Jerks at Work w/ Tessa West
In this episode of Talk Nerdy, Cara is joined by NYU psychology professor Dr. Tessa West to talk about her new book, "Jerks at Work: Toxic Coworkers and What to Do About Them." They talk about the types of conflicts you're likely to encounter in the workplace and evidence-based approaches for dealing with toxic bosses, annoying coworkers, and all-around jerks at work. Follow Tessa: @TessaWestNYU
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00:00.00
talknerdy
Well Tessa. Thank you so much for joining me today I am excited to talk about you know once in a while a book comes across my desk a topic comes across my desk that is so translational you know and I know it's kind of weird when we talk about psychology to use terms like translational science because like.
00:02.12
Tessa
Thank you for having me.
00:19.48
talknerdy
Most of psychology is translational science but it's so news you can use and I feel like this is such a joy to be able to talk about stuff that the people listening to the show right now. Can you know immediately put into action.
00:33.92
Tessa
Yeah I think the goal in writing this book was to actually take all the science and and kind of frame it it away where people can read it and walk away with very concrete things that they can do to improve their lives at work so you don't have to have a ph d you don't have to have majored in psychology to understand what I talk about it's just. Very straightforward everyday tactics meant to improve our lives at work.
00:55.33
talknerdy
I Love that I love that so much. So before we talk about those tactics I Want to know so you're coming at this as a social psychologist right? Not like an industrial organizational psychologist or is there a lot of crossover there.
01:10.50
Tessa
That's a great question I'm trained as a kind of classic social Psychologist. So What I study is the science of awkward interaction and just kind of broadly speaking I sort of found myself in this in this niche area over time realizing. Watching people where they're really anxious and uncomfortable is is really interesting and you know from everything from our doctor-patient interactions to talking to a boss about a raise you know there's basic psychological processes at play things like how we feel inside doesn't match the behaviors on our outside. Um. The more anxious we are the more we Smile. You know these kinds of interesting contradictions I find super fascinating and how it disrupts communication and all different kinds of social interactions.
01:52.25
talknerdy
Oh for sure and I've always thought about so my I went back to school for psych after several years away as a science communicator and I'm actually focusing on clinical psych. So I'm mostly you know working with people through um, ah. Diagnoses I work with people who have cancer working with them on you know their stressors in life and what I find seems to hold true kind of across people is that who you are at work.
02:16.31
Tessa
Um, so system listen.
02:23.77
talknerdy
Is not always or I should say maybe some of the coping mechanisms and the skills that you use to manage your work aspect of of your identity or your personality does not always translate to let's say your relationships or your self-care or whatever so you may have. Total skills in 1 aspect of your life that actually bite you in the ass in another aspect.
02:44.27
Tessa
You know it's so Interesting. You say that because people actually are pretty good or at least you know they try to figure out the tough stuff at homes with their spouses. They'll go to Therapy. They'll learn to how to have conflict with their teenager. And then when they go to work it sort of all falls apart and they don't actually use some of those same tactics when it comes to interacting with a boss or a coworker. We kind of walk in as if we don't know anything right? where like just babies just bored and plocked into this workplace and we're like how do I.
03:04.80
talknerdy
The.
03:16.61
Tessa
Get my way with you know, a difficult person at work I agree at this with my really difficult teenager and I saved my marriage even but somehow I can't figure it out. So I think actually a lot of the skills can translate from 1 domain to another but we're just not very good at like seeing that connective tissue.
03:31.95
talknerdy
Smart Um, for sure. No, that's so true and of course I can't help but think you know even just looking at the title of your book a jerks at work and thinking about this idea of how do we deal with difficult people.
03:33.57
Tessa
And you know it's there but we just don't see it necessarily.
03:49.29
talknerdy
I can't help but think of that ridiculous old um Dane Cook standup when he's talking about how like every friend group has a Karen and Karen's like such a bitch and then he's like oh I see you looking there like there's no Karen in my friend group. You're the Karen you know and so and so I can't help but think like news you.
03:54.49
Tessa
Yeah, it.
04:01.55
Tessa
Ah, totally.
04:07.80
talknerdy
And use in case, you're the jerk at work too because you may be and not even realize it.
04:07.90
Tessa
Ah I think most of us and I like I'm not the world's most optimistic person about humanity. So that's probably I'll lead with that. But I think most of us probably all of us.
04:18.32
talknerdy
Ah.
04:24.61
Tessa
Have the ability to be a jerk and have been a jerk at work at some point like we all have this worst case scenario version of ourselves that probably came out at some point in the pandemic. You know when we're under stress and we're anxious and we're not getting support. It's just really hard to admit when it's us because a it's super threatening but be no one.
04:42.85
talknerdy
Right.
04:43.90
Tessa
Tells you, you know? So We think that no news is good news but there's all this great research showing that even in exit interviews people will just flat out light to their boss while they leave. They always say it's compensation or work hour flexibility. It's almost never compensation or work hour flexibility. It's their boss sucks and. We Just don't have a good way of having these conversations so we avoid them and then you know we talk about people behind their back but we just assume no, one's doing it to us so we have this positivity bias that I think makes it really difficult for us to even get the feedback when we are a jerk at work. Um, and then of course that just perpetuates.
05:09.11
talknerdy
Right.
05:18.75
talknerdy
And then of course on the flip side of that and this is something that has happened to me very explicitly and I worked through it in therapy for almost a year before I finally felt kind of strong enough to.
05:19.65
Tessa
Problem.
05:34.28
talknerdy
Speak out and be public about it. But I worked on a television show I used to be an on cameraa and I shouldn't say used to be I Still do some of that work. But um I did a live daily television show and um, my executive producer like hated women and gaslit the shit out of me and I didn't realize it at the time.
05:49.35
Tessa
Oh god.
05:53.55
talknerdy
I literally started to internalize all of the terrible things that he would say and it took a while before I realized I was being gaslit so sort of the other side of this everybody this toxic positivity and nobody saying what's actually going on is this experience that some people have where there. Made to feel like they're losing their minds like they're made to feel like they're so terrible at their job when they're doing everything correctly right.
06:16.87
Tessa
I Think that gaslighter is by far the scariest jerk at work and you have a clinical background so I actually try to be careful. What I talk about this person. You know I try not to get into why they're doing it because I do think it's clinical territory and probably what you experienced was this kind of.
06:22.16
talknerdy
So m.
06:30.63
talknerdy
Right? right.
06:36.10
Tessa
Social isolation cut off from other people telling you to keep your head down because if you make too much noise people are gonna notice you and the only reason why you're still here is because of me but people don't like the way you look the way you sound, you're kind of almost always on the chopping block.
06:45.61
talknerdy
In.
06:52.90
Tessa
These are tactics that gaslighters use just to keep their victims from speaking out or from even fact, checking them. So by the time you're done. You know you have completely fractured self-esteem and sense of reality. You have no idea what you're good at and what you're bad at.
06:55.33
talknerdy
Yeah.
07:07.54
Tessa
You know where you fall relative to others because you've been cut off so you don't even get that kind of social comparison that we need to figure out how to get ahead at work and it's a horrible isolating experience and it's surprisingly common for people I think you know we would think Gaslighters would be called out but the problem is victims because they're not.
07:18.36
talknerdy
M.
07:25.96
Tessa
Speaking out because they're isolated they kind of become invisible to everyone around them. You know others around them don't realize it's happening. They just sort of forget that person is there or assume they're fine. Maybe they're a little bit strange or quiet or whatever. But they're not in the know they don't know what's going on and and that part I think is like really terrible and that's something that we all have to work at to deal with these kinds of people.
07:46.70
talknerdy
Oh for sure and I sometimes wonder like in in in my example I realize sort of later on that many of the women on the show felt the same way I think that because I was the person in front of the camera.
07:57.14
Tessa
Right.
08:02.79
talknerdy
It was a slightly different situation but all of the women behind the camera had various degrees were being gaslighted to various degrees and of course once we all realized it. We had this common bond and we could discuss it and kind of you know work together and work from it. But I wonder in your sort of research and in your experience. How common it is that gas lighters Target women people of color individuals who are already dealing with microaggressions and a lot of kind of social pressures to conform to this very like white male dominant workforce.
08:37.20
Tessa
I Think absolutely I think what all these people have in common is that they already are a little bit socially isolated from what looks like the dominant person at work like who has the trappings to be a leader a white guy that comes from an Ivy league that has a well-connected family.
08:49.20
talknerdy
Right.
08:56.82
Tessa
Whose Dad knows the boss Those people are and well networked they're in the no they know the hidden curriculum to get ahead at work. They're never the targets of gaslights. It's people who are the only person of color. It's women. It's people who don't have strong support systems who aren't in the know with a hidden curriculum. Are always the target of gaslight. So You know you don't target victims who have everything they need social support-wise getting a head-wise power structure-wise to win you target those who don't have those things and I think we have to be so careful right now when we're encouraging hiring.
09:24.22
talknerdy
Right.
09:34.34
Tessa
You know more people of color more women into these leadership roles that we don't just have this revolving door of talent where we plop them in there but we don't give them this kind of support structure to prevent these types of gaslighters and other leaders from taking advantage of them and I think you know. There's absolutely evidence to indicate that what you're saying is true that these types of individuals are more targeted.
09:54.11
talknerdy
Ah, and then of course what ends up happening is that the victim gets blamed right? because like oh because of your constitution you were um, you know you were primed for this or you brought it on yourself or you should have been stronger. You should have spoken out and of course I'm I'm wondering which sort of.
10:03.16
Tessa
Yep.
10:13.53
talknerdy
Archetype this falls into but 1 of the things I struggled with a lot specifically on that show and probably it was tied into this gaslighting was the classic experience of the woman at work who is confident and has a strong voice and a strong opinion but has to kind of toe that line between if I'm too confident I'm a bitch.
10:31.70
Tessa
Gap.
10:32.77
talknerdy
But if I'm not confident enough I'm weak and it's like there's no that you can't win sometimes or.
10:36.78
Tessa
Yeah I think it is absolutely true I mean my colleague Madeline Heelman at and Nyu has been studying women in leadership positions for a really long time and there's this like great research showing that like women in on the senate floor. For example, when they speak up. It's almost always.
10:50.38
talknerdy
And he.
10:54.66
Tessa
Echo another woman and not in their own self-interest because they've learned over time that if they become across as too self-interested then their own constituents won't vote for them again. So it's not even that they'll be punished within their own in-group. It's like once they leave and go home. There be punished. But if they use that voice to to sort of prop up somebody else.
11:03.92
talknerdy
Right.
11:12.84
talknerdy
M.
11:14.46
Tessa
Especially another woman then it actually helps that's complicated and we're constantly having to juggle all these kind of motives and and Stereotypes whereas men can just get away with just the very straightforward speak up self-promotion style women have to have all these caveats like I can speak up but only if X and Y and Z occur.
11:30.40
talknerdy
Like yeah.
11:31.99
Tessa
And you know ah like everything has to align perfectly for them to not be labeled a bitch at work and you know not and then there's also this sort of like glass ceiling and and you know glass cliff stuff that's going on as well where we promote women and and minorities into leadership positions where they have nowhere to go but down.
11:34.69
talknerdy
Ah.
11:47.67
talknerdy
Right? Yeah, yeah, and that's I think that's an important point and I know it's one that you kind of point to which is that kind of the culture work culture.
11:49.61
Tessa
Because the company is already a total disaster. You know.
12:03.41
talknerdy
Doesn't occur in a vacuum so you can we? Obviously we're going to spend some time pointing to these individual archetypes these individual sort of work personalities that need to be self-aware so that they can work together in a team environment. But there's also corporate culture and. If. The corporate culture is toxic. It's kind of ah ah I don't want to say it's a losing proposition because it's not but you're definitely going to be like paddling Upstream a lot.
12:29.27
Tessa
I think this is such such an interesting thing. We've seen happen in the last five or so years historically it's been the case like I'm thinking like baby boomer generation that if the Ceo was an asshole and the c-suite had a certain way of doing things. It just didn't really trickle down to everybody else.
12:40.85
talknerdy
Mm.
12:47.30
talknerdy
Um, yeah.
12:49.19
Tessa
People were very much siloed off, but it's so different now that if the people at the top behave a certain way. You know those like private chats going on those sidebar conversations. The slack channels everybody knows about it. It's on social media. There's outrage. People take size and it's strange to see this like huge evolution of people who are you know entry- level employees at a company like Facebook are outraged over what the Ceo has done that has not historically been the case that anyone even cared.
13:21.70
talknerdy
Right.
13:22.89
Tessa
About what's going on at the top and vice versa. The people at the top even cared about the attitudes of people you know 10 levels below them on the corporate ladder. But now they have to care because there's power in numbers and there's reputation management and all these things so you're definitely seeing much more of an interdependence between the culture at the top. And the culture at the bottom than you ever did before and I'm 100% on board if the people at the top are kind of saying 1 thing and doing another it just nobody buys it and if there's toxicity at the top it trickles down there's contagion and it and it happens much quicker than historically we've ever seen and I think. You know there's some social science and kind of the role of social media plays and these kinds of things there but it's definitely happening.
14:02.31
talknerdy
Yeah,, there's sort of ah a democratization of the voice that people who didn't have power like you said these entry-level workers before they just they didn't have any power nobody listened to them. But now that you can amplify your voice so readily by you know, taking to social media or by rallying the troops with these. Um. With these chat functions like we ah Whatsapp or like you said slack or or these different um these different apps that are available to you and of course it's probably difficult for sort of New. New entrance into the workforce. Especially those I mean I struggle with this because I've worked as a freelancer for so long that when I do enter a more corporate environment. It's always really hard for me to know Like. What's Appropriate. What's not appropriate like how are you supposed to act at work. How are you supposed to? What can you say?? what? can't you say that sort of work Diplomacy is is something that I feel like the Boomer generation was trained early on and like the Zoomers I'm in between I'm um, ah like tail end of the millennials.
14:52.62
Tessa
Yeah, yeah.
14:58.25
Tessa
Yeah, yeah.
15:05.30
talknerdy
Um, like I don't know if we really got as much training in that. Yeah, ah, right? yeah same I'm grumpy I'm a grumpy millennial. Yeah.
15:07.16
Tessa
We certainly didn't I'm also an old ass millennial. Um I'm March in xer in spirit I think um, you know I'm grumpy I tell people that stop whining I sound old. Yeah, we we definitely. Didn't get training and I but I also think there were just very explicit rules of what to do and what not to do and you know I think that the boomer generation was very much in favor of a clear hierarchy at work where everybody knew their role and so because of that there's some benefits people don't like hierarchies. They don't like social status.
15:28.62
talknerdy
No.
15:35.62
talknerdy
Yeah.
15:43.49
Tessa
But the research shows there actually are benefits to having these clear hierarchies at work because everybody knows what their role is and when they get together to do work. They're not actually jocking for status and fighting over these norms. They're just getting down to business and doing their jobs not were they necessarily happier because of that That's a different question but they knew what they were.
15:55.68
talknerdy
E.
16:02.11
Tessa
To do what they should and shouldn't do. But now the the way we talk about social status at work is it's much more malleable. You can have it one day lose at the next you know it's something that you can't just have via birthright or your race or your gender or you're you know, being a first gen college student versus not.
16:10.90
talknerdy
Yeah.
16:21.80
Tessa
And it makes it very complicated at work on top of that we are very bad at work and I think this is a problem of making implicit norms. So what you're talking about what you can say what you can't say who you can tease who you can't you tease who whose meeting you can be late to and who you should never be late to these kinds of implicit norms.
16:31.40
talknerdy
He.
16:40.91
Tessa
I think need to be made very explicit because when you come into the workplace and especially say if you're a first gen you know person coming into you know I grew up very blue collar. So I walk into a white collar environment I don't know that you can't dress super casually to a corporate meeting or something like that. You know.
16:41.20
talknerdy
Yeah.
16:57.50
talknerdy
Right.
17:00.91
Tessa
We have to actually make these things explicit because then it like equalizes these differences and how people were raised and the social class backgrounds that they come from and these kinds of things. Um and then on top of that you layer that we've all been working hybrid. So we we went years without actually learning any of this stuff and you know.
17:15.93
talknerdy
Oh gosh I know.
17:18.30
Tessa
There's a whole generation of workers that like don't know how to do anything like at work. So I think it's that's a real issue.
17:23.74
talknerdy
It's so true and you lose a lot like I think we don't obviously this has been like the topic of so many op-eds And so yes, we are talking about it. But I Sometimes wonder how much the sort of benefits of the flexibility of being able to work. From home. Oh I don't have to commute that saves me so much time and oh my gosh you know I can get ready in 10 minutes instead of in 45 minutes because I'm only being seen from like the you know shoulders up and you know all the different things which are great but at the same time I'm finding like again I work in a right now in a cancer center and.
17:49.90
Tessa
Yeah, just.
17:58.83
talknerdy
I I don't have these casual chats with the oncologists or with the social workers or with the psychiatrrist in the hallway I don't bump into people and say hey what do you think about this patient or do you think that this is the approach so I have to make a meeting every time I want to do case management. And there's just so much pressure on every interaction because there are no casual interactions anymore.
18:15.85
Tessa
Yeah I think I I see our world right now like a little bit akin to how I interact with my ex-husband who I don't get along with well but we have joint custody and every social interaction is just managing a Google calendar or like a very specific goal right? like.
18:26.23
talknerdy
E.
18:33.25
talknerdy
Yeah.
18:35.82
Tessa
Our son has to have basketball is Saturday better or is Sunday better and I feel like I'm talkinggging to my ex-husband all the time when I talk to people at work that I normally actually really like but we just everything is so goal oriented. We don't have that informal interaction. But I think on top of it just you know to get to your kind of oncology example. 1 thing we're missing is we don't know what other people think of each other. So normally you'd be able to watch two doctors and I have this like crazy study right now with surgeons in an operating room and that talk about hierarchy. You don't know which doctors respect each other and which ones don't and which one is the most trustworthy one and the least trustworthy one and.
18:56.00
talknerdy
Right.
19:03.24
talknerdy
Yeah.
19:11.81
Tessa
You know whose opinions are heard heard and who gets interrupted. You don't get to watch those 1 on 1 interactions between other people that's really critical for you to figure out a correct kind of social map of where everybody stands at work because everything's in a vacuum. It's just you and 1 person or you and 3 people you go and.
19:22.87
talknerdy
For sure and I'm going in blind. Yeah I'm going in blind every time like I've got a patient who's like struggling and she says she can't communicate with her you know, um.
19:29.98
Tessa
Line.
19:36.13
talknerdy
With her providers and then I say okay you know I'll go with you to ah to your next appointment and we can talk and I can advocate for you. You know I'm her therapist like that's what I'm gonna do and then you're going in blind and you're like I don't know if this physician is a narcissist I don't know if this physician is a bad communicator or I don't know if it's.
19:42.65
Tessa
Yeah.
19:54.60
talknerdy
Ah, patient. That's not able to you know communicate effectively. It's like there's so many unknowns when you' I don't want to say your're Cherry picking because you're not cherry picking but you're getting these teeny tiny glimpses of personality instead of it being able to integrate like you usually would in a workplace.
20:10.41
Tessa
Yeah, you're getting what we call thin slices and there's lots of research on this that you can just look at someone for 4 seconds and you make an assessment of them but like that isn't that you can only draw so much from that right? and I think with doctors you know.
20:13.30
talknerdy
Write.
20:22.30
talknerdy
We.
20:27.81
Tessa
I've studied doctor-patient interactions and the biggest predictor of how a doctor behaves with patients is just how that person has behaved with their prior patients. You know there's not so much even interpersonal between a doctor and a patient is just consistency.
20:33.89
talknerdy
Right.
20:41.93
Tessa
And things like busyness and looking down at their charts instead of making eye contact but they tend to do it consistently so you're trying to gauge relational variables. How much this person trusts this person and so on but without having any sense of how that patient interacts with others or how that doctor interacts with others so you're missing three quarters you know so
20:43.33
talknerdy
Me he.
20:59.20
talknerdy
Yeah, and of course and of course this translates to literally anybody listening to this show right now that that is working on Zoome like anybody and and not just.
21:01.82
Tessa
It's really hard.
21:12.61
talknerdy
At work like students who are going to school on Zoom like people who are in either a fully online or a hybrid model. Um, that translates they're missing. They're seeing their interactions through these thin slices.
21:23.89
Tessa
Yeah I think also you know people are coming to me. They're like I've been working with this boss for 2 years and I don't think she likes me you know and I'm like what makes you think that well because she always ends our calls 30 seconds early it's just such decontextualized information and like well what is she like with other people I've never seen her interact with another person.
21:30.86
talknerdy
E.
21:41.83
talknerdy
Right.
21:43.66
Tessa
Like imagine that if you were in an office and you never saw your boss interact with another human being just you that would be crazy. You know that would just never happen. Yeah.
21:48.54
talknerdy
Umm, yeah, yeah, and so you have no reference no point of reference at All. Ah yeah, that's it's so it's such a different thing and I mean I'm wondering as you were working on this Book. Of course it came out right now sort of in the midst of all of this. But. And some ways on the later edge of it. So How much were you thinking about the pandemic as opposed to just kind of the classical office environment prior to the pandemic when you wrote your book.
22:15.78
Tessa
Yeah, so that's a great question I I signed my book deal two weeks before the start of the pandemic wrote it over the pandemic and then it came out at the end of the you know indish of the it came out during oakron. So i.
22:22.60
talknerdy
Um, oh God Yeah right.
22:34.73
Tessa
Saw everything kind of evolve I think there's certainly times where some of the jerks that we deal with at work just they evolve and they figure out how to work their magic in any setting. So I try to like make fairly general. Recommendations based on that. But then there's some that have really learned to up their game you know because people are socially isolated and cut off from others like you know free riders. For example, they can tell 1 group on Zoom that they're too busy. They can't get to their work because of this other group on Zoom. They're part of and then say the same thing to that other group but not those.
22:54.70
talknerdy
E.
23:11.50
Tessa
There's no cross talk between people so they just get away with doing this over and over again. So I definitely think some you know some people have learned how to thrive So I've sort of had to figure out what types of folks are thriving in this environment and which ones are actually really hurt by it. But I think the one thing I learned is that we got really? um.
23:13.80
talknerdy
Write.
23:23.73
talknerdy
E.
23:31.21
Tessa
Lazy about dealing with Jerks at work during the pandemic for good reasons. We're overwhelmed with other stuff but we lost our conflict management skills and we decided at the end of the pandemic that we didn't want to hone our conflict management skills.
23:34.44
talknerdy
Right.
23:48.56
Tessa
So we all just decided to stay working from home as long as we possibly could to avoid those people. Yeah, you know and like you can't you can't like run a marathon if you haven't worked out for a year right? like So no one wants to go back to the office and then all of a sudden have to do all this.
23:50.79
talknerdy
Right? Yeah like I don't want to go back? yeah.
24:01.55
talknerdy
Who. Yeah, it's no, it's scary and it's it's it's it's the thing that I think we don't talk about enough that.
24:08.26
Tessa
You know, like manage these relationships that they didn't miss is so um.
24:18.95
talknerdy
Part of your work life. So I once had a therapist and I love this and I even use it in my own approach to therapy who talked a lot about sort of the 3 a 3 hree-legged stool of mental health and like obviously on a 3 hree-legged stool if one leg breaks you fall right? like you have to have this foundation and so he would talk about.
24:32.10
Tessa
Um, yeah, yeah, yeah.
24:38.50
talknerdy
Ah work and work could be academic. It could be hobbies. It could be whatever but basically like vocational pursuits. Um, ah love and play as sort of the 3 pillars that are intrinsically important for mental Health and. I Think we often think of work as just your job like you go to work. You do your job but we don't think of all of the social and psychological components to navigating the workplace like we have this whole extra Burden. Of of being good workers which is figuring out how to not be an asshole and how to navigate other assholes like it's It's a whole extra layer to to doing your job. That's just sort of implied and and people don't prepare you for it.
25:15.84
Tessa
Yeah.
25:25.23
Tessa
Yeah I think it's a little bit crazy if you think about it so you have these assholes you didn't pick them. You can't break up with them. But you're spending 8 hours a day with them right? So it's like imagine if we had a relationship with you know, a boyfriend or a girlfriend or whoever.
25:34.63
talknerdy
Yeah.
25:43.72
Tessa
We didn't pick. We couldn't break up with and we had to spend 8 hours a day with. We would say why would I ever opt into that that sounds like a black mirror episode. That's horrible. You know, but that's what the workplace is and and leaving is costly so you know we leave there's turnover we have to start all over again. We have to learn the new workplace norms and so on and so forth, but yet none of us.
25:48.73
talknerdy
Yeah.
26:03.62
Tessa
Ever Take a class on how to handle low-level conflict at work I mean I got a Ph D in Social Psychology I never took that class. Not not a single person and that I've ever talked to from the c-sweed down has ever taken that class and so we just kind of makes it up as we go or we try things that we read about. We try to just Confront all out.
26:05.42
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah.
26:17.80
talknerdy
E.
26:23.47
Tessa
We try to hide if we try to gossip We we drink too much wine. You know we try different things because no one's ever taught us how to do it. So why would we know how to do any of these things I mean you're clinical psychologists. You know like you have to actually learn the tactics and and you know practice them and get good at them.
26:28.90
talknerdy
Write.
26:36.90
talknerdy
And practice. Yeah, and and the sad thing is very often if there is a formal training. It comes only after something horrible has happened at work and HR is like.
26:47.98
Tessa
It's punitive. Yeah, ah.
26:49.11
talknerdy
Exactly HR is like Whoa. We got to do this training and even then I wonder So I'm curious because I'm you know I'm somebody who is very celebratory of sort of a constructivist worldview and I you know I am existentially oriented which is not always like like you. Firmly evidence-based but at the same time I'm also a scientific skeptic and I think it's really important that we recognize pseudoscience where it is we stop it in its tracks and I worry sometimes that industrial organizational maybe not psychology but the sort of like coaching industry is riddled with pseudoscience.
27:24.72
Tessa
Yeah.
27:26.62
talknerdy
So these people who are actually getting these trainings. They might not be getting evidence-based trainings. Yeah.
27:30.57
Tessa
Yeah, in fact, most of them aren't getting evidence-based tradings I think there's a lot of snake oil salespeople out there making a lot of money off of this, especially right now anyone can kind of you know, call themselves a well-being expert. Um that that you don't have to sort of have a lot of street cred and I think it's.
27:43.92
talknerdy
E he.
27:50.29
Tessa
Gary on a couple levels. So one a lot of it is just intuition-based science. It's like what we think might be true is true and social psychology often shows. That's not the case. In fact, intuition is often totally wrong. You know, completely goes against what we think is true is true. You know, but I think there's.
28:01.43
talknerdy
Right? right? yeah.
28:07.99
Tessa
Also this component of like a veneer of an expert and a lot of us will trust people who have these what we call peripheral cues of being experts. They have a lot of Linkedin connections. They have a pretty website. They're professional looking. They have some like great quotes. Support you know, whatever it is they do and so we hire these people they make a lot of money and there's almost no evidence that any of these workshops actually do anything no one actually collects data on whether they work or not and you know a lot of companies are actually afraid to collect that data. They don't even want that data to exist.
28:33.60
talknerdy
He he.
28:43.57
Tessa
So they don't collect it and we spend a lot of time in resources going through bullshit training exercises to take up a lot of time that don't do anything and I think people are also yeah, you're learning your Myers Briggs or you know yeah who cares? how does that translate to anything that actually matters.
28:50.72
talknerdy
Yeah, you're learning your Myers Briggs type and then like what like who cares? Yeah yeah.
29:02.32
Tessa
But then sometimes they're even worse right? They just make people fight with each other but they don't resolve anything. You know there's a lot of backlash. They're costly so I actually don't think you need.
29:04.84
talknerdy
O god.
29:15.43
Tessa
And I'm gonna undercut myself because of course I give paid talks and shit. But I don't actually think you need to hire someone to pay them $40000 to go through like some basic if you if you want you know some bespoke things sure but some basic training the science exists.
29:31.17
talknerdy
Right.
29:32.73
Tessa
It's out there. It's just you just have to know where to look and fight through the noise which is very tough to do and as someone who writes about jokes at work from a scientific perspective I get a lot of people coming at me with like various lay theories that are convinced. They're true and.
29:49.70
talknerdy
Um I can imagine. Yeah I can imagine and I think on that note, it would be maybe a good time to then transition transition into talking about some of the sort of archetypes that you've identified in your book and that are you know more sort of evidence-based like you're you're looking at the.
29:49.31
Tessa
It's it's it's hard to convince people. Otherwise sometimes.
30:07.43
talknerdy
Social Psychology literature. You're looking at the iosychology literature and based on um based on these observations and and sometimes even like kind of classical experimental investigations. You have sort of identified these different types of people at work and these are specifically.
30:27.90
Tessa
Yeah, that's right? So you know they're jerk Archetypes I think what they you know what they have in common is like some basic behavioral signatures that you know so I tried to kind of.
30:27.28
talknerdy
Jerk Archetypes yeah.
30:39.18
talknerdy
E.
30:43.90
Tessa
Make it clear what behaviors you might see in multiple types so you can be both a kiss up kicked out or on a credit stealer for example and also just make it really clear how the social environment actually can breed these types and and you know give them the oxygen that they need to survive.
30:45.94
talknerdy
M.
30:57.88
talknerdy
Right? right? Okay, so so talk to me about some of these types I mean we mentioned the gas lighter already I just jumped into the deep end right at the top and we mentioned the gaslight I know I know and of course that that's one of the really intense ones that like you mentioned is.
31:04.32
Tessa
Yeah I'm like that's the end of the book. Yeah, yeah, so intense? yeah.
31:13.84
talknerdy
Likely linked not always because obviously we can't be armchair diagnosis here but like maybe linked to legitimate psychopathology like these individuals might actually be struggling personally with Narcissistic personality disorder or antisocial personality disorder or some form of trauma that is affecting their ability to connect with people. Um, but it's not always the case that when somebody at work is a jerk.. They're also mentally Ill right? very often. They're jerks because they just they think this is how they're going to get ahead.
31:42.50
Tessa
Yeah, absolutely I mean in fact, sometimes this is how they're going to get ahead. So they're not even off base about that I think yeah, it's like yeah of course it works. Someone's you know, allowing them to do this. So I think the first chapter is a perfect example of that. So this is the kiss up kick downer. So this is that person who.
31:49.51
talknerdy
You're right like it. It works. Yeah.
32:02.50
Tessa
Very Machiavellian they they kind of torture. Everyone who works at the same level as them and sometimes beneath them but they have a talent they have skill the boss really likes them. They know how to seem like a team player in front of the boss and kind of do all their dirty work behind the scenes.
32:07.20
talknerdy
M.
32:19.78
Tessa
And I think because of that they're very difficult to beat because you can't just simply complain about this person to your boss I certainly have tried I got you know, accused of just being jealous and petty. Um, you know so kind of acknowledging their talent is a really important first step for actually learning how to beat this person.
32:29.33
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah.
32:35.80
talknerdy
Okay, all right? and so what happens if you are that person. Oh yeah, yeah.
32:39.54
Tessa
Yeah, if you're a kiss up Kickdowner you know it. So sometimes some jerks are accidental jerks you know I don't it's got sounds like at oxymoron but kiss up kickdowners are very strategic. They tend to be high on you know what? I call what.
32:53.39
talknerdy
Okay.
32:58.18
Tessa
Social Psychology calls social comparison orientation. So they're obsessed with comparing themselves to other people all the time they know who makes more money than them who has a bigger office who got the last promotion. You know they know all of these little details about everybody so they know sort of who they need to be to get ahead. They also tend to be very skilled.
33:03.13
talknerdy
E.
33:17.00
Tessa
They're great at kind of kissing up to leaders not by showering them with praise but by doing things like finding incidental similarities with them highlighting how they came from the same town or they're you know, even wearing the same brand of clothing these kind of little things that can.
33:25.62
talknerdy
E.
33:36.10
Tessa
Ingratiate you to someone but don't seem over the top and don't seem too sycophantic and so because of that boss is actually Liping around them because they're not totally full of shit. They actually have skill and they know how to warm themselves up to the boss. Um, in a way that that makes them almost invaluable.
33:43.53
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah.
33:53.60
talknerdy
Well and you would think that like a vocational coach would actually ah would actually recommend kissing up and kicking down. Maybe not kicking down but definitely kissing up like that they would teach these strategies in order to climb that corporate ladder.
33:53.83
Tessa
In some organizations.
34:07.26
Tessa
Exactly and we see this all the time. So any place that has a strict hierarchy. You know I think of a law firm. For example, where only a handful of people are going to ever make partner that is a place that's going to encourage this because it's 0 sum. Not everybody can get to the top if you didn't get to the top then you necessarily are a loser.
34:16.46
talknerdy
E.
34:26.36
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah.
34:26.73
Tessa
You know in some capacity and they encourage this kind of behavior just by virtue of what their kind of social structure. What the hierarchy looks like at work.
34:34.55
talknerdy
Yeah I think you see that in certain corporate environments too where there's a clear management track like where there are the people who are always going to sort of be the workers and then there's the people who are like vying to to make it to the c-suite and it's a completely different um track.
34:40.77
Tessa
Yet.
34:53.15
talknerdy
And so they get like corporate management training and they get and and and of course these kinds of things are going to be recommended to them.
34:58.17
Tessa
Yeah, and so you end up with these leadership training programs that not only don't teach you how to deal with Jerks at work. They teach you how to be a jerk and go undetectable but like here's the best kind of jerk. You can be with you know, getting the right people to like you. So.
35:05.69
talknerdy
Yeah, ah yeah.
35:14.94
talknerdy
And is that why you sort of started with this jerk archetype because it is sort of the I don't want to say it's the least noxious but it's sort of it. It actually has some perks to it.
35:16.67
Tessa
Yeah I think it's a real problem.
35:25.50
Tessa
Yeah, and I think understanding that your jerk has talent is a really critical first step in figuring out how to deal with jerks at work and you know I really had when I I sold mensus at norstrom's in college and this was my first encounter with dealing with one of these people.
35:34.36
talknerdy
M.
35:45.60
Tessa
It was a really hard lesson for me to learn that my jerk was loved by so many people and had talent and was respected and I had to figure out how to deal with someone I you know I was used to like you know, being a teenager and if if you were a jerk nobody liked you. You didn't get invited to prom or whatever but in the real world.
35:48.76
talknerdy
Right.
36:04.24
Tessa
Lots of people like you when you're a jerk and and recognizing that talent I think was really important and then seeing how it's encouraged you know because it's not something that everybody hates lots of people actually like and and sort of recognizing how it can get reinforced because of that.
36:08.55
talknerdy
Right.
36:16.71
talknerdy
Yeah, and if you're the person who's always going. Joe is such a dick and then everybody goes we love Joe maybe you're the dick you know exactly.
36:23.53
Tessa
Yeah, Joe so great. Our numbers are so good. Stop dragging Joe down ever since he got here. We are the number 1 sales group in you know Southern California blah blah blah yeah that's exactly what happened? yeah and I just looked like a loser who couldn't sell and was jealous honestly, so.
36:32.83
talknerdy
And then you've painted a target on your back Sadly yeah, right? exactly? Yeah, yeah, yeah, and so so kind of step one is to recognize that even in them and of course these different archetypes there is a bit of a Venn diagram here because I can imagine. That the next archetype you dig deep into the credit stealer. The credit stealer is a kick downer too.
36:55.40
Tessa
Yeah, the credit Steelers absolutely kicked out or I think the hardest part about credit stealers is they tend to be people. We trust. So you know we tell them our good ideas we brainstorm with them sometimes their colleagues are coworkers or friends. Even our bosses can credit steal and that's sort of like a terrible feeling a punch in the gut. And they often will do this thing. The kiss up kickdowners also do which is they'll grant you credit for things that sometimes you didn't even really play that big of a role in to make it look like they're teen players so that if you accuse them of credit stealing. It just makes you look really petty that you know you just have to get.
37:25.20
talknerdy
E.
37:34.67
Tessa
You know, kind of hoard all the gold for yourself. You can't share it with the team and they're really good at doing that and on top of that credit stealing credit granting is 1 of the most difficult processes we do at work. It's just you know, riddled with ambiguity.
37:36.50
talknerdy
Write.
37:50.20
Tessa
It's often actually very hard to know who came up with what when ideas are in the air. You know actual work is easier to grant credit but ideas are fuzzy and they move around and you know they evolve and so that it gets to be very messy.
37:53.33
talknerdy
Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Ah, yeah, and I think almost everybody listening right now has probably experienced this in some form or another where they you know, very explicitly ah laid down an idea or actually.
38:18.16
Tessa
Yeah.
38:18.75
talknerdy
Physically did work only for somebody else to like put a hat on a hat and then say oh that was mine to begin with.
38:22.90
Tessa
Yeah, it's such a demoralizing experience and you know the best thing you can do about these people is actually putting together very clear guidelines of how you're going to assign credit and grant it before you even start and if you do have one of those totally chaotic meetings which happens.
38:36.11
talknerdy
Right.
38:41.89
Tessa
You have to note take and write down who did what immediately later like not not an hour later immediately later because you're just gonna forget and what's gonna stick in your mind is sort of who said the thing in the most elegant way and sometimes it's usually a white guy who gets the credit because they look more like.
38:44.12
talknerdy
Right.
38:57.10
talknerdy
Right? Or like just who said it the loudest. Yeah, it's like who said it the loudest and the most times like who reminded you? Yeah, it's like oh God Yeah, and that's why I know that you mentioned this earlier in the in the episode. But I.
39:01.56
Tessa
But the loudest. Yeah yeah, and the most times. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
39:13.25
talknerdy
I remember reading that during Obama's administration there was like a concerted effort too because he brought so many women into into his cabinet that there was this concerted effort of like when a woman or a person of color has an idea or makes a statement because so often a man will kind of take it and run with it that that it was sort of a. Ah, common practice for the other people in the room to say yes as Lydia just said what a great idea. Lydia just had and then reinforce it because the more times it sort of reinforced with the credit in the moment the more salient it becomes I guess.
39:40.41
Tessa
yeah yeah yeah yeah I think this is really critical at the moment of credit stealaling. So Lydia has a good idea. Someone comes and summarizes it Bob comes and summarizes it the next person to speak up say it's Nancy. Nancy has to go back in time and say just to just to remind us what Lydia said because now there's been 2 people who who have spoken and people are gonna forget? you know it's like the game of telephone. You only remember sort of 1 thing that you just heard most recently so a lot of it is actually not even just echoing Lydia the moment she said it.
40:04.82
talknerdy
Mm.
40:09.55
talknerdy
Yeah.
40:20.56
talknerdy
Right.
40:20.95
Tessa
But 3 or 4 people later when the idea has like kind of transformed and now maybe it's associated with Bob just reminding everybody that it was Lydia who originally came up with it.
40:27.72
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah I love that I'm I'm loving this game too. So what comes next? what comes next? Ah okay.
40:33.42
Tessa
So the bulldozer I got I developed some very bad habits around the bulldozer during the pandemic. So the bulldozer you know these aren't good habits but I'll share them with you I think most of us have done these things they they talk a lot.
40:47.14
talknerdy
Ah.
40:49.13
Tessa
They don't have they have no inner monologue and look people in power actually do this a lot. They come up with their ideas outside of their mouth and it takes them 3 minutes to say the idea whereas lower power people just say the idea they've done the thinking ahead of time. Um, so that's kind of the the least bad version of the bulldoz is a really bad version. Is the one that has an agenda. They're not getting their way in the meeting but they have power and status and they go behind the scenes and the way that they get their way is if they don't like the outcome they'll question the process and so they'll say things like.
41:19.29
talknerdy
Mm.
41:21.32
Tessa
I know we held a vote at the end of that meeting but you know honestly I was there and it didn't feel like anyone really had a chance to speak up and then when we held the vote. It wasn't really clear what the vote was on. You know, no one really are clearly articulated that we were actually voting to hire this person. So I really think what we should do now is a revote. And then what they'll do is like they know their numbers. They know they need to get 2 more people on their side to kind of flip things. They'll do their behind the scenes work their bulldoz threaten whatever because they consider the first vote like a straw vote you know and and it gives them the power to do that and so I think we have to I've been bulldozed a lot you know I'm in academia. So.
41:50.92
talknerdy
Right.
42:00.10
Tessa
This happens a lot with hires because when we hire a professor we're stuck with them for 50 years so it's pretty high stakes. Um, no one ever leaves so you have to have just watertight procedures and you have to have a leader in the room who's willing to say.
42:03.76
talknerdy
Yeah.
42:11.73
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah.
42:16.86
Tessa
No matter what the outcome of this these were the procedures that we followed and I've been in this case recently actually where I had to be that person to push back and say no, we followed the procedures here's exactly how we did it so that we couldn't get bulldozed but they're conniving and you know my bad habits I developed and during the pandemic is when I just hit the mute button on them. You know.
42:34.85
talknerdy
I Love that.
42:37.40
Tessa
Minimize mute minimize. Go online shopping you know and I didn't get bulldoze I actually got found time you know, go watch some shit's creek for a little bit but it's not but it didn't work because then they had worked all their magic and I wasn't paying attention and then I had to like figure out what to do afterwards. But it's definitely a temptation.
42:43.36
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
42:52.38
talknerdy
Right? right? They were bulldozing in the background still.
42:56.74
Tessa
Yeah, yeah, they're doing all this damage while I muted them and was all online shopping but so I eventually had to deal with it. But in the moment it felt great. You don't have to listen to them.
43:05.11
talknerdy
So I can imagine that this sort of personality or this sort of archetype is very common in politics like it just it just screams the political kind of ah path and of course.
43:12.17
Tessa
Oh yeah.
43:21.74
talknerdy
You know we ah often talk about things not being a bug but a feature like the system is built around this and so of course these are going to be the people that sort of Rise to the top. Yeah.
43:23.39
Tessa
Yeah.
43:30.45
Tessa
Politics selects for bulldozers I would say it doesn't even reinforce it. You're not going to get very far unless you can bulldoze I mean think about when we watch debates. There is a ah talk time measure.
43:43.50
talknerdy
E.
43:45.23
Tessa
And and you know putits will talk about who spoke for more as a measure of power and authority so bulldozing is seen as ah as a measure of strength and so we we learn that if you want to be strong and powerful and when you have to bulldoze and I think that you know that's something that we saw when Hillary ran. The same exact amount of talk time was actually massively overestimated when she spoke compared to sort of other male democratic candidates. So we don't even have an accurate perception of how much people talk you know we tend to overestimate women and underestimate men.
44:05.43
talknerdy
Of course.
44:13.39
talknerdy
No, especially yeah, gendered M Yeah, there's a lot of good evidence to support that too like you know we're sign to sat down and literally recorded the number of words or how long.
44:19.60
Tessa
And so that that kind of human bias also plays an important role here.
44:28.38
Tessa
Yeah.
44:32.42
talknerdy
You know, somebody spoke and I think that's why when you were first describing the bulldozer I sort of identified with the archetype. Not the bad version like the behind the scenes version but like you said the more innocuous version of the bulldozer like the person who who has the idea and sort of processes it out loud or who just like gets in there because.
44:47.16
Tessa
Yeah, yeah.
44:51.27
talknerdy
Podcast so much and I podcast with four other guys on on one of the shows that I do and if you want to say something you have to just get in and say it because they're never going to wait for you to say it and of course as a woman I do think that throughout my entire career unless I bulldozed a little bit. No I I would never be heard.
44:56.80
Tessa
Yeah.
45:08.11
Tessa
Oh absolutely yeah, you learned it as a strategy right? I mean it's just if you have to interrupt to be heard. That's that's what you learn how to do and then as you climb up we select for that trait.
45:10.90
talknerdy
So it was almost like a reaction. Yeah yeah.
45:19.55
talknerdy
E.
45:24.38
Tessa
People who interrupt or heard the people who are heard get invited back to the meeting. They're who's you know who we think of when we're thinking of who we want to promote within and so by the time you get to the top. There's just a lot of this kind of interrupting going on. But I think what's scary is when women do the exact same thing as men do it's just perceived.
45:26.60
talknerdy
Riot.
45:43.41
Tessa
Very differently in the workplace you know with a bit a woman interrupting someone regardless of their gender is perceived totally different than a man interrupting. In fact, people don't even detect men interruptions male interruptions whereas if a woman does. It's like super salient the entire time.
45:43.65
talknerdy
Yeah, we're the bitches.
45:59.65
talknerdy
Oh for sure she was like you know whether she was like hysterical or she just like couldn't she was impatient. She couldn't wait. She was whatever whereas the man. Well he had something important to say no good right? right.
46:10.12
Tessa
Yeah, yeah, but he support that you you can you get to be an ice queen or hysterical. There's like 2 categories. Yeah yeah, one so great.
46:18.81
talknerdy
1 or the other one or the other. It's so fun. It's so fun. So the the free rider somebody I do not identify with at all I do not get that I don't think I've ever been this archetype this archetype like makes my blood boil.
46:30.28
Tessa
Yeah, I'm really high on protestant work ethic I think it's like but you should work your ass off to get ahead. Your freeriers tend to be very charismatic. They tend to be social butterflies.
46:33.97
talknerdy
Yeah.
46:45.61
Tessa
And what they bring to the team is their ability to pick out the best restaurant that we should go to after the meeting and who all we should invite to the party and they have office gossip and they're super fun to have around and so because of that we put up with them. Um, yet they're a real pain in the ass because they are actually their their skill lies in social charsma.
46:52.18
talknerdy
Right.
47:04.91
Tessa
Class picking out really competent teams to actually take advantage of so freeriers don't join teams where there's conflict where there's disengagement where there's a lot of spotlight on them and the boss knows something is up and is kind of chronically overseeing them. They find the teams full of conscientious people because the research shows.
47:06.14
talknerdy
E.
47:24.30
Tessa
That the more a free rider doesn't do their share the more the conscientious team members overcompensate for them and in fact, to the point where they're outperforming teams without free riders. The boss notices it and gives them.
47:30.96
talknerdy
Do I.
47:41.20
Tessa
You know, bonuses and often even more work to do because they're so efficient and so this overcompensation effect just perpetuates freewriting instead of kind of weeding it out and free riders then benefit because they get the bonuses and things like that. Um, and these teams also tend to have collective rewarding and they're full of people who like each other.
47:49.59
talknerdy
So.
47:57.99
talknerdy
So right.
48:00.90
Tessa
And they don't want to complain about the free rider because it kind of throws off their mojo um, you know so they they end up putting up with them and in the pandemic it got really bad because everyone's working in these silos so we don't know if like Tom from our team is just doing nothing with us. He's doing nothing with any of his teams because none of us see each other so we don't get to talk about it and I think that makes it very easy for them to sustain their behavior.
48:23.17
talknerdy
It almost sounds I in my mind but then I caught myself it almost sounds like a free rider would be a great manager. But then I realized managers do have to actually work. Ah.
48:32.26
Tessa
It you know? yeah.
48:38.70
talknerdy
But if they didn't really have to do that much work. It seems like Ohh they're so good at picking teams and they're so good at sort of like delegating and letting other people do the work which managers aren't good at very often. It's it's It's their big downfall like a good manager should be good at that.
48:49.56
Tessa
Yeah, absolutely I think that's like such an interesting connection because a lot of these jerks actually have skills and you just got to figure out the right place to put them. But you're totally right? They're great at delegating. You know they're they're great at cutting up 1 job and splitting it into 12 parts.
48:57.20
talknerdy
Right. Right.
49:09.24
Tessa
So no 1 person actually feels the load and that's how they get away with it but a good manager who who's not micromanaging and is in the loop can actually do that. They also have that kind of charisma social connection. That's really hard to fake and really hard to learn that we often look for in leaders. So maybe we should be promoting our free riders.
49:11.40
talknerdy
Oh.
49:19.44
talknerdy
Yeah.
49:25.54
talknerdy
Exactly like yes we'll stop promoting like the Kiss Ups We'll stop promoting the the gaslighters all the you know we'll promote the free riders and our in our corporate structure will just make so much more sense.
49:27.71
Tessa
Instead of trying to get rid of them.
49:38.43
Tessa
But except for whether the c-sueded they had to do work again and they're like shit I don't actually know any of these things. Oh but exactly can always out. You can always outsource. That's the thing right? and they know that.
49:42.69
talknerdy
Right? But that's that's when they just hire consultants right? yeah.
49:52.30
talknerdy
Ah, so okay, Okay, so we've got we've got our free riders and then we've got just a few left. We've got the micromanager and so this is actually a manager or is it somebody who's not even a manager but is micromanaging.
50:02.46
Tessa
You know that's a good question the way I wrote the book is an actual manager but I think there's a kind of a jerk in between which is the manager who's not really a manager the Fox manager. Um, you know so the micromanager what distinguishes them from a detail-oriented bos.
50:10.10
talknerdy
Yeah, ah.
50:22.30
Tessa
Is that they are obsessed with detail about everything no matter how irrelevant or relevantvant it is. They're always in a time crunch so they're actually a little bit chaotic. They actually don't have their shit together so much because they're hopping from 1 person to another and micromanaging. They have a bit of like a frenzied vibe about them.
50:32.33
talknerdy
E.
50:41.44
Tessa
And you know they do this to everybody no matter how much actual top down oversight someone needs. So some employees actually do need to be micromanaged. In fact, a handful of people I talked to that complaint about the micromanager then they tell me they made 50 mistakes at work and I'm like of course you have to be micromanaged made 50 mistakes.
50:49.69
talknerdy
Of course.
50:56.77
talknerdy
Ah, right.
51:00.77
Tessa
But some people don't need to be and you know they don't know the difference or they treat everybody the same. It's like a very kind of homogeneous approach to dealing with work and you know I actually kind of feel for these people I'm not one of these people I'm more than neglectful boss but a lot of the reasons why they micromanage don't necessarily have to do with.
51:04.25
talknerdy
M.
51:18.30
Tessa
Them. It has to do with how much control they have over their own time. How much management training they got whether they're being micromanaged and they they tend to be very conscientious people at work and they got promoted because they were good at their old job not because they know how to manage you know and so be yeah.
51:19.87
talknerdy
Yeah.
51:30.90
talknerdy
Right? Which is so common.
51:35.49
Tessa
So you know we should just be bringing in a free rider to take their place but instead we're promoting them and now they're micromanaging you the poor soul who's stuck with their old job that they were really good at you know and it makes them feel better. So it's a little bit of a travesty because I think often their heart is in the right place.
51:44.22
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah.
51:52.89
Tessa
And they're very conscientious and they want to do good work but it drives everybody insane and everyone works the hardest but gets the the least done at work If you have a micromanager.
52:00.81
talknerdy
Right? Yeah, it's hard to be productive when there's somebody literally breathing down your neck and telling you exactly what to do every step of the way and not giving you any independence. It's also hard to have a sense of self-efficacy when you feel like somebody's holding your hand through everything.
52:15.89
Tessa
Yeah, and they also like to make you feel like you're in a sisyean exercise at work like you push that boulder up the Hill you work really hard on something and then they kind of destroy it and make you redo it and you know I've talked a lot of Journalists who had micromanages as editors and they're like it's the worst I write this piece.
52:22.89
talknerdy
Mm.
52:26.79
talknerdy
He.
52:34.59
Tessa
They add it. They bleed all over it I rewrite it. They bleed all over it just happens over and over and over again and they just know there's no end in sight. You know they do it until the deadline and then they do it again and so you just have no sense that the work you're doing ever matters because you know it's just going to get torn down and built back up again about 15 times the next day
52:40.41
talknerdy
Right.
52:51.63
talknerdy
Um, and that just Breeds complacency like nobody's going to actually keep trying.
52:55.58
Tessa
Yeah, you just give up and it doesn't matter you know and they slide into your Dms and they text you all day long and it doesn't matter if you respond to the text or not they just continue to text you all day long. So it's a little bit like having a robot as a manager like a bad ai that doesn't learn because they're just not attuned to like.
53:10.30
talknerdy
Yeah.
53:14.89
Tessa
Social cues in the environment telling them that someone is frustrated or disengaged or trying it doesn't matter what response they're getting back. They but always behave the same.
53:22.35
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah, I actually have a a micromanager on the board of my H a we are. We are not a fan. He is really neurotically obsessed with very small details and we often feel like he's policing us instead of supporting us.
53:27.56
Tessa
Oh fine.
53:38.59
Tessa
Yeah.
53:40.56
talknerdy
And like what is that you know like you never want to feel like the person whose job is to promote and support the workers I mean and this translates to to work too is actually like you mentioned tearing you down Constantly. Um God What a bad feeling.
53:57.14
Tessa
Yeah, micro managers think that everybody is up to no good and everybody is lazier than them and so I think it just really brees a lot of distrust like they give off distrust vibes. They don't really trust what you're doing. They don't really trust that you listen and you know.
54:01.20
talknerdy
Right. Name.
54:17.14
Tessa
That leads people to just say fuck it and they get very disengaged at work and that's that's like a huge predictor of Burnout I think in the workplace.
54:17.56
talknerdy
Yeah.
54:22.90
talknerdy
That makes sense and then on the on the other side of that you you see burnout when you have a neglectful boss when you have someone who's just not there to support you someone who just never kind of gives you any feedback and you feel like a hamster in a wheel.
54:37.20
Tessa
Yeah, then but neglectful Boss is a really tough one. Especially right now where people have like completely missed onboarding and they don't even really know their bosses. So these people just do this kind of bad cycle of disappearing act. So they're never around. You're not getting feedback but they don't.
54:44.14
talknerdy
Yeah.
54:54.41
Tessa
Usually stay disappeared. They they actually micromanage when they feel enough anxiety so then they show up often kind of the day before your project is due or at the eleventh hour they micromanage to feel like they have some control and then they disappear again.
55:06.71
talknerdy
Yeah, okay.
55:09.93
Tessa
And it creates like this height and uncertainty I mean clinical psychology. We talk about sort of uncertainty being a huge predictor of mental and physical stress and how kind of waiting for a cancer diagnosis is actually worse than just finding out. You have cancer because we're actually quite good at coping but uncertainty is terrible.
55:19.71
talknerdy
Yeah m.
55:27.34
Tessa
And human beings are just not built for chronic uncertainty like that level of just cortisol pumping through our bodies all the time not knowing if your boss is gonna show up yell at you disappear if he's gonna come back the next day or in two weeks or never that makes people really crazy at work and I think.
55:28.37
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah.
55:44.54
Tessa
They're one of the most kind of harmful managers to work with in terms of your psychological well-being.
55:47.37
talknerdy
It makes sense and then finally you know we we opened with the gaslighter but of course in the book you close with the gaslighter and one of the observations that sort of I made as we were describing some of these other jerks at work is that many of them have gaslighter components to them. Like you know the Kiss up kick down or the ah the person who is free riding or even the micromanager they they manage to convince you that you are the problem or that you are doing something insufficiently like there is this kind of gas lighting.
56:22.50
Tessa
Oh yeah, we get like ah little gaslighter flares throughout you know, dealing with Jerks at work I think kind of what's interesting about the gaslighter. So the other jerks are usually making you feel pretty terrible about yourself like you're doing a bad job.
56:22.74
talknerdy
Add on to almost every type. He.
56:39.20
Tessa
Sometimes Gaslighters do the opposite they actually make you feel like you're a member of a secret club doing something really cool that nobody else knows about and so I'd say probably most people have an experience like you did where the gaslighter makes them feel terrible about themselves. You don't really realize there's other victims.
56:43.76
talknerdy
M.
56:56.78
talknerdy
Yeah.
56:59.00
Tessa
They're doing it to maintain power and status. But other times gaslighters are doing it because they need you to get away with whatever it is that they're doing. They're stealing ideas. They're faking data. They're they're like building some you know bullshit product that we all have to kind of.
57:05.35
talknerdy
Right.
57:15.75
Tessa
Believe into some degree and if we reality check we would know it's not going to work out so it's almost like a cult where you feel super special and people don't like to admit that often when they get victimized by gaslights. It feels very good in the beginning.
57:19.26
talknerdy
E.
57:27.26
talknerdy
E e.
57:29.37
Tessa
Because they make you feel like you're special and you're a chosen member of something that you were selected out of all these people to be part of something special and the people that this works on are people who haven't really felt that before they're socially isolated like we talked about they don't have a lot of friends at work. They often come from.
57:40.73
talknerdy
Bri.
57:47.83
Tessa
Socioeconomic gender and cultural backgrounds that aren't well represented at work so they don't already have like this network and Gaslighters see that they see that they're isolated. They see that they're sitting alone at lunch and that no one comes by their cubicle to talk to them and think okay this is a perfect victim for me I'm gonna get this person to help me and then you do help them because you don't know what you're doing. And then you can't escape without you know a little bit of bloodshed. So I think that's that's the really kind of truly tragic part is in the end unless it's purely victimization often victims end up eating and abetting in things at work that are not so great and so it's hard for them to exit without. Kind of any any damage done to themselves.
58:24.23
talknerdy
Yeah, it definitely does feel like the most sort of psychologically damaging like it's very hard to survive a gaslighter just like it's very hard to survive a cult like you walk away with scars. Yeah.
58:34.81
Tessa
yeah yep yeah years and years of therapy to like help you get that fractured sense of self back right? You just don't have that kind of sense of self and it's it's really hard when that happens to people because you need some core kind of sense of self to be able to navigate any of these difficulties.
58:42.36
talknerdy
Yeah, yeah.
58:54.80
Tessa
Um, especially after you leave when there the lot of healing has to be done.
58:56.96
talknerdy
Oh absolutely? Well I've got to ask you so so we're we're coming up on the end of the show and I always close with my same 2 questions but before I dive into those I've got to ask you because it's been on my mind this whole time. It's varied like neither here nor there but whatever. Um.
59:08.21
Tessa
From.
59:11.24
talknerdy
A how much did you watch the office and how much is your work informed like you you always like oh my God there's that there's that oh oh look he's he's you know, kicking a oh or kissing up. Oh he's kicking. Ah.
59:19.88
Tessa
I Love that show. So I love that show I Love the British version I like the American version here's what's great about that. They make the shittiest work situations funny as hell and I actually tried to bring as much humor as I could into this book because I think when we're going through this.
59:30.77
talknerdy
Yeah, so.
59:38.93
Tessa
We need to be like we need to be able to laugh a little bit or it's just too painful and I think you know like these little fights over Irrelevant Power Assistant manager to the manager. You know these kinds of things seem so stupid but they're really common at work and.
59:50.32
talknerdy
Yeah.
59:57.63
Tessa
The way they handle you know gender issues and race issues and the awkwardness around all of that and the just the sheer cluelessness around all that I think actually is pretty representative of what most of us are like it works. So yes I Love that show.
01:00:07.83
talknerdy
Absolutely oh love that love that and then on the other end of that probably ah I maybe I should have flipped these have you seen the new documentary. It just came out on Netflix call about Boeing called downfall.
01:00:21.64
Tessa
No, but it's like number 1 on Netflix what's the deal with that show. What is it about I can't wait to see it.
01:00:25.71
talknerdy
Right? So yes I highly recommend it because of course this is about the um, the what was it the seven thirty seven max the 2 crashes and how Boeing was like back tracking but what they do so beautifully in this documentary is they show what happened when Boeing.
01:00:34.50
Tessa
Yeah.
01:00:44.48
talknerdy
Merged with another company in like I think it was like the 80 s or the 90 s and the total corporate culture changed and it really exemplifies kind of some of the things that we're talking about how when a new corporate structure comes in that has a completely different culture and that promotes. Um, or or maybe I should say um, ah pushes down certain types of workplace behaviors and certain types of workplace interactions that negative consequences above and beyond trauma to the to the employees but ultimately lives are at stake because.
01:01:17.68
Tessa
Yeah.
01:01:20.22
talknerdy
You know you see these archetypes where these people are like I don't want there to be anything wrong. So instead of tell me what's wrong. So we can fix it. It's like I don't want to hear that anything's wrong. Let's not talk about what's wrong and that's like very dangerous when you're talking about the safety of human beings in a. In a massive airplane. But I Really think you would enjoy it because I think you'd see a lot of these patterns in the discussions in the documentary.
01:01:43.80
Tessa
Yeah I mean that's fascinating I take kind of just to end a lot of these problems will eventually work up to something catastrophic, but it's more like a frog and boiling water where they're small. They're day-to-day culture changes slow and it's the additive effects to these that get you into a place like where Boeing was.
01:01:50.58
talknerdy
Who.
01:02:02.39
Tessa
It's not even like 1 decision was made right? It's just daily ways of thinking and interacting which are cumulative and eventually lead to something horrible which we don't typically think about. Yeah.
01:02:04.73
talknerdy
Yes.
01:02:10.75
talknerdy
And that's why it's so hard to say quote or like point and say it's your fault and it's so hard like it's like when people go How did this happen and it's like oh there were a thousand things went wrong, but the culture allowed for those things to go wrong. Ah yeah.
01:02:21.21
Tessa
Yeah, yeah, and like look at 10 years of it. It took a long time for it to get that bad. Yeah.
01:02:28.84
talknerdy
Oh for sure for sure. So so okay, so Tessa um, ah thank you a thank you so much for being here. We're not quite done yet because I always close my show by asking my guests the same 2 questions and of course because of your knowledge and because of the work that you do I'm to be fascinated by how you approach this? Um I want you to approach this in any way that feels. Relevant or salient for you. So this could be a personal answer. The context could be global. It could have to do with your work. It could be cosmic. It doesn't matter so the first question is when you think about the future in whatever context is relevant to you. What is the thing that's keeping you up the most at night the thing that you're most concerned about maybe a little pessimistic maybe even cynical about you know, where are you like and then on the flip side of that so we end on a slightly more positive note where are you finding your optimism What are you looking forward to.
01:03:14.69
Tessa
Yeah. Okay, so the answer to the first question is I am very worried about cancel culture and our our complete unwillingness to have difficult conversations.
01:03:26.63
talknerdy
E.
01:03:37.45
Tessa
In a way that allows for mistakes and I don't mean that I think obviously racism sexism. There's no place for any of that but tiny little errors in navigating these difficult things at work people are terrified to have these conversations because they're afraid they're going to say the wrong thing so they don't talk about them at all and I'm very worried that we're in.
01:03:47.58
talknerdy
Okay, okay.
01:03:53.48
talknerdy
Um, okay, yeah, yeah.
01:03:57.26
Tessa
That approach at work and everywhere in our lives actually social media is is brutal for that. So I'd say that keeps me up at night a little bit I'm worried about that. What am I optimistic about that's harder for me because I'm not an optimist. Um I. Um, optimistic that people are actually missing social interaction and that there's kind of this resurgence and a lot of this is like you know the signs of happiness and these kinds of things I don't typically glom onto that are really about social connection and I think we're starting to realize the importance of that.
01:04:25.00
talknerdy
E.
01:04:31.91
Tessa
And I have a little kid who gets he plays Ipad all day but social connection is the most wonderful thing he experiences and I do think that we're starting to realize how important it is and how those small things like having dinner with someone or having a chat with someone can actually really improve our well-being.
01:04:45.56
talknerdy
Yeah.
01:04:51.70
Tessa
And I think people are just kind of much more willing to admit that and kind of take the step to do those things.
01:04:54.50
talknerdy
Yeah, love it all right? Everyone the book is jerks at work toxic coworkers and what to do about them by Dr Tessa West Tessa thank you so much for being here of course and everyone listening. Thank you for coming back week after week I'm really looking forward to the next time we all get together.
01:05:03.94
Tessa
Thank you so much for having me This is great.
01:05:14.11
talknerdy
To talk nerdy.
