Watch Out for Weaponized Praise
Your bosses might be using compliments against you.
Her boss expressed some concern. Not really about her. No, she was doing a great job. It was just that…she used to push other people to work harder. Now she didn’t. What happened?
He said, “You’ve lost a little of your enthusiasm.”
A look of abject terror spread across my friend’s face. Her boss caught himself. “I mean, your work is better than ever. But you just seem, I don’t know. Tired. We don’t want you to burn out.”
Basically, my friend’s boss wanted her to keep doing everything she’d been doing. Plus manage everyone else.
Essentially his job.
Even worse, he was using praise to manipulate her into doing more work. And he wanted her to hide how much she was doing, by faking her old energy. He needed her to alleviate his guilt.
Praise usually covers up something more sinister, like the prolonged absence of a promotion. It often serves no other purpose than keeping people in line.
This is the kind of crap bad bosses like to pull. They condition employees to work harder for the sake of everything else but themselves. They…
