What type of Horrible Boss do you have?

The 9 Types of Horrible Bosses

It would be so much easier if Horrible Bosses wore signs letting you know how bad they were, but sadly, they don’t. They come in all shapes and sizes: male, female, black, white, polished and rough, plus everything in between. Appearance doesn’t tell you anything – actions are all that matters.

Throughout the course of the book, we’re going to reference the 9 major types of bosses. They’re all evil and to plan your campaign against them, you need to be able to identify them. Here, for your consideration are the 9 types of Horrible Bosses:

The Psycho

The Psycho is the easiest to identify. She’s nuts. One day she’s your best friend and the next she’s screaming at you. You walk on eggshells, never knowing what’s going to set her off. She makes your life a living hell and everyone is terrified of her.She’s easy to identify because she is erratic, unpredictable and every word out of her mouth trumpets how crazy she is. She tries to control even the smallest details of her team and the slightest failure sends her into a towering rage. This paranoid whack-job thinks everyone is out to get her and constantly scrutinizes your every action to find and expose your flaws.

Fortunately for you, she does this to everyone. Since there’s only so much time in the day, she can’t spend all of it on you, but the flipside is her team will self-destruct. They spend so much time checking over their work their output plummets. When the rest of the organization sees how little gets done, they blame the group, not the boss and your group’s reputation suffers. You become seen as lazy, stupid, or even worse. Occasionally, this insanity will even reach the senior leadership team but more frequently she skillfully blames the idiots who work for her.

So, why does she still have a job? The simple reason is the Psycho is actually really good at something. For example, she may be a technology expert or have deep knowledge of your new accounting system. Either way, senior management didn’t hire her for her personality. They hired her to do a specific job, but she’s so good that they’ve been forced to promote her or lose her.

Because she’s nuts, she will never rise above middle management and as the years go by without further advancement, she will become more and more bitter. She can’t blame herself and the only other explanation is her team.

The good news is that everyone thinks of her pretty much the same way. Everyone from her direct reports to the Senior Leadership Team will start to see her as a loose cannon. Although her attitude will eventually be her downfall, she’s a huge risk and can ruin your reputation and delay your career development for years.

The Jealous Girlfriend

At first, you think this boss is great. He spends time with you on all your projects, brings you everywhere he goes and constantly tells you he is your biggest champion. He will tell you he is “grooming you for leadership” and at first seems like a really good guy. All this will end if you start to work with other groups. Overnight he becomes spiteful and sabotages all your other relationships. Next thing you know, you’re isolated in the company and it’s just the two of you.

If he had his way, he would make sure you never left.  He won’t promote you because he believes “the team should stay together”.  He may promise that you’ll get his job when he moves up. The problem is, he won’t ever leave because he spends too much time in his comfort zone. Instead of working with Senior Leaders like his boss and other higher-ups, he spends most of his time with his small circle of employees. He will obsess over the future of “the team” but fears the change any advancement would bring.

The worst part about this type of Horrible Boss is that he will actively try to stop you from becoming successful. The Jealous Girlfriend believes that if he can’t have you, no one can. Therefore, if you try to leave, he will do everything in his power to sabotage you, for your own good, of course.

He truly believes the only path to success is through him and any time you spend on outside projects is seen as a personal rejection. You will have a much harder time moving ahead because he will destroy your reputation with his peers as soon as you give the slightest inkling that you might want to do something else.

The worst aspect of this type of boss is that if you try to sever the relationship with him, you will have to deal with the awkward break up.  You know that girl that mopes around after her office affair goes south? Well, the Jealous Girlfriend is 1000 times worse. He will try to exact revenge, ruin your reputation and more. The only way to beat this boss is to appease him until you can get rid of him. Otherwise, he becomes mopey and can pull you down with him.

The Moron

This boss is a complete and utter fool. He makes no sense, he has no idea what’s happening in the company, but he thinks he’s a genius. This boss is especially dangerous because he will fail spectacularly and blame it on you.

Typically what has gone wrong here was a senior leader was snowed during an interview or had to fill the job as a favor to someone. The Moron drops all the buzzwords and when you met him you might have thought he knew what he was doing.

It won’t be long before your team realizes he has no idea what’s going on. The next group to be aware will be his Peers but they won’t be able to do anything, nor would they even if they could. They’ll see him as a lightning rod and an obvious scapegoat. He’s the perfect person to blame when anything goes wrong because he’s too stupid to be able to defend himself and has no idea why things went wrong.

His hiring manager may figure out what a horrible decision it was, but remember, they are the ones who made the decision to bring him on board.  They don’t want to believe their own judgment is flawed and keep making excuses for why this person fails. They will blame the Moron’s team for his failures.

The Moron will support him in this. He wholeheartedly believes that his team is failing because they are incompetent. Everyone who will listen will hear him complain about how hard he works and how difficult his team is to manage. Since most people won’t know who you are, that means you will be lumped in with a bunch of losers. This is the last thing you want and it can destroy your immediate career prospects.

The only way to beat this type of boss is to be the star of the show. You have to distance yourself from this person, the farther the better.

The Aristocrat

These bosses are often younger but they think you’re barely worthy to polish their shoes. They brag about their Ivy League degrees, their chalet in Zurich and their parents who serve on the company’s board. They treat their position as a stepping-stone to greater things and you as a peasant whose existence is necessary, but barely tolerable.

This is one of the most insecure types of bosses – although the Psycho comes close. Because they bought their position, they are constantly trying to prove they deserve it, regardless of all evidence to the contrary. They ask detailed yet irrelevant questions in meetings to show off their knowledge and will criticize you publically for insignificant mistakes.

One of the worst things you can do to this type of boss is to make a fool of him in public. It doesn’t matter if you’re right or wrong or even if you meant it. You better back down immediately or he will go out of his way to destroy you.

On the other hand, they do have one advantage over the other types of bosses. They have connections and ambition. Sometimes these guys will move on quickly, not because they’re Ladder Climbers but because they’re convinced they deserve something “better”. As long as better means another company, that is a good thing.

The Bully

This boss plays favorites and if you don’t kiss his ass, you will find yourself pushed off to the side and ignored. Plum projects go to the people who flatter him and agree with everything he says. Any resistance is met with absolute destruction.

Sometimes this is a newly promoted individual who is just flexing his managerial muscles. Other times, he’s just a jerk. Whatever the problem, every day at work is like high school. All promotions go to his friends, both inside the company and out. He’s cliquish and smug. He’s intimidating and may even have his leadership cowed. If he has brought in his cohorts, you end up having to placate an entire group, not just him.

The worst aspect of the bully is he always has a preferred punching bag employee. When things go wrong (as they always will) the bully is prepared.  He never admits making a mistake. Why would he? He already has a good target to blame. The same people take the fall over and over again even if they were only remotely involved.

As you become a better Ladder Climber, you will learn the tricks to stand up to him and make him afraid of dealing with you. Your transitional goal will be to make it so difficult for him to pick on you that it’s just not worth his time. He’ll have to find an easier target. Bullies never pick on the people who fight back. They prefer the weak so you will need to become strong.

While this is satisfying, it is not the final outcome with this type of boss. Your end goal will be to get him fired. It takes work and determination but there’s nothing more satisfying than seeing him make the “walk of shame” out of the building. Feel free to cheer.

The Roadblock

This boss is almost always in mid-level management. He’s been with the company for more than a decade isn’t going anywhere. He’s comfortable in this position and fears change. When you come to him with your fresh ideas and thoughts on how to improve things, you’ll be shut down – hard. He’ll tell you it’s too difficult, too radical, or just a bad idea. Remember, he only wants to mark time until he can get his retirement. Anything that threatens that will be harshly dealt with.

That isn’t the worst part though. The real problem with this boss is that he doesn’t care about promotion. He isn’t ambitious. He is perfectly happy to stay at that level until he retires. He won’t understand that you don’t want to spend the next 15 years waiting for something to happen, that you want more. Any attempt you make to learn more or to increase your value to the company will be seen as useless, therefore why do it? Better to stay where you are and be happy with your lot in life. After all, he is happy, why can’t you be?

His Peers will love him since he isn’t a threat. He supports them, doesn’t try to take credit for anything outside his domain and is probably very good at his job. As a result, he is often strongly supported by the company leadership as well.  The senior leaders may know him by name and praise his detailed knowledge.  You can’t get him fired – he does a good job.  You can’t get him to leave – he doesn’t want to.  But, as long as he is in your way, you can’t get anywhere.

To get him out, you will need to learn how to get the attention of management even in a group that doesn’t normally get attention. Otherwise a leader like this can effectively make you into a corporate drone who will wake up twenty years later in the same boring job doing the same daily routine.

The Politician

You can’t trust a word she says. Everything that comes out of her mouth is designed to create an impression, not convey information. Every piece of data is massaged and spun to put her and only her in the best light. She will take your ideas and champion them as her own while convincing you that she’s doing you a favor, that her highest goal is to further your career.

She will promise you a great deal, but when the time comes to deliver she will give you lots of reasons why it’s your fault that you didn’t get the reward. Because she is willing to lie, many Peons believe her and trust in her.  She can often create a supportive team that may never catch on to her tricks.

On the other hand, her peers will be aware of her duplicity much earlier.  Because some of them are Ladder Climbers, they will notice someone like her. Keep your ear out for rumors of lying, cheating, fake emails, that sort of thing. If she lies to one group, she will lie to another. Remember, the Politician is always trying to get ahead and is willing to lie to cover her tracks. If her peers don’t trust her, you shouldn’t either.

Discovering your manager is a Politician is one of the most disheartening and demotivating things you can have happen in a job. Politicians know just what to say to keep you happy, so you arrive at work pumped, ready to take on the world, but all your motivation is built on a foundation of lies.

The problem is, when someone is willing to lie, they can say anything. They can promise you a raise but when it doesn’t happen, it’s not their fault. They’ll tell you the company couldn’t afford it. They can promise you a bonus but when you don’t get it, it’s not their fault. They fought for you. They promise promotions, advancement, credit and glory but only because they know it’s what you need to hear if you’re going to work hard for them.

The problem with a Politician is that you can’t get them fired. They are too careful to get caught. Everyone may know they lie, but no one can prove it. Nothing is in writing; everything is said in the hallway or over lunch. If they do put something in writing, it’s so vague as to be useless.

Therefore, it’s rare to see them fired outright. Instead, when enough of the right people realize your boss is a liar, they will position the Politician to be laid off or will make things uncomfortable enough that they leave on their own. Because Politicians are so hyper-sensitive to other people, they are one of the easiest bosses to get rid of. They will sense the change in the wind and will be long gone before it gets too bad.

The Losing Coach

This type of boss wants to make you believe he’s there to help you. He will constantly tell you what you can’t do and why you need his help. He will encourage you to get certifications, training, anything that makes you believe you need to “grow” or improve and that you need him to help you.  He lives and breathes to “help” but the people beneath him find there is always one more step, another thing he needs to teach them, that he just needs more time…

The Losing Coach sees his team as the problem and himself as the instructor. He is great at pointing out your flaws and shortcomings, designing your career path, and providing you with training. In fact, he’s great at everything except actually helping you.

The Losing Coach doesn’t really want anyone to be successful – he feeds on people’s need. The more help you require, the happier he is. As a matter of fact, he is likely to throw you into areas in which you don’t excel under the pretense of helping you gain valuable skills.

Are you a terrible public speaker? Don’t be surprised if he puts you up in front of a large group. Is doing reports where you really shine? You won’t be assigned a report while you work for him. In general, he keeps everyone down by focusing on what they can’t do and avoiding what they can do.  His goal is to make you think that you aren’t good enough and that you need him.

Further, he will propagate this view of you throughout the organization. The biggest problem with this is that when the only exposure the Senior Management Team has to you is when you fumble around at the podium, stumbling over your words, how can they view you as one of their equals?

This is another boss that you will have to find a way to work around.  For him, the relationship you build with his boss will eventually become his downfall. When they see how excellent you really are, they’ll realize he isn’t leading the team – he’s holding them back. With work, you can ensure he’s marginalized, exposed, and eventually laid off.

The Chimera

If more than one of these descriptions seems to fit your boss, it is possible that you have the worst and most Horrible Boss of all, the Chimera. These people are ruthless, will use any dirty trick in the book to try to get ahead. They know about Ladder Climbers and they know it isn’t just taking management classes and getting degrees. The problem is, they don’t know what really works.

Instead, they desperately try every dirty trick in the book. They’ll lie, threaten, manipulate, and cajole, anything to get ahead. They will destroy a team and do whatever they can to get ahead. Unfortunately, they can also take you down with them. I know, because I have been there.

I was a young Software Development Manager, a natural Ladder Climber at a Fortune 50 company and things were going extremely well for me. I had a team of 40 people working for me, was making six-figures and had just won CIO Magazine’s 50/50 award for one of the top 50 B2B websites in the country. I thought I was the coolest thing to walk the face of the Earth. I was not.

I hadn’t learned all the tips and tricks I know today and I was still a bit green. My boss was a Bully who used fear and intimidation to keep us in line and I’d just learned he’d decided to move on. Today, I would have just taken his job but back then I didn’t know how and instead, the Senior Leaders filled the position with a woman from outside our organization. I held out hope that I would get one of the elusive great managers.

At first, it seemed like I had. The first thing our new VP did was to meet with all the managers. After our first 1-on-1, I thought she was great. She was smart, funny, listened to what I had to say, took my suggestions seriously and really motivated me to work hard to get ahead. She got along with others in the organization and seemed to be supporting her team. I thought things were going to go well.

I was a fool.

There were so many signs I’d missed, so many “tells” that in hindsight were blindingly clear. One of the biggest signs was that she was much older than most of her team but hadn’t moved up that far yet. When there is no good explanation for such slow progression up the management ladder, it’s usually a good sign that your boss isn’t a Ladder Climber.

Another way to tell was that she only spoke with people she thought could help her. Real Ladder Climbers realize that people throughout the organization are necessary but a Horrible Boss think that they can ignore the Peons without consequence. They are wrong.

But that’s the problem with teaching yourself to be a Ladder Climber.  You have to learn from other people’s dirty tricks and from your own mistakes.  In this case, I learned a lot.

It turned out that she wasn’t just one type of Horrible Boss, she was a Chimera.  She used the lies of the Politician. She added new positions and filled them like a Bully. If you tried to give her any feedback she would attack in a way that would make a Psycho proud.  In short, she was the worst of all the groups. Before she was done, she’d gotten rid of the person who’d hired her, taken his job and decimated his entire organization.

I was one of the casualties. Within six months, I held a letter from Human Resources telling me that I’d resigned. When I pointed out I hadn’t resigned, they handed me another piece of paper, a promise of a $2000 severance if I promised never to reveal the terms of the agreement.  I didn’t sign it – what I’d learned was too important not to share.

She had more tricks and lies than anyone I have ever seen. Granted, her methods are self-destructive and only provide short-term gain but I learned to recognize them. I never make the same mistake twice.

What eventually did her in was that she became too confident. She strove for and often got more power but everywhere she went, she created an army of enemies. Although her unethical practices were missed by many of the Peons and even some of her peers, they became more apparent as she moved up the management chain. No one wanted someone that dangerous around.

Eventually, the CEO got rid of her but it took more than a year. After all, she hadn’t actually done anything wrong. Sure, she was manipulative and unethical, but since she didn’t actually violate any laws or company policies, she was also untouchable. So he created a whole new group for her to run, put her in charge of it and then shut it down a short time later.  Effectively, he terminated her without actually firing her.

Of course, if I could go back in time, she never would have had a chance to get the job. I would have taken The Bully’s job and she never would have been hired.

But that’s the thing with Horrible Bosses. They will stay as long as you let them. If you don’t do anything about them, chances are that they will ruin your career and the careers of everyone on your team. That was the last time I failed to act in time.

There Is A Silver Lining

No matter what type of Horrible Boss you have, there is one good thing about each and every type. They all have weaknesses and all can be destroyed. There are plenty of people who have removed a boss just like yours and gone on to take his job.

You are now on to him. Your Horrible Boss isn’t going to be there much longer.  All you need to do is choose to “Steal his Job”.

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