Dilemma of the day - hen nights and work colleagues........

[MadreInglese]

Hoping the collective powers of MN can come up with a solution to this one.

A workmate, let's call her Sue, is getting married next year.

'Sue', 'Claire', 'Jane' and I all work in the same section in an open office of about 60 people. Jane is our supervisor and a bit of a cow sometimes and the rest of us do not really get on too well with her.

Sue, Claire and I all get on well and occasionally socialise outside of work. Jane is invited but never comes, she is more friendly with a couple of other women in the office.

Sue has invited Claire & me to her hen do (spa day & night out) but does not want Jane to come. She is considering inviting her thinking she won't come anyway, but then there's always the danger that she will come. She doesn't want Jane to come, but also doesn't want to cause ructions by excluding her.

Sue even suggested that Claire & I keep it 'secret' that we're going but I'm not particularly comfortable with that.

Any suggestions on how she could handle this without upsetting anyone? I'd really like to go to the hen do but am worrying already that it will cause a stir.

Is she inviting Jane to the wedding?

Hmm, not sure, she has been agonising over wedding invites too.

IMO you should just invite who you want to be there, but that's very easy to say and harder to do I guess. Even though Jane is a cowbag most of the time it's still not nice to be obviously excluded from something.

What Sue has said is that she is more concerned about the hen night atm as it'll just be about 10 people so much more concentrated I suppose than being one of 100 wedding evening do guests, IYSWIM

If Jane is the supervisor then I think it's perfectly acceptable NOT to invite her. And I'm guessing here that the reason she generally doesn't socialise with the rest of you is that on some level she wants to maintain her distance?

If you were all regularly having giggly girly lunches then yes, it would be tricky, but as you're clearly not, i think you should just treat her like any other woman of your acquaintance who is not sufficiently close enough to justify an invite!

Oh, and you wouldn't have this issue if your supervisor was a man would you? I think just try to think of her as a colleague and supervisor, and not a woman. IYKWIM

Yes Bling, I think she wants to keep herself a little distanced, all the supervisors tend to pal up together.

Unless she';s inviting the whole rest of the workploace to the hen night then she has no need to invite the supervisor. It sounds like you two are her friends as well as her colleages, and 'Jane' isn't.

No, it would just be us two from the office.

She shouldn't invite her if she doesn't want to
I don't think you need to keep it secret but don't show off about it iykwim