Advice for Job Hunting During Job Probationary Period (bully boss' boss)

[Anonymous]

Hi, all, Looking for some career advice. I took this position which looked exciting with all good hopes. 2 weeks in, things changed, and the boss' boss who had interviewed me left the company. My boss has a heart of gold. His new boss started a few weeks before I did, and it's been an uphill challenge ever since. Her perfectionism combined with nitpicking myself and others on the team have caused me distress. This is my 3rd encounter with a female bully boss in my career, and they all have some things in common - insecurity and some form of immaturity. When confronted calmly, sometimes things went well but most times did not. The difference in the first two cases was that I had at least 1 year into the job under my belt. My other teammates confront her and standup for all of us, and they also have seniority (10-15 years). My job is in IT program management. A few in the office have "read right through" this new boss and her personality (cozying up to some in a way to curry favor). Her lack of experience in our subject area is being buried by effusive personality. Even as we ask for stylistic (concrete) examples of what we should be doing with things such as templates, most of her criticism is subjective (i.e. the heart of our message is correct, just the style is ugly. Boxes not aligning in presentations, wrong font size, etc.) We do not work in graphic design, by the way). Sorry about all this venting. My instincts are telling me the wisest thing to do right now is update my resume and to start looking again to save my mental sanity. Any advice is welcome.

[Anonymous]

Start aligning the boxes in your PowerPoints and making sure you deliver quality work.
I am a relatively new boss and when I started, I was aghast at the quality my team had gotten away with under old management.

[Anonymous]

This response goes to heart of my question. Quality is subjective. Boxes not aligning, yes I get it. Grammar is technically correct - just not her style. The same criticism was given for table style choice or color selection. I have brushed up on my presentation skills w more training on my own dime. Belittling people (and I can take constructive criticism well and act on it) over these types of things, though, is another matter. I understand that accurate messaging is important and is a reflection of the messenger.