Audio Version (10:36)
Let me be blunt. If your workplace makes you feel anxious, second-guess yourself, or afraid to speak up, that is not ‘just the job’, and it is definitely not you.
What most people call ‘bad management’ is often something far more serious: a pattern of power and control that quietly breaks confidence and keeps good people silent.
Today I’m exposing the abuse wheel at work. The tactics toxic leaders use, the psychology behind why it works, and why so many intelligent, capable people stay stuck in environments that are damaging them.
In the extended YouTube version of this article, I also discuss Why Organisations Miss This, and What Healthy Power Looks Like. You can watch it here.
Introduction
The abuse wheel is often most associated with domestic abuse. It was originally developed as part of the Duluth Model to explain how patterns of power and control operate in intimate relationships.
But abuse does not stop at the front door of our homes. It walks into offices, warehouses, hospitals, housing associations, boardrooms and team meetings every single day.
Over the years, through my work as an executive coach and leadership development trainer and through my own personal experience of being bullied at work, I have seen the same patterns play out in workplaces. So much so that for the last 20 years, I’ve been studying trauma psychology.
These patterns are not always loud. They are not always obvious. In fact, the most damaging forms are often subtle, normalised and dressed up as “just how things are done around here”.
The wheel you see below is a workplace adaptation of the Duluth Power and Control Wheel. It shows the different strategies, consciously or unconsciously, used to dominate, silence, and control others at work.
Let’s break it down in simple psychological terms.
What the Abuse Wheel Really Explains
At the centre of the wheel are two core drivers:
Power and Control
This is not about one bad day or a stressed manager snapping. Abuse is not occasional. It is patterned behaviour that consistently makes another person feel smaller, less safe, less confident, and less able to act.
Psychologically, it works through three main mechanisms:
Fear – The nervous system learns that speaking up, disagreeing or making mistakes leads to threat.
Shame – The person begins to believe there is something wrong with them rather than with what is happening to them.
Learned helplessness – Over time, people stop trying to protect themselves because nothing seems to change.
When this happens in a workplace, you do not just lose morale. You lose judgment, creativity, psychological safety and ethical behaviour.
How Each Part Shows Up At Work
Using Coercion and Threats
This includes:
Threatening dismissal, demotion or “making life difficult”
Forcing you into unsafe or unethical work
Creating a climate of “do this or else”
The Psychology:
Your brain has a built-in threat system. When someone with authority repeatedly activates it, your nervous system moves into fight, flight or freeze.
Thinking becomes narrower as your pre-frontal cortex (the part of the brain responsible for decision making and analytical thinking literally goes offline), and so, you comply to survive. This is why good people stay silent in bad cultures. It is not a weakness. It is biology.
Using Intimidation
This includes:
Aggressive body language, glaring, raised voices
Slamming doors, smashing objects, public displays of anger
Making you feel on edge without directly saying anything
The Psychology:
Humans are wired to read threat in faces, tone and posture. Intimidation bypasses logic and goes straight to the amygdala, the brain’s fear centre. Even without words, the message is clear: “I am not safe with you”. Over time, you become hyper-vigilant, anxious and exhausted.
Using Emotional Abuse
This includes:
Put-downs, sarcasm, belittling (I have an article coming up on ‘belittling’)
Making you doubt yourself or feel “too sensitive”
Humiliation, guilt, mind games
Eye-rolling, tutting, and generally undermining.
The Psychology:
Emotional abuse attacks identity. When someone repeatedly tells you that you are incompetent, difficult, or the problem, your brain starts to internalise it. This is called introjected shame. Once you believe the narrative, you stop challenging it. Control no longer requires force. It becomes self-policing.
Using Isolation
This includes:
Controlling who someone talks to
Excluding you from meetings, decisions or information
Discouraging external networks or support
The Psychology:
Humans regulate stress through connection. When someone is isolated, their emotional resilience drops. Without reality-checking from others, distorted narratives take root. This is one of the most powerful tools of control. It makes you feel alone, dependent and increasingly unsure of your own perceptions.
Minimising, Denying and Blaming
This includes:
“You’re overreacting.”
“That didn’t happen.”
“If you weren’t so difficult, this wouldn’t be an issue.”
The Psychology:
This is workplace gaslighting. It disrupts a person’s trust in their own memory and judgement. Over time, you stop raising concerns because you anticipate being dismissed or blamed. When organisations do this systemically, it teaches employees that speaking up is unsafe.
I have a recent video on gaslighting. You can watch it here.
Using Co-Workers
This includes:
Turning colleagues into messengers
Creating unnecessary competition, guilt or peer pressure
Threatening others to enforce compliance
The Psychology:
This exploits our need for belonging. When survival at work depends on staying in favour with authority or the group, you may comply with things you privately know are wrong. It also fractures trust among colleagues, further weakening resistance.
Using Employer Privilege
This includes:
“Because I said so”
Making unilateral decisions without input
Treating employees as resources rather than humans
The Psychology:
Hierarchies are not the problem. Abuse of hierarchy is. When authority is exercised without transparency, accountability or respect, it conditions people into obedience rather than responsibility. The organisation may look compliant, but internally it becomes brittle and fearful.
Using Economic Abuse
This includes:
Threatening pay, hours or contracts
Undermining your reputation (or threatening to)
Leveraging financial dependence to force compliance
The Psychology:
Financial security is directly tied to survival in the brain. When income becomes a weapon, people tolerate treatment they would never accept elsewhere. This creates moral injury, the internal conflict between what someone believes is right and what they feel forced to do.
If This Feels Uncomfortably Familiar
You are not weak. You are not “too sensitive”. You are not imagining it.
Your nervous system may simply be responding to a pattern of power and control that your mind has been trying to rationalise. Naming it is not about blaming. It is about reclaiming clarity and clarity is always the first step back to choice.
The Wrap-up
The abuse wheel shows us something many people sense but struggle to explain: workplace bullying and toxic leadership are not about personality clashes or being “too sensitive.” They are about patterns of power and control that quietly shape behaviour, silence voices, and wear down confidence over time.
Whether it shows up as intimidation, emotional manipulation, isolation, denial, or threats tied to job security, the psychological impact is the same. Fear replaces safety. Shame replaces clarity, and eventually, people stop trusting their own judgment.
If parts of this article felt uncomfortably familiar, that is information worth paying attention to. Because clarity is not about labelling people. It is about protecting your mental health, your integrity, and your right to work in a culture that values respect over control.
If you want advice around what to do if you think you’re being bullied at work (because this is what this is about… BULLYING), I recommend this video. I take you through what to do, step by step.
What Next?
Again, in the extended YouTube version of this article, I also discuss Why Organisations Miss This, and What Healthy Power Looks Like. You can watch it here.
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If there are any subjects you’d like me to cover in upcoming content or if you’d like coaching support with anything I discuss in my videos or articles, please email me at info@jobanks.net.
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