ABSTRACT
Bosses loom large in the life of most employees. Whether one focuses on the dynamics that create high-quality supervisory relationships (as did Bono and Yoon in Chapter 3 of this volume) or on the interactions underlying hostile ones (as did Tepper and Almeda in Chapter 4 of this volume), the many ways supervisors can impact their employees’ well-being and productivity are readily apparent. Interestingly, the research literature has much less to say about the consequences for supervisors of a positive or negative relationship with their direct reports. This imbalance in research focus and knowledge mirrors the defining feature of supervisor–employee relationships—an imbalance of formal power—a feature that the authors of both chapters note makes for a more complicated relationship.
