You work for a manager who keeps his employees divided, rattled, and demoralized so no one pushes back. Unfortunately, because Brad delivers bottom-line results, your senior leaders have situational blindness. They see the numbers, not the wreckage.
Here’s how to protect yourself, regain your footing and stay effective.
Continue reading Tactics for Dealing with Toxic Leadership
No one should be asked to work in an environment that requires swallowing hate in order to belong. Nazi imagery and praise signal exclusion, intimidation and threat, especially to Jewish employees, people of color, LGBTQ+ coworkers, immigrants and anyone with a basic grasp of history. It poisons the workplace and creates a hostile work environment. Continue reading When Extremism Walks into the Workplace: 3 steps
Your boss: charismatic, confident and allergic to being challenged. He mistakes dominance for leadership and disagreement for disrespect. The hardest part of what’s happening comes from the way it changes you. You’ve started rehearsing sentences before meetings. You’re editing yourself in real time to avoid setting him off. Over time, this chip away at your confidence.
Continue reading Dealing with an Arrogant Boss: Strategies for Success
For decades, college-educated employees built a career on the assumption that if something went wrong: a bad job fit, a stalled role, a difficult manager, they could fix it. Today, as hiring slows and layoffs ripple through white-collar sectors, that assumption again erodes, this time more persistently.
Continue reading Spooked by AI: Clinging to Stability in a Shifting Job Market
Number six: drown in a vat of burnt office coffee, slow, bitter, company blend.
Number seven: death by paperclips, swallowed one by one.
Number eight: Lock Willy and Ken in the conference room with a malfunctioning speakerphone; feedback shrieking, brains scrambled, meeting finally useful.
Office fridge salmonella surprise. HR report: “unfortunate potluck accident.”
Continue reading 16 Ways to Kill Your Managers (Metaphorically, Mostly)
I’ve had five managers in four years. Each turned out to be unethical, cruel or a slacker. I don’t want to keep job-hopping, I just want one emotionally stable manager who won’t derail my career. As an applicant, I fill out applications. How do I vet the mangagers? Continue reading Tired of Speed-dating Managers
you can’t let your focus get hijacked and expect to feel successful. Reclaiming control isn’t about hustling harder—it’s about refusing to let every ping dictate your day. When your day becomes one long loop of: start task → ping → approval → “quick question” → begin again, you feel wiped out. No one thrives in a job that forces a full focus reboot every few minutes. Continue reading The Managerial Promotion Underbelly: Side Order of Chaos
You survived a full-scale workplace blow-torch of a moment—voices sharpened, tempers roared—and the next morning you crawl into the day. You feel scrambled: emotional static, adrenaline residue, and the sinking suspicion you said something you won’t be able to live down. Your power lies in the reset. Continue reading Surviving the Workplace Meltdown
Every workplace has one: the coach you never hired.
They roam the halls (or the Zoom screen) convinced everyone’s lives would run better if everyone followed their advice. Unpaid coaches only stay if you feed them. If you want to shoo them way, four strategies work.
Continue reading Why I Fear Eye Contact in the Break Room
Employee roomba: everyone performs work & looks slammed: syncing, circling back, touching base, aligning priorities, and actioning next steps. The problem? None of these verbs produced anything tangible. Meetings multiplied like rabbits while projects stayed in limbo. Like bouncing in place for your smartwatch. Continue reading The Roomba School of Management: When Everyone Looks Slammed but Nothing Gets Done