I once confronted a boss who periodically berated me. It turns out, she was shocked that I saw it as her berating me. She felt bad. It cleared the air a bit, but didn’t really give me the result I wanted (less berating). I changed jobs.

Anonymous wrote:DC is a magnet for those with emotional baggage. People with Daddy pain. People with older siblings who are smarter, better looking, and more successful. People who are "all but dissertation" PhDs. The list goes on and on. This region is essentially Hollywood for ugly people. They come to DC to impress people who don't care and you are catching some of the shrapnel. It's not pleasant, but once you understand the mechanisms at play you progress from indignation ("Who does that?!") to compassion ("Oh, sweet summer child, let's help find your groove and make something of this hot mess that you think of as life.")

Calmly place your hand on the top of theirs and say "I don't know who hurt you, but I can tell you are suffering a lot. We have a great EAP program, check it out. As for this matter, I am going to give you some time to regain your composure. We can talk later." Then leave.

Sometimes you will get halfway through this approach and they will break down in tears and ask you to forgive them.

There is so much pain out there. An astonishing percentage of people you see walking on K Street have not attained the emotional intelligence of a well-adjusted high school senior. It's a whole thing out there and it seems to be getting worse over time.

I laughed out loud. I love you.

Walk straight out and take your lunch

Anonymous wrote:Please give me some real life examples of how you dealt with a boss who yells at you and if anything changed after you confronted them. Is confronting them a good idea or will it make things worse?

Yell at them back. If you can get fired for yelling so can he.

*this doesn’t apply if your manager is a woman. there’s a whole separate set of rules for taking down a b!+€#

The yellers are not always the problem. Try a disrespectful ass who never screams, but does things that display a total lack of professional courtesy. A rude dude who thinks he is a star. Three people have left in the last few months, but of course he advertises it as not being able to meet the demands he puts on the team to run a high performing group.

Anonymous wrote:Leave. Agree with poster above.

This is the only solution.

Also, heed warnings before you commit to a job.

I told them they had no right to speak to me that way and I would have this discussion when they could talk in a civil manner. Then I put in my 2 weeks notice a couple days later. I know my worth. Had a new job within a month with a 35% pay increase.

Anonymous wrote:Leave. Confronting them will make things worse. Contacting HR will ruin your life.

This is so true - letting HR know will put an end to the future of your career at that company.

In the early career years, where HR lets you know you are hired, inquires as to how things are going, it feels like they are there for the employee.

Teach your college age children that HR is only there to cover the company's legal risk - HR is not on your side as a "regular" employee.

Leave. Confronting them will make things worse. Contacting HR will ruin your life.

I had a boss like this. I confronted him about being critical and insulting and told him that it was interfering with everyone’s ability to do their job.
At that point I was already planning to leave, but I chose a moment when we had completed a project successfully. He did not react well, got extremely critical, so I was able to say look you are doing it right now even though you are happy with the project. He really hated that.

Anonymous wrote:I did analysis and realized my manager was hiding our Software being late to his boss and was paying for an engineer to do "fake" testing in Europe on SW that wasn't even close to being released. They held a routine Risk meeting with my manager and his boss and asked for everyone to list risks. I mentioned the SW not being on schedule.

&*$#%!%!?%!%!%! - the room went silent...

After the meeting, my manager came outside my cube and was literally yelling so loudly at me for mentioning this. Everyone within 50 ft could hear him, including this young engineer who sat across from me. He had also realized the manager was lying and the 2 of us out of 20 people were the only ones who refused to "go along".

Luckily, the boss was grateful to me for exposing this to him and called in ethics. The manager got transferred to a proposal in an off site trailer as his punishment for lying and for screaming at me for letting the big boss know the SW was late. I have no idea why he wasn't fired.

A few days later, the young engineer had a strange accident and died from a head injury in his home. For a minute, I had a thought that maybe the manager was involved, then I chided myself for even going there.

The next week, two other engineers individually stopped by my office and quietly asked me "you don't think John had anything to do with his death do you?".

Crazy times in the trenches!

That's awful.

I did analysis and realized my manager was hiding our Software being late to his boss and was paying for an engineer to do "fake" testing in Europe on SW that wasn't even close to being released. They held a routine Risk meeting with my manager and his boss and asked for everyone to list risks. I mentioned the SW not being on schedule.

&*$#%!%!?%!%!%! - the room went silent...

After the meeting, my manager came outside my cube and was literally yelling so loudly at me for mentioning this. Everyone within 50 ft could hear him, including this young engineer who sat across from me. He had also realized the manager was lying and the 2 of us out of 20 people were the only ones who refused to "go along".

Luckily, the boss was grateful to me for exposing this to him and called in ethics. The manager got transferred to a proposal in an off site trailer as his punishment for lying and for screaming at me for letting the big boss know the SW was late. I have no idea why he wasn't fired.

A few days later, the young engineer had a strange accident and died from a head injury in his home. For a minute, I had a thought that maybe the manager was involved, then I chided myself for even going there.

The next week, two other engineers individually stopped by my office and quietly asked me "you don't think John had anything to do with his death do you?".

Crazy times in the trenches!

Oh no. I am one of a few women in my company and I learned quickly many years ago that yelling back is the fastest way to take care of this. They don't expect it and you gotta be quick on your feet, but you usually only have to do it once.

Barring that, you need to leave.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“It’s clear you aren’t in a good place right now. Let’s talk when you’ve calmed down”

Or yell at them back. I think this is the most effective.

Both of those reactions would get you terminated

There’s a guy online who says to pause, look at them and ask “are you okay?”

At the very least I'd stare him/her directly in the eye and give him my stankest stank eye. And then I might say very calmly with a smile, "Noted, thank you for sharing" after they were done yelling.