Love Bombing and Knowledge Theft at Work

Stages one and two of covert workplace abuse

I recently listed the 10 stages of covert workplace abuse that I have suffered, as have many others I know and have spoken with over the last few years.

I am posting a description of each stages to LinkedIn each day, if you want to follow me there. The first post (of the list) resonated with a lot of my followers.

Stage one: Love-bombing or grooming

While much has been written about how love-bombing works in romantic relationships, it’s a far less understood concept at work. The basic idea is that you are quickly showered with excessive praise and made to feel extra special, all with the goal of reeling you in.

Some have written about how companies can love-bomb candidates during the recruitment process, only to ignore or turn on them once they are onboard.

I want to talk about how this concept works once you’re already in the job, and your boss or co-worker or someone else at work decides to target you. We will call this person your abuser.

Why are you targeted? Because you are smart and accomplished, and the abuser is not. They desperately want what you have, whether it be skills, connections, power, whatever, they want it all from you.

But they have to be clever about it. Remember this abuser is highly manipulative at getting what they want. Just like most burglars will sneak in when no one is home, an abuser must be covert about their operation.

So the first step is to earn your trust. Unfortunately, humans are highly susceptible to being told positive things about ourselves, so love-bombing can be very effective. If someone at work starts showering us with praise, why would we be suspicious? Of course I am great, tell me more!

This process can also be called grooming, which has been recognized in adults. One expert described it aptly:

"It often starts with friendship. The groomer will look for ways to gain their target’s trust, often with gifts or promises. Eventually they’ll start to ask for something in return, and this eventually leads to abuse."

The main goal of the love-bombing or grooming phase is to get you let your guard down, so you start sharing information.

I met my own abuser at an event, and right away, he glommed onto me (not romantically, it was all platonic). He said, “we are going to be fast friends”, a phrase that rings in my ears years later, realizing the red flag that it was.

He knew I was in the early stages of building the non-profit organization that I founded. So he made a significant enough donation to get my attention. He also claimed to have fundraising skills and offered to volunteer. Music to any struggling founder’s ears. Gift, check. Promise, check.

The stage is now set for Stage 2….

Stage 2: Gaining access / knowledge theft

This is where your abuser worms their way into your good graces to get access and extract your knowledge, your contacts, everything valuable to them.

Nathalie Martinek, Ph.D. (who writes the newsletter Hacking Narcissism) calls people who do this “knowledge vampires” and has an excellent explanation of why this happens:

“They do this because their rise in success, social currency or professional status relies on preserving an illusion of intellectual prowess … to maintain a competitive advantage.”

Illusion being the most important word; they want to pretend they are smart. These are deeply insecure people who, instead of coming by knowledge the honest way, prefer to extract it from others.

My abuser would ask for my “opinions” about my expertise. But he did this in a way that made me feel smart, not like he was pumping me for intel to use. (Later, I got chills seeing an email to a funder where he used a phrase that came right out of my mouth, claiming it as his own idea.)

In addition to extracting your knowledge, your abuser will also use this stage to gain access to your professional contacts, especially to those who have power over you.

In my case, I had built a network in my field that included leading companies, retailers, investors, funders, consultants, and other movers and shakers, so that alone was extremely valuable.

My abuser’s goals were two-fold: First, to gain access to my contacts for his own personal gain, and second, to get the ear of those with power over my job. In several cases, these were even the same people.

He did this in insidious ways, such as volunteering to help me with certain projects, which gave him access to the right people. When I look back, I realize that I essentially gave him the keys to the kingdom.

That’s how manipulative such abusers are, you don’t even realize it’s happening.

Gaining access to key contacts is part of the set-up for stage 3, the smear campaign

To be continued…

If you need assistance, check out my website:

https://www.workplacetraumalawyer.com/