The Abusive Boss Who Made Me Better at Life: It Took Quitting to Find That Out
Sadly, I know this topic all too well since in our modern workforce, I believe that abusive bosses are becoming more the norm and compassionate leaders are becoming the exception to the rule. I’ve had more than my share of the crazy, authoritarian manager that drives the office towards complete insanity. But it was my first boss after graduate school that opened my eyes to this petrifying reality.
Here’s my story.
I was 22-years-old at the start of the financial crisis when I finished my Master’s degree and scored my first job on the last day of class. You see, I was groomed to believe that if I worked hard and did everything I was told, in the end I would gain success. So, as a young, black female ingenue having internalized this belief, I was ready to take on the world.
I was overjoyed when I found out that I was selected to interview for an assistant position that would support the President of a large nonprofit. It’s probably why I ignored all of the blaring sirens that were warning me not to take the job. In the waiting room, the HR Director sheepishly admitted that I was the 4th assistant they were hiring for him in only a year, and the longest that any assistant lasted was only 6 months.
Once the interview started I knew immediately that something was wrong. His arrogance could be felt through the door. He was the typical overweight, middle-aged white man who failed to look me in the eyes and opened with “Can you type?” His tone in the interview had as much aggression as a police officer interrogating a murder suspect. But something within me felt both terrified and excited. In my mind, I felt that if I conquered this demon-boss and survived, one day I would have his job. So I accepted the position. And there began the long rollercoaster to hell.
At first, I thought his behavior was tolerable with only a side of daily crabbiness while fetching his Wall Street Journal and coffee, and occasionally yelling at me to blow off some steam. The meaner he was, the harder I worked to please him which not only the company noticed, but at times he would notice too. I was gifted with important assignments, given access to board meetings and celebrities, and was even given a slight raise after only a few months on the job. In my mind, enduring the abuse was clearly paying off. But as time went on the abuse got worse. Instead of calling me by my name like he used to, he started throwing things at my direction to get my attention, causing me to leap with anxiety every time I heard the loud bang. His executive colleagues would distastefully comment in front of us that I was hired only because I was young with “sexy legs,” as he laughed approvingly along. His racially insensitive comments were straight out of a Ku Klux Klan handbook. He once referred to himself as my “Great White Hope” and remarked that he was hesitant to fire a female employee who made a complaint against him because “she was black and after all you know how they are.” Maybe it was the look of horror and anger he noticed on my face that promptly led him to ask me to leave the room as he scurried to close the door behind me.
My friends and family began noticing a change in me. I was more anxious, I wasn’t eating as much, I was drinking a lot more than usual, and I lost my overall joy. But I always talked myself out of leaving because after all, there was a recession scorching everything around me like a wildfire and I was at that time his longest lasting assistant, coming up to my two-year anniversary.
But then one day changed everything. I was called into his office because he had an assignment for me. I was to draft a tax acknowledgement letter for an expensive item donated to the organization by one of the board members, as I had done many times before. When he brought the letter back after his review he said it looked fine, but asked if I could change the value of the donated item to a higher amount. I did not understand why, because we had a receipt for the value of the item. I thought it was odd that he simply did not make the edit himself. At the time, I did not understand the nuances of taxation and donations (I still don’t), but something on the inside of me knew that something was amiss. Shaking with fear, I got up and handed the letter back and told him I didn’t understand tax law, but didn’t feel comfortable with changing the amount. He was furious of course, but I was ready to be fired. All I remember was the HR Director, the CFO, and other senior executives having a long meeting afterwards and sending the letter out, fudged and all.
Strangely enough I was not fired that day. Though his behavior became more petty and unbearable in the following weeks, the letter debacle was never brought up again. But I had reached my breaking point. I realized that no matter how hard I worked the situation would never change. I put in my two weeks notice. I had no other job lined up. The recession was in full swing so the chances I would find one were slim-to-none. I was frightened for the future, but my fear of staying in that office with him was much greater. Once HR alerted him that I was resigning, he became uncharacteristically sweet and told me how great I was at this job and how much he appreciated me. Seeing that I was unimpressed, he then reminded me how powerful he was and could ensure I never worked in that town again. He told me to take a week and really think about my decision, then come back and move forward with him together like the happy working couple that we never were. Although I did not owe it to him, I took a week.
The day I arrived back into the office for the follow up meeting I was full of rage, so I cut right to the chase. In front of him and the HR Director, I told him that he was an abusive person. I told him threatening me to stay makes him a coward and that eventually people like him will lose everything. In a fury and in full shock at my audacity, the HR Director promptly gave me my separation paperwork and I left that day never looking back.
Three years later, I received a text message from a former coworker that still worked at the nonprofit. She forwarded a Wall Street Journal article (the karma was not lost on me) with my former boss on the cover and the title “Charity Chief Resigns”. The article detailed how my former boss was forced to resign because he was being investigated by the attorney general on a variety of issues including bilking a half-million dollar salary from the federal, state, and private donations that were made to the nonprofit. It was all over the news and I like many of his victims felt vindicated that day.
But I realized that there was something positive that came out of it, more than envisioning my former demon-boss humiliated and in handcuffs. I learned the hard lesson that abuse on a job is not normal or healthy, even though it is quite prevalent in our modern workforce. One should never feel obliged to endure it for the hope of achieving later success. But I also developed through the years into a compassionate and kind leader for those who report to me. The sting of his behavior humbled me with every promotion I received on a job, knowing that what was inflicted on me I did not want to put another person through.
Almost a decade later, I have the privilege of being the Director over a large team in the execution of a documentary film. And with the recent grads and interns that have reported to me on the project, I am extra careful to be the leader to them that my former boss was unable to be to me.
