A lot may fall apart at a workplace when an unreliable person starts to mess around. You don´t understand whats going on until the damage is done. The worst scenario is when colleagues get hurt, but it may also affect the business in other ways. For example, they may tell a lie at the job interview about their ”ongoing education”. Time will show that education isn´t a fact at all. When they want time off, to do something they find fun, they may call in sick, but leave out the part of the sick-report which affects the salary. But as I said – the worst part is when colleagues get hurt on a personal level.
When personality disordered individuals show up at work and you are seen as a threat to this person´s plans and wishes, problems will arise.
With lies, manipulation and emotional coldness, the disordered person will turn everything against you, and he or she won´t give up until you´re gone. The managers do not understand what´s happening.
If you don´t say anything to defend yourself, the problems will continue until you are totally eaten from inside. If you tell the managers, you can´t trust them to believe in you. In the new, alternative world that the personality disordered person has created, you yourself may as well be the deceptive person in the manager´s perspective. All managers would need an education to see through situations like these. We need to stay as objective as possible to a certain limit and show understanding to the fact that also our managers are deceived and manipulated. It would help many employees and the business in the long run if managers could study examples with purpose to understand ”the game” better, and stop it before everything falls apart.
At the workplace as well as in peoples private lives, three keywords for these problems are; Manipulation, Lying and Emotional Coldness. (Google these three traits together and see what you get.) The thing is that when this happens in a workplace, managers and maybe also colleagues probably will use the terms ”Problems with Cooperation”, ”Problems with Communication” and ”Misunderstandings”, as attempts to explain what´s going on and you will find yourself in a situation where you are forced to take on half of the blame for something you never caused.
The more you defend yourself, the greater the risk will become that you are pointed out as the bad one. The person in question is nice to everyone else, so…
When you are gone (exhausted or fired) everything may be just fine at the workplace. This is because you, who from the start might have had a greater responsibility, a greater authority or a greater respect – you – the threat to the personality disordered person – are now gone. He or she has managed to take your place, and that was his or her goal. So when you´re gone things may be just fine. Then it is proven – it WAS you who caused the problems! Though, if it really is a personality disordered person, he or she won´t last long even after you´re gone.
In other cases, there are several people who are seen as threats. Then problems will appear in more than one spot. Surprisingly, the managers still sometimes believe that the explanations are ”Problems with Cooperation”, ”Problems with Communication” and ”Misunderstandings”. With a strong appearance or by acting out as victims, the disordered individuals may manage to fool all their leaders.
For my part, with experiences from school, a person with a personality disorder may affect the workplace so badly that the value base is thrown out the window. The equal dignity of every human being – out through the window. Children´s rights to equal education – out through the window. Everyone´s rights to feel safe, that means: No violations or bullying – out through the window. Managers may have their eyes open, without being able to see what´s going on. They just can´t see through. Who is the bad guy? All of us who are reading this, do understand that it´s not anyone who can cause these situations.
As I wrote earlier managers would need education on this issue, to understand and learn to see through these ”games”. With knowledge they may be able to ask the suitable questions to reveal it all. They will then save both the employees from suffering and their companies from many devastating situations in the future.
The individuals suffering from narcissistic or / and psychopathic traits, are, in the long run, not being helped from having their way and succeed from it. By letting them break other people down without being forced to take on responsibility, we do show them that what they are doing is working well. In the end, though, they will be infamous. What they are doing won´t benefit them.
Unfortunately, they do have a problem in this area. They lack long-term thinking. They want immediate satisfaction. If the fastest way means they have to crush others, so be it. Of two bad situations, and if everything comes to a head; Who would we ourselves choose to be? Who would we choose our child to be? The disordered person or the exposed person at the workplace? Think about that question for a moment.
If you wish to know more about personality disorders at the workplace, I do write more about it in my book Narcissism and Psychopathy. Maybe you need to know more about this behavior and the signals? A kick-off present for the boss, maybe?
decreasedisorders.com 