Tips For Dealing with a Bad Boss

Tips For Dealing with a Bad Boss Jill Jacinto, HuffPo’s â€Å"Millennial Expert† has some suggestions for handling outrageous boss requests that cross the line from demanding to ridiculous. It’s harder than it sounds! At my first editorial assistant job out of college, they hired an executive who didn’t understand that my job was supporting the whole department- he was used to having a personal secretary and didn’t realize that I was not there to manage his calendar or handle his lunch order. But I couldn’t just say â€Å"sorry, you’re out of luck.† I had to deftly navigate the intersection of the professional and the political- and you can do it too!Say Yes, then Ask QuestionsAccording to Robert Hosking, the Executive Director of OfficeTeam who spoke with Jacinto, it’s better to try to be helpful instead of pointing to your job description and shrugging. If it’s something way outside of your typical roster of tasks, it’s probably worth ask ing your boss after the task is done if you can clarify their expectations and priorities for your workflow.If you’re at the bottom of the office hierarchy, it’s possible they’ll just add â€Å"gofer† to the list, but at least you’ll have directed their attention back to the job you were hired to do. You can also go to HR and ask them to mediate a discussion, particularly if you feel you’re being taken advantage of.Stay Away from NegativityRoy Cohen, author of The Wall Street Professional’s Survival Guide, suggests an anti-â€Å"Just Say No† response. If you refuse to go above and beyond, someone else probably will, and you’ll start to get a reputation as a non-starter.If you decide you do need to turn down an ask, try responses that show you’re capable of compromising and also fully loaded with to-dos, like â€Å"I’m just now finishing up a project on deadline- if this request needs to come first, I can s et it aside, just let me know if I should rearrange.† or â€Å"Is it possible to tackle this first thing in the morning? I can come in as early as you need me, but I have a prior commitment tonight†Politely Ask for ClarificationWith a boss who seems inclined to just keep piling on the demands, or worse, micromanaging how you fulfill them, sometimes it’s helpful to turn into the skid and ask for more clarification.Try questions like, â€Å"And would you like me to do X? How should I approach Y? Can you take a look at this and tell me if I’m on the right track?† This serves a dual purpose- it lets them weigh in at every step so you don’t waste your time on something they’ll ask you to re-do, and it makes you enough of a pain that they may micromanage less.When Requests Become UnreasonableWhenever I’m trying to decide if a request is reasonable or not, I try to mentally review the give-and-take dynamics in the office as a whole. If I’m in a company where the culture is to pitch in, I try to go with the flow a little more. If everyone else pretty much sticks to their lane and I suspect I’m being tapped as the youngest, or as a woman, or as most likely to be accommodating against my own self-interest, I might try to propose a compromise rather than just saying yes.I spent some time at a very small nonprofit with a boss who was, to say it politely, very hands-on. I’d been responsible for compiling a video slideshow for our annual benefit, which was only a few days away, and the video editor we’d hired was late turning around a final cut. My boss insisted I make the trek to the editor’s apartment after work and deliver the DVD to her apartment, which meant staying late at the office and walking over to get it in the pouring rain, then taking an express bus uptown and arriving home close to 11.I was wet, cold, and miserable by the time I had the DVD in my hand. To make matters wo rse, my boss wasn’t picking up the phone to confirm I should drop it off that night, so I finally gave up and went home.My boss was leaving me furious messages by the time I got back to my apartment–despite the fact that she’d been unreachable. She told me I should have gone to another coworker’s apartment to view it–she didn’t even trust me to watch a 15 minute video! I quit about a month later. If it have been a larger office, or I had been older than 22, I would have tried some of the other strategies before I gave up–but sometimes unrelenting inappropriate requests are a sign that you’re working in the wrong office.

4 signs your boss is not impressed with your work

4 signs your boss is not impressed with your work When things are going well at work and the praise is flowing, things are great. You’re feeling happy and accomplished, and comfortable that you’re in the right place. But sometimes there will be bad days and bad periods, when the work is more difficult, or you’re just not performing up to where you should be. How can you tell if things are moving into a danger zone with your boss? Let’s look at some of the signs that you’re just not crushing it at work.You’re bored. All. The. Time.A little boredom can be a good thing- it can give you some space to be creative, or find a new way of doing things. Feeling bored all day, every day is a bad sign. It means that something just isn’t clicking for you in your work. Maybe you just don’t have enough to do, or maybe you don’t like what you are doing. You should be doing work that makes you feel challenged and satisfied- if not all the time, then at least most of the time. If you†™re constantly bored, it’s likely that you’re not the only one who has noticed, and it’s time to consider your other options.Your work gets reassigned.If a project that would normally have come your way goes to a colleague (or is taken on by the boss herself), that’s a red flag too. It’s a sign that your boss is losing confidence in your ability to get the job done. If it happens only occasionally, it could just be that your boss is trying to spare your workload. But if you notice it happening frequently, it’s time to talk to your manager about it. Let her know that ready and able to take on tasks.You’re being micromanaged.Everyone’s had a manager like this at some point- the boss who details all of your next steps, item by item, and hovers to make sure everything is getting done. The boss who checks in every five minutes to see if you got his email. Some people are just micromanagers, but if you find that this is a consisten t issue with your own boss, it could be a sign that he or she doesn’t trust you with particular tasks.You’re called into meetings to discuss your work.Status meetings are one thing, but if you find your boss is regularly scheduling sit-down meetings to talk about the quality of your work, that’s not a great sign. Even if there’s no specific criticism, it can be a sign of lost confidence.So what do you do when you notice these issues creeping into your working relationship with your boss? The first step should be having a neutral, nonconfrontational discussion about it with your boss. Make sure he or she knows that you’re open to more responsibilities and making changes that make you more productive, while avoiding personal accusations. And if you find that there’s no longer a productive dialogue and your boss is still freezing you out, it may simply be time to look for another job.