The Atlantic reveals just how bad it is for you, your family and your company when you’re stuck working for a bad boss:
The more negative the bosses’ management style, the less happy the workers — not a surprising finding. When bosses were controlling rather than encouraging, employee well-being was low. On the other hand, when employees felt that their autonomy was encouraged (for example, when bosses gave a “meaningful rationale for doing the tasks” and made employees feel they were being asked to contribute rather than commanded to do something), they also had better overall well-being.
The psychological climate of the organization itself also affected participants’ happiness: The more supportive the company, the happier the employee.
Some of the findings in the study are intuitive: Most people can tell you that a bad boss can seriously affect one’s work experience and overall happiness. But pinpointing the relationship in a scientific study is tricky. For example, it is not clear how and to what degree employees’ on-the-job performance affected their bosses’ behavior. Hopefully, as more studies support the connection, more companies will come to realize how much the attitudes of their supervisors can affect the well-being — and, likely, productivity — of their workers.