Bosses – they make a business go round, giving orders, directing employees, supervising, and taking care of all kinds of tasks. Employees are forced to tolerate a lot of behavior from bad bosses but that doesn’t mean they will perform at their best. Some bosses are uncaring, others are untrained, and still others are simply not held accountable. If you do one or more of the following your employees could be seeing you as a bad boss.
• You don’t give recognition and credit when you should. Employees like to be recognized, and to receive praise for their work. It’s especially bad if a manager takes credit for employees’ accomplishments or ideas. This is a ‘big’ mistake.
• You don’t have the backs of your employees. If you have no problem not backing your employees and you’ll hang them out to dry, then your employees will neither respect you nor trust you, and you will be considered that ‘bad boss.’
• You bully your employees. If you bully your employees and don’t respect them, whether that bullying is physical or emotional you will be seen as a bad boss.
• You have no idea what you are doing. If you are going by the philosophy of ‘fake it till you make it,’ you are certainly setting yourself up to be a poor boss.
• You are a poor leader. Do you offer them the leadership they need? Do you see the bigger picture? Do you know what your department’s goals are and do you convey those goals to your employees? If you answered ‘no’ to any one of these questions you could be a poor boss.
• You treat your employees with disrespect. If you don’t show respect to your employees, you will hurt their self esteem and their self confidence, and land up hurting their feelings. You certainly are not going to gain their respect if you aren’t respecting them, and you certainly will not be seen as a good boss.
None of these behaviors are acceptable at work, let alone by one’s boss. If you fit any of these, you are a poor boss, and it’s time to change.