As much as we might love what we do, we can’t always love the people we work with – especially when it comes to our boss.
And yet so much of our productivity, happiness and satisfaction at work is determined by this particular individual. Men and women who often have zero training in the art of management get to where they are through attrition, and are more often than not too busy dealing with their personal reputations to bother with developing their teams.
It’s a problem that’s so rampant in Australia that positive psychologist Michelle McQuaid recently told me she believes it’s the number one reason women quit their jobs. She conducted her own online poll to find the extent of the problem and found that three out of four employees report that their boss is the most stressful part of their job.
McQuaid’s gone on to write about the problem with her aptly-titled 5 Reasons To Tell Your Boss To Go Fuck Themselves. It’s a book in which she speaks from experience, having told her own boss where to go once upon a time – a guy who was making her life miserable by complaining about her resilience and telling her to toughen up.
“I said ‘With the greatest respect, when it comes to my resilience you can go and fuck yourself’,” McQuaid said.
Some of Australia’s most prominent businesswomen openly admit to firing their boss at some point during their career.
Red Balloon founder Naomi Simson recalls how during her previous career in the corporate world she’d more often than not “resigned bosses”.
“I would coach young people now and say ‘Don’t resign [from] a boss because they could leave’, but I did,” she says.
Many women “fire their boss”, without finding a new one first.
Earlier this week I caught up with a friend who could barely contain her excitement about the fact she’s starting a new job next week. It wasn’t what she had planned – which was to stay with her previous employer another year before making a move – but it was an opportunity that came about when dealing with her previous boss became so difficult that she simply quit.
The motivation to find a new job is never greater than once you’ve handed in your notice, she explained.
Still, unless you’re fairly confident with your financial situation, starting that new business idea or of quickly finding a new employer, quitting before you’ve found where the next pay cheque is coming from may not be the wisest move.
But there’s no reason to not line up the new opportunity and then happily resign your boss.
Just be nice about it. It’s a small world after all.
Do you fire bosses? Would you like to fire one in 2013?