Narcissism is a personality trait that can make people unpleasant to deal with. The clinical disorder of narcissism occurs when this trait is taken to an extreme. With or without a clinical diagnosis, narcissists have an inflated sense of self-importance, an excessive need for admiration, an inability to handle criticism, an oversized sense of entitlement, and a general disregard for other people’s feelings. So yeah, narcissists are not fun to interact with, let alone work with.
If your boss is a narcissist, it can make your work-life utterly miserable. They won’t respect your boundaries, their moods will swing from one extreme to another, they will make but not keep promises, they will take credit for your good work, they will blame you for their mistakes, and they will consistently “forget” or deny things they’ve said and done in the past.
So what can you do to keep your job and your sanity? The following three articles can help you not only identify narcissism but deal with it in a healthy fashion. (Please note that none of these three articles suggests that you hold out hope that your narcissistic boss will change.)
Seven Ways of Detecting and Dealing with Narcissistic Bosses