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Yelling

Here are the questions filed under this category. To read Ken's advice on any item, click on the link "Read Ken's Answer."


I was just reprimanded by my manager in front of our whole department. She was yelling and screaming about my project being late, but I told her several days ago that I needed more help to get it done. She wouldn't listen to me then, and there was no way to get a word in today. What should I say to her now?
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I love my job in this fast-paced environment. My job is very detailed, and if something is not done exactly right, the boss yells and curses at me in front of everyone. We are all women, but if others make mistakes, she does not treat them like this. I admire and respect this woman, but after our conflicts, I leave upset and hurt. After each episode, she leaves an apology on my desk. I cry after reading it and wonder how things can be different.
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I am an over 50-year-old woman, and my boss is an alcoholic. Some days he can be normal, but on most days he yells, screams, and curses at me for no reason. I am scared to death of him. I have been on the job for over two years, but I cannot tolerate his behavior any more. I have sent out resumes and received no replies. I am discouraged. What can you suggest?
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About a year ago, the company president's assistant was fired because she would yell back when being screamed at and cussed at by him. I schedule his meetings, and I too get yelled at and cussed at. If he makes mistakes, he yells at me. We are a small office and there is no human resources professional. What do I do?
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I can honestly admit that I am a screamer, but none of the employees in my charge seem to care about it. If I blow up, I apologize, but my manager recently came down on me about my outbursts, and he did not care that my employees are not upset by them. How can I get him to stop worrying about this?
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There is one person in our department who has been making sugar-coated mean little comments to me and taking shots at my work whenever she can. When she did it again last week, I completely lost it and blew up at her. The problem is that I did this just as our manager appeared, and I ended up getting a verbal warning. Now what should I do?
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I can honestly admit that I am a screamer, but none of the employees in my charge seem to care about it. If I blow up, I apologize, but my manager recently came down on me about my outbursts, and he did not care that my employees are not upset by them. How can I get him to stop worrying about this?
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I report to one of several managers-on-duty, and she yells at me and insists I do everything her way. Her boss, the general manager, gives me totally different directions. If I do what the general manager says, the manager-on-duty yells. My supervisor decided to quit because of the manager-on-duty. How do I deal with her?
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Our manager is a tyrant. She yells and screams at most of us, makes unreasonable demands, and generally treats us poorly. The turnover in our department is the highest in the company. We have gone to senior management and told them about this, but they do not seem to care. Is there anything else we should be doing?
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I recently began a new job as an estimator. The owners of the company are young and both lack formal education. One owner yells and screams at his subordinates, and his words carry throughout the building. Isn't there an appropriate method to inform employees of errors or potential errors?
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I am the manager of the accounting department at a large title insurance company. There is a title officer who has a history of angry outbursts, mistreatment of assistants, and verbal abuse of co-workers, regardless of warnings from upper management. He claims that people are yelling at him, so he yells at us. His behavior is abusive and against all company policies and harassment laws. I need some advice.
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There are about 20 people in our department, but the manager is mean to me. She yells and screams at me if I make the slightest mistake, but rarely raises her voice to the others. I hate to say it, but she makes me cry. What can I do?
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An employee who throws a temper tantrum, screams, shoves boxes out of the door, swears, and then walks over to a table and punches a box would probably be immediately escorted out the door. But what do you do when the owner of the company does that?
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When one of the people in my department made a huge mistake on a project, I screamed at him. He went to my boss and I was formally reprimanded. The problem is that when I make a mistake, my boss yells his head off at me, and he's not the only one around here who yells. Does this sound fair and what should I do?
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My boss made condescending and patronizing statements which escalated to yelling and screaming, which escalated to kicking boxes out the door and punching them. The boss said that employers can treat employees any way they want and employee relations have nothing to do with it. I quit the next day. I don't know about you or anybody else, but I certainly did not want to stay in that kind of environment.
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My boss stormed into my office and yelled and swore at me, saying that I did not give him the full story on a problem we had discussed the day before. He then misquoted what I had told him. When I said that to him, he told me I was lying. How do you deal with a boss like this?
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I am an administrative assistant, and my boss was starting a meeting and he asked me to go down the hall and tell another manager who was supposed to attend that the meeting is about to begin. I stuck my head in the manager's office and he yelled at me and said he knows the meeting is starting and he'll be there when he can. I left and simply told my manager what he said. Should I tell my manager about the screaming?
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I was at a meeting with several other managers today and the senior manager running the meeting attacked one of the others because of a very minor mistake. As the meeting was closing, I mentioned a point that needed further discussion, and he jumped at me and told me I was wrong and declared the meeting over. How do you deal with someone like this?
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My question is about an organizational behavior that is creating a lot of stress, mostly at work. I consider raising my voice different from yelling. In your opinion, is there a difference? What can I do to have others understand the difference?
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I am in management, and I admit that I scream at my employees when necessary. If I really lose it, I apologize later. My people understand me and work hard for me. Now some new young vice president has told me to tone it down. I've had a productive department for years, and I don't see why I should change.
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I have a co-worker who constantly finds fault in all of us. She brings up petty stuff to management, and she yells at other co-workers, is very confrontational, and becomes angry at the drop of a dime. This past weekend she purposely pulled a stunt that caused me to get written up. I’ve tried to resolve conflicts with her personally, and I’ve talked to management about her, but they almost seem afraid of her. What can I do now?
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My company is filled with people who yell and scream. If you don’t yell, you are seen as weak or uncertain about what you are saying. I don’t like working this way, and I am trying to stay calm and get people to stop yelling. I have been getting headaches almost every day, and I wonder if it’s worth it. What do you think?
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I work in a relatively small business that is now very, very successful. I’ve worked my way from $8.00/hr + Commission (@28,000/yr) to $20.00/hr + Commission & bonuses(@65,000/yr) in 6 years. I know that I’m the highest paid employee, and that I’m satisfied with my pay. I also know I’m an over achiever and I’ve brought the company from 130th in our industry to the top-dealer in 6 years total. I know for a fact I’ve made huge improvements to this business and I have a great relationship with the majority of the other employees. Although, I am not the “general manager” and have yet to receive an actual title - I’m definitely the coordinator and actually manage the dealership. Now the owner’s daughter has decided to come in more often and try to take on the role as general manager. She has no management experience (other then hiring & firing 10 or so employees within this company). She causes extreme amounts of drama with and extremely flirty attitude with employees, customers, and even local delivery men causing more issues than you could ever imagine. She does not come in at normal hours, maybe 3 to 4 days a week and if she’s there maybe 4 hours she’s paid bills and sent me off to run her personal errands. (Today I picked her up a fountain poured coke, and picked up two rings from the local jeweler) She does not have a real business plan, nor a true job description, or standard order of operations for the employees and their job duties. The rules change on a daily basis. She is extremely demanding and does not like to be shown how to do something, even if it is imperative to the business or a prospective new customer. For instance, this week I was delivering a purchased unit to a new customer out of state when she called and informed me that the salesman were all away and that she needed to know how much the two units we just finished up cost were... I told her the retail figures and she wanted to know actual cost so she could intelligently talk to a potential customer about pricing. I informed her that I knew one unit was completely entered in our dealer management system, but the other was not. I also informed her that I did not know the actual dealer cost of this unit, nor the other unit off the top of my head. I informed her that she could easily look at the cost in our system for the one unit that was entered. She said “ I’m not going through that, that takes entirely too long, this is absolutely ridiculous that we do not have the actual dealer cost written down in the units files!” ((Yelling)) I had the phone away from my ear and even the owner could hear every word she was yelling. (He looked confused during this) She kept yelling at me, and I expressed that if she wanted to know the actual dealer cost that there was a very easy 30second procedure she would need to do... she just kept yelling... I told her that we could go over everything tomorrow morning, and she kept yelling, I said we can discuss this tomorrow... she paused for a moment and I heard nothing so I hung up the phone. She immediately called the owner (right next to me) and started yelling at him about the situation and he said “we can deal with this tomorrow, no big deal”. Just from his looks I only assumed that he understood that she only wanted it her way and that she was not going to it the way everyone else does it. That wasn’t the case the next morning... The next morning I was called into her office with her and the owner. I was written up for insubordination because I hung up on her. I spoke my peace that I was not to be yelled at like a dog, and that I was not a child and should not be spoken to in any other fashion. She said that she never raised her voice and that I refused to do what she said. I kept my mouth shut... I never refused anything... I looked at the owner hoping he would be a more logical person because he witnessed the confrontation, but he agreed with her and even to the point saying that I was in the wrong and that was uncalled for. I did sign the paper with a very shaky hand.... I have addressed a multitude of other issues that she has caused to the owner, but it's been no help... it is only getting worse now that she is coming around more often. I also keep a very close eye on the bookkeeping and the profits and loss reports. She has started two new credit cards under the business’ name and she and her husband uses them for personal usage. (Vacations, fuel, hotels, food, clothing, home furnishings) I’m taking thousands and thousands of dollars! This has now put a financial burden on the company and it makes it very hard to buy product to resale if the money is gone. I rely on this for a huge part of my income. I’ve put in for other jobs, and I’ve received a few offers, but nothing close to what I’m making now. I would accept a pay cut for happiness, but I can’t accept a 50% cut. Recently, we’ve had quite a bit of employee turnover at the dealership and we’ve lost a bunch of good people. A retired industrial plant operations director decided to try selling for us, and he said it best on his personal goodbye letter left for myself... “Get out of here, you’ll do great, open your own shop! I can’t take the drama and abuse, I don’t have to work, but I thought I would enjoy this... boy I was wrong - You can’t work under someone who operates their business by the “seagull management methods” “Comes in every now-and-then, squaks a lot, shits on everything, and then just leaves!” I need some advice... I have the knowledge, I have the customer base that I know would follow, my other half is very supporting and is always after me to open my own business.... but I don’t have the finances... HELP KEN! P.S. please excuse any and all dramatically errors, run-ons, and incomplete sentences... it’s nearly 11pm after a 13hr day that has dragged me down...
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During my mid-year review, I took the opportunity to bring forward my concerns and frustrations since being hired, and my boss stood up, got belligerent and yelled: “I can’t take this any more. This is a job! There are lots of jobs out there, maybe you should take a look around and go get one where you can sit in a corner and do projects all day. I have a lot of people I need to take care of, not just you. You obviously are not happy but I cannot make you happy. You need to decide if you are happy--and I’d like to know soon--because we are hiring.” She then stormed out of the room and returned to our department, got her coat, etc. and said to the team coordinator: “I need to get out of here NOW. I need a cocktail, badly.” [or something to that effect] and left enraged. It was said loud enough that others could hear and were alarmed. I was later texted by co-workers asking, “what happened? …are you ok?” The Assistant Manager was in the room with me during the yelling. He texted me later saying, "If you want to take a sick day that is fine and if you want to you talk with HR, they will be around next week." Is this acceptable behavior from my boss and should I discuss with HR? I have heard that HR is not helpful with employees, they tend towards blaming the employee and backing management…. Thank you.
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