How to make your only employee feel like shit

A public service announcement from the effective boss's league.


1. Force them to come to a meeting on their own time "because you take better notes than I do." But don't tell them what the meeting's about, or why you're having it, and definitely don't ask if they had other plans.

2. Be sure to ignore them throughout the entire meeting, pointedly, if possible. In fact, be sure to make your husband sit next to her, although you do run the risk of her not minding this because your husband is actually a pleasant, thoughtful guy, who simply has horrendous taste in women.

3. When asked about things you should already have done, be sure to fob it off as a side effect of not having the right frame of mind, or because you just don't have the right person to bounce ideas off of. Make sure you purposefully don't look at your employee during this dialog.

4. Be sure to bring up, at least once, that you don't mind being the hardass boss, because "People need to realize that they have jobs because of ME."

5. Take extra pains to not include your employee in any of the conversations, and instead, center non-work-related chatter around your expensive jewelry, your children's school, etc. Involving her in the conversation means that she's part of the group, and it's bad enough you have to pay for her half portion of spearfish.

6. Whenever someone offers you a suggestion, be sure to completely disregard it, and continue yammering about whatever you think is important. Be sure to blatantly miss the point too. Why should your employee be the only uncomfortable one at the table?

Yeah, those will definitely get you on the way to having your employee crying the entire drive home. Sure, she may just be stressed out and she just really needs a hug. Ok, a hug, and maybe a beer. And the closest set of arms she'd like to be comforted by are an hour and a half away, which makes her feel like a gigantic loser in and of itself, but y'know, your efforts will definitely go a long way to making her feel like a total piece of shit. Maybe she's overly worried about her cat, because she looked up the symptoms the cat has online, and anytime a diagnosis includes the phrase "potentially fatal", it's not all sunshine and roses. Even if she knows that she has tried to get you to do many of the things suggested to you this evening, but can't control you, and can't tell you to sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up for five minutes, because you sign her paycheck, she'll still feel like a total piece of worthless shit thanks to you. Good for you, effective boss.

Fear not. You'll be able to find that "special someone" to bounce your ideas off of really soon, and they can be eternally grateful to you for providing them with a job (just don't promise them health insurance, 'k?), because you won't have to sign my paychecks for much longer.



I had been toying with the notion of staying on to get her through this event, but after we add "made me cry" to the list of shit that is unacceptable (and I am so not a fucking crier, not even duckie), the scales just tipped overwhelmingly in favor of getting out. Now. So, um, good luck with that replacement, crazylady.