[VA] should I be worried that I’m getting fired ?
Long story short
Got hired in June at a unionized shipyard. Not in the trades.
I was trained under an employee who was there for 40 years, retiring this past December. But kept things in house which included the constant beefing between the guys and how much he had to repair things after them. Essentially coddled them, and now there isn’t anymore coddling, it has caused a lot of problems that I kept trying to address with my foreman that I think I made a mistake of going to my general foreman cause now I feel like everyone is being cold to me. Am I being fired or going that way?
So— long story
He was basically the glue of my facility, which it was just him on a shift, Joe on another shift, Jerry on another and Bob on his own. This particular facility, we are the only ones authorized to work in this said plant in the shipyard.
My trainer was great at training. But I never caught on to the vague things he said because .. it was super vague. He mentioned
—don’t show the guys what you’re being taught. When they show you how to do things, just don’t let them know whatsoever what you know. Ever.
— hide your notes. Don’t let them see your notes.
— I’ve been keeping Jerry and Joe off each other, and off of you, even though you aren’t doing nothing to them.
— don’t do shortcuts. And doing the right thing is going to be difficult.
— don’t let Jerry or Joe lead the plant.
— if they do lead and word gets out to <insert military branch here> of what is going on, they will take over.
Well after he left and I got authorization. It’s been literal hell since and I feel like although the job is easy and I see the guys when they take watch, it seems like there was such a big deal for either one to be the next leader (with no extra pay and they have voiced they aren’t doing extra work for no pay), so if there is interpersonal conflict they also tamper with equipment or mislead the following person coming in as to what needs to be done.
If I do well or basically do what I’m told to do which is document what I do, etc, resolve equipment issues, they turn on to me. I feel like I was put in a shitty situation.
Up until April I was trying to ignore them and focus on my shift and how I run the plant. But because they were taking shortcuts and trying to fix those shortcuts, they were trying to keep it quiet but also tell me that I am the cause of the quality and performance issues.
Joe found out about my girlfriend’s suicide. She died self inflicted gun shoot wound and essentially died in my arms in 2017. I’m also a lesbian. When I had told my trainer (last time I shared anything personal) cause we were having a deep talk, my trainer said in short “Good”.
Well Joe shared with the maintenance crew, and they laughed about it. But in a way that it had to upset one of the maintenance men cause they told me discretely cause it was a shitty thing to even laugh about or repeat to others.
I try to report these things to my foreman. I tried to let him know what was going on. I tried to point out something was going on as subjectively (objectively? lol) as possible without making it appear personal.
Well, things eventually got personal for me cause the treatment got to the point of being so suffocating for me.
I reported this to my general foreman of the things going on. And I think I messed up for doing that, or at least providing the information about everything that has been happening to me.
Fast forward—things have been cold between me and my foreman. He told me no one is trying to sabotage me. No one is doing xyz. I was upset he was dismissive of the things happening but I understand that eventually my judgement became clouded. But he was aware of things worsening rather than deescalating. I really tried to do right by documenting, reporting and also keep as professional as possible but it really got to me to point of losing sleep sometimes.
Starting this Friday, I will be training again. The guys will be doing 12 hr shifts and I will be on my 8 hr shift still, so I get 4 hrs of each of them. I don’t think it’s a bad idea and I’ve mentioned before about getting a chance to see how they do things (and to know what to work for if I suspect any thing they did whether intentional or not). But I feel such a shift in the air. Joe will be off after Friday for 5 days cause we get 5 days off after 3 rotations. But I’m unsure if there is a reason more to it other than maybe us needing to rebuild our morale.
I don’t know how to interpret all this, but I’m so upset cus someone had told me before the guys were trying to scare me out of here. All because I’m a woman. Which I hate to even say out loud because I feel like treating someone different cause of race sex etc is such a cop out. I’m afraid though if that is what they were trying to do it might work.
My general foreman and foreman initially told me they know what I’m dealing with when I first got authorized.
And I have been doing what they tell me to do, and making sure I notify them and maintenance of issues to where it’s more often than not that I’m trying to fix things.
They actually wanted me to be the operator to represent my plant, and I think the guys finding that out is what set things on fire for me.
But My general foreman told me in front of my foreman that if my foreman does not handle things, to go to him about it(cause my foreman had a rep of not addressing issues).
So I think me doing that, I got my foreman and potentially the other guys with their foreman’s in trouble.
Do you think I’m getting fired ? I know that’s not something I can get a definitive answer on. But I’m just scared. What if I jumped the gun ? What if I didn’t handle things correctly ? What could I have done differently?
Im scared that I’ll be let go or moved.
I noticed that Joe in particular has been giving me the silent treatment which is actually in turn made things very peaceful. We keep it to a need to know basis now, and I want it to stay that way.
But he has been aggressive in his own ways like slamming the door when he comes in and stares at Me but I don’t give it any attention.
Do you think I’m on the way out the door ? Or that I caused trouble that I ended up causing a departmental rift ? Should I be worried ?
We are a unionized shipyard and it’s allegedly hard to get fired from here unless you’re a contractor. Even if I went to HR, they would tell me to go through my foreman. I never worked in a unionized shipyard before so it’s all different for me.
I tried to call my general foreman a few weeks ago but to try to get a number to call an engineer, he didn’t answer nor call back. But he’s also in meetings or not even in his office often so i could be overthinking that. But I definitely sense the tension between my foreman and I.
If anything good came out of it, the interpersonal conflicts have deescalated to a good degree and the equipment isn’t messed with anymore. It was a constant thing since December until I was able to directly identify what was happening.
So if anything, I hope management saw the validity in my complaints regardless of how I approached things. And that I still have a job. :(
Sorry it’s a lot and I’m all over the place. I think it’s been heavy on my mental health and I needed to get it off my chest.
Thanks for reading