The Cruel-la Angle 

The extension buzzed  just as I was about to take a sip of the blessed Coffee. I answered and I heard a distinct screeching from end of the line " Get in here. NOW " Sighing deeply I kept down the phone and went to 'Her" Cabin knowing my morning was ruined and that I would soon require a pain killer for the headache which was en route. "Her" or Cruella, as I had come to call her, is as you might have guessed is my boss. I nicknamed her so as every time I looked at her I was so reminded about the lady 'Cruella De Ville' in 101 Dalmatians movie who wanted to get a fur coat by killing dalmatian pups. 

I reached the cabin, knocked and entered and realized that my heart had started palpitating. I worked on my breathing, slowly breathing in and out and asked her" You called ?" All this while, mind you she was typing away on her laptop and was well aware that I was standing there waiting for her highness to speak up. She continued typing and I started getting pissed off. She spoke up just as I was about to ask her if she wanted me to come back later. "why is not complete ?" I looked at what she was pointing. Oh... It was a register where we kept account closure records. She had never checked it before and I knew why she was checking it now. I had taken a casual leave the day before and she was pissed off about that. I knew she was clutching at straws as I was good at my work and she couldn't have found anything else. Hence, I zoned out, a practice I had come to adopt lately whenever she was in one of her 'moods'. I noticed how her face kept getting redder with each and every sentence she spoke and I bit my lower lip to keep from laughing. She was still ranting so I kept my eyes down and started looking at the attendance register, noticing who had taken how many leaves and who was present today, "Well ?" she said and I jolted out of my reverie. She was looking at me expectantly and that could mean only one thing - she has asked me something, something I had not heard. I didn't know whether to laugh at my situation or feel scared. I opted for a safe way out. Sorry. Yup. that seemed liked a good idea. I quickly apologized and said that I would work more diligently in the future. She appeared a little mollified. I quickly exited before she could start again. I went to my work station and resumed work and left the incomplete records for later. Later. I realized how I had changed as there was time when I would have left everything and just focused on those and shown them to boss lady as soon as I was done.

One way home I kept on pondering about the day's incident, how I had lost my motivation to work and excel further in my career all because of a bad boss. I thought about doing some research on this and powered up my PC. I had realized one thing very early in my life that if life gives you questions, Google gives you answers. I started on my research and the facts were shocking. 

A Bad manager causes the best of the employees to flee the organisation while the remainder lose motivation and confidence My research further highlighted a very strange fact that I would never had believed if I hadn't experienced it my self. It said that 65 % people would pick a better boss over higher salary. Jim Goodnight had said once, "95 % of my assets drive out of this gate every evening. It's my job to maintain a work environment that keeps  those people  coming back every morning." 

According to a survey done in the U.S. employees spend about 20 hours in a week discussing and lamenting about their bad bosses. It went on to state further that bad bosses not only hamper your growth and well being at work but are also responsible for indirectly hampering family life, mental and physical well being as well. Sheesh !

I realized that both my mental and physical well being was in jeopardy. I had developed a tendency for easy headaches as my boss was a screamer. Her screaming even if not directed at me started a migraine for me. I realized that this was a case with a lot of my colleagues and pondered over the possibility if Cruella was paid weekly incentives by the local  pharmacy dealers for increasing sales of pain killers.

I came across this image of difference between a good and a bad boss and wondered idly if I should share this with Cruella but shook off the idea when I imagined her shrill voice telling me that I could forget my promotion:

Hence I decided to keep my thoughts to myself and started reading further about how to manage such people. I went to bed with head buzzing from all the reading, my mind already forming new plans  for the day that was yet to come...