Office politics - point scoring!

pickledonionspaceraider

Funky_Bold_Ribena wrote: »

Who is her boss compared to you? Do you have the same manager? Does your manager manage anyone who manages her?

Love your user name. Me and this lady do have the same Manager

pickledonionspaceraider

3v3 wrote: »

:huh: What does her age have to do with anything? :huh:

I think meritaten has given you some good advice regarding tactics on how to deal with her behaviour.

Unfortunately there is nothing you can do about her age
You may want to reflect on why you feel it is so relevant that you mention it twice?

I may want to reflect on why I mention her age twice? Why would that be? I also mention the fact that she is female about 20 times, should I be concerned with that too?

Sorry, but you are being a little sensitive over the age thing, I am just merely giving facts as looking for some help. To be honest I would probably find it easier to deal with if it were someone my own age as I was always taught to respect my elders.

Funky_Bold_Ribena

pickledonionspaceraider wrote: »

Love your user name. Me and this lady do have the same Manager

Ok that makes it easier.

You ask your manager how they want you to play this.

You feel bullied by this person but appreciate that the space is small and that they are on a lower level so you don't want to be seen to be belittling them back. Is there any way that the manager can manage this situation so that you can get on with your work, and no grievance for bullying has to be taken out and be investigated - which makes it look bad on your and the manager...and the person. You offer them the ability to resolve it amicably [ie manage it - that's what they are there for].

I'd suggest to the manager calling her in, going through her work and setting targets around her work, with regular meetings to look at where she is falling behind. The manager should be telling her it is not appropriate to behave towards you in the manner that she is, and to concentrate on her work not yours. and the manager should be telling her that if she has issues with your work, to take it up with them not with you - and certainly not in public.

It really is an easy situation to manage if the manager is up for it. If not, then you might just have to take out a grievance or consider changing jobs. Either will mean upheaval for you.

Of course, you could have a conversation on the phone and drop some subtle hints and let her come to a dismal conclusion and then go round the office spreading rumours and let her hang herself with the manager...but that's way too low, isn't it?

pickledonionspaceraider

RedBern wrote: »

Perhaps it's that an older woman should know better, and the OP behaves with respect or feels she should behave with respect (and even deference ) to an older colleague.

Good advice already. I would add that you could try asking her if there's anything she needs help with as you've had a couple of queries and she seems to have an awful lot of paperwork backing up in her tray. nd then say 'ah well, we've both got lots to get on with, I'll leave you to it!". If she eavesdrops, stop your conversation and say 'sorry, did you want something?' or say to whoever is on the 'phone 'I'll have to go, someone's waiting to speak to me/trying to Ttract my attention.' That should stop her.

Don't let her upset you. It is bullying, but if you're a little more assertive she'll back down, bullies always do.

Definately, I totally need to be a tad more assertive I think. We do have our reviews coming up soon, and I am going to ask if work can offer some assertiveness training - (but not planning to say why) we do have some difficult customers at time so am planning to say to help with that

pickledonionspaceraider

Funky_Bold_Ribena wrote: »

Ok that makes it easier.

You ask your manager how they want you to play this.

You feel bullied by this person but appreciate that the space is small and that they are on a lower level so you don't want to be seen to be belittling them back. Is there any way that the manager can manage this situation so that you can get on with your work, and no grievance for bullying has to be taken out and be investigated - which makes it look bad on your and the manager...and the person. You offer them the ability to resolve it amicably [ie manage it - that's what they are there for].

I'd suggest to the manager calling her in, going through her work and setting targets around her work, with regular meetings to look at where she is falling behind. The manager should be telling her it is not appropriate to behave towards you in the manner that she is, and to concentrate on her work not yours. and the manager should be telling her that if she has issues with your work, to take it up with them not with you - and certainly not in public.

It really is an easy situation to manage if the manager is up for it. If not, then you might just have to take out a grievance or consider changing jobs. Either will mean upheaval for you.

Of course, you could have a conversation on the phone and drop some subtle hints and let her come to a dismal conclusion and then go round the office spreading rumours and let her hang herself with the manager...but that's way too low, isn't it?

Thank you. I hardly slept last night for thinking this through, and I think I will try and takle it on a personal level with the lady, without getting management involved - well initally anyway. I do want to play fair, and not try and score points back...as much as I want to scream at her some days.

Definately going to get more assertive and say something directly to her i.e if I walk in and catch her discussing my work etc, say ''No work to do then?'' that kind of thing. Hopefully she will back off at that point..

Funky_Bold_Ribena

pickledonionspaceraider wrote: »

Thank you. I hardly slept last night for thinking this through, and I think I will try and takle it on a personal level with the lady, without getting management involved - well initally anyway. I do want to play fair, and not try and score points back...as much as I want to scream at her some days.

Definately going to get more assertive and say something directly to her i.e if I walk in and catch her discussing my work etc, say ''No work to do then?'' that kind of thing. Hopefully she will back off at that point..

That's the problem with addressing it yourself. She could easily go and say that you are ordering her around. If it gets out of hand the first thing the manager will say is 'why didn't you talk to me about it - I now have a bigger issue to address'.

They are there to manage, if someone who you don't directly manage is interfering with your job, then their manager needs to address it. You are just going to get yourself in knots trying to sort it yourself.

getmore4less

Stop covering and trying to guess what she hs done just bat stuff back to her or her manager. Only clean up any mess if instructed on each case.

There seems to be a lack of any Quality control.

Get an escalation proccesses in place to trap these issues they are costing the company money if there are knock on effects.

you need to get the managers to manage, what happens when this person is on holiday/sick, if the replacement manages the workload and does not make mistakes then this should be obvious.

The key will be to identify what will motivate the mangers to act, cost and productivity are the usual ones but you may have to send the info up a level or two to get the managers to be told to sort it out.

Seems there are 2 main issues
productivity, getting the work done, managers need to find out why too much work not working hard enough.

Quality, root cause of the issues that her deliverables are not getting done correctly.


One solution is that ALL work gets checked and targets set for delivery to the checker.

getmore4less

If you start the course you propose expect to get a bullying grievence against you.

This is a management problem.

pickledonionspaceraider

Funky_Bold_Ribena wrote: »

That's the problem with addressing it yourself. She could easily go and say that you are ordering her around. If it gets out of hand the first thing the manager will say is 'why didn't you talk to me about it - I now have a bigger issue to address'.

They are there to manage, if someone who you don't directly manage is interfering with your job, then their manager needs to address it. You are just going to get yourself in knots trying to sort it yourself.

Yes very true, a very good point, I totally agree. Plus im not qualified to deal with it, no management experience etc and I totally would end up tying myself in knots. I am just very wary of making the situation worse by making it official..in such a small team environment...Oh here I go making excuses again, no wonder I get walked over.

This time last year, we had our reviews..and mine were glowing, I was really pleased and I had worked very hard for it and had great consumer feedback.. and all was well until towards the end of my review meeting, my Manager told me that this woman had complained about me. My husband works in the same building as us (in a seperate company) and every lunchtime we go out for half hour together. He pops by to ''call for me'' on our way out..which means he will pop his head around the reception door and say ''you ready?'' and then wait outside. I am always ready as this happens at the same time each day. Apparently she complained as she saw this as a personal visit and someone coming into the reception area and saying ''you ready?'' to another member of staff was disturbing her graft. My manager looked embarrased at telling me this..and I was secretly fuming as it isn't like my husband was hanging around in my workplace or being a nuisance, and my actual work had all been scored as very high as in next stage promotion. That's how petty it has been for a while. I did stop my hubby calling in for me, and now he waves me out through the window but 9 times out of ten I am already waiting for him outside.

suki1001

It's awful when your job becomes miserable because of one person. Rather than skirting around the edges or hinting, I think your manager needs to know how difficult you are finding the situation.

Are they aware it's getting you so down, that you feel like leaving? Do you think they'd be happy to lose a hard working and reliable member of staff?

I think they'd like to know and I think you need to be completely open with them. If you find her difficult, the chances are other people may feel the same way - but perhaps no-one feels like they should say anything.

It does sound like they are fully aware of what she's like, but they need to know it's causing you a problem and exactly how much it's affecting you. If your work load doesn't directly affect her, then how you're working is none of her business anyway.

Good luck with the situation.