How to deal with a really bad CEO

Dear Bob …

I have some understanding of being demeaned while at work. My boss, the CEO, likes to play games with his employees. He will put them in a position so that he can use them to get something done for him and then he pulls you out of that high position and puts you in a smaller one and then after that nags at you, intimidates you, threatens you until you quit as he is through with you and don’t need you anymore. It blows my mind on some of the stuff that he does.

I was covering for his Assistant one day, it was the final day, Friday, and I forgot to take his mail down. He came into my office and started chit chatting about his assistant and if I thought after having all this time off if she was coming back, if she missed us, etc. Then, out of the blue he says “I am so disappointed in you, I am very, very disappointed in you. You forgot to take my mail down and therefore it didn’t get taken to the mailbox and I had to run to the post office to make sure it went through.”

By the way, he goes to the post office at least three times a day even when I am not covering which makes me think that his assistant forgets all the time. Anyway, I apologized to him and he said Well, you are going to have to do better than that, a lot better than that. He wrote me up for mispelling Michael on a phone note and says that I broke the computer in my office. I didn’t as it was so old that the button just got stuck and wouldn’t come out. It would have happened to anyone who was going to use that computer.

Any little thing he thinks he can get me on he will make a big deal of it. A lot of the times are when everyone in the office is gone so no one hears him. His assistant supports him 100%, although all of us employees feel she has her …..so far up his …..she is stuck there. His assistant was put in the basement when the last CEO was there as he didn’t like her and she never followed through on her work, (she still doesn’t). But, whenever she messes up it is okay. I had to correct the fact that she forgot to set up a meeting the CEO wanted. He came to my door and said, “Can you make sure that this certain meeting got done.?”

Now you know that his assistant, was very busy trying to get out of here and she had so much going on that she could have innocently forgotten. He was sticking up for her. His last CCO quit two months ago because he treated her like dirt and she had a three hour evaluation with nothing good to say about her at all. She is the one that got this organization through all the inspections, wrote policies and procedures, did all his work. She said something wrong one day and he had it out for her ever since then. If he wants rid of you he is on you like glue until you give up.

How can I stop the harrassing and let the board know what is actually going on? He is just covering himself with the board. They asked him why the CCO quit and he said Gee, I don’t know. Don’t ask me, I don’t know. He golfs with most of the key staff and he has snowed them too. WHY DOESN’T ANYONE OPEN THEIR EYES AND SEE WHAT IS HAPPENING TO THIS PLACE? WHAT CAN I DO? I NEED SOME ADVICE AND HELP.

– Desperate

Dear Desperate …

This is the most common question in Advice Line: I have an awful CEO; how do I fix the situation. The answer is, you can’t. You can’t effectively let the board know, because the board doesn’t care. You can’t have a heart-to-heart with the CEO because this sort of behavior works for the CEO. It’s how he got to be CEO, in fact.

You have three choices. You can:

• Grow a thick skin so you don’t care what the CEO says. Just nod and make appropriate noises until he goes away, then go back to your job.

• You can perfect the art of manipulating the guy. With an ego like you describe it shouldn’t be very hard to figure out which buttons to push. His assistant has managed it, after all, and you didn’t suggest there’s a non-professional relationship there.

• You can leave. This is the best choice, because it gives you the opportunity to leave a poisonous environment and enter one where you enjoy showing up every day and are motivated to do great work.

Why on earth would you want to stay where you are? Unless what you’re looking for is revenge. If it is … forget about it. You aren’t going to get it. The worst that’s going to happen to the guy is that he ends up failing to perform. If he does, the board will toss him out, with enough money that he can retire in comfort on a warm, sandy beach in the Bahamas.

No satisfaction there.

So give up any dreams you have of whistle-blowing. Give up any hope of turning the place around. Exchange it all for the hope of peace of mind – what you get from taking control of your career.

– Bob

Powered by ScribeFire.