My experience is that managers don’t normally “overcompensate in the other direction” on purpose. After all, if they are friendly with someone, they will be inclined to help them.

Two exceptions:

1. Bad managers make bad decisions generally, and usually for illogical reasons, so they might do this by accident.

2. Owners of family businesses can be much harder on their kids when they first start out, because the owners mean to have the kids run the business when they retire, so want to do a “trial by fire”