Melody Wilding: We have all had that one boss who just seemed to make our lives harder. Maybe they were impossible to pin down for decisions that you needed or they would change direction without warning and leave you scrambling to keep up. The toughest pill to swallow though is what if that bad boss is us. And I will be candid, I have been that boss at times over the last 12 months.

We are growing quickly, which has been wonderful, but my team has had to sit me down and say, we are overloaded. We need you to spend more time with us explaining what we are doing and why we’re doing it, because we feel disconnected from the big picture. Or you said X in a meeting and that felt dismissive.

And while that stung a bit in the moment, I was so grateful to hear those things because it jolted me out of my own circumstances, the urgency I felt I was operating under, the stress that I was feeling that was trickling down to them in unfair ways. Whether you want to admit it or not, I bet if you have managed a team for any amount of time, then you have been there too. And it’s why I am so excited to welcome Mita Mallick on the show.

She’s the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of Reimagine Inclusion, and she’s here to talk about her new book, the Devil Emails at Midnight. What Good Leaders Can Learn from Bad Bosses.

The thing I appreciate about Mita’s approach is she is not boss bashing. This is something I see all over LinkedIn and social media. We just villainize leaders. Mita’s message is that bosses are often created by their circumstances, and if we can attempt to unpack and diagnose what’s going on, we have a better chance at being successful navigating that situation. And more importantly, not recreating their mistakes so we can be the leader that we want to be.

So with that, here’s my conversation with Mita. 

Mita, thank you so much for joining me. I’m really excited for this conversation. We’re talking about bad bosses today, which is unfortunately something I think way too many people can relate to.

And one of the first places you start in this book, which has a very provocative name, the Devil Emails at Midnight, we’re gonna get into all of that. But you start with this statement where you say bad bosses aren’t born, they are made. And that all of us have the capability, the potential, the possibility of becoming a bad boss. So I’m curious, why did you choose to start there with that idea?

Mita Mallick: Well first thanks for having me I’m so excited to be here with you in conversations. And yeah bad bosses is a hot topic because I wanna humanize bad bosses. You know you think of Miranda from the Devil Wears Prada. And you think of these bad bosses we villainize them. And I actually believe they’re hurt people right. And hurt people hurt other people as we know famously. And so that’s why I started that way. Bad bosses are not born, that they’re made. I believe that one of the first signs of this is whatever’s happening in the market.

Hmm.

Right so you’re sitting in a government shutdown potentially. There are tariffs. There’s stress on the business from external pressures and that causes us to behave badly. That’s number one.

Number two. We say in my house I have children poo poo trickles down. So if you are working for me for the first time as a leader and I’m a bad boss guess what. You might unknowingly absorb some of those behaviors.

And number three. I really talk about the personal earthquake which I have gone through when I lost my dad suddenly in 2017. And you have suddenly something that happens that’s so un unexpected. Particularly, when it comes to grief. It’s inconvenient it’s unrelenting and it can show up in the workplace. And so those are three ways in which bad bo bosses can be made.

Melody Wilding: Yeah, and I really love your perspective in this book that we’re not villainizing bad bosses. We’re trying to understand them. This was one of the reasons why I wrote my book Managing Up, is because

Mita Mallick: yes

Melody Wilding: think there is so much, um, dialogue out there about if you have a bad boss, just quit. And that’s not always reality for most people.

We have to figure out how to work within the systems we are in with imperfect people who are in imperfect conditions. And many times when you have that, just that little bit of situational awareness to understand that, maybe this is a decent person in a difficult situation that it, it takes some of the sting out of it for you personalizing their behavior because now it, it feels like something workable that, okay, I can, I see the situation more clearly.

Maybe there are inroads I can make or things I can drive, versus this is just a bad person and there’s nowhere you can go from there. Which is, which is not good for you.

Mita Mallick: Right and I appreciate all the tools you provide in your book Managing Up and I think that context and situation matters. And so to your point there are three bosses that I talk about in the Devil Emails at Midnight three bosses who really impacted my mental health, and I wish I would’ve left those situations sooner. But it’s really easy particularly when you have friends and colleagues and family members who are like well why don’t you just quit. And it’s never that easy. But you really have to think about, how are you gonna actually make the most of that moment when you’re working for unfortunately micromanaging Nita. Yes that was me If you worked for me years ago, I’m sorry. Or maybe you nicknamed me Maleficent or have some other clever nickname. And you can’t like I I am raising children, what would my advice be to my kids or my friends, you can’t quit every time you have a bad boss. So that’s why managing up and how you navigate that situation is so important.

Melody Wilding: Yeah, I was talking to a client yesterday actually, who is in a very, very large organization that has a ton of change going on AI and reorgs every, you know, three, six months and, and all of that. And this person was feeling really frustrated with their manager because they’re not getting clarity about performance expectations and certain vague feedback about, well, we need to see greater presence from you and we need to see you influence. It’s not what you’re doing, it’s how you’re doing it. Yet her manager can’t, or is not giving her more specifics. And it’s frustrating because she fully recognizes, you know, I know this is trickling down. This isn’t my manager just withholding from me because they’re trying to be malicious. It’s, it’s because there’s not clarity from the top and things are changing every day, and therefore that is trickling down to her and to me.

Mita Mallick: I was just chuckling as you’re sharing that story cause it sounds like you’re talking to my younger self where people would tell me to get more gravitas, and I was like how do I get how do I get more gravitas. What does that mean, the elusive phrase.

Melody Wilding: Always. And you were saying you were the micromanager and, and in the book you talk about you fess up to being the bad boss yourself. What is the story of that coming to that realization and, what changes did you make? And I, why I wanna go here is because you are someone who cares so much about inclusion and being supportive as a manager.

So it must have been tough, I imagine, to have that reckoning that, oh no, you know, it’s that like social media mean like, am I the drama to realize, you know, I, I’m the drama.

Mita Mallick: Well there there’s probably two moments that this has happened. There’s many moments. Here’s the thing people are very fascinated by this. It’s like am I bad boss. Am I a bad boss, or am I a good boss or am I a good leader, and and this is not a static state. It it’s it swings like a pendulum. So for me as I mentioned earlier, I I was in a really good boss era I was in like a good leader era. I felt like there was a groove to my career, I was really excited I just gotten promoted, had this big team was doing all these great things.

And then I get a phone call from my mother on February 14th 2017 that changes the course of my life and my dad had suddenly died. And so all the things that you go through with grief with bereavement, we don’t really talk enough about grief as a community and certainly not in the workplace. And so I was trying to deal with the sudden loss of my father and all the things you have to do for arrangements. And then you’re expected to go back to work, and I shoved grief in my kitchen drawer thinking okay stay here and I’m gonna go to work. It showed up in the most unexpected ways. I lost my temper on people. I screamed and yelled. I’m not proud of that. I was also disengaged. Like I would disappear for days. And then I would show back up again. And I remember there was a big meeting we were presenting to a a proposal to the executive leadership team and I was saying to my team where’s the deck? We’re on in 90 minutes and where’s the deck. I’ve never seen it. And they’re like we’ve sent it to you like three times. And I’m like no you didn’t. And then I look in my email and there it is three times. And I am right before making all these changes micromanaging, and why. It’s because I have had something devastating happen to me and have a sense of loss of control. But I don’t feel like I can be vulnerable enough at work to even mention or talk about it. Because when I come back to work, a few weeks later my then boss says to me oh finally you got your mojo back. No one wants to see a sad Mita missing her dad at work. And so we feel this need to try to be performative and pretend everything’s going well. And then at the moments that we least expect it we just will explode in different ways. And I talk about in Devil Emails at Midnight I had somebody who was a high performer leave my team, and I just remember sitting and reading the notes from HR crying. It was all right all the ways in which I had become disengaged. And that along with some other things made me realize I need to get support and help and I need to actually, you know. Advice of like, just push through it, it’s work through it, right. We have to work through these things not like push past it and work through it. And I hope that gives other people the courage to talk more about grief in the workplace and also for companies to provide bereavement leave and support need it the most.

Melody Wilding: Yeah. And it, it can be, it can sneak up on you grief, right? Because it’s not a linear process. And I think many, traumas frankly, in life are like that. Like if you are getting a divorce, for example, and you’re, you’re having to lead a team, and there can be this duality to it. If I have this major bomb that’s gone off in my personal life, but I have to show up at work and I have to be this visionary leader and I have to rally the team or keep the priorities. It can be, it’s almost like I imagine it, you know, if you have a pot that’s boiling and you’re trying to keep the, the top on it, but everything’s all, all the water and rice and whatever is, is spewing out of it.

Yeah. And it, it does sneak up on you. And for you to have that moment of realization to say, oh. Okay. There, there are changes I need to make here. I’m, I’m curious now, because now you run your own company, how do you keep the micromanaging Mita in check and maybe, maybe I’m asking, for personal reasons. But I would love to hear, how do you keep a watch on that?

Because what if we resist something, it will persist, or if we don’t repair it, it will repeat, you know, as we say from my therapy training. How does it still show up for you? What, how do you work through that now?

Mita Mallick: Oh absolutely. And my hope is people read the Devil Emails at Midnight and think about one behavior they have that go to under moments of stress. Because guess what, micromanagement, it can either be micromanagement or it can be holding people accountable and sharing your standards. Like there’s a difference. And so for me I think about what can I only uniquely do? What is so important to me, this detail, that let me not tell someone else on my team to do it or outsource it and then be unhappy with the result? Right. So like think about those things and then just be clear. I think too often we send people running off that I need this, without clear guidelines, guardrails and that takes a little bit more time upfront. But when you do that, then the end result is what you want. And you know too often in my career I think about this a lot, I demanded excellence from people but I didn’t coach excellence. Right? There’s a difference. I didn’t help people get coaching and training in the way I could have to show them what the standard was I was expecting. And I think if you have that conversation this is for the CEO deck is really important. This is an onboarding deck. This person’s only been here three months. Are meeting our team for the first time. Here’s why. What I’m expecting and here’s what it’s important. You get people behind the vision and they get excited about it versus I mean we’ve I’ve done this I’ve received this, you received the red line document back and it’s like, Mita thanks for the first draft. Here are my changes. And you open it and you’re like oh my God did the person just rewrite the whole thing? And there’s no context right. They just like rewrite it and you’re like I totally failed at this assignment.

Melody Wilding: I am just, I’m laughing because I am that person very, very, very often. Something I’ve had to, I, I love you saying that we all have these, it’s almost, I imagine it like a magnet that when we become stressed, stressed, there’s like these, behaviors that we just feel pulled to, and that is certainly one of mine.

And I’ve realized that I, I have conflated ownership with being hands off. And what I mean by that is I, I may have standards or I may, I may have context in my head and I think I’m giving someone ownership by saying, you take care of this. And then when it comes back and it’s not to the standard I want, I would feel frustrated. Yet I had not gone through what, what you were saying, that practice of explicitly writing down, here’s the background for this. Here are some lookouts for very particular things that I, I may have, you know, yeah, I want things done this way that might be different from how you might approach this normally. And literally just taking the 10 minutes to slow down and articulate that, instead of just saying, Hey, here’s the task. Come back to me when it’s done. Which then creates this whole lack of trust when I redo it. So yeah, this is,

Mita Mallick: I’ll I’ll give you a quick example The cover of my book

Melody Wilding: yeah.

Mita Mallick: Ask me about right I was so explicit about it. I was like I want horns on the letters I want a tail. I want the letters to come to life. Like very and and you’re like, huh. But then what’s gonna happen as you know cause you’ve written a book you get many iterations of a book cover. But from the start if you’re like I’ve done my research. I like these colors, I like this font. Here’s the look and feel. Here’s why. Here’s and then all of a sudden you’re on the same page. You’re not just like going through rounds and rounds. And then what happens is you just the productivity dips. It’s with every round Mita has another change cause to your she didn’t set up the vision from the start. I don’t actually know what she wants but she comes back and nitpicks. All these things It drives people crazy.

Melody Wilding: Yes, yes. Now, okay. So thank you for the mini therapy session there. Uh, I do wanna switch gears because in the book, each chapter, you’re covering a bad boss, you have had previously, and I wanna talk one, talk about the one who, the namesake of the book is about the devil emails at midnight. What is the story of that leader? How did you handle it, and what has it taught you?

Mita Mallick: Sure. So this is my one of my first bosses in corporate America. I am so excited to work for her. And the feeling is not mutual right. I am so excited to be there, and she never has time for me during the day. She certainly has time for me between 10:00 PM and 1:00 AM to dump out her inbox every single night. And what happens? My people pleasing tendencies kick in. I want to be liked, I wanna stay relevant, I wanna work there, I wanna please her. So it is not just the emailing, you know I wanna get into this because people are so it’s either they love the title or they hate it. And they’re like oh my God like we’re trying to be productive. Have you seen this market. People need to be working. And I’m like I’m not an Uber app, no one is. This is the biggest I think, challenge leaders are gonna face moving forward, is how do you drive teams through intense periods. Particularly with the race to embrace AI and so much happening in the market. You’re gonna have drive periods. You’re gonna rest and recover. You’re gonna have drive periods. But this was a person who was constantly on overdrive. And not only would she email me during those hours, I would respond and we’d be in these back and forths. Right. So that’s really interesting too. And I was like the golden retriever in the office just laughing around trying to get time with her. I was I chased her out into the parking lot once. Like that’s how desperate I was. But she never would make time for me. I wasn’t important enough. And that is as, you know in your work like the most important thing in a relationship and the biggest complaint, is you don’t have enough time for me. Right. You don’t have it’s the most precious commodity we have. And I don’t understand, if you are a leader and you can’t make time for your teams then why are you leading? Why are you leading?

Melody Wilding: Hmm. And I, I wanna hear both sides of this coin. Did you, did you just leave that role? Did you deal with it while you were there? And you see this now in hindsight, did you find ways to cope with that? And then I wanna talk about how do people, because if I, if I’m on the other side there, there are certain times in my work where it is, I don’t wanna say convenient, but truly the only time I do have to triage is over the weekend on a Sunday, for example. And I’m very upfront with my team to say, there is no expectation I’m doing this when this is convenient for me. And I try to schedule things so they don’t hit them at those times when they should be taking their personal time.

But I think we do find ourselves in a bind as, as leaders of, I’m doing three jobs. I wanna be there for my team, but the only way I can do that is in the margins.

Mita Mallick: Yeah start with I think it actually goes back to what you talk about in Managing Up is that you have to retrain your manager. Your job is to make sure that your boss is working well with yourself and others. It is. I never really actually thought about that. So for me managing up was something that was dirty. Like I’m like oh I don’t need to do that. Like my boss is like a God. They’re a superhero. They’re gonna remember everything I work on. Like I just never thought that. Cause for me it was politics and it was something you know I was I’m the proud daughter of Indian immigrant parents. My parents used my dad used to always say to me you know keep your head down

Melody Wilding: Yep.

Mita Mallick: hard. You’ll get recognized and the stay out of trouble which I think is hilarious cause I was a kid who was afraid of my own shadow. But it is this nod to like don’t get involved in office politics. Right. Like your boss is like the super God has all the power and they’ll take care of you. And that’s not always the case. And so if I had done more to retrain, like I’ll give you an example. Years later I worked for somebody who would multiple times a week text at 6:30 AM

Melody Wilding: Hmm.

Mita Mallick: and it would be like oh I’m taking a run and I just walked by this retailer and I saw this competitive launch and we should look into it. Or, I was just like making my morning coffee and had this thought. And it was never anything urgent but clearly disruptive cause I find like like that disruptive versus like go to email. So I would what would I do I would go to my email at eight 30 when I logged in and I respond then. Right. I did not actually respond to those texts I was retraining her. And then when we would meet as a team I would say, hey I’m starting a Google Doc It’s like a parking lot for big ideas. So if anyone has a big idea let’s put it in there. Then every Wednesday at our team meeting we can go through it, right. So there’s a part of how you have to manage up and retrain people and set those boundaries. Which I wasn’t good at when I was junior in my career. And then I wanna talk about what you said which I is so important is that we’re all working, as you know the Microsoft study said there’s like that second shift at night that everyone’s doing. But here are the things I ask myself, I love that you said you know you have to do work when you might be the most productive. But the thing I the nuance I wanna bring up is that if there’s a power dynamic, and you email me and you say, mita I’m sending this on a Sunday but do not look at it. The question is do you really mean it or not. Because if I am people pleasing and I’m in a more junior role if I write back and you write back then we’re working all Sunday or in the late hours or early morning. So that I think is really important. And I think setting those standards especially when you’re on a global team. And here’s the thing think that I’ll say this about myself, I have sold a lot of beauty products, a lot of food products, and SAS software. I have never been a 9 1 1 operator, a crisis counselor, an emergency room professional. Nothing I have ever done has been life or death right. And so when you are constantly creating this sense of potentially false sense of urgency with these emails, when you actually do need something at midnight because a client has called and there’s like a comms crisis, they’re not gonna respond because you’ve trained them that way. So I want people to think about it that way. And then finally I’m just gonna say, treat your calendar like I try to treat my wardrobe. Things that I don’t need anymore gift to move on that’s never gonna fit me again. The style is gone. Whatever it is. But I bet you if people sat down and looked at their calendar and worked with if you have an executive assistant there are meetings you don’t need to be in FOMO versus JOMO There are meetings that you know you log on and you’re like hanging out for 15 minutes and then you’re like oh Mita’s not even here today. Was her presentation. Or wait didn’t we just talk about this in the other meeting. Like I guess this is reoccurring. And have the courage to cancel the meeting cause that’s gonna help free up time as well.

Melody Wilding: There’s so much, so much goodness there. The, the theme that sounds like is under so much of it is emotion regulation as a leader, right? Is realizing that, yes, it’s satisfying to me to get this off my desk and check this task, but what’s the, what’s the trickle down effect? Like you were saying with your, your kids, the, the poo rolls downhill. Yeah. Um, and it, it, it comes back to when I am under stress as, as the leader asking yourself like, what is, what is my go-to? And is that actually serving me and the other person? And to your point, it’s, it’s, you were saying, even if you say no pressure to answer, that exists in the larger context of your relationship. So it’s never just that one email, right? It’s the, it’s the totality of do you have trust, right? Do you have agreements and contracts around when something is truly urgent when it’s not? Does that person know you’re, you actually are being truthful when you say, this is, this is not an emergency. Get to this on Monday. That’s totally fine. So that stands out to me as well, is that this is, we’re not just talking about clearing your inbox here, we’re talking about the larger dynamic of the relationship, which is, which is bigger than that.

Mita Mallick: Absolutely.

Melody Wilding: Okay, so there, there are some other bad boss types in the book that, that I wanna get into the, the one who is, who does cry wolf that everything is urgent.

Let’s go back to that for a second, because I think that is very common, that everything feels like it’s a fire drill, it’s an emergency, you know, I need this done. How do we as leaders, what do we do when we are being squeezed from the people above us who say, I need this done? This is a fire drill. The client needs that. What do we do? So it doesn’t trickle down then to our people.

Mita Mallick: Yeah. So this is the white rabbit who I talk about who I’ve nicknamed and she is a throwback to Alice in Wonderland the white rabbit it’s like every always late everything you know. She derived her value from busyness and the badge of busyness. And that was her insecurity and she wanted to stay relevant. That case in the case of people listening to this is that you also have to do a good job of managing up as you would say to your leadership. Too often when you’re caught in the middle you’re just taking the stuff that’s the poo p trickling down the theme of our conversation. And not saying no to say Hey Mita understand this is urgent and now due tomorrow but, there were two other things you assigned me and the team that’s also due tomorrow. And then suddenly that person because you know we’re human and they might say oh my gosh like I didn’t realize I assigned all that to you. So actually those two other things can now go to Friday. Because this is the environment we’re in. There’s constant reprioritization. And sometimes we have to be the mirror to say Hey like let’s just go back to all the things that we’re doing this week. Because the the most senior person is just firing off emails or walking into offices or in meetings saying this is what we need now this is what we need next. And not maybe having a whole picture as they’re sending off those orders. And I like to use the analogy, I mean this like remember being in a very high story Manhattan building like years ago and my husband and I lived there and I’ll never forget it was like the 30th floor the fire alarm goes off.

You’re like oh my God And you’re like the fire alarm. There’s a fire and you like race all the way down the stairs and it’s like two in the morning and you’re

then you’re like oh it was a false alarm. They’re like oh my God. And, that happens a few times. And then it’s the wildest thing It keeps happening and no one is leaving. None of your neighbors. The piercing sound is there and we’re just numb to it. We’re watching tv. We’re cooking. We’re sitting and working. And that’s what bleeders do, they burn out through their capital. Right I’ll never forget the white rabbit gets people tries to get people together on a Friday afternoon because something urgent is due and nobody believes her. She can’t even gather half the team cause people are like everything’s urgent. Let’s add that to something else. I’m gonna go take my summer Friday. I’m not coming in for this. And so that’s what I also want people to think about is like you’re actually burning through your capital. You’re burning through your ability to actually have people help you when something really is urgent.

Melody Wilding: Yeah. Oh, that’s such, that’s such a great point. And this is all, underscoring for me, like this is all about power dynamics. As you were saying before, we have to realize when we are emailing someone on, on our team that there’s a power dynamic that they feel. But also when we are managing up, there’s a power dynamic there. And I think you said this earlier, just being mindful not to psych ourselves out, that these are the C-suite are these people who are on a pedestal that can do no wrong. Right? That they are humans too. And we actually do them a service. When we say, know, if you recall in the last leadership meeting we talked about number one and number two or priorities. I hear this new thing is important. I can juggle things around this way. Does that sound good? Because they, they might not even be aware, but if you are so intimidated and in your head about, oh, I can’t push back to this person that’s going to make me look bad. I need to stay in line. This is the hierarchy, then you are just going to sacrifice yourself and everyone below you. You are a steward. Of all of those people and their bandwidth and their wellbeing. And uh, I think sometimes we, we let our own imposter syndrome get the better of us not realizing that ripple effect that does happen downward. Yeah.

Okay. One other manager type I wa I wanna cover. What surprising to me, and I think may surprise other people, is the toxically positive boss, the one who says everything’s okay.

Even it’s like that, that meme of that dog sitting in the fire and yeah, and it’s like everything is fine. So tell us about, how do you know if you are being the toxically positive over optimistic manager?

Mita Mallick: Well this was the cheerleader and he was in a time when people are talking about how do we get people back into the office. No you know the whole rhetoric. No one wants to be in the office. I and others wanted to be in the office to be around this person. He was like the corporate Pied Piper. He coached, he taught, he trained, he walked in he was like snapping and clapping, like so much energy. And you’re like okay so what’s the problem. This sounds like a really great boss. And it was all lollipop’s, rainbow, sunshine, cotton candy, until it wasn’t. And so that’s where the toxic positivity. It was a constant Instagram reel. Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. You can do this Mina, you’re superwoman. If there’s anyone who can do this on the team it’s you. And I go through this example which I still remember so vividly. We are selling cereal a cereal innovation like hotcakes. People are having cereal for breakfast lunch and dinner. I don’t recommend this but that’s what’s happening right. And it’s going so well and then all of a sudden, supply chain comes to us. It’s it’s the marketer’s worst nightmare, and they’re like there’s a ingredient that’s no longer available for the next three to six months to make this cereal. And it’s like oh my God, so we cannot make it. And he’s like adding a million dollars to the forecast. Don’t worry. It’s gonna happen. Let’s do it. Corrals the troops and we’re all, this is like not grounded in reality. Like we’re being told we can’t produce this product. So fast forward it’s my performance review. End of the year. Guess what happens. We miss the million dollar forecast. We don’t make it. I get no merit increase. I get a bonus that does not cover my Starbucks addiction. And he says to me will you missed the forecast. And so this is this idea of the toxic positivity in a market where goals are constantly changing. You have to be in the trenches and revisit the goals with your teams. I think there’s nothing like toxic positivity to drive burnout. Because we have a goal for the end of this quarter, 10 things I needed to achieve the goal I now only have four. Resources gone, budget count, whatever ingredients gone. And yet I’m gonna paint you as the toxic positive boss. You’re like yeah Mina you can do it. And you’re like I I’m telling you I cannot. I’m being so straightforward and so wouldn’t it be wonderful if you said, and you were granted in reality and you would do this, you would say okay we can’t get to a hundred percent. What does it look like to get to 90 to 85. Let’s go through the scenarios and let’s revisit. But people are scared in this market and it and it’s so much worse cause you’re going to miss the a hundred percent. So have the conversation now and manage up as you would say.

Melody Wilding: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, and, and like you were saying, people respect when you give them the reality of what’s happening, not being all doom and gloom, but also not just su sugarcoating over the things they can see in front of their face in black and white. You almost in some ways start to feel gaslighted of we’re, we’re really struggling here, yet, you’re making it out like we shouldn’t be. Which can feel dismissive. And you know, what I see is, is this, you know, I work with people who are very empathetic, who consider themselves servant leaders and they may overindex on this style of, let me try to be encouraging and supportive. How do you strike that balance of acknowledging things are difficult right now while still keeping people bought in and, and motivated?

Mita Mallick: I think that’s exactly what you do is what you’re saying is you let people know it’s difficult but we’re in this together.

Melody Wilding: Yeah.

Mita Mallick: Right. Not the the the like let’s we can still do a hundred percent. No the market’s changed. I wanted to gather the team because all of these things have changed in the last few weeks. And it is now unrealistic that we’re gonna achieve this. But I do wanna have a conversation realistically of what we can do because I know that we can still close X Y and Z. And then get the team to be involved and how they might actually generate more ideas to get to that a hundred percent that you didn’t think about. If you don’t and that goes back to you know I was raised in a corporate America where it was the pyramid. I’m on top and I have all the answers. And so that that those days are long gone. And so the more leaders can understand that and show just a little bit vulnerability to say here’s where we are and I need your help. This is why I have a team I can’t do it alone.

Melody Wilding: Mm-hmm. I mean, the last question I wanna ask you is, how do you know if you are the problem? How do you figure that out when you always can’t see your own gaps?

Mita Mallick: Mm I love that question. I you know building self-awareness is so key, and for me you know you’re a writer I’m a writer I like to I have career journal I like to actually have like minutes for anyone listening start with this. Have 10 minutes on a Friday where you sit down and you write for 10 minutes and just set a timer. Reflect on the week. Don’t reflect on like the details of what you did. Did you feel. How do you think others felt. How did meetings go and start sort of reflecting on those things. Because here’s what I will tell you. If you are the last person to know about things if people get quiet around you, I mean really watch for non-verbals. I think people don’t we don’t do that enough. It’s not always what people say, but it’s like if if people are walking in the other direction when I’m walking down the hall which happened with one of my bosses repeatedly, if people are scared of me if people don’t want to you know all those things those are all signs. And then I you know ask ask people for help. If you’re working on something and we’re working together and I say you know one of my tendencies is I get into a micromanaging state under stress. I really like your help to help me watch for this. Rather than me saying, tell me the thing I should be working on. Which does not work in a power dynamic. I hate when bosses tell me that. Cause I’m like is this a trap? Like if I say the wrong thing and, I’ve done that before and a boss has lost his mind. He’d be like that’s not that’s I don’t need to work on that. And what you’re saying is not factually correct. And so guess what I never gave that person real feedback again. And so if we can be vulnerable and say this is like the one thing I’m working on and then like you to hold me accountable. And then I’m just gonna say you know check in each check in on each other. We spend too much time at work not to care about each other in our workplaces. And so if I’m in a meeting and I am short or lose my temper or shut it down and I’m leaving that meeting if you just come up to me and say hey I just wanted to check in on you. I saw that you fact-based you shut shut it down. You said the following or maybe I dropped the F bomb I hope I don’t right. Something happened where you reflect that back to me, and I say thanks so much for checking in with me. I’m having a really hard time because we just moved towns. It goes back to what you said on all the things we’re going through. Divorce, breakup, fertility struggles, moves, right. Everything happening in the world. There’s like a low level of anxiety. And so sometimes we do things and if we can be a mirror for each other you can be like oh my God I’m so sorry I did that and this is what’s going on and let’s let’s talk about this again. Start again

Melody Wilding: Mita, thank you so, so much for joining me, for sharing all of this wisdom on this really, really important topic. I think this is whether someone is realizing, oh no, there are some of these tendencies in myself that I need to keep in check. But also being in, maybe dealing with one of these boss types, just hearing that they’re not alone. They’re, there are ways to navigate through this that aren’t just resigning yourself or literally resigning from your role and just picking up and leaving. So I really appreciate you.

Mita Mallick: Oh thank you so much for having me.