Do you have a ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ boss? Managers with mood swings cause more stress among staff than managers who are always mean, research shows

Having an annoying boss is stressful enough, but having a boss who tries to make up for it the next day could be even worse, according to a new study.

Researchers at the Stevens Institute of Technology found that bosses cause more stress when they swing unpredictably between good and bad behavior.

Their research found that employee morale and performance dropped sharply when their bosses behaved erratically.

So-called ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ bosses who try to make up for their bad behavior by acting nice actually cause more damage than those who are mean all the time, according to the study.

Lead author Dr Haoying Xu says: ‘Organizations tend to intervene when bosses are consistently abusive, but are more tolerant of leaders whose abusive behavior is only occasionally apparent.

‘However, with this research we have shown that periodic bad behavior can actually be more toxic for organizations.’

The effect of this uncertainty is so strong that Dr. Xu and his colleagues found that it affected staff who were not even directly affected.

Employees who saw their manager’s boss behaving unpredictably had less confidence in their work and had less confidence in their manager’s abilities.

As anyone who has had a tyrannical boss can attest, researchers have long known that a bad manager has a serious impact on employee well-being.

But not every boss is a full-time terrorist, and some will shift between what researchers call “ethical” and “abusive” management styles.

While you might expect that a consistently abusive supervisor would be the worst for employee morale, this study published in the Journal of Applied Psychologycame to the conclusion that this is not necessarily the case.

Although Dr. Xu saw that employees with abusive bosses had low morale and poor performance, they also discovered that a boss could make things worse by trying to be nice.

Previously, when bosses tried to make up for abuse with a bout of ethical management, it actually caused their employees to become more stressed.

Dr. Says Xu: “We already know that abusive leadership takes a serious toll on employees – but now we see that leaders who switch back and forth between abusive and ethical leadership inflict even more harm on employees.

‘It turns out that returning to an ethical leadership style doesn’t magically erase the impact of previous bad behavior – and in some circumstances can even make things worse.’

The likely cause of this damage is the uncertainty that Jekyll and Hyde’s bosses create with their volatile style changes.

With a consistently bad boss, employees at least know what to expect and can find ways to work around it.

But for a boss who can be mean one day and friendly the next, employees can’t prepare.

Dr. Xu says, “If you’re constantly guessing which boss will show up – the good cop or the bad cop – you’ll end up emotionally exhausted, demoralized, and unable to reach your full potential.”

Furthermore, this article shows for the first time that a Jekyll and Hyde boss does not only influence a boss’s direct reports.

The researchers also discovered a series of indirect problems caused by having a Jekyll and Hyde boss in the company.

Employees who saw their supervisor’s boss behaving unpredictably had higher levels of emotional exhaustion and poorer job performance than those with consistent upper management.

To make matters worse, the researchers suggest that this type of erratic behavior could be contagious.

Because employees tend to pick up their manager’s worst habits, Dr. Xu says a boss’s inconstancy can promote inconstancy in others.

“If that is the case, it would be an additional important reason for organizations to take Jekyll-and-Hyde’s leadership seriously,” says Dr. Xu.

A bad boss is more than just an annoyance. Research has shown that poor management can have serious consequences for companies.

A 2023 survey by the Chartered Management Institute found that one in three people have left their jobs due to poor work culture, while half of those who say their bosses are ineffective plan to quit within a year.

On the other hand, some negative interpersonal traits have been shown to have positive consequences in the business world.

For example, research from Aarhus University in Denmark found that companies with narcissistic CEOs tended to perform better – although this was only the case for female bosses.

But when it comes to dealing with Jekyll and Hyde’s bosses, researchers suggest the best solution is to address the psychological root of the problem.

Dr. Xu says, “This kind of occasionally abusive leadership tends to be impulsive.

“That means there is room to reduce or eliminate this by helping leaders manage their mood and improve their impulse control.”