Just call me by my name!!

[BTECBetty]

I have a four-syllable name, which I hate being shortened. Yes, it’s long, but it’s not difficult to pronounce, so if people try to shorten it, I just correct them and tell them I prefer my full name. Most people just apologise and don’t do it again.

Except one colleague. No matter how many times I say “My name is X”, she will still try to shorten it to Y. What makes it even more frustrating is the shortened version she uses isn’t even an accepted shortening of my name - think calling me “Jenny” instead of “Genevieve”. She definitely knows she is doing it, as when I’ve picked her up on it, she makes a big performance of using the shortened name again the next time and then saying “Sorry, I mean X” - every time. No one forgets every time.

Anyway, today was once too often. I snapped that my name is X, I want to be called X - not Y, not Z or any other invented version of my actual name. I pointed out that I’ve said this time and time again. She went off doing a hurt face, muttering about how I didn’t need to be stroppy about it.

I wouldn’t give a damn if it was just her saying she was upset - she’s clearly never given a toss if I’m upset. But now our manager has got involved. He took me to one side and said what I said “Could have come across as aggressive”, and that maybe I could have asked more calmly. I pointed out that I had asked calmly several times and got nowhere. He tried to laugh it off, saying different people just had different preferences about these things, and that maybe colleague found using my full name a bit formal. I stood my ground and said she didn’t get a preference about someone else’s name - my name is mine, and I don’t want to be called anything else.

There wasn’t really much my manager could say to that, but I still feel like he’s making it my fault rather than hers, when she’s the one doing something wrong. I’m now sitting on a bench down the road from the office munching on a pasty, hoping it doesn’t rain, because a) I want comfort food as I’m pissed off and b) I don’t want to sit in our break room and have her come up to me and pretend to be all “I didn’t mean to upset yooooo”, when I know very well she’ll go back to shortening my name tomorrow.

I’ve reached the point where I want to raise this formally, even if it just forces my manager to acknowledge that he can’t blame this on me. WWYD?

Conflict for the sake of conflict. The manager's eyes must ache from all the rolling. 🙄

Why is it childish to want to be called your name?
And the manager acted terribly and hasent helped the situation at all imo.

Just don’t respond if she calls you anything but your name

But if someone says they don’t want their name shortening then you are bullying them by carrying on doing it because you know they don’t like it

Never in a workplace that I worked in if somebody introduced. Themselves as Janet I wouldn't take it upon myself to call them Jan,it's just rude.

She's free to simply ignore it but is making it a matter of high workplace drama. I'm sure most of the staff agree with me - it's childish nonsense from both of them.

Anyway, I'll leave you to your storms in teacups and just be grateful I don't have to work with such types. 😂

How far do you go with that though? My gran is called Margaret but known as Ann since she was born
if you call Margaret she doesn’t respond
so calling her by the wrong name is just ignorant as she would always introduce herself as Ann

I had to have a word with the hospital that she wasn’t hard of hearing, they were using the wrong name!

Completely unacceptable.

I would put it in writing to your manager that you consider this to be deliberate workplace bullying and you are very unhappy that he appeared to take the side of the bully rather than doing his job and defending you. Tell him that you want him to tell her to knock it off completely and if she does it one more time you'll make a formal complaint to HR, adding in the fact that you asked him to put a stop to it but he didn't.

I work in education - I make it very clear to my students that names are important, and they need to be clear about what they want to be called, and if I get it wrong (because official records haven't been updated), they MUST tell me. If they do that I respect their choice, and appreciate the reminder. Your colleague is being deliberately obstructive. Stick to your guns, keep correcting and, keep your manager involved.

(for what its worth, I have a name that can be shortened, but not in any nice way that I like. I cannot imagine anyone daring to try it ;) )

Just start calling her phil or dave until she starts calling you properly by your name.

I think it's just so rude. And the offence when you pick them up on it!!

I had a colleague who consistently called me the wrong (similar sounding but completely different) name. She laughed it off every time I corrected her until one day I snapped and told her that she had known me for about 5 years and I found it deeply disrespectful and rude that she couldn't be bothered to learn me name. She was so offended she barely spoke to me from that moment until I left!

Id be tempted to call her a different name each time. But im petty

It drives me nuts when my colleagues do this - mispronounce kids names or use nicknames when not asked to. At the start of every year, when I first do the register, I ask each child to tell me what they prefer to be called and check that I’m pronouncing it correctly (I write it down phonetically if there’s a chance I might not remember) and I stress that they should correct me every time if I get it wrong. I would never use a nickname unless it’s one they’ve told me to use, even if I’d heard other kids calling them that (I will sometimes say that I’ve noticed people call them X and whether they’re still happy that I call them Y, or would they prefer me to also call them X). Everyone occasionally slips up - I have definitely called the child who e.g. prefers Lizzy ‘Elizabeth’ and the child who prefers Elizabeth ‘Lizzy’ or called Maya ‘My-a’ when she pronounces it ‘May-a’ because I have just been teaching Maia who pronounces it ‘My-a’! But I’ll get it right 99% of the time, because it matters.

And OP, you’re definitely not being unreasonable - she’s doing it on purpose for some reason and it’s a power-play. And FWIW I have a name that is commonly shortened (and typically spelled differently in England) and whilst I would never introduce myself with the short version, I don’t really care if people use it. In my case, I think it’s just laziness and because it’s pretty rare as a name in my generation and generally rare in England for people of any age to use the full version routinely. So I don’t think it’s usually done maliciously - but once you’ve told her that you don’t like it more than once and she continues, then it is malicious.

I like the PP’s idea of acting totally calmly now and waiting until she, inevitably, does it again and then raise a formal grievance because there’s no way now that she can argue that she didn’t know that it bothers you so much!

Just don’t respond unless she calls you the right name.

We had this with my DS is school.

His name (not real name) is Matthew. Gets called MJ for short.

Teacher calls him Matt. Refuses to use MJ as “won’t use nicknames” (go figure 🙄)

Anyway after a few weeks teacher is talking to Matt and ds doesnt respond as has his back to her and doesn’t know she’s addressing him. She tells him off.

i raised it with school who said it was da fault as he knows she calls him that.

So I said I’d like it in writing he has to answer to any name she calls him in case she’s addressing him because she won’t use his correct name and that she will respond to any name he calls her that starts with a Mr/Mrs or Miss. at first the school said “that’s ridiculous”. But when I asked why when they expect him to do the same they couldn’t answer.

She called him Matthew from there on in. Turns out it was quite easy to refer to him by his actual name not why she assigned to him through her own choices.

I wouldn’t be so sure that most staff agree with you, given that 88% of the poll agree with the OP.

I’m glad that I don’t have to work with the thick-as-mince types you seem to be surrounded by!

Everytime she does it call her by another name. Something similar. Okay Maureen. Thanks for that Maureen. etc She will soon get the message.

Dont apologise to her. When she calls you the short name don't answer her. She's being passive aggressive. If she continues make it formal.

Id be tempted to explain to manager that he’s only siding with her because she got the complaint in first. You could easily have gone in with the ‘she’s deliberately using the wrong name’ complaint and he’d have been dealing with it from the other side, but you didn’t because you’re a grown up.

Absolutely ridiculous, and is actually classed as a micro aggression- I quote:

''One of the most common microaggressions in a diverse workplace is getting someone's name wrong repeatedly. It may seem like a harmless slip-up, but it signals to the individual that they're not important enough for others to make the effort to learn their name.''

I rest my case. If she persists, report it.

this.

Great idea! Simply don't answer to the shortened version - it's NOT your name.

Sorry for quoting everyone by the way, my 'reply' function seems to have disappeared 🤔

I am surprised at that because in the notes I used in the NHS, one of the first things on the first page of the assessment was "what do you like to be called"

If she did this to a colleague of a different ethnicity, saying she found the name difficult, she would, quite rightly, be guilty of racism and abuse. I'd say this to your manager if the subject comes up again, might make them think twice.

What’s interesting here is why the colleague is choosing to do this and to persist in it when there’s a detriment to her i.e. an uncomfortable atmosphere in the workplace. It’s a symptom of something else, a way of expressing how she feels about OP without actually saying how she feels. There’s always a reason why a bully chooses a particular victim. Get to the bottom of that and maybe a proper conversation can follow where the bully realises that their behaviour is shit.