Dealing with Gaslighting at Work
In the 1944 film Gaslight, a man emotionally manipulates his wife—including by denying that the gaslights in the house flicker at night—driving the woman to question her own sanity. Today, the term gaslighting more broadly refers to psychologically manipulating someone so that he or she doubts their own beliefs, memory, or sanity, or even questions the validity of their feelings.
Gaslighters are a particularly pernicious archetype of adversarial workplace personalities because they tend to be socially intelligent and cunning. They are often masters of reading people’s emotions, crafting alternative narratives to seemingly straightforward events and exploiting ambiguity and gaps in communication.
As a young travel risk professional who had moved to the United States from Cuba, Iliana Infante Basulto says she was routinely gaslit by her much more senior boss.
“The boss would call me into their office and tell me things,” Basulto recalls. “Then they’d say, ‘If you ever repeat this, I will deny it and call you a liar.” It didn’t end there. When Basulto would complete a project, she was told it was perfect. “Then when I presented the same thing to the boss in front of their boss, I was told it was poorly done or wrong.”
Brand new to the workforce and new to the country, Basulto thought that was normal behavior. She dealt with it in the way many young professionals do. “I consulted with close colleagues. Everyone said, ‘Keep your head down, keep working, the quality of your work will speak for itself.’” But repressing her emotions harmed her mental health. Today, she says, “I would just walk away. I wouldn’t trade my mental health for a job, title, or reputation.”
Early in his career, security professional Nick Koziara, CPP, PCI, PSP, worked as a control room operator for a major guard provider, assigned to a large insurance company. One of the company’s sites had recently installed access gates to a parking lot, and, according to Koziara, he and his colleagues had standing orders to rigorously enforce access control at the gates. However, one mail carrier refused to wait to be identified and authorized. If he pushed the call button and the gate didn’t open immediately, he drove off without dropping off or picking up the mail.
A national account portfolio manager for the guard firm—three levels up from Koziara—directed guards to automatically open the gates for the mail truck. Koziara pushed back, citing various risks, including an impersonator looking to loot the building or the mail person seeking to harm an estranged spouse. The manager chewed him out, making Koziara doubt his own expertise in security.
“A week later, I’m in a meeting with him and [the client company’s] senior security advisors,” Koziara says. The account manager mentioned the mail truck issue—and then parroted Koziara’s arguments why the mail person shouldn’t get special treatment. The client agreed. “I was dumbstruck,” Koziara says. When he confronted the manager later, he chided Koziara for not having framed the argument correctly, although the manager “had used the exact same arguments almost verbatim.”
Koziara raised the issue with his own direct supervisor, who replied that his hands were tied because the account manager was two levels up in the hierarchy. Koziara quit six months later.
Even seasoned professionals are not immune from psychological warfare. It happened to one senior security operations leader with a sterling career history who will be identified as John Smith. He worked for a large media organization with a global footprint.
Smith, who was recruited from another major corporation, took the job even though the interview with the CSO’s boss (Smith’s boss’s boss) was off-putting. During the first 90 days, Smith built a detailed plan—involving coalescing disparate security approaches and developing metrics to evaluate the overall program—and presented it with the CSO to the CSO’s boss at a big meeting. But the CSO’s boss sent Smith and the CSO back to the drawing board. When they came back with another plan, the boss again peremptorily rebuffed it.
“We went through this process several times, without him ever saying what he wanted,” Smith says. He was condescending to both this executive and the CSO, “to the point where I questioned whether I knew what I was doing.”
A no-quit type of guy, Smith plowed ahead this way for two and a half years, always hitting the same roadblock. He eventually realized that the CSO was probably part of the problem, also gaslighting Smith so he could stay in the boss’s good graces and make Smith the fall guy.
Despite these and countless other nightmare scenarios, security managers and professionals can deal with allegations of gaslighting with methods that can better support their own and their staff’s well-being.
Document, document, document. The importance of getting things down in writing cannot be understated in these instances. Document behavior—dates, times, and other witnesses present—when certain instances or events arise, including twisting another person’s words in a meeting, selectively misrepresenting events in writing, or shifting blame while claiming victimhood. Artificial intelligence (AI) programs that summarize meetings can be helpful here to provide an objective view
Gather evidence objectively. Before confronting someone you suspect of gaslighting, verify the facts independently. This could involve reviewing emails, chat logs, or meeting notes; speaking confidentially and tactfully with others involved; and cross-checking claims against what you know to be true.
It’s worth noting that the person who initially files a complaint might turn out to be the gaslighter, weaponizing the HR process to further intimidate victims.
Set a controlled one-on-one meeting. Once you’ve gathered the context and evidence, set up a private meeting. During the meeting, maintain a natural, calm, and professional tone and present observations, not accusations. Rely on neutral language, such as, “I’ve noticed a pattern where others’ actions are consistently framed in a way that may not align with the facts or how others present them.” And ask open-ended questions like “Can you help me understand how you came to that conclusion?”
Reinforce team values and norms. Given that gaslighters often exploit vague or unwritten rules, be clear about expectations for honesty, professionalism, and respectful discourse; the impact of divisive or manipulative behavior; and the importance of psychological safety.
Monitor and intervene consistently. Make sure to positively reinforce improvements, addressing relapses immediately. If you see that gaslighting behavior continues, escalate the issue through formal HR channels. Also, encourage peers to report any manipulation or toxic dynamics, but avoid direct confrontation with the gaslighter.
Support those affected. If you notice or learn that staff have been undermined, acknowledge their concerns privately and reaffirm their value. When communicating with the gaslighter, do not let him or her speak “for” others. It may help to offer coaching, mentorship, mental health services, or mediation as needed to either the gaslighter or other staff affected by the behavior.
Know when it’s time to act. If the gaslighting continues despite the feedback and coaching, it’s time to escalate the issue to formal performance management or disciplinary action. If the behavior is egregious enough or damaging to another person’s mental health, consider reassigning or terminating the gaslighter.
Michael Gips, CPP, is managing director of ESRM for a global risk advisory firm. He was the former chief global knowledge and learning officer at ASIS International, and is a current member of the technical committee for the forthcoming revision of ASIS’s standard on workplace violence prevention.
