A video popped up on my Twitter (yes, I’m still there) this week, which at first I thought had to be a parody. It featured the CEO of a company that describes itself as “a collective of dynamic brands that design the world we live in.” I have no idea what that means. In the video, this CEO appears to be holding a staff briefing and is responding to someone asking her how they should stay motivated if they know their bonus is going to get cut. You can see the whole thing here but in short, she doesn’t handle it well. She tells staff to stop thinking about themselves and focus on bringing the money in, leaving them with an old piece of advice:
“You can visit pity city, but you can’t live there.”
The video has gone viral for the obvious reason that it’s a millionaire CEO, berating her staff for wondering how they’re going to pay their bills. I suspect it’s also gone viral because she’s a woman, and that’s just not how we expect women leaders to behave these days. But over the last few months I’ve been working in a whole host of different businesses, delivering female leadership programmes and designing D&I strategies, and I’ve noticed a worrying trend… regardless of gender, when it comes to leadership it seems that soft power is out and the Wolf of Wall Street is in.
I’ve seen more bullying, more ultimatums and more diktats issued this year than in the nearly a decade that I’ve been working in this space. I’ve spoken to leaders who want to install spyware on their employees’ computers so they can see exactly how much work they’re doing when they’re not in the office.
I’ve comforted exhausted department heads who have worked non-stop for weeks on end to get a project finished, while their boss changed their mind on each stage of the process and got more and more irate as the deadline was pushed back. Nobody dared tell the boss that they were causing the delay.
I’ve led senior teams through discussions about harassment complaints brought against them, trying to help them see how they could find a way through where everyone felt supported, only to have them joke about seeing how many more people they could offend.
And my personal experience is being mirrored in the world.
The Confederation of British Industry, the UK’s most prominent business group, has been accused of allowing sexual misconduct and creating a culture which overlooks bad behaviour. (This will come as no surprise to anyone who has been to one of its events).
New research shows that a third of workers have experienced bullying at work disguised as “banter”.
Last year the advertising industry had its highest rate of employee turnover, with a churn rate of over 34%, since the financial crisis of 2008. High levels of burnout, gender and race discrimination, and levels of pay that only add to the financial crisis. I very much doubt they are the only industry experiencing this.
While flexibility is the one thing most senior women want more of, JP Morgan issued a statement saying all managing directors had to be in the office five days a week and anyone found to not be meeting their allocated in-office time would be subject to “corrective action.”
And of course, lest we forget, at this very moment the UK’s deputy Prime Minister is defending himself against allegations of bullying.
When I read these stories and think about my recent experiences in workplaces, I feel profoundly depressed. I know that at times of stress, we tend to become our worst selves. We become untrusting, judgemental and fearful of supporting others in case it comes at a cost to ourselves. And yet, I had hoped that we were at least in a place where we could recognise that this behaviour was conducive to neither productivity nor our own wellbeing. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case.
It would be nice to say that we should just ignore the bullies but the problem with that is that most of them seem to be in seats of power. So for every one bullying boss there are hundreds of people whose lives are being blighted by it. And if you’re one of those people, then I’m so sorry. Don’t be afraid to vote with your feet and go and find another job. When you’ve had someone screaming at you, telling you to get out of “pity city” and generally belittling your worth, it can feel as though you’ll never find anything better.
This is never the case. As well as finding the video of the MillerKnoll CEO, Twitter this week also threw up something really lovely - a tweet from one woman about how two years working a team that supported her had allowed her to find the balance and joy in work that she was seeking.
There is better out there. Go get it.
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Yes! People are the worst versions of themselves at the moment, and not just in the workplace 🫠
I think what made that video so viral was the "wait for it..." aspect. It starts off fine but, boy, did it get dark. And to your point about the dictator-leaders, I think it's the death throes of that way of working, and those that suffered it desperate to inflict it on others. It's not desired, nor is it sustainable. I love that Spain and England are flirting with a 4-day workweek, because we are all craving that work-life balance, and are sick of making CEOs richer and less human. xo