Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5

Original poster

To feel offended by co-worker's message

103 replies

AnnieNonaMouse · 16/03/2019 13:09

I had my last day at work this week before starting maternity leave for dc2. My line manager organised a mini leaving do for me and I received some lovely gifts and a card with messages from all of my co-workers. One of the messages from a more junior member of my team said 'congratulations on having a baby and passing your workload onto me'. Am I right to feel a little offended by this? I know it may have been tongue in cheek but it wasn't followed by anything and it isn't the first time she's made remarks (I've been part-time since having ds and she often comes out with 'enjoy your day off' etc).

I appreciate that she feels as though her workload will increase in my absence, however we have just hired another junior who will also be sharing the workload. I just can't help feeling that it's a disservice to women to make such remarks (ironically she is part of the company's equality committee).

OP posts:

HoppingPavlova · 17/03/2019 00:19

Am I right to feel a little offended by this?

No, you are not right to feel a little offended. You would be right to feel extremely pissed off.

I’m in camp ‘it’s not a joke and not funny’.

I would email back copying in their manager, your manager (if not the same) with the message that their workload is not your issue and it’s the companies/trust/department’s responsibility to ensure adequate cover while any staff is off in any form of planned extended leave and if they have issues in this regard to please bring them to their managers attention rather than yourself. Fuck that.

Happyspud · 17/03/2019 00:22

I’m in camp ‘it was a joke and it was funny’.

U2HasTheEdge · 17/03/2019 00:39

I am not sure if you are being serious with this post, but if you are OP, do not follow this advice. You would make yourself look silly.

I think it is funny, personally.

HoppingPavlova · 17/03/2019 01:20

I am not sure if you are being serious with this post, but if you are OP, do not follow this advice. You would make yourself look silly.

Of course I’m being serious. I was a department head in my previous working life and a manager in my current working life. I would be ropable if I received such an email and I would be ropable if any of my staff ever received such an email.

Yes, we all get pissed off when people are on leave and it causes workload issues but it’s never appropriate to bring this up with the person on leave (for whatever reason including if you think they are taking the piss with the reason they are not ther). If it’s an issue then you bring it up with management as it’s their job to ensure adequate resourcing. Of course we all know everyone gets screwed re resourcing in these situations but it’s genuinely not okay to even bring it up let alone have a dig at the person on leave.

heartshapedpositnotes · 17/03/2019 02:01

Yes an inappropriate joke, and also true. Unless your role is the exact same junior role that they've hired a temp for then yes, people will be working harder to allow for your parental leave.

heartshapedpositnotes · 17/03/2019 02:04

Whether that's 10 -15- 30 mins a day extra that's a real life sacrifice that adds up.

Daubergine · 17/03/2019 02:13

HoppingPavlova.
You'll be ropable when you discover that it wasn't an email, it was a message in a card! A good luck on your maternity leave card.

Manager or not, you should learn to read.
FFS.

It was clearly a JOKE. Poor girl didn't know her audience well, but Christ.

Daubergine · 17/03/2019 02:15

Myself and other colleagues always joke when one is going off on holidays for e.g. "Ye enjoy it there Susan, while we're here slaving doing your work for ya......" Accompanied by fake sad faces. (I know, we're hilarious).

It's just typical office banter and how you could read anything more into it I can't fathom!

Daubergine · 17/03/2019 02:17

And the offending colleague always manages to rub it in with an 'I'll think of you when I'm on my sun lounger with a Pina Colada'.

Ellenborough · 17/03/2019 02:31

I think she meant to be funny and it didn’t quite come across as it should have. That kind of joke needs to be said face to face to avoid looking like an attack.

Ellenborough · 17/03/2019 02:32

It was immature and inappropriate though, however the message was delivered.

finn1020 · 17/03/2019 02:51

It’s a joke, chill out and don’t take offence where none is meant. 🙄

Littleraindrop15 · 17/03/2019 03:18

Am in camp 'it's a joke'

I always say enjoy your day off / have a lovely weekend to people I work with if I'm not going to be seeing them the next day or few days.. Thought that was being polite

HoppingPavlova · 17/03/2019 05:21

You'll be ropable when you discover that it wasn't an email, it was a message in a card!

Christ on a bike. It doesn’t matter whether it is an email, a note on a card, something written on a post it note, something written on s whiteboard, something delivered by carrier pigeon OR a message delivered verbally. It’s completely inappropriate.

HoppingPavlova · 17/03/2019 05:24

I always say enjoy your day off / have a lovely weekend to people I work with if I'm not going to be seeing them the next

Yes, completely normal. And completely different to saying ‘enjoy your day off, I will now be left with an increased workload due to your choice to have time off that you are legally entitled to whatever that may be’ Completely different scenario. Can’t believe people think thats okay.

thatmustbenigelwiththebrie · 17/03/2019 05:54

It was probably a joke. But as someone who doesn't have children it's true that you get everything dumped on good when people go on mat leave or in school holidays or when the kid is ill and it can feel a bit like "oh here we go again".

CloudyTuesday · 17/03/2019 06:12

I read it as a joke too. It makes a refreshing change from the usual banality you find in a card.

Anyone genuinely aggrieved by the workload wouldn't choose to make their stand in the leaving card.

I find it quite scary that some people would be upset or offended by it, to the point of posting on a forum for advice.

I find pavlova's response hilarious. Anyone responding in that way in our place of work would be a laughing stock, I doubt anyone would chat or joke with such a person again out of fear of complaint.

And so many part time pp offended by 'enjoy your days off' comments. Surely a slightly sarcastic 'day off again' is akin to the 'think of us when you're relaxing by the pool' comments when someone goes on holiday - such comments are a jokey 'I hate you because I'm jealous'.

Soontobe60 · 17/03/2019 06:19

It reads like a joke to me too.
I also work pt, so on Fridays often get comments about enjoying my long weekend. I know they are envious, who wouldn't be? It doesn't bother me in the least!

19lottie82 · 17/03/2019 06:19

Jeezo it’s a joke. They were prob trying to think of something to write apart from “from Sandra” or whatever their name is. Unclench.

Oysterbabe · 17/03/2019 06:37

I always get asked if I enjoyed my day off when I come in on a Tuesday and always reply "This is my day off!" It is too, that first cup of coffee in silence at my desk after 4 days of the kids on at me every minute is bliss.

Abouttime1978 · 17/03/2019 08:14

I agree it is office banter. She wouldn't have written it in a card, which the whole team will see, if she was serious.

I'm part time and I'm always told to enjoy my day off - to which I respond that I'll happily swap and they can go "relax" with my kids.

Same when going on holiday, we thank each other for leaving us to pick up their work for a week or two. We also WhatsApp pictures of us lounging by the pool with a drink and a smirky emoji.

I suspect you are reading this girl wrong, and/or she thinks she is closer friends than she is.

Greyhound22 · 17/03/2019 08:25

No I'm with you OP - the more we take this kind of shit as 'banter' the more it enforces the 'women aren't really part of the workforce as they go off having babies' thoughts that have been prevalent in many places I have worked.

I had an awful time working for a large government organisation - they sent me a letter demoting me as I was 'going on maternity leave'.

The joke the other posters male colleague made above is funny - sniping about workloads etc isn't.

donquixotedelamancha · 17/03/2019 08:38

I’m in camp ‘it’s not a joke and not funny’.

Hoppingpavlova (Assuming you are not teasing) would you mind explaining your thought process here?

I understand that you can't tell this is a joke, but there are almost 70 messages explaining that it is. Why do you think that they are wrong?

Assuming that OPs managers can probably see the joke, what outcome do you imagine to the aggressive response you suggest? Can you not see why it might work out very badly for the OP?

Sciurus83 · 17/03/2019 08:44

It's a joke, don't give it any more headspace. When my baby was born colleagues sent me a card saying Congratulations on your maternity leave....it was funny

greeneyedlulu · 17/03/2019 08:58

Other women can be actual arseholes towards mothers, it's actually sickening! A fellow colleague of mine messaged me on fb to say work was great without me, no one was missing me and the dept hadn't gone tits up without me...... this was after 1 month of mat leave, by the time I returned after 8 months, the dept had gone fully tits up, think going from taking 30k a week to 10k! When I returned my job was no longer available and I eventually ended up running another dept which now excels!
You should have told her that she'll now realise what actual hard work is!!

Flip

1 2 3 4 5

Swipe left for the next trending thread