Are Jennifer Aniston, Kevin Spacey and Colin Farrell truly ‘Horrible Bosses’?

The madman, the manipulator and the maneater -- three managers from hell call the shots in this weekend’s new dude-centric comedy, “Horrible Bosses.” Aside from Jennifer Aniston’s sex-crazed character, the other two are probably archetypes many people have seen or been
forced to deal with -- and studies show neither is good for an employee’s well-being.

Narcissistic bosses, such as the conniving self-promoter played by Kevin Spacey, destroy an office’s morale and are bad for business, according to a Florida State University researcher -- they increase employees’ stress levels and lower productivity. That’s bad news, given that it turns out to be a pretty common problem: A full 24% of those surveyed said their bosses were self-centered, and 31% said their bosses were prone to exaggerating accomplishments to look good in front of others.

Colin Farrell’s cocaine-addled character is a different type of tormentor, one better described by a 2009 study in the journal Psychological Science. The paper shows that feelings of inadequacy trigger some bosses them to lash out at underlings -- in this case, attempt to fire overweight and wheelchair-bound employees. (Then again, that could just be the drugs.)

There’s little real-life evidence that Jennifer Aniston’s nymphomaniac character represents a general boss type -- if there’s any workplace sexual harrassment going on, studies show it tends to be male-to-female -- but this is where the tenuous link to reality snaps. Creating a sympathetic female character dealing with sexism or harrassment from a male boss? Total buzz kill, dude.

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