Did my manager avoid me?

[suerte1998]

I wonder whether my manager at work deliberately avoided me and I’d be a little offended if so.

Long story short, my manager is twenty years older and in the past few years I’ve been with the company, he’s been pulled up by his wife (who occasionally comes in) for being too friendly with me. On a handful of occasions, she glared at him really obviously (in front of me) for chatting and laughing with me, offering extra help (not extended to others), and for making comments (though not overly creepy) on my clothes and size of my figure. She obviously doesn’t like him talking to me for whatever reason (though it’s silly imo, I’m a 28 year old woman).

Anyway, usually manager guy (who works from another office usually, so I only see him once a month or so), will come into our office in person if we’ve had some issue (he just has always done so, of course if he could call Teams meetings but he doesn’t). If he doesn’t come in, he has to pay another senior colleague extra hours for coming to see us…. Which he hates as he’s tight!!

Last week I had an important (but not urgent) issue on a project. Manager guy gets in touch and sends over a senior colleague to assist the next day, telling me that he’s “a bit out of his depth with this one” (clearly untrue - he’s dealt with the same issue before). He then turned up to the office a few days later, with his wife (who was next door), and I said, “so did Y tell you about project xyz?”, and he said, “yes… I’m not looking forward to him billing me though!”

Think he deliberately avoided working with me?

Fucking vile. Anyone who uses this type of language about a woman is misogynistic.

Some replies do give that impression….. people just making slurs towards me which are completely unfounded (tart, bimbo)

Op, some posters who have insinuated that you are a tart are the ones who let women down. It’s not a surprise that violence against women is still rife when even women cannot support one another! It’s like the man with the wife isn’t the problem but you are!! It is so sad there are still so many backwards and jealous bitches who are ready to rip women apart.

p.s emknewfuckall!

Ok OP, so if you didn’t want invite it and didn’t enjoy the attention, why are you lamenting your boss distancing himself?

Who said I was ‘lamenting’ it? If you’re being singled out at work and other colleagues notice it isn’t a nice feeling. Are you going to say it’s my fault for being a tart? 😅

Why is your issue when it had stopped? Rather than the sleazy comments he made initially

I think you’re reading a different thread to the rest of us. Either that or the misogyny is so ingrained that you can’t conceive of a situation ever being the fault of the man, not the woman.

The issue isn’t the comments stopping (though with hindsight they were creepy), the issue is me being treated differently (ie external staff coming in) to every other employee. Colleagues noticed and made fun of the boss’ usual skinflint mentality, joking about what the external hire would be billing!

I know. Apparently it was also on me to ‘shut it (his flirting) down’, and it was all my fault he even started because I wore tight clothes 🙄🤔 The mind boggles….

I think you would have been better to raise the issue when he was making comments / giving you attention. Rather than when it ended

I haven’t raised any of it as an issue with anyone… when he made the skirt comments, nobody else was there, and I didn’t think much of it at the time (I know people are going to say I’m stupid/faux niave etc) and just changed the subject or laughed it off. I’ve only started to think of it again now further down the line, a few months later.

Maybe you should raise it with HR but to be completely honest with you, I’m not sure it will be easy or the right thing for you. Maybe keep a low profile and see if it passes? If not consider alternative

I’m sorry to have been harsh. It came across initially as though you were upset the wife had put a stop to it.
if as you say, on reflection you thought his behaviour inappropriate and now you are being treated differently at work, that is difficult
it’s also difficult for the wife and hard to imagine, when you are 28, being that woman, it will be you one day.
Really quite rubbish on the man. But it did seem, initially, as though your only issue was being ignored.

💯 this!

She doesn’t want flirting, she wants the professional attention every other employee gets.

The manager doesn’t even work out of the same office and only visits once a month. On this occasion, he got someone else to deal with the OP’s project’s issue. Whether he did it because the other person had more expertise on the issue, or whether he’s so desperately attracted to the OP that he would spontaneously combust if in the same office building, is irrelevant.

It’s not irrelevant. If he is treating her unfavorably or in a way which makes her stand out to colleagues in a negative way because he fancies her and can’t act professionally/has to placate his wife, that is illegal.

I never insinuated he was "so desperately attracted to me...". I just described what happened. People are attracted to other people all the time, it's not unusual it's just human nature.

He definitely sent someone else because of something to do with me (whether out of his own volition or because his wife asked/advise him to), and others noticed I'd been treated differently.

The fact you care whether he comes in or not says it all.

He sent a senior colleague instead to deal with the issue instead of doing it himself. He has apparently done this in the past, as stated in the OP. It’s not his usual method, but neither is it totally unprecedented. In no way is it ‘acting unprofessionally’. (That would be his comments on her body and clothing, but that’s not what the OP was originally concerned about.)

Your OP is mostly about his wife’s hostility because of him ‘chatting and laughing’ with you, commenting on your clothes and body in a way that’s completely professionally inappropriate, and giving you more help than your colleagues. So he apparently usually treats you differently to the others, only usually it’s more attention, rather than less. For once he delegated dealing with your issue and you have constructed a narrative about it. You seem far less concerned with his inappropriate comments on your appearance than with him not arriving to make them on this occasion, and his possible motivation. Why is that?

So now you’re backtracking on your claim that it doesn’t matter what his motivation was?

It is pretty unprecedented when it's something he can do himself.

Missed this post....I don't think that letchy middle aged (pushing 50) men typically leer at 18/19 year olds as they're fresh out of school. They leer at younger women though.... Obviously unpleasant, but eyeing an 18 year old girl when you're almost 50 seems more gross to me (and definitely others).

I don't think I am "chasing" anything or looking for anything. This kind of comment is too close to the 'you invited it/asked for it' school of thought which, to be honest, should stay in the 1980s. For what it's worth, I'm not even wearing anything provocative at work.

I commented on his wife's hostility (towards him) because on the handful of occasions I've met her, she was very blatantly glaring at him or eyeing him with an unimpressed, 'what have you been doing?!' look. Most people would be more discrete if they're annoyed with their partner, I think.....they'd just act normally in company and then privately have a word/give an ear bashing.

I haven't 'constructed a narrative' I've just described what happened. I don't want more appearance comments from him, that wasn't my question.