accused of being a bully

glossgal

tandraig wrote: »

now we can expect an appearance from all of jojothemeanminded 'friends' - this is common practice on the 'praise, vent and warnings' site.
didnt expect to see it on here - oh well - guess i have made more enemies then!
chin up libby hun - ignore them - I do!

What are you on about? If I agree with someone on here I'll say, if I don't I'll say that too. I assume this is how the board works. Lots of people being each others 'friends' ie forming the same opinions then conspiring against you to air them :rolleyes:

OP- I for one don't have anything else to add about about the incident in your post but ...social work isn't rocket science so I'm not sure why you are making endless pompous references to this field in relation to your personality and how your conduct yourself. We all need to assert ourselves to get on in life, it's not the preserve of this profession (or any other) and really isn't relevant to whether or not you've offended someone!

anguk

tandraig wrote: »

now we can expect an appearance from all of jojothemeanminded 'friends' - this is common practice on the 'praise, vent and warnings' site.
didnt expect to see it on here - oh well - guess i have made more enemies then!
chin up libby hun - ignore them - I do!

I have to agree with some of the points jojo made. I can remember when I went to college (many years ago), we did quite a bit of group work and there was one girl in particular who was very opinionated and basically just took over. She always said "if you don't agree just say", well one poor girl did dare to disagree and the dominant one didn't like it one bit.

She did what libby did and went round everyone else to get their opinions on this girl, and do you know what, everyone said it wasn't a problem and tried in a diplomatic way to tell her she was too dominant. They didn't want to rock the boat or be on the receiving end of her "opinion" so just kept quiet. I'm ashamed to say I was one of those who kept quiet to keep the peace but I was young and didn't want to be singled out, I certainly wouldn't keep quiet now.

I'm a lot older now and if I find myself in a group and there's one who is too opinionated or overbearing I remove myself from that group because I just find it unpleasant.

For the record I'm not one of jojo's friends so I'm not sticking up for her, I just happen to agree with some of her reasons.

If I was the op I would take this opportunity to take a look at my own behaviour and how I interact with other people. I would leave the other woman alone, you've apologised if she won't accept that then that's up to her. Move on, and perhaps allow other people to take the lead occasionally.

tandraig

glossgal wrote: »

What are you on about? If I agree with someone on here I'll say, if I don't I'll say that too. I assume this is how the board works. Lots of people being each others 'friends' ie forming the same opinions then conspiring against you to air them :rolleyes:

OP- I for one don't have anything else to add about about the incident in your post but ...social work isn't rocket science so I'm not sure why you are making endless pompous references to this field in relation to your personality and how your conduct yourself. We all need to assert ourselves to get on in life, it's not the preserve of this profession (or any other) and really isn't relevant to whether or not you've offended someone!

thank you for your thoughts - but I don't really know what you mean by 'making endless pompous references to this field in relation to your personality and how your conduct yourself' . perhaps you are confusing her with another poster?
if social work isnt rocket science why do you need a degree to qualify? it is a highly skilled job - or perhaps you think anyone could walk in off the jobcentre to do it?
In fact - I dont think your comments make sense!
And thats just my humble opinion!!!

shellsuit

libby, from what you've said, I don't think you sound or acted like a bully at all.

The other person sounds like she took it the wrong way and just flew off the handle.

Do you think maybe that she has ignored your apologies because she is embarrassed??

I know some people ignore things when they KNOW they are in the wrong, either because they are too proud or too embarrassed to back down.

Julieg

Maybe she's ignored the apologies because she's had enough of the OP 'jokes'.

Regarding the ''making endless pompous references to this field in relation to your personality and how your conduct yourself'. To be honest the OP does sound a bit full of herself, ie how wonderful she thinks she is because she does social work.

shellsuit

Julieg wrote: »

Maybe she's ignored the apologies because she's had enough of the OP 'jokes'.

Regarding the ''making endless pompous references to this field in relation to your personality and how your conduct yourself'. To be honest the OP does sound a bit full of herself, ie how wonderful she thinks she is because she does social work.

The OP doesn't come across as full of herself to me.

She comes across as open and vocal because she is passionate about her work.

SU51_3

PasturesNew wrote: »

From reading the OP's post, I could see how somebody might feel her over-bearing and if you're a poor communicator (I am), then this can well up inside as you don't know how to say what you mean, resulting in isolation and a "blowing up" style situation as has happened.

But I doubt the person who was unwell is an Aspie like me

l m an Aspie and l absolutely hate being disbelieved or unfairly criticised - its the way our very orderly minds work l think. l am not the best communicator and so resentment builds up like you say till the 'big bang' situation. She probably felt she was being accused of faking it or shirking

glossgal

Julieg wrote: »

Maybe she's ignored the apologies because she's had enough of the OP 'jokes'.

Regarding the ''making endless pompous references to this field in relation to your personality and how your conduct yourself'. To be honest the OP does sound a bit full of herself, ie how wonderful she thinks she is because she does social work.

Thanks, this is exactly what I meant. The job you do has nowt to do with how you interact with people in social situations-or at least it shouldn't-I didn't see the need for OP to keep crowing about how tenacious and worthy she is ..but maybe I like my social workers with a bit more modesty lol

alm721

Steel wrote: »

I think it really depends Libby how often you make "teasing" or 'joking' comments to people.

The odd comment is one thing and if that is what this was then she has over-reacted. But if you do it frequently to a number of people you need to curb the habit. It could be this lady is the tip of an iceberg...

I have cut contact with friends and aquaintences who do this frequently as I find it a unpleasant passive aggressive way of controlling people. Persistent comments made in a 'joking' way can eventually destroy someone's self esteem.

I find your comment about being loud and dominating in group work interesting....perhaps it would be wise to take a back seat for a while in group situations and allow others to take more control...it could be this lady (and perhaps others) feel their voice is not being heard and are becoming sensitive to it.

I must admit this crossed my mind when I read this post. Do you think she reacted the way she did just becasue of what was said today or do you think if was just the straw that broke the camels back as it were? You say you have previously 'joked 'with her and she's been ok, was that her 'teasing' you as well or was it mainly one way and was she as ok with it as you seem to think?

The way your posts come across it does seem like to like to be a bit ' in control' of group situations and lots of people don't really like a person 'trying to 'organise' the others when you should all be on an equal footing.

There is no excuse for her language but you really need to think about whether this was ujust her being unreasonable or whether she really has reason to be upset.

alm721

libbyc3 wrote: »

Through working in and with social services for several years, I have found staying in the background gets a person nowhere. having to advocate for extremely vulnerable kids to get the services they desparately need and are long overdue does not come about by letting others have their say - all that achieves is endless discussion over budgets, responsibility, and timescales. and believe me, nothing ever actually gets done.
I am proud of the fact that being bolshy has got positive outcomes for some of the kids I have had, and yes, I am being defending my personality. it may not suit every situation and I may - and have this time - got into bother, however, I am at the start of a course and learning curve into stepping up to a professional level where I can transfer and utilitse my skills, including 'bolshiness'.

So you do not 'let others have their say' and this makes you a better social worker I guess the people you are studying with will all be rubbish then as they won't get the chance to ' have their say':rolleyes:

Seriously there is a HUGE difference between being assertive when necessary and dominating when its not necessary. You can get your point across without needing to be bolshy and while you may be right in that you do not need to defend your personality I would suggest that as a good social worker (as well as human being) you need to be able to listen too. By all means be assertive, bolshy even, when fighting for kids rights but to be fair thats not what you were doing. You just made someone who was feeling crap feel worse, which I would think is probably not the best attribute of a social worker! Maybe you just need to tone it done a little, or as my dad would say, 'engage brain before opening mouth'.