A boss can make the workplace miserable. Given the amount of time people spend in the office, life itself can become miserable. You start to feel angry, humiliated, anxious and depressed. You tell your colleagues how bad this supervisor is, how they treat you, how they make you feel. Your boss really is a jerk, you claim. A schmuck , you all agree. You plan to do something, but take no action. You hope they stop acting that way and everything can get better on its own.
But of course they don't stop. They keep yelling at you, keeping you late, making you re-report. They criticize your work. They criticize you. You begin to realize that change is unlikely. You try to do everything you can to avoid an eruption, but nothing works. Your job becomes a prison where you spend each day thinking about how much you hate your boss – feeling bad and dreading every interaction.
Related: 15 Traits of a Terrible Leader
There are two steps on the way forward. Both may seem difficult, but are surprisingly simple:
1. Recognize what you might bring to the table and why your boss' behavior bothers you so much.
Because while you may have found solace in group gossip about your manager, there are good reasons for you are so personally frustrated with this person. Do they remind you of anyone else in life? Can you absolutely not tolerate criticism? What makes you so bad about your boss? As insufferable as it may seem, and as little as you want to ask these questions, you may be surprised at the answers that will present themselves.
2. The complementary approach – which can be incredibly hard to accept – is to empathize with your boss.
Why on earth would we suggest finding a place to empathize with that person when that's literally the last thing what do you want to do? Because if you're going to find a way to get along, you'll have to take the long view and try to figure out why they're acting in that particular way. By allowing yourself to empathize with your boss, you also give space for some of the negativity to fade away. By understanding and understanding yourself, a desire to learn and grow can begin to replace the bottled-up disdain that pervades every part of your day.
We have consulted with a number of employees over the years who have had significant issues with their bosses. In all situations, we asked workers to ask why they seemed to be so shaken up by these superiors. Why do they feel so belittled and humiliated when, for example, they have been scolded or criticized? These are all questions that an employee brings to the table and must evaluate. Maybe the same boss wouldn't bother another colleague so much. We try to help people understand that it is their responsibility to look within for answers to some of these questions.
At the same time, employees often wonder whether people who rise to leadership positions possess any special characteristics. So we ask them to empathize and think about what might cause someone's boss to be so dismissive of their feelings. What does my client know about this person? How is the office for the boss? What was their path to promotion? What in this story could have made her behave so unpleasantly? More importantly, we try to define the internal difficulties that the boss may face that cause unpleasant behavior.
Maybe a micromanaging boss is so afraid of losing control that he has to discipline everyone in the office to feel more secure. Maybe their whole life has been dedicated to being perfect to please others, so they take those insecurities out of those who work under them. Maybe a seemingly arrogant boss only steals from the hilt when he feels exposed or humiliated. They are afraid that everyone will discover that the big job is just a mask covering a crippling low self-esteem, and they constantly fear the discovery of this fraudulent and inadequate self.
By trying to understand the boss's underlying anxiety, an employee can interact in a way that avoids the fear of the supervisor. Find small ways to show the boss they are in control if necessary. If the boss has fragile self-esteem, recognize their positives when opportunities arise. If a disorganized boss can't finish anything and is slowing everyone down, learn to interact with them in bite-sized tasks and complete them one at a time.
The hard part is recognizing our own roles – and abilities – in making the workplace more comfortable. By accepting the task of learning about ourselves and our bosses, we can do just that. People want to tell you about themselves and will do so all the time; they want to be heard. Look and listen with the intention of understanding. It works every time.
Related: 20 ways to develop empathy
