Told to respect someone who screamed at me

[Wouldgivetwostars]

I’m going to be vague with details.

I was bawled out by a consultant (male). His manager (male) told me I should be more respectful of his station and stress level and pretty much bow and scrape to him to prevent it happening again. His words were “as a woman, Consultant feels you don’t respect him enough”

As a woman.

I was so struck dumb I didn’t know what to say and now I’m kicking myself.

I’ve documented and my line manager is aware. I won’t be in a room with him on my own anymore, he came into my office the other day and I said “good afternoon”, he literally looked at me and completely blanked me.

I want this person gone and do have some say in this (we are peers level wise). I’m dreading my next run in with him

Woah! Keep communcating with your line manager. Both of them, consultant and his manager, need to get their heads out of their frail male egos. "As a woman" - get to fuck! And to HR...

What absolute fucking idiot these days actually tells the victim that the bullying incident is purely because of sexism?! Record everywhere and complain loudly to HR. Speak to an employment solicitor too, in case you need to kick anything off quickly (beware of time limits).

I need to work on my “people skills”, he needs me to be more respectful. Sorry but as soon as someone starts screaming at me my people skills go out of the window.

I didn’t even respond in kind, waited for him to stop and said “I’m going to leave the room now, you’re screaming at me and I’m not prepared to put up with that, please come back when you’ve calmed down”. That was the sum total of my response.

What Curious said.
Completely unacceptable behaviour from consultant and manager.

Some suggestions of how I can be more respectful

• Anticipate his trigger points (basically any stress) and work to eliminate them
• Greet him politely and ask how he is
• Accept that he has a very stressful job and give him leeway

I work with a number of consultants and not one of them has ever spoken to me like this or demanded “respect”.

Your response was good. You kept your dignity. He showed himself to be what he is.
Escalate your grievance to HR. And in the meantime his behaviour will show itself to others, without doubt

I've dealt with many similar situations as an "inferior" nurse during my NHS career. A consultant once threw a scalpel at me during a surgical procedure because I wasn't quick enough.
I cornered him in private and gave him the biggest bollocking of his life. He never tried anything like that with me again.
They are all cowards when you get them on their own.

Tell them that respect is earned. It is not a god given right.

Wow, so he admitted out loud that he expects MORE respect from you because you're a woman?!

What a prat. If there's any kind of HR, you have to put this on record.

He sounds like a narcissist. My x was abusive and used to demand respect all the time.

You probably caused some narcissistic injury by doing something you're perfectly entitled to do but I'd be worried about your future there if you have upset a narcissist. He will take you down and he won't feel bad about it. He will destroy you and he will feel that he has had been the victim of you.

Speak to HR

None of the above. You are asking how to be adequately obsequious. How long could you keep that up without harming your own sense of self worth?

This has been done to you. The manager has told you quite specifically thatthis is sexism in the workplace. As others have said, het advice from an employment lawyer, keep HR in the loop. You have to protect yoursef from this. Being quiet, respectful and 'feminine' won't help you in the long run. You'll be sidelining yourself - you said you and the consultant are peers, act like one, for your own sake!

God knows you must feel scared as well as angry (I remember that feeling only too well). I didn't handle it well, I was polite and apologetic. Lost that career in a haze of 'not quite right, doesn't have the necessary gravitas' etc.

@MrsMoastyToasty which was my response to his manager! To which I was told he has automatic response due to his station. Some of these doctors literally think they are god

Respect not response

Speak to a lawyer?

Shocking! Escalate all of this with HR, this is completely unacceptable

There's an employment issues board on MN op and you might get good advice there.

@MrsMoastyToasty

Tell them that respect is earned. It is not a god given right.

I think it's better to insist that everybody deserves a basic level of respect. The cleaners. The canteen staff. The patients. The consultants. You're asking for the basic minimum level of respect that decent human beings find it easy to show to all.

If you start talking about respect earned, it plays back in to his hierarchical placement of you all. You all have a place in his mind. This hierarchy that he sees is invisible to you all but quite clear to him. There may be one or two people he will concede are above him.

So he will believe that he has earned more respect than you have earned @Wouldgivetwostars

The way he has behaved, the disrespect is so abusive, what he is saying is 'I am entitled to be abusive, respect my entitlement

A similar experience here as a ward manager with a consultant - awful man, constantly rude, would shout at me and my staff in the middle of the ward, in front of patients etc. No respect at all for our clinical knowledge or expertise. I tried to tackle it directly with him (professionally, in private) and was yelled at and told basically "I'm the doctor, you're the nurse, just do what you're told".

I had enough and reported to my line manager who got HR involved. A investigation was commissioned. A short while later he left the organisation. Obviously due to confidentiality I wasn't made aware of the circumstances of his leaving but I highly suspect that I wasn't the only person who had complained about him and once the floodgates were opened I know a number of people including junior doctors and other nurses also came forward with their experiences. One had had a box thrown at her.

Pursue it - for you and for your colleagues as you won't be the only one. If he's prepared to behave this way to a peer I can only imagine how he speaks to junior nurses who definitely won't feel confident enough to speak up. Ignore the managers and go straight to HR.

Bold fail! I mean, what he is saying is I am entitled to be abusive to you, respect my entitlement

That is his position.

So you need to focus on the shouting. Everybody knows that that is wrong.

If you say ''Respect is earned'' that might make it sound that he is right that you don't respect him.

I think it's better to insist that everybody deserves a basic level of respect. The cleaners. The canteen staff. The patients. The consultants. You're asking for the basic minimum level of respect that decent human beings find it easy to show to all.

Yes I agree with this.

But undoubtedly he is the one who needs to change his behaviour, not the OP.

Outrageous.
His behaviour is totally unacceptable and his line manager should be managing him not you.
Your manager should also be going into bat for you on this.
And i would be filing a complaint to consultants boss's boss with your boss and hr on cc about both of their behaviour. One in unprofessional with anger management issues and the other is unable to effectively manage staff and has demonstrated very poor judgement.

What a shower of bastards those two are

"As a man, Consultant needs to learn to speak to women with courtesy and good manners."

What caused the incident

I'd go above his manager- report the pair of them to HR.

Wo screams at people in a professional working environment, except maybe Malcolm Tucker?