A difficult boss can create a lot of workplace anxiety, but different management styles can create very different kinds of stress.

In this episode, I break down five common types: the anxious manager, moody manager, angry manager, avoidant manager, and micromanager. We will explore how each can affect your nervous system, and I'll offer practical strategies for responding without simply absorbing your boss’s stress.

You’ll learn why an anxious manager’s urgency doesn’t have to become yours, how to stop trying to predict a moody manager, ways to get clearer feedback from an avoidant boss, and how proactive communication can help when you’re being micromanaged.

The goal isn’t necessarily to change your boss. It’s to recognize the dynamic, understand your own response, and focus on what you can control.

This episode draws from Jeremy’s book, Wired for Peace: Using 7 Neuroscience-Based Principles to Resolve Conflicts.

📘 Get Wired for Peace:
https://a.co/d/02XFwbCC

Dealing with conflict on your team or in your workplace? Schedule a free consultation:
https://pollackpeacebuilding.com

🎧 Listen now to learn how building conflict competency can transform tension into trust, alignment, and stronger performance.

Connect with Me
🌐 Website: PollackPeacebuilding.com
🌐 Dr. Pollack’s Courses: peacefulleadersacademy.com/courses/
📧 Email: support@pollackpeacebuilding.com
📱 LinkedIn: Jeremy Pollack
📣 Subscribe & Share:
If this episode resonated, share it with a colleague or leader. Follow Peacebuilding with Dr. Pollack for practical tools that create healthier, more effective workplaces.

Host: Dr. Jeremy Pollack from Pollack Peacebuilding Systems

More from Dr. Pollack:

• Peaceful Leaders Academy
• Conflict Resolution Playbook: Practical Communication Skills for Preventing, Managing, and Resolving Conflict
• FREE e-book: The Ultimate 12-Step Guide to Coworker Mediation: Free Ebook - Pollack Peacebuilding Systems

Connect with Dr. Pollack on social media: Facebook | Twitter | YouTube | LinkedIn

Could AI be contributing to some of the tension showing up between coworkers?

In this episode, we explore two ways AI may be influencing workplace conflict.

First, uncertainty about jobs and the future of work can leave people more on edge, potentially lowering the threshold for tension and disagreement. Then there’s a less obvious issue: the growing tendency to use AI to draft responses during difficult conversations. When emotionally charged exchanges turn into a back-and-forth of polished, AI-generated messages, we may lose some of the human contact needed to actually work through the conflict.

We will discuss what leaders can do to communicate about AI when they don’t have all the answers, why transparency matters during uncertain times, and how coworkers can use AI without outsourcing the human side of difficult conversations.

AI can be an incredibly useful tool. But when emotions are involved, sometimes the better move is simply to talk to each other.

This episode draws from Jeremy’s book, Wired for Peace: Using 7 Neuroscience-Based Principles to Resolve Conflicts.

📘 Get Wired for Peace:
https://a.co/d/02XFwbCC

Dealing with conflict on your team or in your workplace? Schedule a free consultation:
https://pollackpeacebuilding.com

🎧 Listen now to learn how building conflict competency can transform tension into trust, alignment, and stronger performance.

Connect with Me
🌐 Website: PollackPeacebuilding.com
🌐 Dr. Pollack’s Courses: peacefulleadersacademy.com/courses/
📧 Email: support@pollackpeacebuilding.com
📱 LinkedIn: Jeremy Pollack
📣 Subscribe & Share:
If this episode resonated, share it with a colleague or leader. Follow Peacebuilding with Dr. Pollack for practical tools that create healthier, more effective workplaces.

Host: Dr. Jeremy Pollack from Pollack Peacebuilding Systems

More from Dr. Pollack:

• Peaceful Leaders Academy
• Conflict Resolution Playbook: Practical Communication Skills for Preventing, Managing, and Resolving Conflict
• FREE e-book: The Ultimate 12-Step Guide to Coworker Mediation: Free Ebook - Pollack Peacebuilding Systems

Connect with Dr. Pollack on social media: Facebook | Twitter | YouTube | LinkedIn

Two coworkers can’t stand each other. By the time the issue lands on HR’s desk, it looks like a classic personality clash.

But what if that’s not actually how the conflict started?

A surprising amount of what gets labeled “interpersonal conflict” at work begins with something operational: unclear roles, overlapping responsibilities, undefined authority, poor processes, or expectations that were never clearly communicated. Leave those issues unresolved long enough, and people start assigning motives to each other. Frustration becomes resentment. Eventually, an operational problem becomes a relationship problem too.

In this episode, Dr. Jeremy Pollack breaks down why workplace conflict is so often misdiagnosed and what leaders should look at before assuming two people simply don’t get along.

You’ll learn how unclear roles can turn into personal conflict, why fixing the operational issue late may no longer be enough, the three questions Dr. Pollack asks when diagnosing workplace conflict, and why ambiguity and organizational chaos almost inevitably create friction.

If you work in HR, manage a team, or lead an organization, this episode offers a practical way to look beneath the conflict you’re seeing and identify what may actually be driving it.

This episode draws from Jeremy’s book, Wired for Peace: Using 7 Neuroscience-Based Principles to Resolve Conflicts.

📘 Get Wired for Peace: https://a.co/d/02XFwbCC

Dealing with conflict on your team or in your workplace? Learn how Pollack Peacebuilding Systems can help: https://pollackpeacebuilding.com

Jeremy Pollack, Ph.D., is a social-organizational psychologist and founder of Pollack Peacebuilding Systems. He helps people and organizations rewire the way they understand and handle conflict.

🎧 Listen now to learn how building conflict competency can transform tension into trust, alignment, and stronger performance.

Connect with Me
🌐 Website: PollackPeacebuilding.com
🌐 Dr. Pollack’s Courses: peacefulleadersacademy.com/courses/
📧 Email: support@pollackpeacebuilding.com
📱 LinkedIn: Jeremy Pollack
📣 Subscribe & Share:
If this episode resonated, share it with a colleague or leader. Follow Peacebuilding with Dr. Pollack for practical tools that create healthier, more effective workplaces.

Host: Dr. Jeremy Pollack from Pollack Peacebuilding Systems

More from Dr. Pollack:

• Peaceful Leaders Academy
• Conflict Resolution Playbook: Practical Communication Skills for Preventing, Managing, and Resolving Conflict
• FREE e-book: The Ultimate 12-Step Guide to Coworker Mediation: Free Ebook - Pollack Peacebuilding Systems

Connect with Dr. Pollack on social media: Facebook | Twitter | YouTube | LinkedIn