Workplace bullying?

[nigel99 143]

Nataly

***Anyone ever quit a job with nothing lined up?

Yep. Twice. First time I had no idea what I wanted to do - total career change, etc. Second time I was like: "fuck this, I'm a Chartered Accountant and can find *something* better than this bullshit - even if it does pay less."

Don't regret either decision as both times things worked out very nicely. That said, I would not recommend this approach to the vast majority of people... Just like I would not encourage the vast majority of people to take up base jumping...

I'm at the point where I believe it is going to be less stressful to be unemployed with a mortgage than stuck in this.

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.

[dorbie 0]

nigel99

Anyone ever quit a job with nothing lined up?

Yes, but there were probably better options. If you're going to quit you might as well take it up the chain first. What do you have to lose at that point?

People often quit their bosses, not their company.

[nigel99 143]

dorbie

***
Anyone ever quit a job with nothing lined up?

Yes, but there were probably better options. If you're going to quit you might as well take it up the chain first. What do you have to lose at that point?

People often quit their bosses, not their company.

Oh my god. This is so fucking tragically hilarious. I am/was at 2nd interview stage with another company. I just got drunk dialled by the Managing Director to negotiate the employment terms at 10:30:at night (midnight for him). Think I'll pass on that job

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.

[Remster 24]

nigel99

******
Anyone ever quit a job with nothing lined up?

Yes, but there were probably better options. If you're going to quit you might as well take it up the chain first. What do you have to lose at that point?

People often quit their bosses, not their company.

Oh my god. This is so fucking tragically hilarious. I am/was at 2nd interview stage with another company. I just got drunk dialled by the Managing Director to negotiate the employment terms at 10:30:at night (midnight for him). Think I'll pass on that job

I dunno! Sounds like a fun company!

Remster

[FlyingRhenquest 1]

nigel99

******
Anyone ever quit a job with nothing lined up?

Yes, but there were probably better options. If you're going to quit you might as well take it up the chain first. What do you have to lose at that point?

People often quit their bosses, not their company.

Oh my god. This is so fucking tragically hilarious. I am/was at 2nd interview stage with another company. I just got drunk dialled by the Managing Director to negotiate the employment terms at 10:30:at night (midnight for him). Think I'll pass on that job

You probably could have negotiated some pretty good terms at that point.

I'm trying to teach myself how to set things on fire with my mind. Hey... is it hot in here?

[Nataly 38]

dorbie

People often quit their bosses, not their company.

I could not agree more.

"There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse."
- Chris Hadfield
« Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. »
- my boss

[nigel99 143]

Nataly

***People often quit their bosses, not their company.

I could not agree more.

Final update in the whole drama. I took my complaint up the chain, he was disciplined, my actions empowered others to speak up, resulting in him getting demoted and ultimately laid off.

I now have his job and the interesting thing is rebuilding a team of 20-30 people who have had their self worth and confidence destroyed. It's about 2 months into the process and going really well.

I know these situations don't always have happy endings, but thankfully for our team it is fantastic.

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.

[JohnMitchell 14]

Congratulations. Now you get a chance to do the job right.

[jumpwally 0]

Cool...Just like in the movies.....next they will lift you on their shoulders whilst cheering wildly !!! Congrats

smile, be nice, enjoy life
FB # - 1083

[riggerrob 558]

Now that we have moved on to constructive solutions ....
Yesterday I offered to tickle a workplace bully.

One of my co-workers prides herself on being a tough broad. She swears like a trucker. She hunts and plays hockey on her days off. She is my age and my weight .... but .... er .... not as tall as me. When she gets excited, she talks in such a terse and brusk manner that I sometimes have to ask her to repeat a couple of times before I understand what she wants me to do.
She also has her own "unique" style of driving fork-lifts. I try to keep my toes clear.
Other co-workers have told me about times she was downright nasty to new employees. .... like a grumpy old Sargent-Major.

Thursday morning she got all in a tizzy about something that was not her responsibility. I figured out an easy way to do the delivery and did it quickly.
No fuss!

She works slightly different shifts than me, so was not at Friday morning roll-call.
So at Friday morning roll-call I sat in front of the manager and explained the Thursday morning silliness. I suggested that maybe she lighten up and I concluded with: "I want to tickle her!"
His face got real serious and he replied: "Oh no! You don't want to do that!"
A second co-worker offered to retrieve my glasses from one corner of the warehouse.
A third co-worker offered to retrieve my teeth from the opposite corner of the warehouse.
A fourth co-worker offered to loan me a full set of hockey goalie armour.
A fifth co-worker asked me if I wanted to tickle her with my beard.
Ewwwwww!
Everyone else laughed.
Then they tried to talk me out of tickling her.

If she gets upset - when she hears the gossip - our next conversation will be in front of a union shop steward.

[riggerrob 558]

Bullying is about repetition .... repeatedly teasing some one about a minor mistake, minor defect, etc.
Bullies learned about repetition in elementary school and have been perfecting their cruel techniques for decades.
Bullies know exactly where the legal threshold is.
They also know that they do not need to exceed that threshold to drive their victim insane.
Bullies know that they just have to approach that threshold dozens or hundreds of times to drive their victim insane.
Teasing once or twice often helps the victim correct the error of their ways, but repeating the same negative message hundreds of times just reinforces failure.
The cruelest of bullies tease victims about things the victim cannot change, like school bullies teasing the kid in La Loche about his big ears. Then everyone acted surprised when the victim shot and killed several bullies.
Why was anyone surprised about the mass-shooting?

Sadly, that victim has traded one set of (schoolyard) bullies for a worse set of bullies. Prison bullies have been sentenced to prison because they are too cruel to be allowed to walk among the general public. The saddest thing is that poor victim is going to be teased more in prison and get ass-raped by prison bullies for the rest of his sentence.

[Nataly 38]

riggerrob

Bullying is about repetition .... repeatedly teasing some one about a minor mistake, minor defect, etc.
Bullies learned about repetition in elementary school and have been perfecting their cruel techniques for decades.

I've never been able to really understand why bullies attack the way they do or whether they are *fully* aware of what they are doing... Obviously everyone is different and not all bullies can be lumped into just one category.

I do know that there are some toxic people out there and that sometimes it's impossible (or not worthwhile) to understand the "why" (or let alone expect for things to change or improve).

Glad the situation seems to have worked out for the better for Nigel. Well done for sticking up for yourself

"There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse."
- Chris Hadfield
« Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. »
- my boss

[riggerrob 558]

Bullies only care about short-term power. Bullies start in elementary school. Bullies use the quickest tactics to gain power over weaker members of society. Bullies soon learn that fear works 100 times faster than love. When victims don't listen to their verbal taunts, bullies resort to physical pain. Bullies only have to beat up victims once or twice before victims learn to associate the sound of the bully's voice with physical pain.

Elementary school teachers allow bullies to ply their trade because bullies force weaker students to conform.

In the long run, bullies decrease the productivity of their workplace, because the only way bullies know how to increase their personal power is by putting down weaker workers. When you put down too many weaker workers, productivity suffers. Slower workers eventually abandon hope of ever earning raises and quit doing any more than the minimum required to collect a paycheck.
When productivity suffers, the whole company suffers and eventually managers recognize the damage bullies are doing and limit the bully's power or force the bullies to quit.

[Texbubba 0]

I was going tom say that I have a shovel and bags of lime.

[wmw999 2,114]

I can't believe I'm saying this, but at least with direct management, one of your defenses against this is regular status reports. Because then there is a record.

I can't believe I'm saying it because I was one of the worst ever about status reports...

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[dragon2 0]

nigel99

Anyone had experience with workplace bullying?

Yeah... Me, atm.....

Nothing I do is good enough. Have been and still am ill too often, they act as if it's my own fault for falling down and breaking my thumb, plus getting Crohn's.
Plenty of rumors floating around,talk behind my back... Found an email in a shared mailbox which mentioned me being completely useless: boss messaged me early about a support issue (I used to work support), I tried to figure out the error and asked a programmer a question, got burned for that. Turned out the customer had installed a new server the week before and were tweaking it, she should have known that as she runs support, this support issue clearly lay with the customer not us. But she felt the need to mail around that I was completely useless for trying to help, outside my current department.
Remarks like "Do you have to go to the hospital NOW??" Eh,yes...
Go to the usual daily meetings? Shouldn't have done that as it was a waste of my time, apparently, or so I was told after 1 1/2weeks of going...
Was the only one out of 18 employees who did not receive the yearly 70 euros Christmas gift: "We don't have a Christmas gift for you".
My boss was communicating with me using mobile phone, whatsapp and personal email. I was apparently expected to read work email @ home too while sick, got berated for not responding to stuff on my work email, which I didn't read...
Lost my yearly personal IT budget of 800 euros this year, refunds for internet @ home and my mobile phone were denied at the last day of January, without notice or explanation.
Worked half days almost all of January, got paid if I was 100% sick, not fair and perhaps not legal as it was my regular work.

I'm still in the research stages of finding out whether it IS Crohn's or whether it is something similar, so no treatment plan yet and plenty of hospital visits to come. I'm sleeping 12-20 hours a day atm, another 'attack'. However I now need to submit a detailed plan for the coming couple of months which is outside of my expertise (would need courses for a couple of months first) and if I fail I'm out. No way I can win this one...

Another colleague left mid December, he has something similar happen to him although to a lesser degree, for being sick too often too.

ciel bleu,
Saskia

[nigel99 143]

dragon2

***Anyone had experience with workplace bullying?

Yeah... Me, atm.....

Nothing I do is good enough. Have been and still am ill too often, they act as if it's my own fault for falling down and breaking my thumb, plus getting Crohn's.
Plenty of rumors floating around,talk behind my back... Found an email in a shared mailbox which mentioned me being completely useless: boss messaged me early about a support issue (I used to work support), I tried to figure out the error and asked a programmer a question, got burned for that. Turned out the customer had installed a new server the week before and were tweaking it, she should have known that as she runs support, this support issue clearly lay with the customer not us. But she felt the need to mail around that I was completely useless for trying to help, outside my current department.
Remarks like "Do you have to go to the hospital NOW??" Eh,yes...
Go to the usual daily meetings? Shouldn't have done that as it was a waste of my time, apparently, or so I was told after 1 1/2weeks of going...
Was the only one out of 18 employees who did not receive the yearly 70 euros Christmas gift: "We don't have a Christmas gift for you".
My boss was communicating with me using mobile phone, whatsapp and personal email. I was apparently expected to read work email @ home too while sick, got berated for not responding to stuff on my work email, which I didn't read...
Lost my yearly personal IT budget of 800 euros this year, refunds for internet @ home and my mobile phone were denied at the last day of January, without notice or explanation.
Worked half days almost all of January, got paid if I was 100% sick, not fair and perhaps not legal as it was my regular work.

I'm still in the research stages of finding out whether it IS Crohn's or whether it is something similar, so no treatment plan yet and plenty of hospital visits to come. I'm sleeping 12-20 hours a day atm, another 'attack'. However I now need to submit a detailed plan for the coming couple of months which is outside of my expertise (would need courses for a couple of months first) and if I fail I'm out. No way I can win this one...

Another colleague left mid December, he has something similar happen to him although to a lesser degree, for being sick too often too.



Shame really sorry to hear your story :(

Doesn't sound like a good place to be on many levels.

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.