AIBU for putting her in her place?

[DrJPuddleDuck]

AIBU to think I got the better of this office bully?

Colleague (slightly senior to me) has always been a bit ‘off’ with me, lots of subtle undermining, but nothing I could really put my finger on. More recently though, I was offered promotion in another company (I believe a company they have admired for a while) to a position more senior than her. Perhaps understandably, I don’t think they liked this. I am currently working my notice period.

Anyhow, around three weeks ago, my manager called me in to discuss an error in my work. It was indeed an error/oversight, which I immediately corrected and apologised for. It didn’t thankfully, but it could have gotten me in a lot of trouble. My manager also informed me that “a colleague” had bought this to his attention. I was hurt by this, as I would have spoken to any one of my colleagues first, not least because it was clearly an oversight that was so easily corrected. I immediately suspected this person, but obviously had no proof, which made me suspicious of all my colleagues and really affected me. I discussed the situation again with my manager last week and said how it was affecting me, as I couldn’t understand why whoever had spoken to him, didn’t just speak to me first. I said I felt like I’d been to thrown under the bus. In response to this, my manager informed me (perhaps inappropriately) that it was the colleague I had suspected originally who had spoken to them. For context, this colleague would never have seen this error if they hadn’t been going through my work, as it was not a piece of work they were involved in.

Yesterday I saw this colleague, who wasn’t expecting to see me (as we often work in different offices). She couldn’t very well turn around and walk out, so sat down, but looked extremely awkward and avoided eye contact with me. We were alone in the office which likely made it worse for her. I asked how she was, and got short responses. I then suddenly got this urge to not let her win and to let her know that I knew what she’d done (very unlike me!!) I said “oh, I hope you don’t mind me mentioning it, but (manager) let me know that you reported me for X. I just wanted to thank you SO much for letting (manager) know, or otherwise the error might have gone undetected”. She looked horrified, but it felt so good! Not only does she now know that I know, but she also knows our manager (who presumably she was trying to undermine me in front of) has betrayed her trust and it’s not got me in the trouble she was clearly hoping for. She also must have known that I was being passive-aggressive in thanking her, even though I said it smiling. I leave next week and feel like I’ve won the war.

AIBU to feel proud of myself? Part of me thinks I might regret embarrassing her at some point!

I couldn’t imagine a situation where one of my colleagues would raise something with management without first discussing it with the colleague.

Can’t you? Really?

How about if that colleague repeatedly made mistakes and showed no signs of improving her work, or at least her self-review?

What about if it was the normal protocol in that business for repeated errors to be raised with the individual’s manager? The colleague that the OP thinks that she has ‘put in her place’ is senior to the OP and works at a different location.

How about if the OP was known to be difficult and to react badly when mistakes in her work were identified, particularly when she is resentful of the person raising it? Or if she has a history of covering up errors?

Iamthe wombat - yes, I agree they would be valid reasons, but don’t apply here. My manager is pleased with me and gave me a great reference for my new role. I guess they might be trying to get rid of me (!) but that’s never been my impression!

However, snide colleague, who had no input into the piece of work and who went riffling through the OP's workfor no good reason, found the error.

She thought she might find an error, and she did. One that even OP admits was necessary to correct and could have done her some damage if left unspotted. Sounds like a decent reason.

I really want to know the other colleague's side to this, especially as OP herself can't explain exactly what she's been doing that's so awful.

We don't even know for sure that Bitch is the one who reported the mistake. OP says Bitch would have no reason to find it so maybe it wasn't actually her. What OP sees as her being horrified at being so thoroughly destroyed by the killer "thank you" could have been her thinking "what the fuck's she on about this time, oh God I'm not getting into this, she's leaving next week".

The list you gave has actually made me see even more clearly how horrid this was, as there was no clear reason for it.

I forgot to include something in an email that a client needed by a certain date

@DrJPuddleDuck

Update for anyone remotely interested at this point: I can’t imagine many people involved will be focused on this on Monday, as I just heard on the grapevine that another colleague has walked out following accusations of bullying from the colleague I have had dealings with. I’m not close with this other colleague, but I hope they are ok.

Two days on, I still feel proud for standing up for myself in a small way. Thanks to those of you who have offered support! ☺️

@DrJPuddleDuck That's nice. But you didn't stand up for yourself. That's the problem. You made her know she won.

You can't feel proud of something you didn't do.

I bet she though, is feeling rather smug and proud. She got one over you, you admitted it to her, AND she has got rid of someone else. She's on a winning roll right now. And you've run away with your tail between your legs. Way to let her win, OP.

Good for you re work colleague. But you’ve fucked your manager, which is shit, you don’t care but that’s fine, hopefully your manager won’t get in trouble.

So how would colleague even have access to the email unless she was given access?

I still feel proud for standing up for myself in a small way.

But you didn't!

You made it clear that even as you leave, you're still too scared to have an honest conversation with her about what you really think, and have to cloud it with fake niceness and plausible deniability in case she confronts you. You even acknowledged that she actually saved your bacon.

I mean, OP, you could have said, "Boss talked to me about that email, I have to assume it came from you. Thanks for pointing it out, but I'd have preferred it if you had just spoken to me directly rather than involving my manager." That would have set it all out on the table, owned your feelings and given her an honest route to explaining herself.

Instead you tried some fake nicey-nicey stuff designed to create plausible deniability around your true objections. Why?

You hardly put her in her place. You could read from this that she was tense because foe some reason was anxious that you might know she'd reported an error and you intimidate her so she couldn't raise it with you.

You then directly raised but only said the only appropriate response to thank a colleague and express relief it was resolved.

Are you always melodramatic? I can see why she might not want to talk to you.

I'm amazed by all of the supportive posts here. I agree with a pp that I'd love to hear this story from the other side.

Yes, it might be that this woman is an awful bully but we've no evidence to base that on. It's entirely appropriate for a mistake to be reported to a manager rather than to be sorted out between colleagues, especially as OP clearly doesn't like the colleague. I can totally understand her not wanting to tell OP for fear of it coming across badly.

The manager has behaved appallingly for telling on the colleague, who has a right not to have her conversations with management blabbed everywhere.

I know a previous poster said that they work in HR but my DH is an HR manager and having read this says that from the information given the only person who has behaved professionally is the colleague. Really shocking. I'm not surprised that so many workplaces are bloody minefields given how many people here are excusing what is very unprofessional behaviour.

There is usually a clear difference between whistleblowing over a matter of gross misconduct/safegaurding/health and safety or similar and the kind of petty tattle-tailing that takes place in organizations. Im talking about the kind of person who rats on a colleague who popped out for a smoke, came back late from lunch or went to catch an early bus once in a while. Unless you are their manager and responsible for them rifling through someones work looking for things to report is stalking behaviour and evidence of a disturbed personality.

Unless you are their manager and responsible for them rifling through someones work looking for things to report is stalking behaviour and evidence of a disturbed personality.

But as Uhtred sensibly pointed out a few posts ago, this was an email from which the OP had omitted something, which by her own admission would have caused a fairly serious problem had the error not been spotted.

How and why would the colleague be given access to the OP’s email inbox/sent items if she had no business seeing the email in question? I bet that she was CCd, spotted the omission and went to the OP’s manager to point it out.

We don’t know whether, in doing so, the colleague was underhand and/or was deliberately trying to trip up the OP. We don’t know enough about the culture at the business to judge. We do know that the relationship isn’t an easy one.

I agree that there is more to this story.

Getting the better of a bully, a narcassist, a gaslighter is a great feeling. Scum like her deserve every bit of what you did.

Yeo, go gyrrl.

Just realised that in a couple of my posts, I forgot that boss did indeed confirm colleague's name to OP. Sorry for my mistake, but OP, should you have been pushing for confidential data like that?

What a place to work.

@MissAmandaLa1kes

Getting the better of a bully, a narcassist, a gaslighter is a great feeling. Scum like her deserve every bit of what you did.

Yeo, go gyrrl.

I hope that this is another ironic post. The alternative is terrifying.

What else is the OP’s colleague guilty of, in your opinion? Apart from being a narcissist, a gaslighter, and scum? Eating babies for breakfast? Torturing fluffy kittens? Stealing from pensioners?

Nope YANBU I love it! I think you handled it perfectly

Ok so a client needed something by a certain date. OP forgot to include it. If the colleague hadn’t spotted the error and spoken with manager then a client would have been let down. Not good for the company at all. The fact the colleague spoke to the manager suggests that the manager, and no one else would have been likely to check OPs email themselves and spot the error. So should colleague have just let the company be shown up like this? It’s possible she knows OP is leaving and maybe thinks OP has just stopped bothering to check things anymore or do her job fully. Clearly there is a history between colleague and OP. Colleague won’t be unaware of the tension so probably thought it best not to approach OP directly and be accused of having a go. Better to have a manager deal with something like that IMO. Colleague probably assumed no names would be mentioned. Colleague did you a big favour, and whilst your thanks we’re PA and totally insincere, from colleagues perspective, they probably didn’t come across that way at all. She probably thought you had swallowed your pride to thank her for saving your ass.

@UhtredRagnarson

Ok so a client needed something by a certain date. OP forgot to include it. If the colleague hadn’t spotted the error and spoken with manager then a client would have been let down. Not good for the company at all. The fact the colleague spoke to the manager suggests that the manager, and no one else would have been likely to check OPs email themselves and spot the error. So should colleague have just let the company be shown up like this? It’s possible she knows OP is leaving and maybe thinks OP has just stopped bothering to check things anymore or do her job fully. Clearly there is a history between colleague and OP. Colleague won’t be unaware of the tension so probably thought it best not to approach OP directly and be accused of having a go. Better to have a manager deal with something like that IMO. Colleague probably assumed no names would be mentioned. Colleague did you a big favour, and whilst your thanks we’re PA and totally insincere, from colleagues perspective, they probably didn’t come across that way at all. She probably thought you had swallowed your pride to thank her for saving your ass.

She probably thought you had swallowed your pride to thank her for saving your ass.

That is exactly what I think, too. I think the colleague walked away thinking OP thanked them and the colleague got one over the OP, yet again.

I am quite bemused that OP actually thinks she in any way 'stood up to' the colleague. She kowtowed to the colleague and the colleague now thinks she was thanked and is like the cat that got the cream.

Goodness me! A copy of the email, listing attachments was copied to an internal audit system.

Anyway, thanks for all the replies. I’m not entirely sure why some people are feeling so angry about the situation, but there you go. I’m happy with what I did. I’m not really interested in reading any more replies now, so will bow out at this point, although I’m sure some people will enjoy continuing to trash me. Thanks again for those who have offered kindness and support 😊

Disappointing when a thread doesn’t work out as you hoped, eh?

So your colleague used the system for its intended purpose and saved both you and the company from embarrassment. And in such a way whereby you never had to have any interaction with her about it at all and could have maintained your dignity, but you chose not to. But she's the cow, and anyone who disagrees with you after you sought opinions is just, er, angry.

Well, thank you SO much for sharing your story with us, OP! Otherwise we would never have known that we were such angry people!

(Haha! Take that!)

I had something similar happen to me, I discovered on a shared drive a list of my faults, errors and conversations recorded in a Word Document, going back to when I started in a role. We worked in a small office and the colleague in question had form for going off on sick leave whenever her work was questioned, working only her precise hours and creating errors which others had to clean up. I took out a grievance on her when I discovered this and then fortunately got another role, I subsequently found out that she was fired following a disciplinary hearing for something else... I will admit to having a very large G&T that evening. I spoke to the line manager before me and discovered that she, too had similar problems which were never addressed. If I ever have problems with staff I manage now, I nip them in the bud very early.

I am sorry that you have had to endure this stuff, it left me in tears at the time, and I was a competent manager with a lot of experience. So good luck with the new role and enjoy counting the days down... remember when you smile at her, you are not smiling, you are just showing your teeth!

Either I've missed something because it was such a long op or I'm just being dense because I'm tired but I honestly can't see how you've put your colleague in her place or how you've won some kind of war.

I agree with this I'm afraid. I think I feel sorry for your manager most out of this. You both sound petty and difficult.