Nothing is really anybody's fault. People only do abusive things because somebody else previously did something abusive to them. This is not likely provable, it's just a belief I have. Of course victims still need to express their anger and abusers need to be held accountable, but it's also important to ask, "How can I not be an abuser or a victim in the future?"
Of course a complete apology feels good, it provides absolution. It will feel even better if forgiveness is tendered by the employees. But to reiterate the real challenge is not getting into situations like this in the future.
> People only do abusive things because somebody else previously did something abusive to them. This is not likely provable, it's just a belief I have.
I used to think the way you did, and then I discovered sociopathy was real. There are people who quite like hurting others, and there's no point in appealing to their empathy because they don't have any.
The best that can be done with these people is to give them incentives to cooperate.
If one accidentally ends up with one of these as an employee or a boss, one could fairly blame them... unless one also takes responsibility for sociopathy-detection.
I know that there are sociopaths and psychopaths, I just don't believe that they're purely genetic conditions, but rather ones that develop due to being the victim of abuse. There may be genetic predisposition, I wouldn't be surprised. I also don't believe they're fundamentally incurable conditions. I'm not saying that blaming or getting angry at an abusive boss makes no sense, but rather that going forward the best thing to do is either resolve the conflict or run away from it gracefully.
Of course a complete apology feels good, it provides absolution. It will feel even better if forgiveness is tendered by the employees. But to reiterate the real challenge is not getting into situations like this in the future.