Your Boss Is Not Your Parent
Your Boss Is Not Your Parent
The other day, I got a call from someone who had just started a brand-new job. She had overslept. She was driving to work while telling me everything that had happened. She had stayed up late studying, slept through two different alarms, woke up much later than she intended, jumped out of bed, and immediately started spiraling.
I listened for a few minutes and reassured her that everything was going to be okay. It didn’t seem to help. Then she read me a text message from one of her supervisors.
The message itself was pretty straightforward, but the way she was interpreting it caught my attention. She was talking not like a professional who had made a mistake, but like a child waiting for an adult to decide what consequence was coming next.
I stopped her and said, “I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but you’re acting like your boss is your mom or dad.”
She got quiet.
“You made an honest mistake as a professional,” I told her. “You overslept. You notified your supervisor. You are on your way to work and this is the first time this has happened, so it is not a pattern. You do not have to turn this into something bigger than what actually happened.”
Channeling Dawn Staley after a tough loss, I added: “Walk in there with your head held high. Own what happened, but don’t walk in like you’re waiting to be reprimanded.”
Later that day, she called me again, this time thanking me for reminding her that she is a professional and that mistakes happen. It turns out everything had, in fact, been okay.
But even during that second conversation, I noticed something else. She was still using emotionally charged language to describe her supervisor’s actions.
So I asked her to do something different. Instead of saying, “They’re mad at me,” I pushed her to reframe it: “They responded to my message that I was running late.”
That shift matters.
Sometimes what makes a situation with your boss feel so big has less to do with what is happening in that moment and more to do with how we interpret it. If we aren't careful, we interpret interactions with supervisors through the lens of what authority has meant to us in past relationships.
Maybe growing up, making a mistake meant somebody was angry. Maybe you learned to watch someone’s tone, face, or mood because it told you whether you were “okay.” So now, at work, a “mistake” can feel more than it actually is.
That does not mean your feelings are made up. It just means your feelings may be connected to more than what is happening in that single moment. And that is worth noticing.
What actually happened?
This is the question I think matters most.
Not, “What do I think they meant?” Not, “What do I think they feel about me?” But: what actually happened?
Your supervisor says, “Can we talk about this?” What happened is simple: they asked to talk. Not: “I’m in trouble.”
Your supervisor says no to a request. What happened is that the request was denied. Not: “They’re disappointed in me.”
Sometimes your interpretation will be accurate. Sometimes it will not. The point is to notice when you have added a story to the facts.
And this is not permission for poor leadership.
Not every difficult supervisory relationship is a projection of your past. Some bosses are poor communicators and expect you to be mind readers. Some are attitudinal and project their issues. Some are inconsistent or misuse authority. Some create environments where people genuinely feel afraid of making mistakes.
The goal isn’t to talk yourself out of every legitimate concern. It is to hold two questions at the same time:
Is there a real issue here?
Is my history making this moment feel bigger than it is?
Sometimes the answer to both is yes.
What to do instead
The goal is to cultivate an adult-to-adult relationship with authority, which means not giving your supervisor more emotional authority than the role requires. Yes, they may have authority over your work, but they do not get to determine your worth, whether you are “good,” or whether you are okay.
When you make a mistake, focus on what needs to happen next instead of slipping into shame. When you receive feedback, separate the feedback from what you think it says about you as a person. And remember: professional consequences are not the same thing as personal punishment.
Workplaces have policies. Supervisors have responsibilities. Employees have responsibilities. Mistakes happen. Patterns matter. Context matters.
I am a professional dealing with a workplace situation. I am not a child waiting to find out if an adult is upset with me.
You do not need to earn love at work. You need clarity, respect, useful feedback, reasonable support, and expectations you can understand.
And when something happens, you can respond to what is actually in front of you instead of automatically responding to everything it reminds you of.