r/workplace_bullying

I have observed the handling of visitors, deliveries, meeting rooms, and security in offices, and I have noticed that certain processes rely heavily on paperwork, Excel sheets, and “ask at reception.”

What workplace process have you observed that badly needs upgrading?

Hi. I too am struggling with PTSD after a traumatic experience at a job. It was actually about a year ago but it’s still lingers. I wake up extra early. I think about it while I’m trying to go to sleep. Frankly, I would like to take revenge. Any ideas? I don’t want anything drastic like harming somebody physically or anything, but I would like to do something to just really annoy the hell out of somebody. If you ever have any ideas, please share them here. Thank you.

I’m currently and have been experiencing work place bullying which is pretty sad if you think about it. I’m a grown women in my 30s and these girls are in their 20s still acting like they are in high school. I’ve worked for this company before and left because I experienced pregnancy depression and post partum depression well I came back like 2 years later because I almost died also so I needed time. Everything was fine until recent past couple of months. Unfortunately I did say something when they all left on the clock to go do their things we work in a medical office urgent care. But even so I’ve notice they didn’t want to train because I had switched positions so I had to train for that I had to leave to another location to train because they wouldn’t show. I’ve noticed small things at first like giving me all the pre ops I was like okay that’s fine I’ll do them and then giving me all the drug screens while they take the easy task just rooming a patient without doing blood pressure or pain scale nothing just putting in the room. Then I had a book for search words I was gone because I tore a muscle and they took my book. I don’t touch anything of theirs nor did I give permission. Then I had some pictures up of my favorite characters because everyone has pictures in the clinic well mine got torn down all the time. If it’s something they don’t want to do they give it to me so they can stay back and chill. I’m older I got hip problems from having my baby dislocated my hip I rest my legs on a small rolling chair. They saw that and the next day it was gone they took it away. I will have music playing really low in the background while I’m working and looking at the board and when I leave they turn it off and click exit from it. You can tell when they just don’t like you . I have literally done nothing to them. I hardly have conversations with them. They don’t teach students they stick to their pack. And the students notice it too. I have to put notes on everything and take videos because they have switched out my name from a patients I did to their own name.

I’m going to try and keep this as calm as possible and explain the situation I have been in.

I am friends with one of my coworkers outside of work and we have recently got very close. They found out some information and shared it with me.

Around 2 months ago they told me one of my coworkers who has been actively hating on me, actively complaining to the manager about me and constantly talking shit about me runs as an admin this separate work group chat under an alias name, where she talks shit about me with some of the other workers in it. They make jokes about me, and plan complaints with other staff to try to get me fired

This is such high school BS behaviour and this woman is 30. Grow tf up seriously. I found out that there are many other people from my workplace in this groupchat, and they conspire against one specific person at a time, jokes about me being into the manager, saying I’ll never be in a relationship, that I’m annoying, that I’m shit at my job, and that I’m an awful person. I have been nothing but nice to all of these people and some of them I even considered my friends.

Ever since that I have been making sure to be very nice to them because I have this information for a later date. I found out she is very close and friends outside of work with my manager. And that he will listen to everything she says. This is corrupt. I went through 2 months of working once a week and survived on nothing, purely because she was spreading lies about me. And the worst part is, she is kind to EVERYONE else.

I recently got a promotion so I am at a higher level than her and she has been getting worse, when I tell her I need something done, she goes against it and does it her way, she doesn’t tell me when she is leaving to go up to the bathroom, she doesn’t tell me her plan. When I tell her my plan for the shift she doesn’t listen and says “I’m not doing it that way” I am significantly younger than her and she doesn’t treat anyone else like this…maybe it’s my age, maybe it’s because I treat everyone with respect, and am kind and generous…but I have been getting treated like shit for the last year by her and all of this information about her conspiring with other workers against my nature was the icing on the cake. I knew it.

I don’t want to be nice anymore, but I know if I start pushing and enforcing my role she will complain and try to make up everything she can to get me fired. Especially considering I found out she was friends with the manager. I am so done. I am staying, not quitting and I’m going to wait until all of those childish people are gone, that will be my win.

This is not just about her, this is about all of those people in the group. I have started telling much less about my personal life, gradually talking less and less but still being very kind and bringing good energy. I know they all hate me, and I am okay with this. They are children, who happen to be 10 years older than me.

I have been doing everything I can to do better at my job so I can prove them wrong, but I don’t need to do that anymore. I will do the best I can to show them they can go to hell.

Just wondering what other people think about the situation I’m in, and what I could do. I can’t report directly to HR without consulting my manager first. And I am pretty sure he won’t listen due to his being friends with them. What can I do without confronting them to make them know I know about this.

I’ve been dropping a few hints over the last couple months, saying “oh yeah remember our old manager, he is so nice I think people reckon I have a crush on him” or things like “I don’t fw people who are kind to your face and talk shit behind your back” that is directed at my other coworkers, who are SO NICE to my face but I know that they talk shit behind my back. I want to do more so they get paranoid about it and they know I know without full confrontation

I still want to revenge a bully boss after almost 10 years. Do I need to get over it?

I was humiliated Infront of my colleagues at the time and the person was a pig.

Any advice please?

I recently started a new job, so I’m still very new to the company and getting to know everyone. I’ve had an uncomfortable interaction with one coworker, and because this has happened so early on, I’m trying to work out whether I’m reading too much into the way she’s now describing me.

I was on a speaker call with my manager. My coworker had left the room, came back in and started interrupting while I was still on the call. I gestured for her to be quiet, and afterwards I said something along the lines of, “Please, next time don’t interrupt my call.”
She immediately responded, “Oh, is that what we’re doing now?” The conversation then became about me supposedly wanting to hide things or keep conversations private, when my point was simply that I was on a call and didn’t want to be interrupted.
She told me I was being rude.
About ten minutes later, I went back to her because I didn’t want there to be tension and tried to reset the conversation.
She later sent me an apology, but in it she said something along the lines of, “I know you and I are both quite feisty.”

That word really bothered me.
I have never been “feisty” with this woman. I haven’t shouted at her, argued with her previously or behaved in a way that would make that an obvious description of my personality. I’m also new she barely knows me. We had one disagreement, and suddenly I’m being described as “feisty.”

What also stands out is that she is noticeably softer in the way she communicates with my manager. Yet when I’m direct with her, my directness is described as rude.
There was also a comment afterwards asking whether this was my first time working with Dutch people, almost as though the interaction could be explained by Dutch directness. It isn’t. I’m familiar with Dutch people and direct communication.

I’m a Black woman, and this is where my concern comes in. I’m very conscious of the stereotype where a Black woman being direct or setting a boundary gets reframed as angry, aggressive, difficult, “feisty,” etc.
I’m not claiming I can prove that this is consciously what she’s doing. But I also don’t want to ignore language that could start creating a particular narrative about me at a workplace where I’ve only just arrived.
Would feisty other you in this context, particularly coming from someone who barely knows you? Does this sound like normal workplace friction, or would you also be paying attention to the way you were being characterised?

I’ve been working at the same location for the last five years. I consider myself to be a hard worker and never find myself gossiping with others. I like to keep my life simple and personal to protect myself from negative people at work who just look for anything or anyone to complain about. It’s been three months since I’ve been reported to our union by some coworkers I’m not close to and have never held any contact with at all. They tried claiming that I don’t do anything and I’m one of the favorites at the school. I work full time and attend school full time at the moment and never focus on anything negative. Lately I’ve felt stressed out and targeted by these people and their fake allegations. Thankfully I’m being backed up by other workers, but continue to have the fear that they report me again for any little lie they make up about me. I’m a very kind and respectful person who goes out of their way to help everyone and especially them since I don’t want to go down on their miserable level. How do you guys deal with people like this apart from ignoring them? I’ll be honest and saw my self esteem has been declining since this incident and finding out about the report.

“Your manners are so bad”
“you need to improve your communication skills “
“What’s your previous job?”
“ You can’t say somebody else is wrong “[her Japanese is not good enough to understand the word <different >and <wrong>]
“ you can’t ask her that question”(my colleague said she got engaged,and I asked is your finance foreigner?)
She asked me outside the office and make just 2 of us space.
“ do you know what is your priority of your job?”
“Is this job too difficult to you?”
And criticizing me in public group slack.

I joined my current workplace a few months ago and honestly, I feel like I’ve been under a microscope since day one.

I was called something pretty horrible on my first day, and since then I’ve constantly felt judged. My boss has commented on my grooming, I’ve been shouted at multiple times, and I’ve even been told that there are complaints that I’m “not working.”

There’s also a classmate of mine who is very close to my boss and the seniors. I feel like she has a lot of influence, and sometimes it feels like people have already decided that I’m incompetent.
She has even shouted at me over work-related things. She really feels terrifying and kinda feels like she’s actively in directly bullying me. During our college days also she tried to disrespect me a lot like I’m below here like an untouchable or something; would talk sweetly but her words are literal torture so I cut her off. She was one of the first friend group in my college days

What makes it harder is that I’m genuinely trying. I’m only a few months into the job, I commute almost 2 hours a day, have other responsibilities/jobs, and I’m also trying to support my family financially. I’m exhausted but I still show up and try to improve.

The scrutiny has gotten to the point where I sometimes sit at my desk with a pit in my stomach because I’m scared of doing something wrong. I even get anxious about walking up to people to ask basic work questions.

I know I’m still learning and I don’t expect anyone to hold my hand. I just want to become good at my work and build a reputation for being reliable.
I don’t want to quit. I need the experience, the money and the career growth. I also don’t want to start bootlicking people or getting involved in office politics.

For people who have dealt with toxic workplaces/favouritism:
How do you protect yourself, build a good reputation and stay mentally detached from office politics?
I just want to keep my head down, get better at my work, get promoted and eventually build something of my own. I’m honestly just trying to survive this phaser without completely losing my confidence.

My mom is currently an assistant manager(AM) at a restaurant chain and I believe she is getting bullied at work by her general manager(GM) and I just want to know what would be the best way to deal with it because I am so fucking angry for her.

The bullying started when my mom was first promoted to AM and was moved to her store to work under the GM. At first, it was because my mom made mistakes in the beginning (which I believe is common for anyone new to the job). Then, the GM would yell at her for not knowing english fluently. GM would purposely make her attend meetings to help her "practice english" and then yell at her for not understanding certain things. My mom was also the only one who did not get paid hours for attending these meetings. The GM would call my mom anytime there was the smallest problem or mistake even during hours she is off work (the tone she uses just makes me want to smack that bitch fr). The GM would also threaten to demote my mom if she keeps making any mistakes.

Just to preface, my mom is a pushover and is afraid to defend herself. She also does not speak english fluently but she is extremely efficient at her job and has worked for the establishment for 10+ years. She was happily working before she became an AM and she has dealt with this for 3 years. I just can't stand that she is going through all of this and she won't do anything about it. She says after being yelled at by her GM she can't sleep well some nights. She has looked so much older recently and this situation genuinely makes me want to cry.

Is it possible/appropriate for me to help her handle this? How should she deal with this so that she won't lose her position or face any retaliation? She is afraid that her GM has good relations with admin and get her demoted if she says anything.

I’m currently looking for advice as I started a new job that was an amazing opportunity and even though the environment is a bit toxic, I would not like to leave it due to it being impactful work that I’ve always wanted to do.

From starting this job, my department is a department that is disliked from the rest of the company so even from the interview, I could tell something was a little bit off. As soon as I started my job as my supervisor is not the one who hires, but the person above her I was hired, but from the interview, I could already tell the supervisor dislike my personal personality.

For context, this is a very older woman who has been at that job for almost 20 years and does minimal work. Because the type of work is something I am passionate about. I do have ideas and things that we could do to make the department more impactful for the community however, this is something that she has created resistance on and believes my ideas are bad yet higher ups and human resources have loved my ideas which is why they currently want me there. In all honesty I feel like she has a good thing going for her because she gets paid with doing almost no work and me being there could potentially bring more work and responsibility to her if they decide to implement any of the ideas that I have.

Now, because of this, I have seen that she does not explain things well to me or withhold information for me to look bad when I am doing my job. Whenever I speak to her, she looks at other employees when when she thinks I’m not looking and rolls her eyes so everybody in the department now is kind of standoffish towards me.

The work is very meaningful and I plan to stay even if the department treats me a certain way because of my supervisor however I am thinking what can I do to protect myself? Should I document everything maybe in a separate document with dates and times so if something happens, I show that to HR or is that something that HR would not really pay attention to later on?

I am a little bit frustrated because I do not wanna leave the job, but I also wanna protect myself because I am worried that she will slowly try to get me fired.

Any advice?

If you are currently in a job where you are being bullied and harassed… where the bullying has been going on for months… where you have even spoken to management about the bullying and the response is something similar to get over it or get out…. Don’t bother to go to HR…. Don’t report nothing else to management….

Please, please please
Documents, everything and anything
If you couldn’t get access to camera footage, get it quietly reach out to the correct people.
If the meeting was over, Zoom, have them send you the copy of the recording.

I honestly suggest recording meetings, depending on the legal right in your state… if you know you’re about to have a meeting record it..

If you could record conversations between you and the individuals that are doing the bullying do it based on the legal right in your state

If it’s a text messages that you have. screenshot everything. Unsave the contact name so you could have the phone number showing . screen record everything because even when I show these text messages I was told it could be AI

Research and take it beyond the workplace. don’t bother reporting it to the police. Unless you have physical hard evidence…. Depending on what it is, take it above the police.

I was too mentally far gone in my case to do it properly and it’s been a year and a half since I resigned, and I’m still suffering from the trauma of that workplace

I really truly wish I did things properly because maybe that would’ve alleviate some of the trauma that I’m still under

Get as much legal advice as you can
Understand some of things may cost money I sure as hell didn’t have any money, but it’s worth it in you can borrow it.

If you have to get evidence from coworkers know that sometimes they may not be truthful over text… speak with them in person.. and honestly record it… again, depending on what’s legal in your state…..

And the most important thing of all MOVE QUIETLY… don’t over share what you’re doing.. only speak when absolutely necessary when talking about the situation… don’t give anyone any warning that could delete or alter any evidence…

When I think about my situation, it’s not that I can’t get over it.. but what happened truly messed me up.. and all I could think is I wish I did more…. But mentally I was really so far gone….. it’s been nearly a year and a half and it still makes me feel sick… and so angry I didn’t do more… and they all got to get away with it…

In my situation, a lot of people would’ve been charged with serious crimes.. my boss manager included…

Don’t end up like me… depending on what your situation is… fight for your rights….

Add on: SECURE A NEW JOB FIRST BEFORE PROCEEDING WITH GETTING JUSTICE..

I have 2 jobs and just got the second job, this is my third week. I apologize for over-generalizing but I see the same type of employees, especially in hospitality. Older women in their 50s-60s, typically blonde, most likely former aspiring actresses/models (I live in LA) where they act all sweet and then backstab. For some reason this type of employee can never stand me. They can't control me and try to make my work life tough.

At job 1, the same type of lady is super sweet to other employees, making them coffee, lending them money and rubbing the shoulders of a few of them like a massage. She told me straight to my face she can't stand me and thinks that all of these employees are her little HS clique. Meanwhile she is talking negative behind their backs, she was complaining how Mexicans get all the jobs and even about me going to community college, how immigrants should be paying more money to attend. ​

At job 2, I am constantly being followed by this employee who gossips about everyone and only has bad things to say. I go for lunch and she comes to the break room pretending that she is cleaning (she is a housekeeper) so she can talk and ask me for personal info. One of the complaints is about her housekeeping team, how everyone speaks Spanish and can't stand it. Meanwhile she tried to criticize me and hates my direct coworkers. My direct coworkers avoid her and told me they want to do nothing with her.

Like, how do you deal with these kind of people? It seems they always hate me.

I am unable to provide any information on my situation without the possibility of making my situation worse.

Has anyone else experienced bullying from one work environment to another that doesn't make sense unless you're being stalked?

Is there a way to figure out how and why this is happening?

Once upon a time, I was the favourite candidate for the next level position. Here comes this new face who does a lot of networking and socialisation with all the male colleagues. He was also ´so lucky' to find a local girlfriend who supported him by inviting people over and all sorts of things people do to show how nice they are so that you think about them when a ´random' position appears. Meanwhile, you spend your time working on your project, alone, far away. Comes the end of the summer holidays and you are told you are not favourite anymore. You had no plan B, no support, no political skills. You cannot compete with a sexist system.

I work as an RN in aged care. During my shift, the staff member pressed the emergency buzzer four times from four different rooms when there was no apparent emergency. This caused unnecessary interruptions and concern regarding the appropriate use of the emergency call system.

On another occasion, when a resident was deteriorating, the staff member remained in the corner and stated that he was “watching.” I addressed my concerns calmly and professionally and asked him to speak with the manager. I did not raise my voice, threaten, insult, or disrespect him.

The staff member subsequently made a complaint to Fair Work alleging workplace bullying. The matter was considered, and the outcome was in my favour.

Throughout the situation, I remained professional and focused on resident safety, appropriate care, and my responsibilities as an RN.

I’ve been working in my department for a while now for a few months and honestly the first 2 months was a big adjustment for me. It was a career change and everything was so new to me I had made a few mistakes (all of which I have owned up to as my shortcomings).

Now I can say I have adjusted and mistakes on my part are few and far between. The problem is my coworker who I coordinate plans with, They have been working here longer than I have, so when I provide her with the revisions, they would always complain about it. At the beginning I took it as constructive criticism and I motivated myself to be better to give them no reason to complain. I sent it in earlier, I would give a heads up for incoming revisions, I gave detailed reasons as to why revisions were made. But I noticed her comments would only get snarkier and ruder over time, especially directed to me.

This started bothering me because it started with passive aggressive comments and now its escalated to uncalled for remarks in our group chat, She would cc me by name and my boss, complaining about (valid) revisions (that are part of our job). I would point out revisions were not in our control and we have to adjust given the nature of our work. They would just criticize me and bring up my past mistakes from when I started, saying that the reasons I’m giving is not the full reason and to “Stop making excuses” for myself. My manager privately messaged me and told me not to reply anymore to the group chat and he will handle it.

My manager told me that what I said was true, and all revisions go through him first so he knows the reasons are valid, but they are trying too hard to keep the peace and not reprimand our other coworker too much, the thing is, the coworker adjusts to the revisions anyway, so in terms of getting the job done they do it.

It just bothers me seeing that last message calling me out, in front of everyone. I’m a bit ashamed and dreading to report back since it’s been a reoccurring thing. Every time there are revisions it’s my fault, they cant seem to grasp that there are a lot of factors that go into it and she is just shooting the messenger.

If you guys have advice or similar experiences I’d appreciate reading it!