(originally published August 18th, 2005)

I have a couple of friends who are having some difficulties dealing with organizational authority figures recently. Both are in similar situations, but their positions are much different. One is the direct employee of the person giving her grief, the other is a consultant who doesn’t even report to the people giving her grief.

All of us sometimes have to deal with difficult people in our lives. Many of us have to deal at least occasionally with difficult people where we work. Sometimes, that person is someone you report to, or in a position of leadership. If we want to get by in life, or succeed in life, we have to take the good with the bad, so to speak.

As it pertains to work, or employment, every person has two choices. One, you can leave; two, you can figure out what you may need to do in order to make it work for you. Sometimes you can’t fully change another person, but you may be able to modify some things. Sometimes you can at least change the circumstances around you. Sometimes you can’t do anything, and you just may have to decide to leave; it’s always up to you, no matter what your financial situation may be.

The one thing I always recommend to people who decide to try to stick it out is to try one thing first. That one thing is that they need to try to establish how they’re going to be treated. I often say that we teach others how to treat us. No person should be a willing doormat in a work situation. We’re all adults, and adults deserve at least the respect to be treated fairly and not be bullied or yelled at, especially in front of others.

One needs to try to get that taken care of before anything else. This is the one thing that will tell you whether it’s worth trying to stay at that position or move on. If your employer isn’t at least willing to change how they treat you, and you can’t get any recourse from an entity such as human resources or your union, then you might as well start looking for other work while still employed, because you’re going to be miserable and end up getting fired at some point anyway. If you can at least get across to them that they need to speak to you in a reasonable manner, then maybe there’s a chance for you to work with your employer to learn just what they need from you so that you can do your job without worry.

Think about it and give it a shot; what do you have to lose at this point?