I have seen this occasionally work, but far more often not work. There can be several reasons for it to fail: 1) the supervisor is responding to their own bad

I have seen this occasionally work, but far more often not work. There can be several reasons for it to fail: 1) the supervisor is responding to their own bad work situation from above, and since they don't know how to do that, the bad supervising strategy is their adaptation to a bad situation. 2) the supervisor is just plain not good at being someone's boss, by temperament or aptitude, and they may know at some level that they're not good at it but don't appreciate their direct report telling them the specific ways in which they are not. However politely and respectfully it is put, if the supervisor knows they're not good at being a supervisor, then being told by the person they're supervising that the situation is not working, just makes them mad. 3) the supervisor believes that their direct reports need to be cowed in order to be productive, and they respond to any feedback of the sort you describe by taking it as a challenge which must be beaten down. In fact, almost the only times I have seen management's attitude really change, is when they have too many people leave (although even then, sometimes they just aren't capable of managing well, and cannot seem to improve). Most often, leaving for a better job is the best way of communicating that the situation needs to improve. In large organizations, obviously case (1) above is the most common, and in small organizations (2) and (3).