Working for a difficult boss can put a damper on your job. For one thing, it may be hard to get up and go into work when you don’t get along with your boss, and when you don't know how to handle it. When you have a difficult boss to deal with, here are some tricks to keep things as professional as possible. You don’t want your feelings to get in the way of how you perform your job, and more importantly, you don’t want your feelings to be the reason you lose your job.
If you have a difficult boss, you want to keep things as platonic as possible in the workplace. You do not want your true feelings about him/her to be the main focus of your performance. To start with, you need to remember that you are the subordinate in this relationship, and your boss hold your future in their hands. You may want to think twice before deciding to confront your boss—especially if this job is the main source of your income.
One thing you can try is booking an informal meeting over coffee, or even lunch with your boss—and, yes, you need to make it clear that this is YOUR treat. If nothing else, he/she will realize that you are genuinely interested in making this position work—why ELSE would you have volunteered to pick up the tab!
If, after this meeting, you judge the situation to be irresolvably desperate, it’s always a good idea to have another job lined up before you even think about abandoning your current position. As hard as it may be for you, you won’t advance your cause by reacting to your boss’ harsh criticisms on an emotional level. Remind yourself that you are, after all, dealing with the boss, here so simply acknowledge the comment and move on.
The trick here is to avoid letting it be known that you don’t care for them. This will only serve to fuel the fires of discontent, and won’t help you obtain a good recommendation for your next position. The best strategy to counteract this is to find a colleague with whom you get along well, and ask him or her to serve as a reference for you when the time comes. While not as good as having a boss’ endorsements of your capabilities, it is certainly better than having a negative recommendation. And, you can simply explain to your prospective new employer that you didn’t ‘see eye to eye’ with your previous supervisor, but that you DID enjoy both the company and the work you did.
Before you throw in the towel, however, another possibility is to find out whether there may be other positions in the company that you can fill. Keep cool, stay calm and do the best job you possibly can until such time as you are either re-assigned or find a new job.
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