To refuse to call him by his stupid nickname??

[PonyPals]

So we have a brand new staff member in my team who has a perfectly sensible name - Steven but has decided to use some ridiculously stupid nickname he made up - Sonty
And he is now constantly correcting all of us and insisting we use his nickname. I am his manager. I feel silly even uttering Sonty. Yet he corrects me every time I say Steven.
Aibi to want to take Sonty and shove it up his bum!
PS not his real name or moronic nickname but they are similar to what I said.

My DH used to be a builder and says he wouldn't even introduce a young labourer to customers as Dazza, it's just not professional. It's fine to yell out to each other on a site or in the pub but not with the clients.
He now works in management with a guy he was at school with who I've only ever known by his silly nickname, at work though, he is Richard, that's how grown up people behave.

Pretty much every manager and director at the company DH works for goes by a diminutive name, even to customers. One manager even has a unique spelling. Nobody has walked into one of the branches and swooned with the shock of it yet
People are do twatty about names.

Sonty?! What a supremely stupid nickname. Hahahaha

Is he like this?

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NO WAY ARE YOU BEING UNREASONABLE. NO WAY.

Introducing him to our clients by saying "this is Dazza" will make me want to crack up laughing.

Yes because you are running a professional organization of some sort I'm guessing. Unless you are a kids party planning business or a casting director for Neighbours, Dazza is the most utter wanky name.

I would go for the "nicknames too matey for work" line - someone expressed it much better than this further up the thread.

Dazza. Snorts to self. Dickhead.

YABU to have hired such a dickhead in the first place IMO.

Hi Professor Alexander, I would like to meet our new team member Darren Smith.Darren puts his hand out and says... call me Dazza. Prof shakes his hand and says "nice to meet you Mr Smith!

I too am in the Professor Alexander fan club.

Still like to know what Dazza said when Professor Awesome swatted him as a fly.

At his old job dh was known as Brains but the management gave him the nickname because of our dc.

I agree with the above comment, I think it depends what professional scenario you work in. If he'd an admin for example and your exchanges are between yourselves and other office colleagues I don't think calling him by his nickname is a big deal. If he's dealing with clients or customers or you're in meetings with other professionals then it's probably not appropriate.

Maybe you could improvise and say you're happy to respect his nickname wish when it's between your office, but outside of that you need to use his real name.

if you work in say, a call centre which deals with customers sensitive financial data etc, in pretty sure you could argue that they are obliged to use their official names in a professional capacity

I find itr hard to believe that all these indian call centre workrs are called 'Dave' and 'helen' etc

CaraAspen you are pretty much spot on. Just add a bit more facial hair!

To those asking Dazza's reaction to the Proff... he just smiled awkwardly and we moved on.

This is hilarious. I think it should be illegal to name a child "Pussy" though!

angeldelightedme - they aren't. And a lot of British call centre workers have a fake name because that is company policy, esp those dealing with high conflict cases like debt recovery.

I was about to come on and say how awful Dazza is, but then I remembered my boss is called Kaz (short for Karen) and is very senior and successful. It doesn't seem strange at all.

My given name has always been shortened by friends and family from birth and is in fact the name that almost everybody knows me by, including work colleagues. The exceptions are of course passport, bank details, doctors etc. This is the name that I wish to be known as and have difficulty responding to the extended version. I also have a nickname which has been used by a very close family member for years. My eldest has also been known as a shortened version of their name since they were born. The second child has a name that hasn't been shortened but has a nickname that is only used by close family and I wouldn't expect anyone else to use it. Surely it comes down to what you are most comfortable to being called?