Tweet
I have really reached the end of the line with my current job which I've been in for 6 and a half years now and simply cannot tolerate my boss’ controlling, micromanaging, OCD behaviour which is starting to eat away at my psyche and confidence. He started a year and a half ago and since then 2 of my previous work colleagues have already left, a some months apart from being long term happy employees with my old boss to falling apart, stressed out and fed up, simply because they could not tolerate him any longer.
The micromanaging, the intensity, the obsession with his job has never stopped, irrespective of what I do or don't do. The OCD explains the constant perfectionism, the exaggerated reactions over the very minor mistakes, just like the OCD person who would go mad if their things were moved a millimetre out of place. Every day spent with him is so draining, I feel exhausted even when's he just in the office and not speaking. Constantly picking up minor faults whether it's one small typo in an email to pointing out one thing I didn't manage to do despite having done everything else perfectly. He went away earlier this year for 2 weeks on holiday and spent every day on his emails. Doesn't ever stop working, evenings, weekends, doesn't matter. Every event, every meeting, every task is like a military exercise as if we're going out to battle, which is why whenever I do mess up even in such a minor way, he loses the plot and almost takes it personally as if I've insulted his mother. This could be a slight misunderstanding with the wording of an email to simply not doing something he expected me to do but didn't tell me.
I can provide so many examples of the above but I don’t want to come across as ranting and take up too much time here and also there’s just so many. He has this way of making you feel so useless and it's just demoralising to the point where you lose confidence in yourself and start believing you have a problem. Like early on, how he mentioned to both myself and my ex colleague, that we had a problem with attention to detail, due to making the odd typo here and there or misspelling someone's name once. I almost started to believe that perhaps I did have an issue with attention to detail because he said this numerous times in the first few months every time I made a very minor mistake. Looking back, this is simply being human and making a small mistake. Isn't this gaslighting?
Anyway, I'm really at a breaking point now, and so my question is, is there a reasonable cause for me to approach HR and at least discuss this? Will they be even interested in this? I don’t think I have a legal case here as nothing criminal or unethical has taken place and he hasn’t been abusive as such but just psychological damage and unfair treatment, in my view. But that’s the issue, how can this be proved? I have some emails which reflect his overbearing personality which may help. Obviously I don't want my boss to find out and wondering if HR will be unbiased. I think they should be given that they are a contractor. I just feel it’s come to the point now where he needs someone to hold him accountable. He’ll be totally fine with clients and others outside of the team but with the staff, he's a different person. It’s the reason these two other Members of staff left, my old boss who did the handover cannot stand him either and now myself, desperate to get out.
The micromanaging, the intensity, the obsession with his job has never stopped, irrespective of what I do or don't do. The OCD explains the constant perfectionism, the exaggerated reactions over the very minor mistakes, just like the OCD person who would go mad if their things were moved a millimetre out of place. Every day spent with him is so draining, I feel exhausted even when's he just in the office and not speaking. Constantly picking up minor faults whether it's one small typo in an email to pointing out one thing I didn't manage to do despite having done everything else perfectly. He went away earlier this year for 2 weeks on holiday and spent every day on his emails. Doesn't ever stop working, evenings, weekends, doesn't matter. Every event, every meeting, every task is like a military exercise as if we're going out to battle, which is why whenever I do mess up even in such a minor way, he loses the plot and almost takes it personally as if I've insulted his mother. This could be a slight misunderstanding with the wording of an email to simply not doing something he expected me to do but didn't tell me.
I can provide so many examples of the above but I don’t want to come across as ranting and take up too much time here and also there’s just so many. He has this way of making you feel so useless and it's just demoralising to the point where you lose confidence in yourself and start believing you have a problem. Like early on, how he mentioned to both myself and my ex colleague, that we had a problem with attention to detail, due to making the odd typo here and there or misspelling someone's name once. I almost started to believe that perhaps I did have an issue with attention to detail because he said this numerous times in the first few months every time I made a very minor mistake. Looking back, this is simply being human and making a small mistake. Isn't this gaslighting?
Anyway, I'm really at a breaking point now, and so my question is, is there a reasonable cause for me to approach HR and at least discuss this? Will they be even interested in this? I don’t think I have a legal case here as nothing criminal or unethical has taken place and he hasn’t been abusive as such but just psychological damage and unfair treatment, in my view. But that’s the issue, how can this be proved? I have some emails which reflect his overbearing personality which may help. Obviously I don't want my boss to find out and wondering if HR will be unbiased. I think they should be given that they are a contractor. I just feel it’s come to the point now where he needs someone to hold him accountable. He’ll be totally fine with clients and others outside of the team but with the staff, he's a different person. It’s the reason these two other Members of staff left, my old boss who did the handover cannot stand him either and now myself, desperate to get out.
Comment