Your boss is not your friend.

You might get along with them, may even like them to a certain extent, but make no mistake: They exist on a higher plane. Their priorities differ from yours. Crack jokes with them all you want, or go bowling with them at the End of Year function, or what have you. None of that changes the fact that you are an underling. Say one wrong thing—or a few wrong things, in an untimely sequence—and all it takes is a snap of their fingers, an obligatory sit-down with HR, and you’re back on the job hunt, desperately peddling your employment profile in the virtual cold.

I’ve had some bad bosses (the micro-managing, drug-addicted kind). I’ve also worked under a few that I got along with swimmingly. Again, all more or less inconsequential: They are there to tell you what to do, and you are there to do what they tell you to do. Simple as that. Under the current socioeconomic regime, this is as hard-baked a commandment in one’s working life as the Laws of Thermodynamics are in physics. Resist these constraints at your own peril.

SEND HELP’s Bradley Preston isn’t just a bad boss. He’s an insufferable one.