When Your Manager Is Gaslighting You

Author: Mary Abbajay

Nobody should suffer at the hands of a toxic boss. And gaslighting is a particularly nefarious form of toxicity due to its subtle and insidious nature. While it is easy to spot toxic leaders who scream, bully, and abuse publicly, gaslighting behavior is much more covert. Gaslighters know how to fly under the radar. They are adept at undermining an employee’s self-esteem, confidence, and sense of reality in subtle, sneaky, and hard-to-prove ways. It’s often your word against theirs, which makes going to other leaders or HR difficult. To make matters worse, their manipulative behaviors—while despicable and destructive—often don’t break any specific company policies.

It’s nearly impossible to thrive with a boss who actively undermines your accomplishments, diminishes your self-esteem, and blocks your opportunities. In a perfect world, you could just pack up and go. But in this imperfect and economically challenged world, you might not have the financial freedom to leave.

Here are some things you can do to survive—until you decide it is time to move on.

Make sure it really is gaslighting

Think about your experience. Are you sure your boss isn’t merely a jerk? Or a poor communicator? Or just doesn’t like you or your work product? Gaslighters actively seek to manipulate and control others by making the victim question their own reality and self-worth. They lie. They deny things that they said—even in writing. They project their faults onto others, putting them in a constant mode of defense. They sow confusion. They insinuate that you are the incompetent one. In short, they weaken you in order to control you. Their need to control can stem from a myriad of pathologies such as incompetence, insecurity, narcissism, jealousy, or just plain pettiness. If you determine it is in fact gaslighting, use the following measures.

Document your interactions

Take notes when communicating with your boss and keep a record of your conversations. Try to have witnesses during meetings and use emails or other written documentation to recap conversations and agreements. Copy other team members on emails when appropriate. Be as clear as possible when communicating. Having a real-time record of your interactions will make it harder for your boss to question your sanity and backpedal on agreements. It will also help you identify if you really are being gaslit.

Protect your mental health

This is critical. Toxic bosses are emotionally poisonous, so do what you can to create distance between your mental health and their abusive behaviors. Imagine you are wearing a golden protective shield that repels your boss’s arrows whenever you feel targeted. It’s also helpful to externalize their behavior instead of ruminating on their manipulative tactics. View their words and actions as separate from you. This might include feeling sorry for them, finding them pathetic, or even finding their insecurity ridiculous. While that may not seem nice, building up your psychological health is critical to your wellbeing. Focus on reaffirming your value by reminding yourself that your boss is the dysfunctional one, not you. Engage in as many life-enhancing activities as you can. Exercise, meditate, journal, and do things that you love to remind yourself of who you are and what you value at your core.

Activate your support network

A strong support network is critical when dealing with an emotionally challenging situation. Surround yourself with friends and people who support and encourage you. Have outlets outside work for socializing and reducing stress. You might even consider talking to a coach, therapist, or other trained professional.

Minimize direct contact

Do what you can to limit interacting with your boss. Avoid hallway conversations, coffees, or lunches with them that you aren’t required to attend. Invest that extra time in connecting with others. A great way to neutralize the impact of a boss who blocks your success is to build relationships with different leaders at your organizations. Seek out mentors and actively look to build your network with those people who can champion your skills and talents.

Confront or escalate with extreme caution

Toxic bosses don’t take confrontation well. Gaslighting is often associated with narcissistic personality disorder, so confronting them or hoping they will change may be pointless because narcissists go to extreme lengths to preserve their ego and control over others. A gaslighter may use this confrontation to further punish you. Escalating to upper leadership or HR is difficult since gaslighting behavior is hard to prove. And frankly, chances are that a manipulative boss has covered their tracks with their own boss.

Before you confront or escalate, become aware of the organization’s reputation in addressing similar employee experiences. There are two ways you can do this. Ask a few trusted colleagues at work if they have any information or experience—even secondhand knowledge would be helpful. Second, check out sites where employees leave reviews about their employers. A company with lots of negative reviews around employee treatment probably won’t offer you much support.

If you do confront your boss, have a clear game plan for what you want to achieve from that conversation. Be prepared to make effective requests for what you want and need. Inside every complaint is a request—find it and make it. If you are seeking more opportunities, find out specifically what you need to do to be considered. If you need clarification from their mixed messaging, bring documented examples for them to review and clarify. If you feel information is being withheld from you, make a specific request for the information you need.

In short, be specific about the resources and support you need to do your job, explain your rationale, and articulate how it will benefit not only you but also your boss and the organization. For example, if you are getting mixed messages, you might say, “I want to make sure that I am on the same page as you on project X so that I can deliver great results for you and the team. I’m confused about Y and need some clarification on Z. Could you explain a bit more about that?” Be sure to repeat back what they tell you, thank them, and follow up in an email.

Explore opportunities within your organization

There might be ways to escape your toxic boss without having to leave your company. Look into other positions in the company that interest you, meet with colleagues and managers in other departments, think about where your skills might translate, and make a case for your transition.

The Caveat

While all of the strategies above will help you cope with a terrible boss, often in these cases the best strategy is to leave (if you can). It can take up to 22 months to recover physically and emotionally from a toxic boss. Mental health professionals liken this situation to post-traumatic stress disorder and battered spouse syndrome. As with any psychological trauma or stress, the greater and longer the exposure, the longer it takes to recover.

So if your horrible boss is not going to change, take the power back. Give yourself permission to save yourself. Line up your next move and get out.

Mary Abbajay is the author of the award-winning, bestselling book Managing Up: How to Move Up, Win at Work, and Succeed with Any Type of Boss and the president of Careerstone Group, LLC, a full-service organizational and leadership development consultancy that delivers leading-edge talent and organizational development solutions to business and government. Mary is also a LinkedIn Learning instructor, a cohost of the popular weekly workplace advice podcast Cubicle Confidential, and a frequent expert contributor for television, radio, and print publications.