Minimizing a staff member s contribution is a strategy used by some managers to keep the staff hungry and pushing toward excellence. But discrediting employees efforts doesn t motivate them to work. As an enrager, however, minimizing is extraordinarily effective. It makes employees recall, perhaps not even consciously, all the times in their lives when what they did was just not good enough. Overcritical, unappreciative, overbearing bosses should not be surprised when employees don t respond enthusiastically to being part of their team.
Manipulation produces anger because it is deeply insulting.
If you cannot play straight with an employee when there are differences of opinion or negotiate a job transfer anger is inevitable. If you maneuver to reward an employee at another s expense, the manipulated employee will feel diminished. Diminished people feel childish. Echoes of parents, siblings, teachers and friends pulling rank fan the flames of anger around the immediate workplace issue. Some bosses manipulate when they are under pressure from their own managers.