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How To Deal With A Passive-Aggressive Boss

How To Deal With A Passive-Aggressive Boss
by Ron Carucci

Bad bosses aren’t just a workplace nuisance. A leader’s manipulative, passive-aggressive, credit-taking, and overly-critical behavior can lead to workplace bullying, job dissatisfaction, psychological distress, and depression among employees according to a set of recent studies by the University of Manchester of more than 1,200 people. If you’re struggling with the effects of your boss’s toxic personality, you aren’t alone. According to Mental Health America’s examination of over 17,000 employees across 19 industries, 64% of employees don’t feel their boss provides them adequate support, and another survey found that 44% of employees have left a job because of a bad boss.

While there are many ways to be a bad boss, one of the trickiest for employees to cope with is passive aggression. There are many different types of passive-aggressive behavior. Some managers may limit access to needed information or be excessively controlling. Others may pit employees against one another, give you the cold shoulder when you disappoint them, or be chronically indecisive. Reporting to such a leader can take a costly toll on you both on and off the job. But your boss’s limitations shouldn’t completely dictate the degree to which you are able to contribute and thrive in your job. Here are three strategies to attend to your own emotional and psychological health even when you have a boss who may not be attending to theirs.

Anticipate and prepare. One executive I worked with reported to the head of their North America region, who played the “I know a secret” game, alluding to things he was privileged to know that my client wasn’t. As is the case with most passive-aggressive people, this was an elaborate form of evasion of direct conflict. Rather than openly disagreeing, he would say things like, “Well, I can understand why you’d see things that way, but there are more factors to consider that you wouldn’t know about from your position.” When my client would ask what those factors were, his boss would say things like, “I’m not at liberty to share them right now.” This left my client no alternative but to acquiesce to his boss’s preferences on any given decision. I coached my client to ask early on, “Do I have all of the information I need to make this decision or is there information you have that could change my options?” This question forced the boss to either own the decision from the outset or free my client up to make the decision. Rather than feeling blindsided, limit your boss’ ability to make passive-aggressive choices at critical moments by setting parameters and clarifying expectations in advance of those moments.

Read full article on Harvard Business Review.