Bossy patronising colleague

[bay391]

Can I please take a moment to vent about my awful colleague

I work in a small department in a big organisation, there are 5 of us in total. We're our own separate unit, don't really have anything else to do with the rest of the org (think education type setting). It's a quiet department, easy-going attitude, nothing high-stakes etc.

My colleague is a middle aged women who sits on the reception desk, she also acts as the assistant to the head of the department. HOD is a lovely older man, he's very relaxed and laid back. Just trying to set the scene!

I joined the team about 6 months ago, she has been there about a year. We are equal levels and she is not my boss, HOD is my line manager. But I am absolutely at the end of my tether with the way she speaks to me and treats me like she is my manager.

A few examples:

• In a group setting with other colleagues she asked me a question, I answered 'yeah, xyz...' she scolded me and told me not to say 'yeah' as I sound like her teenage children
• Every time I leave the office she will ask me where I'm going, in a snappy, pointed tone. Once instance where I was talking to HOD by her desk as I was leaving, and I can hear her saying 'where are you going?' 'where are you going?' repeatedly!
• She tries to take over EVERYTHING I do. Part of my role is organising small internal events. So I organise the catering, decorations etc. She will comment on every. single. thing. I do and say how she would have done it. She will bring in her own decorations from home and start putting them up in the event space, when I have finished decorating, and when I'm setting up she catering she will say things like 'I wasn't going to put that food out until xyz time'.... it's not your job!!!
• I can't open a cupboard or even look at anything without hearing her pipe up 'what are you doing?'
• Her general tone is completely patronising and belittling. I am younger than her and more reserved (not shy, just reserved), whereas she is very loud and loves the sound of her own voice, so I think she feeds off my personality tbh. She is generally obnoxious but doesn't treat anyone else as bad as she speaks to me.

And then yesterday I am wfh. We have a young intern who comes in to do some admin work, I manage his time. Another colleague asked me if they can use some hours with him and I say 'yes of course, he's in from xyz time so just take as much time as you need and I have told him to let me know when he's done with you and I'll send him some more work to do.'

So why do I have the receptionist emailing me 30 minutes after he's arrived that he doesn't have work to do and I need to sort it asap and I need to 'communicate'. It has absolutely nothing to do with her - both colleague and intern know to message me, the same process as always.

If I was her in that situation I would simply say to the intern 'send Bay a message and they will send you more work to do, but let me know if you get stuck' but she can't help but jump onto me with something else to point out.

Reading this all back I feel like it doesn't come across as bad as it is... but it is CONSTANT. Every single day, anything I do is commented on or questioned. I have never in my life worked with anyone who is so patronising and belittling and treats me like I report in to them when we are equal levels!

Anyone else have an annoying colleague they want to vent about?

You need to push back, have a range of responses ready and yes you are going to need to be blunt.

Where do you think you are going? That’s none of your business or why do you need to know? or That’s for me to know or a simple nosey.

Organising - Thanks I’ve got this, HoD approved my plans have you checked he is happy for you to change it? Don’t you have your own job to do (rather than mine)

What are you doing? Again push back none of your business, nosey, why do you need to know or even my job.

Re intern - it’s all in hand no need for you to be involved

The other option is to talk to HoD about it and ask him to talk to her. He may not want to do this so suggest you are going to push back and you want him to be aware in case their are repercussions.

Effectively she is bullying you but it’s subtle so expect tears etc. if you push back. If you forwarn your HoD he is prepared for it.

Have in you pocket independent mediation. This can be useful to stop the situation escalating and can result in agreed ground rules - she won’t like that as it will be about her acknowledging you are equals and she needs to but out.

This is actually bullying and harassment and you need to raise it with your boss.

You lost me when you felt telling us their age was relevant.
It wasn't.

Welcome to MN though.
Are you a ChatGpT bot or a journo? (Clue being in the not asking for solutions to your problems but just for other people to tell you about theirs)
Yawn.

Age may well be relevant here!

You have expressed this all calmly, she is overbearing so you either have to push back or speak to the HOD although that is a pain to involve your boss. Maybe start writing down examples of what and when so you have some concrete times

….of how frequently this is occurring and how its affecting you

Actually it is relevant here. In some work-places there can sometimes be an implied or informal seniority that comes with age, and there may be different strategies for dealing with it than if the perpetrator was the same age or younger than the OP. Not everything is "ageism", fgs.

Anyone else have an annoying colleague they want to vent about?

I don't have any colleagues so I'm going to have to vent about me! I'm so fricking lazy. And I'm getting worse. I used to work so hard but now I can't be arsed to do anything. I only get paid for what I do, so I'm not ripping anyone off, but I end up stressing to meet their minimum requirements because I leave everything til the last minute and I'm not earning like I should.

I want to kick the good fir nothing, bone idle, waste of space colleague that is me up the arse and tell her to get off bloody MN and do something productive! 🤬

Ah. I feel a bit better now. Maybe I need to do this every day. 🤔

My first thought, too. Sad when it's so obvious 🙄

Try these replies as you could have a lot of fun with some of these :

I am going to the moon and back / Timbuktu / Royal Ascot
i am looking for diamonds/ treasure /chocolate/ dunno, what have you lost recently
All said with a huge smile and loud enough for everyone to hear

my mum used to tell me if I asked a silly question I’d get a silly answer.

How is the age of the overbearing colleague and the HoD relevant in this particular situation?

Jesus Christ, OP, don't do this.
They'll have you certified.

Where are you going? For a poo. Say this each and every time. She'll soon stop asking.

Well like I said, there can be a perceived power imbalance if the person over-stepping is much older. You can't imagine a scenario where a young, fresh from school / university worker is being bullied by someone with a significant age advantage? And how that age gap might make it more difficult for the younger colleague to challenge the behaviour? There can be cultural and societal reasons why people don't like to challenge older people, so imo it is relevant in this scenario.

Q "What are you doing?"
A "Why are you asking?"

Q "Where are you going?"
A "Why are you asking?"

Ad infinitum.

Is there a reason why you haven't mentioned any of this to your boss? He must have noticed the way she speaks to you.

Thanks for the replies I will read them all properly now but just wanted to address something

I think that the age of my colleague is absolutely relevant here! As I've already said, I am much younger and she has 'told me off' for speaking like her teenage children...

She talks to me like I am a child. She does this because she's not a very nice person, but I believe she feels able to do this for a number of reasons, including that I am younger than her. I'm the youngest person in the office and as I said, I get treated visibly worse by her than anyone else. And bearing in mind I'm not even that young I'm early 30's!!

I described our HOD to give an idea of the broader office environment and dynamics. HOD is brilliant, I don't see why describing him is an issue?

I think realistically the only thing you can do is discuss it with your HOD. I'd have a quiet sit down with him out of the office, list some of the things you've said here especially the constant interrogations of where you're going and what you're doing, as not only is that not helping your confidence it's actually demanding that you take time out of your job to give her a running commentary. And the belittling comments.

Making him aware of it is a good first step, explain that it's making it hard for you to get on with your work when you're feeling like she's watching your every move. He might need to remind her that he is your manager, she isn't, and preferably tell her that you're doing a brilliant job.

She sounds like the sort of person who's worked somewhere for ever and essentially thinks they own it.

(And yes like a PP I'd be tempted to throw in a jokey answer every so often "just off to the bookies/circus/interview for MI5", because IMO as long as the nosy person gets genuine info - however dull - they'll keep asking)

Practice some standard push-back responses.

"Why do you keep asking me these questions?"

"Why are you trying to micro-manage everything that I do? Is there a problem here that we need to bring to HOD?"

"Am I answerable to you for my every move?"

"I'm trying to get on with my job and your constant interruptions are very distracting."

A lot of these suggested pushbacks are very rude and would quickly have OP labelled a complete pain in the bum in small departments where I've worked!

But the questions being asked by the older colleague are also rude, as it is non of her business what the younger OP is doing.

it can feel a lot ruder to say ‘why are you asking, why do you need to ask that’ or to say ‘ that is not for you to ask me’ than to reply with a joking nonsense response that keeps the atmosphere lighter. It has to be done with a smile but it works very well with nosy Parker colleagues, and keeps the office atmosphere good

Agree that you have to be careful
As you've said, the way you've described her behaviour is clearly incredibly annoying but is hard to explain how much when written down
Whereas if you use some of the very abrupt/rude pushbacks pps have suggested you will be the one that sounds unreasonable - e.g. annoying colleague can completely accurately say 'I only asked her where she was going and she told me it was none of my business!'

I'd go more along the lines of either a completely ridiculous answer each time 'Where are you going?' 'To the moon!' 'Off home!' or just looking confused at her and asking her to repeat the question, then stating the obvious, slowly explaining as if she's a bit slow or asking something completely ridiculous?
'What are you doing?'
'Sorry Sandra, what do you want to know?'
'What are you doing?'
'Are you asking me what I'm doing in the stationery cupboard?'
'Yes.'
(slowly) 'Well...I'm looking for a stapler. As this is where we keep them.' (stare at her as though she's completely mad for asking). Or, alternatively, bright laugh and a 'What a strange question!'
Same if she says you shouldn't say 'yeah' - just laugh 'What a funny thing to say!' I've never heard of anyone thinking there's a correlation between the word yeah and age before. That's why I love working with you Sandra, you come out with the most random things!'

Or...the easiest one....completely ignore her. She'll get bored/feel awkward repeating herself again and again, and you can always say 'So sorry, I didn't hear you/was concentrating on my work.' Even if she complains to boss you can just say 'Oh really? I don't do it deliberately, but to be honest Sandra talks so much, she's always asking me strange questions that have nothing to do with her role, and making weird comments, it's really distracting and I just want to get on with my work, so I try to tune her out unless she's asking something job related.' Any boss would struggle to discipline you for that!

Bullies hate getting laughed at/ignored so hopefully she'll stop, but if not at least you can have so much fun in trying to out-annoy/out-passive aggress her that you'll stop being so aggravated by it.

🤣🤣🤣

Send me an email on that Sandra.
Send me an email on that Sandra
Send me an email on that Sandra, pivot and go back to your desk with a smile.