I think my boss is scared of me - should I call it out?

[CaponeOnTax]

My boss is very able and experienced but not a massive people person so we’re a small team. We’re each other’s key colleague. What’s bothering me is my boss seems to dread being in a room one-to-one with me. I don’t know if it is weird or AIBU to think it is weird or what.

Around November my boss took me into a meeting room to give me what he thought was a dressing down (closed door). It didn’t go well, I had plenty to say from my side and HR ended up involved. After that, any meetings he instigated were either with the door open or in weird places round the office without doors, so in open plan. A marked change from previous years of working together.

We’re both mainly WFH so it doesn’t come up much and I thought we’d got through it. But again today we had a meeting and he left the door open. The implication seems to be that I am too unpredictable/toxic/not sure what really? to be in a room with. I find it hurtful, unprofessional and odd but … should I say something?

YABU - he can leave the door open if that’s how he prefers it, everyone’s entitled to feel at ease
YANBU - weird and unprofessional, you need to be able to work in a meeting room in your company’s office with the door shut.

It was my boss who reported the conversation to HR. My boss. Not me.
And why did he do that?

Must be because he's "difficult", a "nightmare" and a "troublemaker", no?

After all, that's what people thought about the OP when they assumed she had been the one reporting it.

🤣 I'm sorry but there was no trope anywhere about your sex or gender

You thought I’d reported it to HR? It was the man.

You insisted I ‘been told’ and must respect the replies for their ‘experience’. I explained I am experienced.

You posted without reading properly and you filled in the blanks, and then imagine that I should consider myself ‘hard work’ because I won’t acquiesce to this?

This is exactly the sort of prejudice professional women deal with all the time.

‘You’re turning on the waterworks/too weak/too strong’
‘Actually, here are the facts’
’God, you’re such hard work’

The reason I go on replying to these posts is because this is invidious sexism.

I answered this on the first page.

If he's been out of line before he will have been told not to open himself / the company up to complaint. It protects you as much as him, because it sounds like he is the one who fails to moderate his behaviour.

This is exactly the sort of prejudice professional women deal with all the time.

It isn’t. I didn’t have to deal with it at any point in a 35 year professional career. The fact that you think it happens “all the time” is pretty telling. Are you always so averse to a bit of self reflection?

‘You’re turning on the waterworks/too weak/too strong’
‘Actually, here are the facts’
’God, you’re such hard work’

@Blossomtoes To be clear, it is the above that I said professional women were subject to all the time. And, yes, it’s telling.

But they’re not. How is it you experience it all the time and I never have? Still no self reflection.

Not ‘me’, women everywhere all the time.

My thoughts exactly.

It's not standard where I work. Quite the opposite, in fact. Or in my previous 3 roles.

Apart from the fact that a lot of meetings involve discussing confidential matters about clients, supervisions often involve discussing personal stuff that most people wouldn't want the whole office to overhear.

Thanks @LakieLady - a good example is recently we had a query about a client money laundering. This isn’t an unusual type of conversation and it is definitely closed door.

As an aside, @MelaniesFlowers comment about me ‘acting out last time’ is also revealing and typical of this thread. She is using the language of a naughty child to describe a grown woman crying/defending herself. ‘Last time’ also ignores the many many meetings I noted we’d had before and since.

So many women really are very negative to working professional women, and want us to feel told off. This thread is an eye opener.

Can you not accept that you may have done something wrong?

I am a woman and make mistakes sometimes, don't you?

Look, without knowing all the details of what exactly caused the altercation in the fist place it's difficult to assess properly, but making it all about being a woman and refusing to listen makes you look unprofessional and not very experienced at all

It could have been misogyny or it may not have been.

I still don't get why you are so obsessed with him wanting to leave the door open TBH

This. You seemed unhinged he/she is now acting appropriately to that previous event.

A good example is recently we had a query about a client money laundering. This isn’t an unusual type of conversation and it is definitely closed door

Why don't you ask him on a case by case basis, rather than 'calling it out'.

Like this 'XX this is a confidential matter about Y. Do you think it would be problematic if we don't close the door to discuss it?' He is your manager and will be able to decide one way or the other. You don't need to still seethe on MN over a non-issue after three days. It's bonkers

a good example is recently we had a query about a client money laundering

Surely these go straight to your MLRO as soon as the suspicion arises? Or is he the MLRO?

Guys, thanks for all the posts, and I do want to keep engaging as women’s treatment in the workplace is really important to me.

However, I can’t keep replying with the same stuff to people who haven’t read the thread and insist that I called HR, or can’t see why it’s standard practice to close the door as a necessary part of the job. RTFT - your trope-y remark or query may already have been made.

But for where I noted that people want to imply women are ‘unstable’ for standing up, we can also substitute ‘unhinged’.

So many women really are very negative to working professional women

So many of us who disagree with you are or have been professional working women.

we’re up against assumed behaviour of difficult/unstable women

Not really; I'm the first to agree it happens, but it doesn't follow that every single case fits the description and in this particular instance people are responding to what you yourself have posted

It's really quite incredible to see such widespread agreement and for for it to be suggested everyone's wrong except you, but of course that's your choice to make

And (understandably) leaving the door open is the manager's ...

Whether you boss is a dick or not, the crux is I don't think you're going to get many people thinking him leaving the door ajar is a partcuarly bad thing after HR have previously had to intervene.

If you suspect money laundering and are having internal meetings to discuss it, but not going straight to your MLRO - that's a criminal offence. (I am assuming you work in a regulated sector by virtue of the fact that you have referred to it.)

I feel like you've given that example in order to make the meeting seem as confidential as it could possibly be, but it doesn't make sense unless your boss is the MLRO for your employer (in which case any meetings on that topic should be closed door, without question, and he will be contravening policy).

Hahaha

Now the OP is maybe a criminal!

But seriously, did you consider that maybe the OP is the MRLO?

OR that they have a different job function altogether- something like shareholder relations or PR where they have to deal with these sorts of enquiries separately?

I feel like you've given that example in order to make the meeting seem as confidential as it could possibly be, but it doesn't make sense unless your boss is the MLRO for your employer (in which case any meetings on that topic should be closed door, without question, and he will be contravening policy).

The reason that I gave this example is because I remembered I had a MN thread on it and it was an example I could give without risking client confidentiality in itself. Other things would be work allocation, departmental moves, client financial instability or cash flow issues, other team personnel changes or outlooks and so on. what prompted this thread this week was I wanted to mention something to my boss about one of the graduate intake and felt uncomfortable to do so with the door open. I will mention it on a Teams call at another time.

From the examples you've given, I'm guessing you work in a similar or the same industry/specialism as me. I'd agree that the majority of those are generally door closed meetings.

I'm still agog at the poster upthread who claimed her DH holds all his mtgs in a coffee shop! 😂

The OP has repeatedly referred to client work/allocation in her posts, so I thought it was obvious that she was in a client facing job role.