Made manager cry - was I being unreasonable?

[Coastalwalks]

Hi ladies,

Long post so apols ! I am changing careers, and whilst studying I work every other Sunday in a relatively up-market restaurant. I am on a zero hours contract. Managers are all notoriously brusque and rude, and as a result they have very high staff turnover. I am not perfect (waitressing is much harder than my previous job in FS lolllllll) but a perfectly competent waitress. When I first started a couple of months ago the manager was consistently incredibly tough and often rude with me, but this has eased off a bit.

There is pressure from the owners to cut staffing costs. I usually work from 10-16:30. At about 1pm, one of the regular girls came over to me and my colleague and said '(Manager) said that one of you can go home, so decide amongst yourselves who is leaving.' My other colleague (who does not usually work that shift) was due to work a double, and so the manager effectively put us in the awkward situation where I would either have to accept going home after three hours (I live relatively nearby) or be really unreasonable by saying to my colleague who lives an hour away that she'd have to take a five hour (!) unpaid break between shifts.

I spoke to the manager about this with my colleague, and we both essentially said that we thought she was being unreasonable in making us decide amongst ourselves, and that she was effectively asking us to decide who had to forego pay, not reasonable to give us a sense of advance notice, etc... She then started crying about how horrible it is to "have to be the bad guy" and stormed off. I cannot stress how rude and brusque this woman usually is, so was really shocked. I did not have a rude tone, and was calm and measured in all I said.

I later texted her to say that I appreciate that she is in an awkward position and that I hoped that she was alright. She has not responded. My colleague who remained on the shift flagged that she has made multiple people cry and is often rude and disrespectful. But I still feel bad. Her job is obviously stressful and means a lot to her, whereas it's just a temporary thing for me. But I don't think I was unreasonable in just standing my ground.

I put up with the rudeness because I would like to work there full time next summer between finishing studying and starting my new job in the Autumn.

WIBU?

OP, I would look for another Sunday job.

I really don't know how you want to work there full time next summer! Good grief!

It has been communicated poorly in this instance but I don’t think this is uncommon practice especially in bar/restaurant work, with zero hour contracts. I worked in a few pubs while getting my degree and it was very rare a manager would just send someone home, they would usually ask who wanted to go or say we could decide between ourselves.

This made more sense because for me at the time my wages was just my “night out fund”, but I worked alongside a woman who was paying rent and bills etc, so while I would quite happily take an early finish on a Saturday to be able to head off on my night out earlier, or quite happily take the Sunday early finish to go nurse my hangover in peace, my colleague would be much more severely impacted by losing that pay. Some of us were always keen to go, others needed the money, so it made sense for them to ask us and that’s never been an issue anywhere I worked

It doesn't matter how much pressure she's under, she acted in an unprofessional manner in the first place and needs to take responsibility for that. If she can't cope with the demands of the job she needs to step down. She sounds thoroughly awful though - being a bastard to your staff is never going to get the best out of them.

Is her name Sheila? Sounds like someone I once worked with.....
But no, it's not your decision on management of staff.

I am not sure that their staffing approach is lawful. If they suddenly find themselves less busy in the course of a day having asked people to turn up at work, they cannot at the drop of a hat not pay people surely? Zero hours contracts means that they can decide where they give hours out going forward but I think your employer behaved very badly.

There are loads of jobs around atm - I'd find a different one if it were me. Sounds like a lot of needless hassle.

Only times I get near to tears is when I am genuinely raging - not pissed off, not stressed, but from pure anger.

I wouldn't be so sure that she was upset as much as she was angry.

I think you were right to speak up. Either she's had a really bad day and that topped it off, or she is being manipulative. The fact she cried is not necessarily your fault at all - mine cries almost every time they can't cope and I've almost got used to it! Makes for a shit working environment though.

@Coastalwalks I’ve done a lot of restaurant work, management and waiting, and really enjoyed it. But, I absolutely HATE bosses who think it’s acceptable to rota staff, so they give up their Sunday, then send them home early unpaid. It’s horrible behaviour and doesn’t foster good staff relations. You made her cry? Tough. Did she give a shit about her staff? No. Absolutely good for you for making your feelings clear.

@AngelAurora do you action every shit request from management like a doormat?

She doesn't sound like a good manager at all. Staff going to her and voicing their thoughts in a calm and non-confrontational way is part of her job. That aside, it's wrong to send people home just because they're quiet. Asking if anyone wants to go home is fine, but insisting is out of order in my opinion. People rely on a wage to pay bills and rent, even students. If I were you I would just look for another job with set hours, perhaps in a supermarket if you're just looking for something temporary. They will not send you home.

'Crocodile tears': That manager was probably a school yard bully in her younger days - the type of bully who resorts to tears and plays victim when confronted (however nicely). Don't be fooled; the basic character remains the same - nasty.

You didn’t cause her to cry, OP. Just because you were there does not mean you were the cause.

She was trying to avoid doing part of her job and you asked her to do it. It’s the job, that she apparently dislikes, that caused her to cry.

This is entirely on her and the restaurant management and ownership, not you.

She gets paid to make these decisions not you. What a shitty way to treat employees.

*You didn’t cause her to cry, OP. Just because you were there does not mean you were the cause.

She was trying to avoid doing part of her job and you asked her to do it. It’s the job, that she apparently dislikes, that caused her to cry.*

This. She may have a stressful job but it is her job, not yours. Maybe she was indeed having a terrible day and was emotional. Fine, she's human. But it's not your fault.

She is the manager, it's her job to make such decisions.

It sounds like you're all working for an absolute garbage company and I'm not sure why any if you are putting up with it.

Perhaps the middle manager knows that it was a really shitty thing to do and that's why she was upset/anxious about it. I doubt the actual decision was made by her. Not an excuse but it suggests a degree of empathy for you maybe.

I don't think you were wrong to challenge the decision. I think you're all f%cking nuts to be willingly working there

Manager who can't manage SHOCKER

ETA: Sorry OP, I definitely don't mean to imply that I'm criticising you here. She is clearly an appalling manager and you haven't done anything wrong.

She didn't want to be the bad guy so made you argue it out yourselves, then cried when she was called out on her shitty behaviour.

YANBU.

retired and sold my restaurant in April this year. It was in Canada. The law in Canada is that anyone that shows up for a scheduled shift cannot be sent home in under 3 hours. If you send before 3 hours then you need to still pay your employee for 3 hours. For night hostesses and servers that came in at 4, there three hours would be up by 7 and we closed at 8 thru the week. I always gave them a choice. Thanks to covid we had many months of an empty restaurant but had to staff just in case.
So , If it was a particularly slow shift I would go out to servers and extra cooks and say, "guys, sorry it is dead. I am needing to cut a few of the floor front and back of house, If you would would like your hours, then I have some cleaning and stocking jobs that can be done, If you chose to go home that is fine and you will not be penalized for not wanting to stay. 9 times out of 10 front of house went home, most times back of house stayed and got prep going for the next morning (which suited me just fine as I was the one there at 6am doing all the prep for the day lol) No manager should ask the staff to make a choice, It is literally their JOB to MANAGE the business, including making hard calls.

also. If they chose to go home I had a checkbox on the signout computer stating offered to stay but chose to leave. That way by law I did not have to pay the 3 hours if they had only been there an hour or two.

@Coastalwalks I worked as a Restaurant Manager for 30 Years. The worst part of my job by far was having to cut people's shifts but the pressure from senior Managers to do so was awful. You always feel like the bad guy when people are relying on the shift to pay bills, have children etc... don't feel so bad about her having a Cry, it probably wasn't your fault but it obviously was too much for the Manager to have to be the 'bad guy'.

🙄Nice bit of casual sexism there

I don't think anyone was being particularly unreasonable in this situation. At the end of the day she's a manager, not the restauraunt owner. She's being directed by someone else to do her job just the same as you're being directed by her. Presuambly you and the other staff member were aware of the cancellation of hours policy when you took the job (if not you should clarify it with HR and check through legal channels if you don't feel they're acting within employment laws), therefore you should accept that sometimes it's going to happen and that it's probably going to be inconvienient and possibly impactful on your finances but by accepting the job you did agree to those terms.

On the other hand, she should have made this decision herself and not tried to wriggle out of it in the way that she did. She also should have remained professional in front of you, particularly as you were with her. But having had to manage shifts and staff in the past I do understand her frustration at having to frequently make decisions that will earn her annoyance and conflict from the staff members she's directing, especially when those staff members are expressing concerns about paying the bills, cost of living etc. I'm not saying you were directing annoyance and frustration on her, you sound perfectly reasonable, but I would bet a tenner that she's had to send someone else home recently and received an unhappy reaction to it happening. It can really put you on edge to constantly be the one trying to firefight shift issues, even if that is your job.

Her attitude the rest of the time is a separate issue. She sounds unpleasant but she also sounds human, and I think I'd be inclined to give her a bit of a warmth the next time she has to do this.

It probably wasn't really anything to do with what you said. I imagine it was simply the straw that broke the camel's back. There will be something else going on at home, work or possibly both.

She sounds like my old line manager. Enjoyed upsetting other people but had to be treated with kid gloves if you had any reason to disagree with her.
YADNBU, she is an adult , a manager and its up to her to manage.