You don't have to make it up
Most people, like Lauren Weisberger - whose book inspired by working at American Vogue for the glacial Anna Wintour has been made into a new film, The Devil Wears Prada - have had a tyrannical boss at some point in their careers. Beautiful Anne Hathaway who plays Andy Sachs, Runway magazine's fashion-challenged second assistant, may be Hollywood's latest Audrey Hepburn wannabe but it's Meryl Streep's deliciously evil portrayal of Miranda Priestly, the editor, that steals the movie. With the merest curl of her lip or a blank stare Streep manages to express a level of visceral disapproval that words can't.
I spent half the film cringing as I recalled some of the people I've worked for. One who only ever addressed me by my surname; another who was famous for reducing every single female member of staff, and some of the men too, to tears. (There was always someone crying in the loo.) I once knew a section head who would lie under her desk in the foetal position when the stress got too much. Another who literally screamed at her secretary because she'd forgotten to remind her to call her own children at four o'clock in the afternoon.
Some people get their own back by going to court. Last week Helen Green, a former secretary, won £800,000 in damages as a result of six years' worth of bullying by her bosses at Deutsche Bank.
Others share their horror stories on PASecrets.com, a fabulously indiscreet website. 'Tippex', 'Goody2shoes' 'Underpaid and Under Appreciated' describe offices which sound more like boot camps for overweight teenagers. There's the PA sacked for buying the wrong toilet roll, the fashionista who had a tantrum when her secretary failed to buy organic blueberries. They get their revenge by revealing their own bosses' indiscretions - such as the leading criminal lawyer who secretly cross-dresses every Friday afternoon.
In my experience many bosses think of their staff as merely the extension of the people they terrorise at home - the gardener, the cleaner and the nanny. Like Miranda Priestly who would send Andy out to buy her a coffee ('Make sure it's scorching!') I recall a boss who ordered me to buy her a currant bun every day from the local Italian cafe. (It's worth noting that despite the fact that she must have earned 10 times as much as me she never once offered to pay for this breakfast. In the end I used to nick the money from her purse.) If I brought back a bun that had been erroneously buttered with margarine she would propel it, like a shot put, at the nearest bin and send me back out again.
In fact, she rather liked throwing things. She was once rumoured to have woken up abruptly one day when her secretary crept into the office to switch off a television set that she'd left blaring. Her reaction was to pick up the nearest thing to hand - a bottle of Clarins breast firming lotion, as it happened - and chuck it at her.
Then there was the manager for whom nothing about me was beyond her scorn, from where I lived to the perfume I wore. Whenever I'd written a piece she would sigh and say 'I suppose I'd better read your crap now' before scoring through whole pages with her blue Biro.
Woe betide anyone who disobeyed her. I especially remember an afternoon when she made me beg a bereaved mother to leave photographs of her dead daughter under the hedge for the bike courier because she had the audacity to be going out that day. Long hours, no lunch breaks - the only saving grace was that this was 15 years ago before anyone had mobile phones.
Like Andy in the movie, this amount of daily humiliation had the bizarre effect of making me go back for more. Two years after I got another job she persuaded me to work for her again.
I'd rather eat my own opaque tights than have to admit this but all my worst bosses have been women. God knows some of the men have had their flaws too but the relationships have been less intense somehow. I don't think men are any less moody or any more talented; it's just that they don't tend to engage with women in the same hothouse way (unless they want to sleep with them which is an altogether different story).
In recent years I've been the boss too. Often I've worried I've become just as obsessive, controlling, plain bonkers as some of my predecessors. But the real irony is that while some of them may have been vile, a couple did teach me a thing or two. On one memorable occasion as I trooped off to interview yet another underage sex addict - I always got the classy jobs - my boss shouted testily down the corridor: 'I want to be able to smell them!' Not the most pleasant of thoughts but it did mean I learnt how to quiz people with a forensic attention to detail. I just wish she'd been nicer with it.
· The Devil Wears Prada opens on 6 October