Why it’s not always wise to report your toxic boss to their boss

Reporting your toxic boss to their boss seems like the ultimate solution to fixing a toxic culture at work. But what if it ends up costing you your job?

Career coach Kelly Volkmar explained on her Instagram @corporateclarity.career that while an employee suffering under a toxic boss may think “justice will be served” once they report their boss and his behaviour, what really happens behind closed doors is this realisation from the higher-up: “If we remove the boss, that becomes my problem. If we remove the employee, that becomes the boss’s problem.”

Ms Volkmar further explained that with the complaint raised, the higher-up now has to “step in”.

The problem then becomes: “They have to deal with HR. They have to cover their work. They have to find a replacement. They have to explain why they allowed this to go on for so long.”

However, “if they make you the problem, now your boss has to handle it.” They tell the toxic boss that an employee snitched on them and let them figure out what to do.

“Now your boss knows that you’re a snitch. And they let the situation play itself out, where you quit, or your boss pushes you out. That is why toxic bosses remain, and the good employees are the ones that are pushed out.”

“So if this has happened to you, you’re not imagining it. You’re just the easier person to remove,” she added.

Many commenters echoed the same sentiment. One commenter who works in recruitment said, “As a recruiter, I can confirm: HR is not your friend,” while others added that “HR is there to protect the company, not you.” 

Another advised, “Make sure you remember this before you complain about your boss. It’s not right – but it happens!” 

Accounts of workplace experiences also poured in, with one commenter sharing that after she was sexually harassed by her boss, an HR director, nothing was done about it; instead, she was later pushed out of the large-scale international fast-food corporation she was working for.

“Meanwhile, I had to go to therapy and was put on two antidepressants to cope with the trauma,” she said.

“A few years later, he was fired because they caught him stealing from them, but sexual harassment? Nah, that was nothing.”

Still, despite workers being the “easier person to remove”, a few commenters shared cases where reporting their bosses worked out in their favour.

One said, “I reported my boss not to his boss but to the global headquarters legal team. He got fired,” while another shared that after getting his boss and his boss’s boss fired, he became “the boss.” /TISG

Read also: ‘Slackers are annoying but harmless’: Why high-performers are getting laid-off in corporate