31 Telltale Signs You Are A Horrible Boss

Horrible Bosses (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

No one starts out their career trying to be a horrible boss.  Yet, it�s amazing what a vast majority of folks seem to accomplish this feat with absolutely no training whatsoever.

Maybe we�re born bad bosses.  It just comes naturally.

Hopefully, you can shake off some of the worst traits.

The first step for any addict is recognizing his or her problems.  So, start by reviewing the list below.

How many of these do you violate?

These are the 31 telltale signs you are a horrible boss � and what you probably think of each of these points:

1. You give your direct reports little to no guidance.  Plans? Who need them?  You work in a very dynamic industry/company.  You prefer to make decisions on the fly � in the moment.  Long term planning and telling your team what they�re trying to accomplish this year individually and as a group? That�s something they did back in the 70s before email.

2. You are supposed to do performance reviews every year but manage to skip them.  When HR has forced you to do them, you don�t tell your people anything constructive.  Ugh. Performance reviews?  Is it that time of year again?  They�re such a waste of time.  You�ve got to actually sit with each of your people in your office and actually talk to them not about you, but them.  There�s too much on your and their plates to waste time on that.  Surely, you can push them off a few months.

3. You like to bully your reports.  You hate it when your team members get too uppity or lippy.  What is it with this younger generation today?  You�ve got to take some of these people down a peg or two so they know their place.  It�s especially important to do this with people who attended a more prestigious college than you or seem to have some halo over them based on something they did in their prior job.

4. You spend more time playing office politics to get the next promotion instead of actually doing work your group is responsible for.  Hey, it�s how you get ahead right?  So why knock playing politics.  You probably wouldn�t be in your current job if you hadn�t brown-nosed to get it, so why stop doing something that�s worked before.  And in terms of you not getting enough work done, isn�t that why you�ve got people working for you?

5. Whenever possible, you rip off and take credit for the work of others � presenting it as your own.  Look, the way you see it, your team members work for you.  So what�s theirs is yours.  And when you�ve ripped off your peers� ideas, you once had a thought of that idea before so-and-so made a presentation on it anyway.  So, it�s not really her idea, as you see it.

6. You put down your team members in front of others and never give them any credit.  This is about running a tight ship on your team. You can never let any of your people get too big a head on their shoulders. When they screw up, they need to know it � and everyone else on the team needs to know it so they don�t make the same mistake and so that they never want to get yelled at publicly.  Intimidation brings out greatness.