Scans › Is my coworker manipulating me? › The Chess Player
Your coworker scans as
The Chess Player
VERY HIGH TRAITS · YOU’RE A PIECE ON THEIR BOARD
All four patterns are lit. They triangulate, they sabotage, they collect debts, and they control who knows what. This isn’t office friction. Someone is playing a game and you weren’t told the rules.
Typical trait profile for this readout. Your own scan will differ.
THE SHARED READOUT
WHAT TIPPED IT · THEIR ANSWERS
What this readout means
When triangulation, sabotage, guilt and information control all score high, you are describing a coworker using the full toolkit of workplace manipulation, usually in service of their own advancement. Researchers link this profile to the “Machiavellian” end of the dark-triad spectrum: strategic, patient and unbothered by who gets hurt. The confusion you feel is a tactic, not a weakness.
WHAT YOU CAN DO
- Reduce contact to what the work requires, and put all of it in writing.
- Build direct relationships with the people they’ve been positioning themselves between.
- Do not try to out-play them. Be so transparent that there’s nothing to distort, and let the record speak.
WHAT TO SAY · SCRIPTS FOR THIS READOUT
How to raise it
- “Confirming in writing: you asked me to hold the report until Monday. Let me know if that’s wrong.”
- “Adding the full team so everyone has the same information at the same time.”
- “I’d like to keep our communication to email and the project channel from here.”
How to set the line
- “I’m going to work directly with Sam on this. You don’t need to relay for us.”
- “I’ll consider that once I’ve heard it from my manager directly.”
- “I’m not going to discuss colleagues. If you have a concern, please raise it with them.”
When they push back
- “I’m not reading into it. I’m confirming it so we’re both clear.”
- “Let’s leave it there. Everything I need is in the thread.”
- “I don’t have anything to add. I’ll follow up in writing if that changes.”
- “I have to get back to work now. Thanks.”
Say them in your own words. The point is to have something ready before the conversation, not to read from a card.
Your full readout, as a PDF
A clean, printable report of this scan: the personal readout, trait chart, every answer, what it means, the three scripts and the reading. Keep it, or hand it to a therapist.
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The other readouts on this scan