I’ve been accused of bullying - ridiculous

[Jinjer]

At work on Friday we were holding a meeting and I asked how people would feel about a specific proposal …

Most people either said yay or nay so to speak but one woman went absolutely nuclear, ranting on and on about how it was a terrible proposal and she’d never support it, drawling parallels to other things in place that she disagrees with, raging on about how terrible it all is and how sick of it all she is etc! Everyone was a bit gobsmacked so to lighten the mood I said “so, can I put you down as a maybe?”

Everyone laughed. She didn’t. She got up and stormed out. I now hear she has complained to the manager about me humiliating her and wants it treated as bullying??!

WIBU?! Her rant was very OTT, all she had to say was “no”

I guess it depends what everyone else in the room thinks, if they back her up then it obviously is you.
People don’t usually get accused of bullying in the workplace for a one off comment.

Your comment would've been fine in a less formal setting and if directed at someone you were pretty sure would see the funny side. Given that this colleague had gone "nuclear" and (on the face of it) behaved irrationally, I think your remark was misjudged.

I dont understand what was supposed to be funny. She was upset by your proposal, clearly didnt agree with it and you said it a maybe for her? Doesnt make any sense to me and dont understand why people laughed.

She was obviously the first one to be in the wrong going balistic. I understand its difficult to react to that and then being criticised for not handling your response when its triggered by someone elses behaviour.

She obviously has some other issues going on - work-related or not. It wasn’t bullying what you did, it was a slightly badly-timed comment in terms of her mental state, but you were not to know.

Maybe the person had person things going on that affected her reaction, maybe she was fed up of others trying to add to her workload, maybe her bloody dog died that morning! People have all sorts going on that impact how they react in some situations. ‘Over-emotional energy’ makes it sound like she should have just shut up and acquiesced?

You did belittle her, even if she was as over the time as YOU describe. I think you are probably are a bit of bully, but tries to disguise it as banter or humour !

Using sarcasm in this case isn’t ‘de-escalation’, it’s humiliation.

It’s understated sarcasm. It’s funny.

It’d be like you telling your friend how much your neighbour annoys you and they reply “So you’re a big fan then?”

It’s very common in British humour - sort of a self-deprecating sarcasm. If you’re British I’d be quite surprised if you haven’t come across that!!

The only issue here was that the colleague is obviously going through some kind of issues so it was a bit ill-timed.

So you openly mocked her? Her behaving unprofessionally doesn’t give you permission to do the same, albeit in a different way. She clearly felt very strongly and you totally undermined and minimised her views. The fact you think what you did was correct is quite shocking and shows a toxic workplace where someone doesn’t have psychological safety to speak their mind. Possibly explains why she exploded.

I don’t think your comment was bullying.

In a public meeting where I’m sure she made you feel humiliated you used humour to attempt to diffuse the situation.

Hopefully any follow up is just HR following procedure.

Thinking about it, I do agree with this. I wouldn’t like everyone laughing at me if I had just had a rant about something that upset me. I mean, I wouldn’t rant like that either but she might have reached the end of her tether.

Tricky one. If I was you I think I’d apologise. I can 100% see why you did it but I can imagine someone in the woman’s state of mind would find it dismissive and as though you were making fun of her.

Not bullying but not professional which will also hinder any progression with the company.

Are you a manager or a peer to her? If not a manager was there one there? I would not class this as bullying but it was mishandled on your part. I would apologise and say it was a misjudged attempt to diffuse things.

You haven’t bullied her at all, I would have wanted to lighten the mood as well as that’s the kind of person I am and it’s awkward in a meeting full of people when someone kicks off. However I’ve had a good few years managing a team now. And the way I’d of handled this would have been to let her rant and say something like “ok, so perhaps there has been some issues that weren’t taken into consideration. I’m not sure this meeting is really the place to talk about them, so let’s book in a time for you and me and we can go through it all” half the time I find it’s just people don’t like change and want to have a moan.

But no, it’s not bullying. She probably felt like you were dismissing her and if she was upset it probably made her feel worse, but you didn’t publicly challenge her, or tell her off for speaking up.

Id have said the same as you, i don't think deescalating a situation could be viewed as bullying!
I don't think op has descalated the situation though. If anything made heR distress worse.

I would have acknowledged her distress and asked if she wanted to continue with the topic or would she preferred to speak privately about it.

Your comment wasn't completely out of line, you probably felt more at ease than her but it did sound like she wanted her feelings to be taken seriously and felt like you were making a joke out of it. I wouldn't worry too much about what you said. She is upset and wanted to be taken seriously though. She also may have been more nervous about it when saying it in front of a group than you thought. She could have taken it as you embarrassing her in front of everyone/not taking her seriously. I would apologise and hear her out, telling her opinion on the issue again (not the bullying if possible but the original issue, I wouldn't say too much regarding the bullying aspect and focus on making sure she is being heard and how it made it made her feel so that she knows you are aware for again. Then just carry on if she'll do that

I would ignore those with the soap box and castigation op.

Professional work meetings are not therapy. Defusing a stressful dramatic event and several uncomfortable colleagues is not a problem behaviour.

I wouldn't apologise but I would have followed up with a message acknowledging the distress your colleague had shown. Now that the drama has been escalated further I would ask HR to support conversations to help resolve, and suggest HR explore training and mentoring for colleague who is obviously struggling.

To the many of this thread who might disagree I recommend reflecting on the impact of chaotic emotional behaviour, particularly in professional settings.

But your response wasn’t really appropriate. She was clearly upset and you took the piss. I don’t think you intended it as bullying OP, but l do think you need to learn to read the room. The fact that everyone laughed may have appeared to validate your comment, but that’s clearly not the case if she was humiliated as a result, and that’s what could be construed as bullying.

Hardly. The response was appropriate for her behaviour.

Although by the sound of things, this colleague was already probably embarrassing herself, your comment definitely did embarrassing her, and very publicly. You should apologise in a meeting with her and HR. Clearly she has issues with aspects work which need addressing and her manager should be getting to the bottom of. If she has not spoken out like this before it suggests this discussion was the straw that broke the camel's back.

She humiliated herself and is now trying to find someone to blame. It's generally better to play it straight with people who are behaving in highly emotional ways in a professional setting but I don't think it's unreasonable to use humour to deal with the awkwardness she created.

If you are asked for a statement keep it very factual and professional. You can say she expressed strong opinions about the proposal being discussed and other issues not on the meeting agenda which caused some awkwardness and you tried to lighten the atmosphere with some humour.

Agree. If people kick off in meetings like this it is often best to say you hear they have strong views and perhaps can speak afterwards/speak to line manager depending on what is appropriate or what the relationships are. Some people might respond to the type of humour op has deployed but not if they are worked up into an emotional state already.

She reacts like this to everything, constantly ranting about anything and everything. Shes ended up in no end of confrontations because of the way she carries on. The proposal wasn’t mine, I was simply the messenger and all it required was a “yay or nay” response which everyone else in the room managed. I felt like her rant was directed at me personally - on other occasions she’s done thing and her “target” has ended up going back at her with the same energy. I didn’t want to do that.

Your intentions have nothing to do with it.. did the person feel humiliated & belittled by your actions? And the answer to that is yes.

Too many workplace bullies hide behind “banter” .. where is “your fault” you don’t find it funny, “you” need to learn to lighten up, “you” need a sense of humour. Banter is just a gloss over bullying.

In this specific incident, you are in the wrong. Instead of blaming the other person (they forced me to do this, because they were being emotional) why not accept that they felt belittled by your actions.