To wonder why i'm not succesful at work?

[malificent7]

I grew up with a strong work ethic, worked really hard at GCSEs and Alevels. Parents wanted me to be a doctor but i wanted to find my own path.
I was bullied really badly at school and after Alevels / start of degree my mh really started to decline. Ended up in hospital etc.
Despite this , i retrained as a teacher but I had a really hard time with people/ politics in placement and on my first job when I got pregnant which escalated into massive drama as usual due to mh.

I soldiered on in teaching after dd was born but ultimately the stress got to me.
I am now retraining in NHS and i love the course but on placements ive had a really hard time with people.
It's like my face never seems to fit, i get very anxious around people and i get bullied a lot. I did have one teaching job where i fitted very well and staff liked me but they couldn't guarentee the contract so i had to move on. Plus the kids were horrid to me.

I've worked in a lot of places and as a rule, true nastiness and bullying happens everywhere, yes, but it's not the norm. ie, there might be one or two people who are unpleasant but the vast majority are perfectly pleasant and fine. It sounds as if you have never experienced bullying. It's more than "one or two people are unpleasant", and it isn't negated by the vast majority being pleasant.

OP, it may be that your past has made you alert to the possibility f being bullied, and that the bullies are picking up on this. Or it may be that you present as a "people pleaser" and, again, the bullies will pick up on it.

Ive no doubt that i'm to blame....it's just not always easy to change oneself overnight.

Be polite , say hello, engage in staff room chat . Ask how a persons weekend was etc and you’ll soon feel more comfortable. It’s hard when you don’t know anyone .

My experience of working in a school is that there’s some fantastic people but there are also those who have never left school as they went straight into teaching and some of those never grew up so staff room behaviour was vile. Similarly, nhs nurses are in short supply so if they’re qualified they get employed but the senior nurses really change how a placement feels. Sorry you are going through this. Get your qualifications, listen more than you speak and once qualified you can pick where you work.

I go to work to be professional so I’m not there to make friends. If it happens then great but it’s not something I look for. I have friends who accept me for me. You don’t necessarily have to change but instead learn coping mechanisms. I have people try to put me down but I don’t enable them - mistakes are an opportunity for learning so anyone being overly officious in calling out a mistake “yes, lots of learning coming from that... thank you!” Big smile and brazen it off.

The other thing to remember, those who put you down are often the most insecure people. Feel sorry for them that they can only feel self worth in others failing.

Don't want to be rude, just curious: if you have problems around ppl why retrain to a profession where you will be in the exact same situation? Why not re-train to something more solitary?

I hate ppl in general. And I work as a program director. At one point I had to decide if I wanted to change in order to actually go up the ladder from being a low level project manager, or I should ditch the whole thing and go in a diff direction.
But not changing you attitude and expecting a different outcome seems weird.

Repeating what other PP have said, I think you have enough grounds to test for autism.

I know people who have struggled to fit in all their lives, then receive a diagnosis (ADHD or dyslexia etc) and it helps to clarify things so much, right back to childhood.

Yes...it would make alot of sense.

I struggle with people and I would struggle with the careers you have chosen. I don't have autism but I am fairly self sufficient, i like being independent and carrying on with what I need to do without someone breathing down my neck. I would be terrible at all the jobs you have listed because of this. Being succesful is playing to your strenghts. Be honest with yourself, look at what you are good at and go with that. Picking careers that don't suit your personality will mean you will always be drowning no matter how hard you work.

Hi OP,

Your experience sounds very much like mine. About five years ago, I began working from home (tutoring and so on) and I found that I was able to focus on my work, but avoid a lot of the interpersonal politics that I found so stressful and which I was not particularly good at.

I do get anxious, but I have a lot more control over my workload and the sessions. Interviews were also a nightmare for me. I would either clam up of ramble on saying all sorts of things (most of which were vaguely relevant).

It has been suggested many times that I may be on the autism spectrum, but I have never sought assessment. However, I am 60 and look forward to retiring as soon as possible. If I were younger and trying to find a career that was right for me, I would certainly pursue assessment.

To work in a team with others I think you have to be friendly, chatty (but not rant on too much) and make a lot of effort to get to know people.

Also be able to see the bigger picture and emotionally detach when necessary.

When I was younger I was very reserved and quite shy, looking back I must have come across as aloof. I found it hard to make friends at work.

These days I find it easy, I just chat to people and ask them about themselves, try to fit into the team and understand it before changing anything.

Also being honest and open, and able to make jokes against yourself at times, able to see the funny side of things rather than get anxious or angry.

We have a colleague who is a nice person but a terrible team player. She just can’t see the bigger picture or think beyond her own needs. Eg she’ll book annual leave on top of other people, refuse to share things, talk about herself a lot but tell people she needs to concentrate if they talk too much!

I'm sure I recognise your username... have you started several threads before about your issues at various jobs?

You talk a lot about placements and training but not about actual employment - do you have experience of paid work outside of university/training environments? Things can be quite different if you are in a job rather than learning how to do that job.

Success at work does not necessarily equal being universally liked by people. In fact my managers at work currently are arseholes in all honesty, probably got ahead in promotion because they can be a bit ruthless with people. Competence comes with time spent in a position and then you'll probably enjoy the job more if you have a sense of mastery. There's a book called 'the courage to be disliked', maybe have a read. Sounds like you need to work on a thicker skin and just give things time, give people time. I hate being new to a job, feel like a real spare part, takes me a good year to feel comfortable at a place. And then becoming competent, I feel much less anxious.

I did have a teaching job where they liked me, i liked them but they couldn't guarentee the contract. This was because it was teaching GCSE retakes and they had no idea how many students they would have from one year to the next.

I mean this in the nicest possible way but you seem to not be taking on board anything anyone is saying. You are saying you are aware of x and y about yourself but then posting in a fashion that suggests you aren’t actually aware at all. You don’t seem to have any awareness of how you are perceived.

OP, like other posters have mentioned, looking into autism may be helpful. If you're studying through a college or Uni, you should be able to access their additional learning support team.

A lot of what you've written sounds really familiar to me. To be clear, I haven't gone down the diagnosis road (time, money, and as an autism counsellor said, what would a diagnosis actually give me?), but realising that it most likely isn't just that I am crap with relationships has made a world of difference for me.

I might be completely off the mark, but what you wrote really resonated.

People very often have no clue how they are perceived and therefore don’t tweak their behaviour. Or even worse they do know but have no desire to change. I know darn well I am very outspoken but have leaned that sometimes you just have to bite your tongue.

My best friend and sister both work for the NHS and have both been bullied by their Line Managers . They work in totally different areas of the country in different departments but l have read on here a few times this isn't uncommon.
OP have confidence in yourself, admit when you have made a mistake and do the job to the nest of your ability

You sound a lot like me - I was also bullied at school, have always struggled to fit in, and found classroom teaching stressful. Ive always tried to do ‘people’ jobs but never been good at them (which feels awful after being a high achiever at school and university). I’ve come to the realisation as an adult (and thanks to my daughter being very similar to me in many ways) that I’m autistic. You might not be, but do have a read up on the female presentation of autism - it’s often a lot different to the stereotypes people think of.

Yes will look into it...thank you.

This doesn’t sound like an environment you’re suited to, tbh.

You have a problem with being “micromanaged” but you’re a trainee!

I second speaking to some sort of career guidance expert and see if there’s a better fit out there for you.

You haven’t given examples of bullying, IMO. And it’s a very serious accusation.

It would be shockingly bad luck if you’d been bullied, properly bullied, in every job/placement you’ve had except one.

A family member of mine has this experience with every job she is in too. She ends almost every job having been bullied, saying she has been micromanaged/shouted at by a manager or saying that everyone is ignoring her and no-one is communicating with her. She tends to leave most jobs after a few months, and she has never got as far as she could have career wise.

A few months ago I was just scrolling through facebook and found a video made by a woman who has been diagnosed with Autism, about the sort of things you see with autism in women.It described my family member to a tee. We have autism in the family but only diagnosed in boys. After doing loads more reading I am convinced there is something in it, unfortunately she refuses to look into it but that is up to her. Maybe it is worth you doing some research.

Or it could be that you are incredibly unfortunate and have just never experienced what nice, decent colleagues are like.

Either way I wish you the best of luck going forward

Op, I can relate to a lot of what you are saying.

I don't have a diagnosis but I am fairly certain I have ASD. I am brilliant with patients but struggle with other members of staff. I do try my hardest to get on with everyone but just seem to rub people up the wrong way! I too feel happier when I am left to get on with things and not micro managed.

I'm not sure what the solution is. I often wonder if I would be better of doing a more solitary job with less interaction and team work.