Would you leave a job because of the boss even if you enjoyed the actual job?

[Honey1975]

I enjoy my job, have flexible hours and a decent salary & benefits.
However my boss is difficult to work for. Unpredictable, moody, controlling. I feel like I'm constantly walking on eggshells & am often very anxious at work. I feel like it's affecting my wellbeing as I'm on edge a lot of the time at work and at home.

I have looked at other jobs but not found anything that pays nearly as well. I could only really afford to take a small reduction in pay.
I feel a bit trapped because of this.

Has anyone else been in a similar situation and what did you do?

Please please leave ... I waited way too long to leave a bullying boss (just shy of a year). The after effects took a good couple of years to shift and I had panic attacks when I occasionally bumped into her. Just awful.

Same intelligent ... I would see people who looked like her and my heart would race - weirdly on paper she didn’t actually even do very much to go to HR with - just just very very cleverly tried to destroy me.

Funnily enough once I had left lots of people kind of checked in that I was okay - one colleague even said she had been documenting all the tiny things on my behalf. But whilst I was in it I was as far as I knew totally alone

I've left. My boss was a compulsive liar... and nasty with it. I got a new job

My bosses' mother worked in HR and tipped her daughter off when I applied for another job.

Together, they ruined my chances in a particular profession, but Mum couldn't save the two children who followed her into the organisation - they were frankly unemployable even if it took a few years for management to realise it in the case of my boss.

Still employed by the same people (different role) while my former boss, barred from two places of work, went freelance and is close to going out of business.

Absolutely, pm me Honey x

Yup. Just left a family ran company, the owner/boss IS HR. You can't take thinhs higher or to anyone else. She sacked people for taking time off, wouldnnt pay overtime, and has now told me the least I OWE HER is more notice than in my contract. (1 day notice in contract, and so that's all I've given) I'm actually scared of seeing her in. The street but I was there 4 months and have a new job waiting for me starting a week Monday. Can not wait.

Wow it seems a lot of people have felt this way. Thanks for sharing your experiences.

I don't think it's going to be easy for me to leave as I need a certain income and to be honest am probably being paid over the market rate salary from what I can see from my quick bit of job hunting research.

I keep thinking perhaps I just need to be more confident and not take things to heart or take things personally but I can't help the way I am.
I don't think it's right that anyone should make other people feel so anxious and scared to put a foot wrong. That's just not on. I could not treat people this way. Maybe that's why I'll never be a manager😀!

I think all I can do is carry on whilst keeping an eye out for something else. It's just such a shame as I really like my job and the other people I work with.

I feel like a weight has been lifted now I've handed my notice in. Work is such a big part of your life and you spend so many hours there every week that it's hard to not let it get to you.

Good for you peachy, well done for making the move.

I'm currently working my notice period at a job I've done (and loved) for 13 years. New boss arrived a year ago, and her inexperience at CEO level began to show very quickly. She's scared of confrontation and people who are vastly more experienced and knowledgeable than her showing her up. One got a new job and left at Christmas, just before her post was about to be up for redundancy, another was made redundant after being treated like shit for months, and I'm under no illusion that if I hadn't resigned, my role would be up for review as well once the current strategic review is over.
I'm sad as I used to wake up in the morning and really look forward to coming to work, but the fire has gone now. Definitely time to move on, and I will be making it very clear why when I have my exit interview (with aforementioned boss!)

I stuck out a lovely job with an awful manager for three years - my final straw was when she raised a grievance against me whilst I was pregnant, fabricated evidence, left notes relating to it all over the office and had to be reprimanded over her lack of professionalism. When I told them I wasn't coming back after mat leave they wrote off my additional maternity pay as a 'gesture of goodwill'. Not that they needed to worry about me coming back and raising a counter-grievance, you couldn't have got me back into that building if you'd stripped and buttered Benedict Cumberbatch and left him hogtied in reception.

Hopefully just the knowledge that you won't be there forever and you're making plans will help!