evil work biatches - give me hope!

[tympanic]

After yet another week of horrendous sabotage from the mean girl brigade at my work I'm in dire need of some optimism.

My workplace is toxic to its very core but I am not in a position at the moment to readily find something else. I'm not looking for advice or ideas to seek vengeance (though they might be amusing...). Believe me, I've tried everything above board short of a lobotomy to make the situation better for myself. I'm just looking for stories where other women - after being the underdog - prevailed in the end, to help keep me from losing my shit completely lest I go nuclear on these bitches.

Help me, O'Mumsnet Kenobis. You're my only hope.

My old job was working for a huge manufacturing company (household name) where I truly understood the phrase "you're just a number". Senior management encouraged internal politics and backstabbing as a "survival of the fittest" test for those who were going to be allowed to progress. These internal politics occurred mainly at team leader/first rung of management level, so as a mere employee, I was a pawn.

One senior manager was annoyed at having to share my team's expertise with other teams, so decided to set up his own version in the dept. Fine. But the new manager decided that he wanted me and some of my colleagues to work for him instead. So started a campaign of not communicating (he still needed our resource as he had no staff to manage himself). So we'd be working on projects that had been canned months previously. I think the idea was to make my manager look incompetent and out of touch with the wider business (which he was tbh!). But was very embarrassing to present results on a design that didn't exist anymore!

The whole atmosphere in the company was one of keeping secrets to use to your advantage at a later date, meaning my scenario was played out repeatedly across the company. I left and the company has since announced large amounts of job cuts that they are blaming on Brexit. In reality, it has nothing to do with Brexit, just an unwillingness to work effectively.

Bonus points if you can guess who I'm talking about!

My point is basically that if offices don't work together, they will eventually fail, either in a company wide way like in my example, of via reorganisation. It just takes forever to get to that point unfortunately.

Really sorry for your situation. I few years ago I managed a charity (local office of a big nationwide charity). I didn't find out until I started that at least one if not two previous managers had been driven out by a clique of three hideous, manipulative bitches.

Some of the staff were lovely but these women were grim beyond belief. Two older women and their younger acolyte. They were vicious to me and drove out other staff as well. Management did nothing and after 18 months I just left after going sick for a few weeks with stress.

Doesn't sound like a great success but it led me to a temp job in a college so I finally got into higher education which I soon discovered was made for me, I now have a very successful and well paid career in HE regulation. They say the best revenge is living well and I take comfort in the fact that I am happy, liked and respected and they are probably still nasty, losers.

Hang in there lovely

Also what does help is word spreads

I can give other examples of what I mean in other workplaces too but in this instance after she had to be reprimanded for bullying me - I felt that a couple of the younger staff were looking at me like

And felt fairly sure she'd gone running to them with : "Evil Barton has raised a grievance on me, I've done nothing I'm so devastated"

A week later someone who was privy to what she had actually done returned off Annual Leave and judging by the 360 degree turn in their reaction to me had obviously set the record straight.

I've never worked in a workplace that wasn't massively gossipy, and whilst that's not great when you're the injured party a gossip culture can work in your favour

Been there done that op! I used to work in a similar place. Unbelievably depressing that grown women behave like this. I honestly thought I was back in secondary school when I started in this office. Women bitching about each other, excluding people they don’t like, playing mind games, being really nice one minute and ignoring you the next, bullying, blocking promotions just because they don’t like you..,, I work in architecture/ planning and this firm was run by women and sat on an initiative aimed to encourage women in our field! Unbelievable! Never been in a less supportive environment for women.

I honest think the best thing to do us blank them. Pretend they don’t bother you at all. They want a reaction. Dont give it to them. Then leave. You won’t change them so just leave them to it.

@Daredevil. Thanks for sharing. It’s exactly the sort of story I was hoping for. And agree about living well. I’m not a vengeful type so I try to focus on that. It’s easy to lose sight of it when you’re getting worn down though.

Shame about the fact this happens in charities. My job isn’t a charity but I’ve done a lot of volunteer work and I’ve had to deal with some horrendous bitches in that work too. Sad when you think people are doing things for the right reasons but they end up being selfish bitches in the end. I realise I must sound like an idealist, but I just can’t understand this behaviour. Considering how much more difficult the world is for women, it’s awful the sisterhood can be so weak.

I've had 3 horrible work experiences one after another- but it was a woman and then 2 men that was the issue there. I'm naturally a very friendly person, like to help other people but I have learned over the years that eventually someone will try and fuck you over. Cut them dead, don't be friendly, be polite, don't help them, don't tell them anything unless it's absolutely necessary. If you think they are sabotaging you then start making noises about getting stuff documented in writing. Cut them out of the loop- even if it's a non existent loop. Take them to task on everything you catch them doing in as cold but polite way as you can. Even if you're a nice friendly helpful person in real life I've found that the only way to deal with this shit is to be as cold and standoffish as you can. You basically want to scare the shit out of them- and if they can't work out what you're at - that will do it.

Just to warn you, men are just as bad but they don't say anything. I've always been very honest, direct and willing to go the extra mile to deliver work which others can use or the company can profit from. It really puts a lot of people's backs up because it exposes their low performance. My boss knows this and loves me for it. Other bosses not so confident in their abilities would push me out.

When I was 19 I worked as a Junior Secretary with a well known bank in a Lancashire town. I had to sit facing two women, I'll call them Jenny and Sue - Jenny was the Head Secretary, in her late 40's and Sue, aged about 28, was next in line. They made my life absolute hell - to the extent that I even considered chucking myself under a bus on the busy road outside the bank - not to kill myself but to be so badly injured that I did not have to go to work and face those two again. From the minute I started there, they picked fault with me, not just my work (which, looking back, I know there was nothing wrong with - I never had a single complaint from any of the Managers) They picked on me personally, the clothes I wore, the packed lunch I brought with me etc etc. Sue's job was to train me on the computer (not commonly used in those days) she used to constantly ask me "are you stupid?" which didn't do a lot for my confidence. My dm used to send me with a packed lunch and every day, without fail, Sue in particular would criticise the contents. One day, I was pleased as punch to have bought a new skirt in the sales (being a Junior I did not have much spare cash) I, stupidly, fell into their trap when they saw the carrier bag and asked to have a look at it, only to be told by Sue "that it looked too small for me and that it would not suit me"I had to sit facing these two day in day out, gradually being worn down by them. I once plucked up the courage to complain to someone in HR - I wrote a letter detailing the extent of their bullying and asking if I could be transferred. The letter was passed onto one of the Managers who told me it wasn't the done thing to "rat on them to HR" but he would ask them to back off - which they did for a couple of weeks, then resumed normal service. Eventually I was transferred and worked with some really nice people. The person I am now would never put up with that kind of bullying in the workplace but in those days it wasn't as unacceptable as it is now.

I have to get right up in their faces and almost shout hello or they just ignore me. Try to talk to all of them about their lives but they just grunt and never reciprocate.

You'd only ever do that once if you got in my face & shouted hello.

I am nice to everyone. I show an interest in people’s lives.

Stop trying to be their friend. You go to work, to work, not make friends. They don't like you so go in, do your work & go home.

It's the same in my work. I absolutely hate it. I work 3 days per week Tue, Wed, Thurs then have 4 days off that's the only reason I endure it.
I'm part time and the full timers blame me for a lot of stuff and also try and give me loads of work to do that they haven't had time to do. It sucks.
My managers are quite nice, the lady that owns the business and the lady that manages the business and I get on well with them, it's the other staff that have the same qualification as me that I can't stand. So bitchy it's unbelievable. I just hate the thought of being bossed around by people that aren't above me etc

Several years ago I worked for a company and a new (female) boss was appointed over me. This is fine, I wasn’t qualified to be the manager then. She hated me from day one, excluded me from team events and meetings, botched about me etc., and set me impossible targets, something like I had to serve 100 customers in a day when we normally had only 20 in the shop. It wasn’t this as not in retail but same principle.
Eventually I was asked to resign and I had no recourse as I was young and naive and wanted out.

About 10 years later she applied for a job at the same company I was now in. The head of dept asked me about her to see if I knew her and I said “if you offer her the job, I will walk out instantly”. The head decided to not upset the applecart and I have now been with that company for 25 years. She never got an interview.
My only regret is that she didn’t know it was me who got her turned down. Took a while but I got her back in the end without really stooping to her level.

A long time ago I took on a job as a secretary in a team with an already established secretary. It became very clear when I joined that she just did the bare minimum i.e. the typing and that was it. She would refuse to take messages if clients phoned, refuse to make amendments once a document was typed, managing diaries and various other things required of a secretary. Of course when I joined and did all that stuff, it really showed her up. And I didn't do it deliberately to show her up, I was just fulfilling my job description.

She paid me back by being as absolutely petty to me as she could - wiping my leave off the calendar so that when she put in her leave application and the boss went to look at the calendar it looked like the slot was free, loudly making plans with all the other secretaries in the office to go out to lunch but leaving me out, moving the typing piles around so if I was next to pick up a pile I'd get the longest typing jobs making it look like I'd done one or two pieces all day whilst she'd done loads. If the photocopier ran out of paper and she was the first to notice, she'd figure out how many sheets she needed to get her printing out and just load that many sheets. And many other things.

When I had eventually had enough and went to HR (who turned out to be the secretary's best friend) I was told that she did that to all new secretaries because she was a bit territorial and it was laughed off. She even told me they'd lost a number of new secretaries over it but they wouldn't do anything.

The two very senior people in the team refused to do anything about it because they were afraid she'd make deliberate errors in correspondence going out to get back at them, which she'd done before.

I eventually got the job that I needed to get a step up the ladder and now I'm qualified and have the job of my dreams. And that team is all still there, in miserable purgatory while she holds them hostage whilst doing a substandard job.

Sad really.

I feel your pain OP.

Their treatment of you has nothing to do with you. It wouldn't matter who you were, how you acted, how you dressed etc. It is 100% about them and their issues and bizarre thought patterns.

Once you really embrace that line of thinking it gets a lot easier.

I have a bitch in my team. Genuinely nasty piece of work. For no reason that I can see. Everyone is nice to her and she just acts like an utter cow.

I started off hurt and stressed but now I don't give a flying shit. Agree office gossip culture can work to your advantage. I told 2 people about one of the things she did to me. It went right round the office - I know it did because she started treating me even worse! That backfired for her because it was obvious enough I could raise it with my manager. Silly cow!

Now when she does mad shit and emotes all over me I just imagine she's doing it to a mirror. I mean that she is so locked in to her deep rooted psychological issues that she literally cannot see me or hear what I'm saying. It all gets twisted up by her utterly warped perception of the world. She is deeply miserable and unhappy and she will never change.. AND it's not my problem!

I worked in an office back in the early 90s and long story short, I must have put one particular woman's nose out of joint because I was new and had 'taken' a job she had been promised.
Every time the boss went out to a meeting, she and her minions would shout horrid things at me and throw stuff.
Little did they know that a few months later the boss had cameras installed and he saw what was going on when he was 'off site'.
The leader got sacked!
I then moved on soon after that and got a much better paid job at a nicer office

*I have to get right up in their faces and almost shout hello or they just ignore me. Try to talk to all of them about their lives but they just grunt and never reciprocate.

You'd only ever do that once if you got in my face & shouted hello.

I am nice to everyone. I show an interest in people’s lives.

Stop trying to be their friend. You go to work, to work, not make friends. They don't like you so go in, do your work & go home.*

Well...………………………….that was helpful.

OP, just go in, when you arrive in the morning. Either say nothing or just make eye contact to acknowledge them. I have a, 'smile don't speak' policy to people I know have no intention of acknowledging me when I have acknowledged them.

I’m sorry you are going through this OP.

Is there a reason why your colleagues could be behaving this way towards you? There is no excuse for people being mean but if they have simply not warmed to you, are you aware of anything you could do to make things better?

I say this having been aware of people who will say they’ve had a hard time at work but it’s sometimes because they’re difficult to work with or not up to the job.

Sorry I haven’t RTFT so I don’t know how mean they’ve been and I’m not assuming this is the case with you but sometimes there’s a reason why people don’t warm to you straight away and some self reflection can be in order.

I’m sorry you are going through this OP.

Is there a reason why your colleagues could be behaving this way towards you? There is no excuse for people being mean but if they have simply not warmed to you, are you aware of anything you could do to make things better?

I say this having been aware of people who will say they’ve had a hard time at work but it’s sometimes because they’re difficult to work with or not up to the job.

Sorry I haven’t RTFT so I don’t know how mean they’ve been and I’m not assuming this is the case with you but sometimes there’s a reason why people don’t warm to you straight away and some self reflection can be in order.

A bitchy woman I once endured at work got the sack.

Two very unhelpful women I worked with both got made redundant.
Obviously not a woman but the chap who set up Waterstones got (I think) the sack from W H Smith and beat them at their own game.

Callywalls Wow, imagine how sad their lives must have been? But what a horrible situation for you. So glad you managed to get through it without throwing yourself in front of that bus xx

But it’s always women. - NO, it's not.

My DP works in a workshop - most of the guys are jsut there to do a job and get paid. But one guy has taken a severe dislike to DP, from the start. Tampers with his work (dangerously), steals tools, moves any Named tools and leaves them in dangerous, compromising positions (think leaving a screwdriver where it could be picked up by a child), has screamed in his face and threatened him, refuses him any overtime, refuses him any training (rest of workshop have training), refused to allow him to work according to his qualifications, he's tampered with machinery and equipment, and left it so it can scald/injure/even kill... He's bonkers, and dangerous, but has been promoted .
DP has not had a day Sick in 6 years, but is now thinking of taking Work-Related Stress sickness for a few weeks. Going to the Union. He can't see a way out (thinks he's too old to start a new job..)

It's not just women.

doyouneedtoknow - Thanks for your kind words - I'm also glad that I didn't throw myself in front of the bus - in hindsight, I should have just left, there were plenty of typist/secretary jobs in those days but my dad was so proud of me getting a job at a bank that I did not want to disappoint him by leaving!!

I’m sorry you are going through this OP.

Is there a reason why your colleagues could be behaving this way towards you? There is no excuse for people being mean but if they have simply not warmed to you, are you aware of anything you could do to make things better?

I say this having been aware of people who will say they’ve had a hard time at work but it’s sometimes because they’re difficult to work with or not up to the job.

Sorry I haven’t RTFT so I don’t know how mean they’ve been and I’m not assuming this is the case with you but sometimes there’s a reason why people don’t warm to you straight away and some self reflection can be in order.

When my Dc's were young I took a job in a local College canteen, as it fitted in with school hours and holidays holidays.
I worked with two women and was upset when NL {nice lady) got trasferred to another site, there was just me and and PD (poisoned dwarf) left.
PD had been there ages and her BFF was the overall manager of all the various sites, so when I complained the bullying behaviour was ramped up. PD did very little all day sat on a chair and read a magazine and would bark out orders to me I struggled to finish each day to be home in time for the DC's.
When she went off on long term sick (drink related) I had another lady working with me it was brilliant, everything got done really quickly and efficiently.
Then she came back with a vengeance, after three weeks I couldn't stand any more so put in my resignation even though I didn't have another job, I felt if I stayed there any longer I would have had a breakdown, or ended up punching her!
I told HR why I was leaving and apparently NL had been transferred due to the PD bullying her!
I left and found a lovely new part time job in a local Dept Store. NL came in one day and told me that the PD had gone, after I had gone they had employed 3 different agency temps to work with her over a period of two weeks. They all refused to work with her and she ended up having an interview with HR and went "by mutual consent". Her BFF was also hauled over the coals and left to take up another job shortly after.

Don't waste your time complaining about or whistleblowing on more senior staff for their incompetence and/or bullying, It never ends well. Just get the hell out as soon as you are able to. Life will get better as soon as you do. Sometimes it is well worth a drop in salary.
Life is short - get out if you can.
Sympathy to all of you who are going through it.