How would you handle a friend hired at work behaving oddly?

[Lyontamer]

A few months ago we hired someone that we knew quite well personally in a well paid, senior role and her behaviour has been really, really weird.

As background: she seems to have had a really great career, solid experience working for small companies doing quite niche work, very creative. But the move to our business is very different- different role, different type of business so she got the job mostly because of personal connections.

However! Since coming to work for us things got very weird, very quickly.

For reasons I can't understand, she started off throwing her weight around in a really aggressive way, sort of like demanding authority that doesn't belong to her. Then also treating other senior people with quite a lot of disrespect really needlessly which has resulted in complaints.

Now I've just found out that she told a junior staff member that she previously held an extremely senior role at a very well known brand, and I know this to be completely false. I find making up something like this to be quite worrying.

I've known this person for years and they were always well paid, seemingly successful and a normal CV. They've obviously got plenty of work experience so should know how to behave at work.

Beyond that she always seemed like a really nice, honest, moral type of person. Admittedly she was a bit of a shameless self promoter, but she was otherwise lovely so I overlooked it.

I'd stress she's been given a very well paid job in a nice company where nobody is competitive and she was welcomed very warmly so the behaviour is completely bizarre and we're struggling to work out what's going on.

I've tried speaking to her as have others and reactions have ranged between getting upset and claiming she's being picked on, patronising people, going on the attack or complete denial.

This has created a horrible environment at wirk, and her behaviour is just so odd that I'm hoping for help understanding it. She seems, behind the arrogance to be a bit fragile and so I'm not convinced formal discipline is the right route.

Well there we are then. She doesn't think of herself as an employee, she thinks of herself as (slightly more than) equal to the owners of the business.

She may also be under the misguided impression that the company is owned and run by 'a bunch of amateurs' who don't really know what they are doing, and the reason she's been brought in as a professional is to lick the business into shape.

Get rid of her asap.

I can be a bit like this at work (and I am properly dx'd ND) so I could try and explain it but really it's not fixable. It probably has some elements of NDness but she may well just be an arse at work too.

And yes, she probably is a bit fragile but that's because she's not joining the dots of "oh, it's me, not them" in reoccuring situations.

I've just been on the receiving end of working with a friend who turned into a totally controlling arse and it's not easy from the other end either...so I have even less patience now for trying to understand people.

I would strongly suspect that the reason she was a consultant in previous roles is that she causes chaos and then moves on.

Her MH is hers to fix, she can't be allowed to upset what sounds like a lovely team and workplace.

Honestly I think never mix work and friends- the amount of times I’ve heard people say they were so different in work/ they can’t believe what they did/ how they acted etc etc etc

Do your fellow owners/members of the friendship group think the same way as you do, @Lyontamer- and would they also be on board with getting shot of her during her probation period in a clean execution?

There's four of us, all friends with her. One is adamant she has to go immediately, two (including me) are really uncomfortable with it but hope we can somehow resolve, the fourth absolutely loves her and thinks it's not a big deal.

As people have said, my main concern is actually other staff and being undermined is really unpleasant and we fundamentally can't allow that.

Her fragility is not your business.

Your business is, treat her just like you would any other non-friend member of staff behaving that way.

My money is on her lying on her CV and basically having a brass neck. She soinds like a nightmare.

It doesn't matter why she does OP, you are her employer not her analyst. Just tell her she's not a good fit and end it.

That has been a learning experience then! ☹️

I think one of your employees has been on here complaining about her and saying that they feel they have to leave even though they've been there since the very beginning. Does anyone remember the post? I wish I could find the link.

I'd very much doubt that. The staff involved are generally 20 /30 something men, but never say never 😂

Haven’t RTFT but are you sure her CV is true? Did you get your HR department to do the standard checks of emailing her last couple of employers to check that she really worked there and her start and end dates? If not, I’d do that now. It may be that the person you thought you knew is all a bit of a fabrication.

I have worked for managers like her. Lovely to work with, nightmare to work for. A true Jackal and Hyde experience.

Basically, in a nutshell, she was a bag of nerves, out of her depth, had zero confidence behind the facade, and just should not have been in that role. She would not take any responsibility and just went about saying everyone was wrong so she was right. The team were the problem, not her. Ended up bullying people and twisting the truth to protect herself.

Interesting implications here too, then - with the potential to cause rifts or tensions within the polarised ownership/friendship group. For me, it’s another reason to move quite quickly to resolve it (by asking her to leave - for whatever reason, she’s a toxic presence) but that would need the fourth person who doesn’t see it as a problem to come on board.

It sounds like someone higher up than her needs to put some boundaries in place

Fair enough! It's just the similarity in the behaviour of these two newly appointed senior members of staff who were both hired because they were friends with the owners is uncanny! The person who posted was being driven demented by this new employee as she seemed to overstep, concern herself with areas of the business that had nothing to do with her and generally get around like she knew better than everyone. She was also very much liked by one of the bosses (a male).
It's just mad how familiar this all is!

You say there are four owners, but surely there’s an executive structure that has clear reporting lines and functions. Who’s the MD/CEO? Who’s her line manager? Who sees her KPIs and who conducts her reviews? It all sounds very unstructured to me, the way you’ve said some people have emailed her and some people have had a chat, and none of it has been effective so far.

it sounds very much like she classes herself equal to the owners in seniority, perhaps even more so given what you said about her attitude to you prior.

That will likely also be making her not remotely take your concerns seriously. She’s not thinking “ag shit, big boss isn’t happy” she’s thinking “oh god Lyon doesn’t have a clue 🙄”

Its also putting your other staff in a very difficult position when they know she’s already getting away with undermining people and things no one else would get away with.

Mh issues?
Addiction issues?

I’ve learnt from experience not to be too Pollyanna with people who behave like her. Let her therapist take responsibility for her fragility - you must look after your staff and that wonderful culture you have. People like her destroy people and organisations from the inside out.

My advice is to fully understand that you never really knew her, then go forth and legally remove her “bony arris” (ever see Working Girl? 😁) from that role you’ve given her.

Bad character corrupts good company(ies) Get rid, OP 💐

My partner has a 'boss' lile.her. a recent graduate who managed to get herself made one of the dirextors of the compamy, despite 0 managerial experience.
She seems to think that all men are out to get her, but she is just rude to everyone. Recprds everything for some weird reason. Has paddies when its proven she is lying or her point is fake.

But we also have someone a bit like thst at my work. Friend of the GM, so they think they can order folk about, do sod all work ans bill £300 a day...

Has she misunderstood her role? Thinks she's more senior than she is? Or is she just showing true colours.? Either way if she is not responding to your verbal feedback then she needs to go. Friend or no, she cannot be allowed to disrupt your business like this. Lose a friend not the goodwill of other staff

I she still in her probationary period withing the company? I would dismiss asap, you don't want a tribunal to deal with.

I think you should consider switching to “she goes now” for the sake of your employees.

Probation period
sorry it’s not working out
off you trot!

Options for helping her that can run alongside disciplinary type processes:

• Help her find a mentor outside of your company (and competitors) - someone she can go to with her perspective on all the issues and get some help
• Look at your documents - her job description/ the who works for who chart / the process to follow if she has a disagreement with another member of staff. Is it all clear? Could it be made better?
• Occupational health / counselling - if it's bizarre, out of character behaviour, my first thought was it's a dementia type condition though that seems less likely now I've read more. But still a role for a healthcare professional to look at her - is she depressed / stressed by work / menopausal/ anxious / autistic?