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This post isn’t about sexual harassment, although the behavior I am talking about is harmful, and sexual harassment is a component of it. And it isn’t about my current dean and associate dean, who I think are awesome. In case you were wondering.
This post is how a mean boss can take your mental health away from you, even if the behavior doesn’t rise to the level of harassment. And, this is a discussion of how one’s self-esteem and competence can be destroyed by a thousand cuts from such a boss.
Tales of senior partner abuse of associates run deep in the whispers of the legal profession. Some tales extend generations. The tales have common themes and characteristics. It’s the boss who screams at you in front of others; questions whether you are competent to handle even basic tasks; takes credit for your efforts while knifing to your back with other partners; micromanages your every move; controls your time by religiously only sending you tasks when they hear the rattle of your keys as you are about to exit; gives you feedback that isn’t constructive, but rather is designed to question your competence and destroy your confidence; or watches you in the creepy “Every Breath you Take” kind of way to assure you are on task or not otherwise gaining support from others. There are many ways for a boss to bully you, and there are many degrees of dysfunction in how a boss might treat you.
Research suggests that your level of competence doesn’t matter in terms of whether or not you experience workplace abuse. You could be gloriously good or average and the abusive boss doesn’t discriminate, although the reason for the abuse might be different. For the average, it might be the abusive boss’s frustration about your perceived level of competence. For the gloriously gifted, it might be because the abusive boss feels threatened.
And there is a lot of advice out there about dealing with abusive bosses. Much of it bad, and in the form of “suck it up.” Work harder. Maybe try being super nice to the bullying boss. Those of us who have dealt with bullies as a kid know how well that advice works.
There is literature that suggests that fighting back will make things worse, while trying to kill the bullying with kindness won’t help. If you lash out at your bulling boss, you might catch more hell. But abusive bosses didn’t respond to their employees being nice or empathetic either, according to research. Thus, one can be trapped in a cycle of abuse at work, just as there are cycles of abuse in other relationships.
Being abused by a boss can affect your mental AND physical health. The headaches, the ulcers, the exhaustion, the panic attacks, the sleepless nights, the dread as you enter work in the morning, the dread every time you check your emails, the dread when your phone rings, the potential to abuse drugs and alcohol to escape the abuse, and the questioning every decision in your life. The cycle of abuse leads to more abuse. As you deteriorate, you make yourself more a target for the abuse.
Law firms are starting to take employee mental health seriously. They recognize the potential such issues might have on their bottom line. There are workshops and other measures designed to ease the frustration of law firm life. But I couldn’t seem to find an article that says “law firm takes bullying seriously!” So, for many, it’s like saying to someone who has been repeatedly yelled at to have a massage between screams.
So, what can be done? Sadly, I don’t have the answers. Well, I do, but telling law firms to stop abusive partners from being abusive is not likely to gain traction. And many who are in this field don’t think that law firms are willing to give up the cycle of abuse. Firms priding themselves on lawyers willing to work long hours and sacrifice their bodies and minds to the cause means that firms don’t pride themselves on having lawyers who are happy and more productive because of it.
That’s a problem. And at the moment, it’s a problem without a solution.
There is an old saying in psychology: The person who broke you cannot fix you.
This is the fatal flaw of the abusive boss. It’s also the fatal flaw in relying on law firms to fix this problem.
LawProfBlawg is an anonymous professor at a top 100 law school. You can see more of his musings here. He is way funnier on social media, he claims. Please follow him on Twitter (@lawprofblawg) or Facebook. Email him at lawprofblawg@gmail.com.