Are you being undermined at work? When you have an
undermining boss, it can make work a nightmare.
And it's an easy starter for a toxic work
environment. But is your boss undermining you at
work? That's exactly what we're going to answer in
this video. And if they are a stick around,
because I'm going to give you some tips on how to
stop your undermining boss, if that all sounds
good, tap that like button, so I know you're
ready. And let's just jump straight into it. The
first and most obvious sign of an undermining boss
at work is they nitpick you in public, they're
calling out your work in team meetings, and not in
a good way. And when you send something for
review, there is just more red lines than you ever
thought possible. And definitely above and beyond
what was reasonable. In my experience with
undermining bosses. This is the first and most
obvious sign that helps you identify if you have a
boss that is undermining your work. And it can be
particularly frustrating, especially when they are
nitpicking you on public. Now ironically, that
brings us to the next sign, which is the exact
opposite. Your feedback is non existent outside of
said nitpicking, while they'll nitpick your
writing about the use of an Oxford comma, they're
not giving you any actual feedback that is helping
you get better at your job. While they may
occasionally throw you a scrap to acknowledge
something that you did well, and particularly
something that you need to do better if you're not
getting a lot of substantive feedback that you can
actually apply to become a better professional.
And I want to differentiate this from the manager
who just doesn't know how to give feedback or
maybe gives a regular feedback, we're talking
about an almost complete absence of substantive
feedback, even in the context of things like
performance reviews, the third sign that you're
being undermined by your boss is that they're
micromanaging. You. You guys know, I have a whole
entire video on micromanaging why it happens what
to do about it, I'll link it down below so that
you can check it out after this one. But when your
boss is micromanaging you, and especially when
they're micromanaging you with the inference that
you wouldn't be able to do your job successfully
otherwise, and particularly when that's done in
front of other people, it can be very undermining
at work, whether it's your boss telling you
exactly how to do something mundane, that you
absolutely know how to do on your own. Going back
to nitpicking and overly critiquing your work in
order to make it better, or demanding excessive
oversight on the work that you're doing. These are
all behaviors that can undermine you at work.
Another sign that your boss has undermined you at
work is that they're stealing your ideas who is is
ever frustrating when this happens, if you're
finding that you're in situations where your boss
is taking credit for the work that you did, the
ideas that you're bringing forward to them, and
especially when they're saying no to the ideas or
initiatives that you're bringing to them in order
for them to take ownership, these are all clear
signs that you are being undermined by your boss,
while your boss taking credit for your work isn't
always a bad thing across all situations. In some
cases, I would actually argue that it can work in
your favor in this scenario of an undermining
boss. And especially when you're working with a
toxic boss who is undermining you, these can be
very detrimental, because if your work doesn't
have visibility beyond your team and your boss, no
one is going to know that those things actually
belong to you. And they were things that you did
or ideas that you had. And that can really impact
your career progression. And because undermining
bosses tend to do the next sign as well. This can
be very harmful, even for your professional
reputation at work on that next sign of an
undermining boss is blaming you for mistakes and
holding you accountable for things that you had
nothing to do with or making you fully accountable
for things you're not fully accountable for. Look,
I get it things are a team effort. When you are a
contributor, you're part of the project success or
failure. However, your mere presence cannot make
something fail entirely. Failure is a group
effort. However, especially when you're dealing
with a toxic boss who is undermining you at work,
they can't have any accountability. That's just
not something that they do, though. instead of
facing their own failures, they're just going to
make their failures, your failures, which
obviously undermines you that said, Your
undermining boss might not stop at blaming you for
things that weren't your fault. Sometimes your
undermining boss might actually sabotage you. One
thing that undermining bosses do is they
intentionally omit you for meetings, they
intentionally omit you from projects really what
they're doing is they're holding you back from any
opportunity that you have to shine and also
staging you for some kind of public blunders. And
obviously, if you're missing crucial information,
crucial meetings, and you're operating without the
full picture,
mistakes are going to happen. And even though
those mistakes are not going to be your fault,
because you didn't know you're undermining boss
has intentionally withheld that information. And
then they're going to hold you disproportionately
accountable, like we just talked about. I see this
very commonly in conjunction with the seventh sign
of an undermining boss. And that is even though
you're a superstar, they're giving you the most
mundane tasks. Let's say for example, that you are
a superstar conductor, you know, all of the right
people Who can get all of the right things done.
And this makes you the best person to take the
lead on a project because you're basically best
friends with everyone that needs to collaborate
with you who better to take it on? Well, this is
kind of terrifying for your undermining boss,
because you're undermining boss is probably toxic,
they're probably an insecure boss, and they don't
want you to look better than them or their
favorite team member, though, instead of assigning
you to lead the project, they're going to assign
you to do something totally random, like plan the
next team happy hour. And I personally think this
is really alienating, especially for my career.
besties here, because you're watching, you're
obviously someone who cares about your career and
is proactive in your success. So the fact that you
are being held back is really unfair and very
frustrating. But there's one more sign that we
need to talk about before we get to the whole what
to do about it thing, and that is the eight sign
and that is the language that they use. There is a
lot of undermining language that is used out work,
when you're have a boss who undermines you, you're
undermining boss probably uses some choice
language, they make remarks about you being so
young, you know, you're pretty good at this bar
girl. It's amazing what you've been able to
accomplish with only a bachelor's degree. You
know, those passive aggressive, underhanded
comments that they make such as those were on the
service level, they're giving you some level of
acknowledgement for a job well done. But really
what they're doing is they're taking a job. And
what they're really doing is they're undermining
your professionalism, your capabilities, and how
deserving you are being in the role that you're
in. Now, obviously, this isn't a checklist doesn't
have to be like, Oh, we checked for your bosses
undermining you. But if you only checked one,
they're not these are signs. And really, you're in
the position where you are able to determine if
you have an undermining boss. Now, if you do feel
like you have an undermining boss, because these
were in home, there's a few things that you can do
about it. The first thing that I suggest you do,
if you have an undermining manager, is to figure
out why they're doing it, I think it's very easy
to assume that an undermining boss is doing it
intentionally. And maliciously, I think in many
cases, it comes down to insecurity and bad
management. And for this, I do suggest having a
little bit of compassion and a little bit of
empathy. A lot of managers don't get any
leadership training or thrown into roles that
they're not very good at. And they themselves are
not given the tools to succeed. Now,
unfortunately, because of that insecurity, and it
creates, some of them end up consciously or
subconsciously taking out on others, especially
high potential employees, at least in my opinion,
that's what I've seen. If your manager is new, if
you know that they're not very confident in your
role, this might be something that you're able to
build a better relationship and maybe help boost
their confidence to resolve them undermining you
at work. Not saying that's the answer in all
situations, but I'm saying that in some
situations, it will be. And really anytime that we
can approach a challenging situation at work with
kindness and compassion, the more likely we are to
succeed, the next step is to actually speak to
them about it. Now, you do want to be careful in
this conversation, you don't want to be triggering
their defenses so that they get mad and start
retaliating against you and stuff like that. But
you're an adult, you're a professional who is
serious about their job, and they should be as
well. And feedback should be bi directional. I
know for me, as a manager, if I was doing
something wrong, I greatly appreciated when it was
brought to my attention as long as it was brought
to my attention in the right way. Okay, to be
honest with me even in the wrong way, I was
totally fine with it. But something else that can
be very helpful in dealing with an undermining
boss is just making sure that you're setting good
boundaries, and that you are being proactive. Look
for workarounds. For example, if you're
undermining boss is stealing your ideas and taking
credit for your work is there ways that you can
make more people aware of the work that you're
doing without relying on your boss to do so if
your boss is nitpicking you in meetings with your
team, ask them to give you that feedback in an
more appropriate setting. Also, when the
undermining behavior at work does not cease,
especially if you have had a conversation with
your undermining boss about it. Make sure and keep
a paper trail. This paper trail also applies to
all of your awesomeness that you might not be
getting credit for, and all of the work that
you're doing. So if they try to leave you for a
mistake that you had nothing to do with or if
they're taking credit for your work. This is a way
that you can prove the work that you did. But
really ultimately, when it comes down to an
undermining boss, who is really set in their ways
they are not open to change, and maybe they are a
toxic boss. The only real solution when it comes
to toxic work environments is to exit the toxic
work environment.
If you're at a larger company, is it possible for
you to switch to a different team or have a
different manager? And if it's not possible? Is it
time for you to start looking around to see what
else is out there? Look, life is too short and you
have way too much potential to waste working for
an undermining boss in a toxic work environment.
If you think that you're undermining boss may have
actually created a toxic work environment but
you're not entirely sure go and check out this
video right here where I go through the toxic
workplace signs. If this video helped you figure
out if you're working with an undermining boss and
what to do about it, make sure and give it a
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After subscribing and becoming one of my career
besties as always my friend thank you so much for
watching. I will see you in the next video. Bye
for now.