many people needing a weekend to recover, with Sundays a day of mourning or fear of Mondays. It's telling that the victim is blamed and has to prove so much in so many orgs, while the bully can shoot from the hip and suck up to the highest ups. School to retirement!
Another online article forum had a piece that still follows the false narrative your above APA link disproved, how bullies "just have low self esteem." Not even! Like my quote from your article.
I was hardly ever bullied in school or work compared to many others, but I stood up to it and the sociopaths backed off. Other friends didn't. But today bullies often fight back more than before when stood up to. Worthless school counselors told a friend to "just stay away from them." Never any expulsion or consequences for the aggressor. (or flogging like a pinata :-)
Regardless, my last job in govt, at the upper edge of my white collar position's pay scale was at least a screenplay worth of bad. Politics is not the root - weak "leadership" and an HR department often are. A shame, as public service could be an honor. And I've heard far worse.
"The problem is that an oversized part of the population believes management is a way of exacting power over others...."
Yeah, that. Combine that with an unwillingness to take responsibility when things go wrong and you have a nasty situation indeed.
I've often thought that when an employee makes a mistake the blame should be assigned to the manager. After all, they're the ones that select the employees, train them and design the systems within which the employees work. Sadly, it's also the managers who decide where the blame goes.
Thank you for another amazing piece. I work in an office that causes so much daily trauma we have begun to feel like we are the problem. We point all of this out and are told over and over we are wrong and this is the way... it's demeaning, disheartening, and it helps to know we're not crazy. I feel so hopeless every day at work, and my colleagues and I have experienced all of these (except the stapler). I hate this system but I have no idea how to fix it. I've given the intent vs. impact speech 1000 times but they continue to tell me I'm wrong and weak.
It is abuse. It is toxic. And it's slowly killing us.
In the best workplace I have worked in the answer to, "I didn't mean...." excuse was always- Impact not Intent. This was driven home in coaching, counseling and harassment training for leaders and employees. Also a zero tolerance policy was in place, if unprofessional or abusive behavior was observed (by anyone) or reported, there was an immediate investigation and follow up steps initiated.
"This is a real cause of the great resignation - a clear-set, obvious problem with many workplaces that is not being discussed with any seriousness, despite its commonality." I got the courage to leave a more than a decade's long position because of the pandemic. It forced me to decide if I wanted to die for my abuser or find the courage to live on in an unfamiliar place. The weight of the trauma I still carry, post-resignation, of my sadistic, abusive manager is only dissipating with time and weekly therapy sessions. I have PTSD flashbacks writing -emails- in my new position because my in my last position the very misplacement of a letter would mean public humiliation for your stupidity. Every word of your piece enraged me and depleted me. I have never felt so seen, and so exhausted at reliving my trauma through your words. The great resignation is a quiet war. And I silently watch the waves of workers join me -- leave their abusive bosses and toxic workplaces. And I wish for real change and personhood for workers in the future. We need more people like you to express the realities of what real, everyday people face. There needs to be a movement that isn't represented by the C-Suite in major publications.
Hear, hear, Ed. Right on, again. For me, and my own experience, here’s your bullseye: “…treating workplace abuse as a slightly annoying thing versus something that creates problems professionally and personally for the victims is irresponsible and harmful.”
We had an editor who drank at work and stormed up and down the hallways screaming the C-word at female employees. He still works there. I do not.
My one reservation about this is its binary, black-and-white approach when humans are basically all shades of grey. And passive aggressiveness is about as grey as exchanges come.
One person's demanding boss coach is another person's jerk. How many of us have people we have a great distaste for whom others seem to not only tolerate but even appreciate? And vice versa. That dynamic is older than the first high school.
Maybe I'm just a pessimist about this, but the story of business is the story of society. There are no laws outlawing 'jerkness' for good reason: fundamentally you cannot legislate morality or being a "good person".
And while I appreciate the idealism of drawing perfect lines between acceptable and unacceptable behavior, all of us carry original sin into the office. We all make mistakes. We all are the victim of mistakes. We all have days where our father died and our spouse is distant and someone phoning it in at the office is the last straw to tip us over into uncharacteristic territory. Otherwise good people do bad things from time to time. All of them.
That doesn't excuse the most flagrant or problematic behaviors. Just that drawing hard lines in a binary fashion isn't nearly as simple as you make it out. This is why we have a court system with hoards of highly paid lawyers for contextual and situational interpretation.
Unfortunately Vishal is back at Better.com
"in the same way that bullying is categorically mishandled and misunderstood in schools, workplace bullying is almost never addressed" Thanks for another expose on bullying, including the APA report link. (odd how research is necessary with an ancient issue) While I think workplace bullying is only a part of the great resignation, it's probably the cause of many people needing a weekend to recover, with Sundays a day of mourning or fear of Mondays. It's telling that the victim is blamed and has to prove so much in so many orgs, while the bully can shoot from the hip and suck up to the highest ups. School to retirement!
Another online article forum had a piece that still follows the false narrative your above APA link disproved, how bullies "just have low self esteem." Not even! Like my quote from your article.
I was hardly ever bullied in school or work compared to many others, but I stood up to it and the sociopaths backed off. Other friends didn't. But today bullies often fight back more than before when stood up to. Worthless school counselors told a friend to "just stay away from them." Never any expulsion or consequences for the aggressor. (or flogging like a pinata :-)
Regardless, my last job in govt, at the upper edge of my white collar position's pay scale was at least a screenplay worth of bad. Politics is not the root - weak "leadership" and an HR department often are. A shame, as public service could be an honor. And I've heard far worse.
"The problem is that an oversized part of the population believes management is a way of exacting power over others...."
Yeah, that. Combine that with an unwillingness to take responsibility when things go wrong and you have a nasty situation indeed.
I've often thought that when an employee makes a mistake the blame should be assigned to the manager. After all, they're the ones that select the employees, train them and design the systems within which the employees work. Sadly, it's also the managers who decide where the blame goes.