Microaggressions: Name Confusions 101
Imagine, you’re part of a team and a POC; another POC joins and suddenly your names become interchangeable. Not with your peers. Only with leadership. Apparently learning two names is too advanced.
Psychological Safety, But Make It Fiction
A psychologically safe environment? Not here.
Set Up to Fail
Imagine being tasked with a project that requires input from colleagues. You later find out your leader told them not to give you their portions, without telling you, of course. Then leadership above your leader swoops in to ask why the project isn’t finished. Plot twist: you are set up to fail, and it’s supposed to be your fault.
HR Theater
Imagine co-workers actively advising you not to go to HR. Not because they don’t support you, but because they’ve seen this movie before. Reporting to HR just results in the whole team being interrogated, morale tanking, and trust in HR disappearing even further.
Awkward 1:1s
Imagine being stuck in 1:1s while your leader makes uncomfortable comments about mothers and women who choose to have children. Because apparently professional boundaries are optional.
Audit Gaslighting
Imagine putting together storyboard slides for a regulatory audit. You are given negative feedback sprinkled with criticism and beratement with no constructive comments. Your leader leaves for vacation. You incorporate changes, check with the team actually using them (Petersburg), and submit them on time. Your leader returns from vacation, never reviews your final work, and declare your slides “so bad they could not be used.” (Your leader VERBALLY confirms that they never looked at your slides because they don't want to leave a paper trail.) Later, the Petersburg team confirms your slides were fine. Only one slide set was not used and that was because the topic never came up. Translation: the only failure here was leadership.
Gaslight, Gatekeep, Mislead
Imagine being given a project. Your leader approves it and gives you the green light to present. You present on a day your leader isn’t there, and their boss points out some mistakes, even taking the time to talk you through them. When your leader returns, suddenly you’ve “caused a commotion,” “wasted so much time,” and “created unnecessary work” for others. Except… there was no commotion. You even check with your colleague because your leader makes you feel guilty about supposedly wasting their time. Your colleague reassure you the meeting barely touched their schedule and you two are fine. You bring this back to your leader, thinking reason might win. Instead, they dismiss it with a casual, “It doesn’t matter.” So which is it? Either my leader gaslit me or they have a flair for creative exaggeration.
Clueless at the Top
Leadership bonus round: the Head of Quality Systems doesn’t know their own role, much less yours, and therefore cannot support their team. But don’t worry, they’re still quick to present your ideas as their own. Many people tolerate and try to limit their interactions with the HOQS. The wild part is, the HOQS doesn't even know it, or maybe they just don’t care. When the HOQS arrived, there was a visible drop in team morale and a shift in dynamics for the worse.
Secondhand Embarrassment
Imagine joining your daily huddle only to watch your leader drag their unsuspecting housekeeper into the camera frame like a show-and-tell prop. The entire team sat in shared secondhand embarrassment while the leader beamed with clueless pride.
Career Growth? Keep Dreaming
Nonexistent. Several people have already left. The rest are updating their resumes.
