A friend of mine told me some stories about her work life that really just tick me off, if I'm being honest.
She's in sales and has always had a knack for it. Always hitting quota and then some. Winning awards like "Top Salesperson of the Year." Not kidding.
But it was never enough for her CEO.
He was always demanding more. Not just from her, but from everyone at the company. It created such an unhealthy culture that people started leaving. Literally for their health.
He'd start every meeting with "feedback is a gift." Then he'd fire anyone who actually gave him something critical or helpful when it came to his leadership.
Eventually, all the people between my friend and the CEO quit. At a pretty rapid pace. So she became a direct report to him.
She had a customer that decided not to renew. Within moments of the CEO finding out he had her alone in a room.
"You're the manager over that account. This is your fault. What did you do wrong?"
Except my friend wasn't the problem. Her job was to connect the customer with highly technical people responsible for building and maintaining the systems the customer relied on. But all those technical people had quit, too.
For the same reason her manager quit. And his manager. And everyone else who had gotten close enough to the CEO to realize they couldn't do it anymore.
And when the technical people left, and the bad Glassdoor reviews kept talented people from wanting to replace them, the customer suffered.
So my friend spent more than a year trying to sort out this problem that she didn't create, without the team she needed to solve it. Then the person who actually created the problem asked her what she had done wrong at 4pm on a Friday. Perfect timing to ruin a weekend.
This wasn't the first time this had happened to her either. Even small, very obviously not her fault things she'd take the blame for. Like scheduling conflicts.
CEO: "Why did you book a sales call over my meeting? You should know better."
Her: "I booked the sales call before you booked your meeting."
CEO: "No you didn't."
She'd even go as far as sending the receipts to prove she did. Never a word back. Never a "ope, you're right. Sorry, I overreacted."
This job paid her mortgage. Put food on the table. Supported her family and the life she was building. And every day, she was terrified that this guy was going to fire her.
Even though she was the top sales rep by a mile. Her customers loved her, the team loved her, and she's genuinely great at what she does. She was trapped.
That really bothered me. Because how do you get someone as talented as my friend to feel like she's the one who's not good enough?
I said to her, "this guy doesn't deserve your time or your talent."
She agreed. And guess what? She left, too.
There are really good bosses out there. It's worth leaving to find them.