If I had a dollar for every fantasy I’ve had that involved slapping my really bad boss so hard he flew out of his chair, I’d be rich. What economic crisis? 

In my fantasy, I’m the guy in the white shirt, and my really bad boss is in blue.  In reality, this is supposedly a teacher-student interaction. For the record, if I was posting this as an article, the really bad boss in this scenario would be the teacher.  Slapping the hell out of your student is a no-no, no matter how disruptive he’s being.  I bet you the other guy is really happy his teacher is right handed!

1. You inspire the creation of the website www.reallybadboss.com – If your actions and behavior are so mind numbingly ridiculous that they inspire the creation of a cottage industry based primarily on the asinine things you’ve said and done, you can rest assured…you’re a really bad boss.  
2. Your turnover rate is 100%  – Ok, so maybe not 100%, but if people would rather make minimum wage dressed like  sandwiches/crustacean/ the statue of liberty and dance in the street in front of the local sandwich/seafood/tax preparation shop – in Arizona, in July – than work for you, you might be a really bad boss.
3. The term “Bossnapping” is coined to describe what your employees have just done to you – Some French workers have taken their disgust at their really bad bosses too far. A rash of boss kidnappings – Bossnappings – have plagued France recently.  Worse, 45% of French people surveyed think that it’s ok.  Let’s hope Bossnapping doesn’t cross the ocean.  Felonies don’t look good on resumes.
4. There has been at least one assassination (or coup) attempt on your life, and you work in, for example…the paper goods industry – Assassination attempts and coups are pretty common in some of the more volatile areas of the world where dissatisfaction with leadership is the norm and not the exception. But, Michael Scott notwithstanding, if you make paper or thumbtacks, or some very uncontroversial product and people are trying to depose you or have you forcibly removed from your position, you might be a really bad boss. 
5. Someone quits live on the air – Arnetta the Moodsetta says it best. Click here for the audio.

Got something to add to the You might be a really bad boss list? Add it in the comment section after the jump.

Laughing all the way to the bank - REUTERS/Frank Polich

I think I’m going to have to name a blog category after Blagojevich.  In a prime example of what’s wrong with America today, our second favorite really bad boss in the political arena – Kwame Kilpatrick being our first – is at it again.  Just hours after pleading not guilty to the federal charges against him, I hear that he’s trying to get himself on a reality show called “I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!” The show takes a group of D-list celebrities to a jungle and leaves them there.  Apparently mayhem ensues, and we are thereby entertained.  Is it wrong to hope they all get scabies?  Blagojevich is in line to make $80,000…an episode! That right there is a really bad boss gold mine and sets the stage for the really bad boss trifecta:

1.  Bad bosses making a killing off of their really bad behavior.  We already ♥ Blago because he gives us soooo much to work with. Now he’s poised to make $80k an episode – for being a liar, and a cheat.  Nice. Really nice.

2. Bad bosses making a profit off the bad behavior of other really bad bosses. You already know how I feel about reality shows and the media execs who riddle our airways with them.  When will rewarding bad behavior stop being prime time entertainment?  Are the networks competing with each other to see who can dumb down America the fastest?  It seems that all you have to do today to get on TV is to be completely talentless, make a sex tape that is ‘mysteriously’ leaked, lie, steal and/or cheat.  Oh yeah, and be in line for a layoff.  I’m waiting for the reality show where honesty, integrity and a little bit of pride is rewarded.  I’ll report on that story alongside the one where the cow jumps over the moon.

3. People choosing to support really bad behavior by tuning in.  We’ve got to share a little bit of the blame here.  You know at really bad boss we believe that people are the bosses of their own lives.  The reason these shows continue to litter our airways is that we – and by we, I mean the ones who think Flava Flav is a good catch – keep watching them.  With the exception of the Amazing race, and that dance off show, I stay away from the genre.   But by watching these shows, we help boost the ratings and we send a message to execs that say ”keep this kind of programming coming.”

Now a man who should be a disgraced former governor, stands to make $80,000 an episode for being a complete and utter ass.

Blago at court on Tuesday (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)

From the Who didn’t see this one coming file - another really bad boss denying all wrongdoing

You know how much we love Blago right?  Well today we fell in love all over again as he pleaded not guilty to 16 federal criminal charges.  Blagojevich, hair perfectly in place, looked relaxed and confident as he entered his not guilty plea at the Dirksen Federal Building in Chicago.  Blago said he was ”saddened and hurt…” by the indictment, and then told reporters to go f*** themselves.  No, he didn’t actually say the last part, or at least he wasn’t caught on camera saying it.  But  when all this drama began four months ago, he was heard on tape referring to now President Obama, as a “m***** f*****,” so cursing at reporters would certainly not be out of character for him.

As you know from our ongoing love affair with Kwame Kilpatrick, the only thing we love more than a really bad boss, is a really bad boss who, even when caught on tape, still denies any wrong doing.  It comes as absolutely no surprise to us that this pillar of the community continues to deny attempting to auction the, then vacant, Illinois senate seat to the highest bidder.  

When Blagojevich finally does admit to some wrong doing, we’ll be sure to cover it here, along with the breaking news of pigs flying and hell freezing over.

Photo: Barcroft Media

  Something to make you smile on Monday

Remember when I told you about the really bad boss I had with the massive ponytail hair extension.  I fantasized about snatching it off her head and dunking it into her 64oz Big Gulp.  Well someone had the idea to style actual horses hair and photograph it.  See some of the pics and the full story here.  If only my boss’ extensions had looked this good. 

P.S.  I know there’s a horses ass joke in there somewhere…but I just can’t find it right now.

For years I wasted entire Sundays absolutely dreading Monday mornings.   The uneasy feeling would start to creep in on Saturday night, and by Sunday evening, I was a basket case.  For many of us Monday spells the end of the weekend, the start of the work week and a return to a real tool of a boss.  Facing a really bad boss on a typical Monday morning is bad enough, but it’s even worse when you’ve got to face him with bad news from something that happened over the weekend.  What could you possibly do over the weekend that would require you to give your boss bad news on Monday morning?  Glad you asked.   I crashed…no… totaled the car. The company car.  Did I mention I’d been on the job for only two weeks when it happened?  I challenge anyone to top that Monday morning story.  

Thankfully no one was injured in the accident.  I still remember the two block walk of shame to the office that morning, after a totally sleepless Sunday night.  As my new colleagues sped by me on their way to work, I sensed more than saw them looking at me in their rear view mirrors wandering why the new girl was walking to work.  They all knew I had been given a company car and like a scene from The Office, were all peering over the receptionist’s shoulder when I arrived several minutes later.  I could have taken a cab, but in addition to the car, the company was paying for me to stay in a hotel until I found an apartment.  I thought it would be pretty presumptuous to take (and expense) a cab to work the day after totaling the car.   

 It’s a testament to the saying “time heals all wounds” that I really don’t remember much of the conversation that took place that morning.  I do remember that it involved a lot of cursing on the Reprobate’s end (in two languages) and quite a bit of apologizing and tears on mine.   I was pretty young then, so crying was one of the only coping mechanisms I had mastered at the time.  I think I must have blacked out for a couple of minutes too because I remember someone handing me a bottle of water and seeing half of it on my shirt a few minutes later…or maybe that was sweat.  In any event, my point is this.  I dreaded that Monday morning probably more than any Monday morning I’d ever had before then and have ever had since.  Yet I survived.  I made it through the swearing, spitting (yes there was spitting) and crying that day.  Had I known 10 years later that I wouldn’t even remember the conversation clearly; I would have slept that Sunday night.  Had I known that the next two years would involve a lot more cursing, a lot less tears, and me ending up no worse for the wear, I would have had a lot fewer sleepless nights. 

It took several more bad bosses and Monday morning mayhems for me to learn that we can’t always control how our bosses treat us, but we can control how we respond.  Our really bad bosses get our talents, our time and our energy, but we own our emotions and our responses to theirs, no matter how erratic they might be. The next time I was faced with a Monday morning mayhem of that magnitude, I slept on Sunday night – not like a baby – but like an adult who knew in her heart that no matter what the boss dealt me on Monday morning, everything would be all right in the end.

Protesting workers at the Scapa factory in France. Photograph: Laurent Cipriana/AP

People are starting to take their boss revenge fantasies way too seriously. 

I read a story yesterday about a poll taken in France where 45% of people polled felt it was ok for workers facing layoffs to take their bosses hostage.  Aside from the obvious downside of having to spend even more time with the boss than normal, the whole illegality of the act, you would think, might be a major deterrent as well.  Not so much for some French workers it seems.  Apparently there’s been a recent rash of what’s now been termed “bossnapping,” in France.  One incident even involved a French billionaire trapped in a taxi for about an hour before riot police came to his rescue.

I’ve never entertained fantasies about kidnapping any of my bosses.  Besides the fact that I am very afraid of prison and try to avoid activities that will land me in one, kidnapping involves a degree of sinister planning and detail for which I have neither the time nor patience.  While I’ve never fantasized about kidnapping, I have had several fantasies that involved me interrupting any one of my bad bosses during one of their ridiculous tirades.  There were times during meetings that I’d get that dazed look in my eyes as any one of a number of asinine ideas erupted from my boss’ mouth. Looking around, I knew that everyone was thinking the same thing that I was, “Please… Shut up and sit-down.”  But of course, none of us ever said it.  Instead I daydreamed about slamming my hands down on the conference table, standing up Norma Rae style, and letting it rip.  My daydream smack-down would start off by me telling him, that we all, without exception, thought that he was the biggest ass going.  Encouraged by my colleagues who had now also risen to their feet, cheering and pumping their fists, I’d let him know that after every one of our meetings, we all got together and asked the same questions “Is he serious? Seriously? No…seriously?”  In my fantasy, by the end of my verbal smack-down, he’d be reduced to a whimpering mess on the floor, cowering in the corner and begging for mercy.  Harsh, I know, but well deserved.  Once he managed to scoop himself up off the floor, I would escort him from the building to the cheers and support of my fellow colleagues.  Even today I get tingly just thinking about it.

Another favorite fantasy involved an especially condescending manager who wore an enormous clip-on ponytail.  Besides calling her My Little Pony behind her back, I’d often imagine myself running up to her during one of her regularly scheduled ‘I’m the boss and don’t you forget it meetings’, snatching the tail off her head and dunking it into the ever present 64 oz. Big Gulp on her desk.  I did neither. And I never delivered on the verbal smack-down.  None of us really ever do.  Reality takes over and we remember that we need our jobs, we don’t want to burn bridges, and of course, we don’t like prison. 

But I guess that’s part of what makes fantasies so fantastic – we can give them any ending we want and they help us make it through another meeting, another day, and another really bad boss.  I hope the rash of bossnappings in France come to an end soon.  It’s one thing to fantasize about getting back at that really bad boss, but it’s another thing entirely to actually hurt or threaten one of them.  I’m a big proponent of making the most of a bad situation by learning as much as you can while you can.  I’d say learning what not to do from your really bad boss will get you much farther in life than a felony kidnapping charge ever will.

Share your really bad boss fantasies in the comment section.