Feel really hurt by colleagues, do I just look for a new job?

[pushed0ut]

I work in an small team (5 women) and have been here for two years. There have been so many little moments that just make me feel like I'm really not a part of things and am most likely disliked. Things like if everyone turns around from their screens and are chatting, everyone will make eye contact between each other but not at me, eventually I just feel like I'm listening into to someone else's conversation so I just turn back around. They do collections for every birthday, wedding etc and usually bring in a cake for birthdays and I've put in every time for every colleague and I've now had 2 birthdays and my wedding where I've had nothing except a card. A new starter that has only been with us for 6 months had her birthday last month and a colleague baked her a cake and she had a little hamper full of presents. A colleague in a different location got married and all the teams put in and she got a £100 John Lewis voucher. I got nothing for my wedding except a card. It's not that I expect presents I just don't expect to be treated differently to literally everybody else. It is the Christmas dinner next week and to be honest I feel like I'm not really wanted so I said I couldn't attend due to childcare reasons, no one really said much more than okay, a colleague yesterday said she's double booked herself and can't come and was met with a chorus of oh my god no, it won't be the same without you, shall we see if we can reschedule etc. I cried about it last night and just feel stupid now really, my husband keeps saying it doesn't matter it's just work and they are colleagues not friends, and I know that, I've got lots of lovely friends and it's not friendship I want from my colleagues, it's to feel included and respected. I feel like I just need to look for a different job but it feels unfair as it's so flexible around my young kids and I may not be able to find anything that works as well. I don't really feel like I can raise it without sounding a bit pathetic?

With the collective gifts say you will put it in "later" and later never comes

But yes i would look for a new job

I get how you feel my last place of work was just like this and now I'm home the school playground is full of people in there own groups I put myself out there chatting to people helping people and I don't get so much as a Christmas card ive just said fuck it all like today I literally walked into the building with a group of people and they hussled off to sit elsewhere I sat by myself in the end people did join me but only because they had too....18 months to go

This sounds horrible op. Start looking for a new job, life is too short

Definitely find a new job before this affects your self esteem.

You can start to believe that you're the problem, that you're dislikable in some way but these people are just not your tribe and completely insensitive and non-inclusive in their behaviours. Some people are to their taste, some not and they're not bothered to accommodate everyone which is typical clique behaviour🤔

Not every group is like this. You've got unlucky with this lot. Find nicer people.

I've been in a very similar situation. It nearly broke me, because I spent my time (years like you) trying to work out what the problem was and trying to fix it. I should have just left, because the problem wasn't mine, they were who they were, are! It turned out it was a combination of toxic relationships and individual priorities within the team, which kept them in cahoots with each other, and placed me on the outside. I believed for years that there must be a problem with me, and it went far beyond anything so simple. When I look back, I'm so glad I was not in that horrible, unhealthy, weird dynamic, that I had my own identity (albeit a lonely one at the time) and was able n the end to move onwards away from it. I'm all honestly take their bad manners and unkindness as a compliment and get yourself another job. I did, made the best friends and was able to be myself again 😍

I agree with pp.. This is bullying. Sorry you're experiencing this OP, they sounds really nasty. If it is affecting you badly and you're not able to compartmentalise then I would find a new job.. They sound hideous

They are bullying and excluding you- the question is whether the job is worth ignoring this for, or if a complaint is worth making.

FWIW, I’ve had the opposite- coworkers who were my BFFS. The downside was you couldn’t disagree with them, you had to go out with them and only them every single lunchtime and answer every text outside work, and they wanted every detail of your life which they then gossiped about.

In some cases co workers can become real friends and be great friends but it’s a good idea to always view a workplace as a professional place and not look for friends there. Giving personal information to employers isn’t wise.

You say your job is flexible - are you part-time?

When I have experienced this sort of thing, it has been as an employee who is not there in the team for 5 days in a row, and there is very little you can do about it. There really isn't a feeling of being included in the same way as someone who happens to be able to work full time hours. It is the most horrible experience. It got 50 times worse when endless Teams chats and threads came into the mix, as it was very obvious when you were both excluded, but expected to read several feet of chatty contributions to get up to speed (or keep your nose out, where you had no invitation or sharing link).

I managed to keep the 'they are colleagues, not friends' mantra going, through about 8 months of job search, but was so nearly losing it and very angry by the end of that (which didn't help). And with 'It's flexible and it fits around the kids', it didn't manage to compensate enough. A couple of the people in the clique were those who had once been in a similar position as me (part time and needing flexible), but were no more inclusive or thoughtful if your face wasn't onscreen or present - almost an unspoken gloss of 'oh, I would have wanted to be a stay at home parent too, but it wasn't practical for us' (and their jobs were about being inclusive and fair from an HR kind of perspective, too).

What did help, was getting coaching for some of that time from someone impartial and experienced, to keep me on track when knocked back in the job search. It would be invest in that or childcare, I think, but there is still no guarantee that you will feel you will trust or reconcile with the people you have described.

Agree wholeheartedly with you.
In a former job, was asked whether I wanted my birthday added to the list - I said no. Why would I want colleagues knowing that?
I keep my private life and work life as separate as possible. I might be seen as aloof/private/standoffish, but my work place is not my social life.
One colleague drones on a bit about her children. I acknowledge but don't pursue the conversation.

I've been in the same situation. It's so demoralising. At first I wondered if I was being unreasonable or imagining it. I would sit in the staff room and they would deliberately sit as far away as possible.

I have absolutely no idea why they disliked me. One day I was quietly working on a computer tucked away in the corner of the room and two of them came in and they were making the most spiteful remarks about me, spotted me and ran out of the room giggling. They were women in their fifties, not kids.

I waited until my annual leave, cleared out my desk and never went back. I sent a letter to my boss explaining why I had suddenly left. He was horrified and they all got a bollocking. I wish I could have seen it. My regret is that I didn't report the abuse when it was happening. Could you tell someone?

This is childish mean girl behaviour and there is a Queen Bee at the bottom of it . It's them not you . If it wasn't you it would be someone else. Don't put to any collections either . You have two options just go in do your work and get out or look for another job .

Oh you have my sympathy. They sound dreadful.

How is the job itself? If the job is good and it's something you can crack on with with no help/input/Co-operation from them I would suggest just changing your attitude and staying.

Just treat them as if they are not there. Polite, vacant smiles if they address you, give polite responses. But don't attempt to be friendly and don't give for collections etc.

Basically, do what's best for you and your family. If you can block them out and just do your job, do that. If not, move.

They should be ashamed of themselves.

Yes, this is what I was trying to say.

They know exactly what they are doing. They are one of those groups who thrive on leaving someone out. It makes them feel powerful. Leave work. Don't ask for or expect a leaving do. Maybe don't even tell them. Just quietly hand your notice in, take TOIL and annual leave if possible so you are suddenly no longer there. You sound like a lovely person who shouldn't be spending all day every day in such a cruel environment. I'd find any job rather than stick with that.

This. Horrible people.

Fuck them op. Look for another job, but in the mean time keep yourself to yourself, no more chipping in with collections etc

Look for another job. This is a passive aggressive form of workplace bullying. Not much you can do about it but move on and give them the finger when you go.

I'm so sorry you are going through this. I can actually kind of relate, at the moment.

Do you dread going into work? I do. And that's when you know it's time for a new job. Shame, as it's fairly niche, and I love the actual work. Just not the culture in there.

Life is too short to spend a large amount of it feeling miserable and sad. And we spend a large amount of time at work.

It's not your problem. It's theirs. And it's ridiculous in this day and age.

Sorry this is happening to you OP, it sounds like a tough spot to be in.

Can I ask if you're quite quiet? Do you join in the conversations? Or mostly sit and listen?

Maybe it's deliberate but if you're quiet and as another PP suggested work part-time it's possibly not being done on purpose, they're accidentally overlooking you if you don't have a big presence?

Still rubbish I know and not trying to excuse them but just offering up another possible perspective.

Don’t put in to any other collections, iv hearted not to do this either. I shared a big birthday with another girl at work,same age. My birthday was on the Saturday and hers the Monday after. I only work Monday to Thursday, she works the 5 but was off the Friday on holiday. The other girl was having a party on the Friday night. I came in on the Thursday to happy birthday posters, balloons for the other girl. She got gifts, signed cards. Other folk knew it was my birthday. I did get a gift from my three close friends, so that meant a lot. I was never mentioned all day by the rest of the work. So from now on I’ll not be putting into anything or acknowledging anyone’s big day.

Unfortunately a lot of people just don't grow up. There's a surprising number of grown women who act like this.

Two years is perfectly fine on a CV, especially with the pandemic and everything. Honestly, just try and look for a new job if you can. These people will never change. You can do so much better for yourself.

This is so desperately sad, I really feel for you. What awful rotten cows. You could go to hr, it's definitely bullying of the covert kind, but I don't know what good that would do really. They may be told to buck up and to be inclusive, but the damage has been done and you can't undo previous bad behaviour. Look for a new job in the ny if you can, preferably with a healthy ratio of women to men. Sorry to say, but in my previous experiences of workplace bullying it has always come from women ....

Linked to PinkPoppet's post, the change in the environment I was remembering above went alongside the change from a male manager, who was careful to keep inclusivity and 'neutrality' in mind in the office, to a female one, after an interim period of cover when one man and one woman (from the team in question) shared the responsibilities.

It wasn't so much a queen bee scenario, that I know of, but worse in a way that they didn't really care about what they were doing/ how it made one person feel. Prior to the new manager, it was a much more friendly but equal feel and I would not have minded doing things like sharing personal information, like birthdays or whatever; by the time of changes, that was too late to take back, so it was a case of already having noticed what had the power to hurt you, and those things being done because the majority was fine with it. I can, for example, imagine the Christmas dinner reschedule-or-not stuff very well. They would have bent over backwards for my jobshare colleague...

Speaking from personal experience, I would advise caution when considering taking it to HR. Often these things are decided in favour of the organisation as a whole rather than what’s actually fair and right. You are better than them. Take your skills, attributes and goodness to a workplace that values them. As I said earlier, it’s certainly not you, it’s them, you’re much better off somewhere else, particularly in such a small team.

My department in my workplace is a bit like this. Most of the clique who behaved like this to me have left over the last few years, so it’s got better. But it was really hurtful. I was consistently left out of invitations. It was a team that made a big deal of birthdays, and mine was usually forgotten. It was very weird seeing one of them gushing about how she had to go to the other office to give Susan her birthday presents (nice gift bag of beautifully wrapped, thoughtfully chosen things) when I didn’t get so much as a card or even a happy birthday email! Or an invite to Susan’s birthday drinks!
I work in a nice small team so I just have as little to do with the mean ones as possible. But it isn’t nice to be excluded by a group.

This is workplace bullying, pure and simple. Do you feel able to speak to your manager about it? Appalling, pathetic behaviour from these grown women who know exactly what they are doing.

I would cut your losses and leave - life is too short to be working in such a toxic environment.