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If you have a whiteboard in your cube/office, write a note, something like "Shhh, concentrating, do not disturb!" or put up a little sign on your desk. If he comes by, politely tell him that you're working on something that requires concentration and you can't talk right now. Let him know that if he doesn't see the sign up, he's welcome to come and talk to you, but if he does to please not interrupt your work since it's very easy to lose your place and yada yada yada. It's what I do when I'm knee deep in writing out a new master page and any "What'd you do this weekend!" conversation will throw me off. Don't go running to his manager like a passive aggressive goon though.
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Jul 26, 2012 01:00
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I just started about two months ago so I'm hoping that the novelty of having someone new to annoy will wear off soon combined with me continuing to ignore him will make him go away on his own. I'd totally do what you suggested, but he also uses the programs I use and he interprets any concentration as me having difficulty with using my computer and tries to offer to help, of course with the attitude of "Oh, look at the little girl trying to use a computer. How quaint!" And I absolutely guarantee any sign saying "Concentrating! Do not disturb!" would result in him barging into my cube asking "WHATCHA CONCENTRATING ON SO HARD?! HUH?!" and grabbing and rocking my chair and/or shoulders. The only reason my coworker and I were considering going to HR was because we're the only two he does this to (the touching is what bothers us the most) and we also happen to be young and female. HR/Supervisor contact is a last resort though, we're just hoping he'll lose interest after a while. Basically I just needed somewhere to rant about him, which is why I came to this thread 
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Jul 26, 2012 01:15
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Aquatic Giraffe posted:I just started about two months ago so I'm hoping that the novelty of having someone new to annoy will wear off soon combined with me continuing to ignore him will make him go away on his own. I'd totally do what you suggested, but he also uses the programs I use and he interprets any concentration as me having difficulty with using my computer and tries to offer to help, of course with the attitude of "Oh, look at the little girl trying to use a computer. How quaint!" And I absolutely guarantee any sign saying "Concentrating! Do not disturb!" would result in him barging into my cube asking "WHATCHA CONCENTRATING ON SO HARD?! HUH?!" and grabbing and rocking my chair and/or shoulders. He's not going to lose interest in a while. If you've already asked him to stop, then I'd really suggest going to HR on this one. You shouldn't have to suffer through this rear end in a top hat going out of his way to creep the hell out of you every day. He might not be explicitly trying to get in your pants at work, but it's still harassment. He gets away with it because no one takes it to HR. If you haven't asked him to leave you the hell alone, then I'd start there, THEN go to HR if he continues.
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Jul 26, 2012 06:08
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Women's Rights? posted:Don't go running to his manager like a passive aggressive goon though. My 2p's worth: If you feel you need to tell someone how uncomfortable you are then follow the correct chain of command - that means speaking to your manager, not his. If you speak to his manager then the first thing his manager is likely to do is talk to your manager, who will then feel (justifiably) left out of the loop. If the talking-to-managers doesn't get you anywhere then I'd say it's HR time as it sounds like borderline sexual harassment. Just because it's 'friendly' doesn't mean it can't be harassment. edit: I am assuming you have, at some point, actually asked him to stop. If you haven't then do that first. Yeah it might be a bit awkward but really you owe it to yourself to make that effort for two reasons: firstly it avoids dragging HR into it and their presence is usually a mixed blessing at best, and secondly it might be that no-one has actually told him before and it's all he needs to hear. rolleyes fucked around with this message at 13:26 on Jul 26, 2012 |
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Jul 26, 2012 13:22
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Aquatic Giraffe posted:The only reason my coworker and I were considering going to HR was because we're the only two he does this to (the touching is what bothers us the most) and we also happen to be young and female . HR/Supervisor contact is a last resort though, we're just hoping he'll lose interest after a while. Basically I just needed somewhere to rant about him, which is why I came to this thread Yeah this has crossed a line. If this dude is touching you without your permission, whatever his reason, you are well within your rights to tell him to stop. No uncertain terms, "Stop touching me." He'll protest, he'll probably be like "Oh man why are you so uptight? I was just teasing!". Keep saying it. "Don't ever touch me again." He'll gaslight, he'll try to make it seem like you're the bad person here for yelling at him, but keep saying it. And if he ever tries to touch you again after that, feel free to say "(NAME), I told you to never touch me again. Stop." There's a bunch of goons who are going to jump in here and say you shouldn't do that, you shouldn't go to HR, you shouldn't make a fuss. But if he's freaking you out, AND freaking another girl out, go make a fuss. Tell your boss. Tell HR. Start documenting every single time he comes over and creeps on you. Cause it's FUCKIN' CREEPTASTIC that he's touching you.
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Jul 26, 2012 16:19
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I think as soon as he started touching the two of you that he crossed a line. If someone thinks that is acceptable and they've only known you for a little while, I imagine that it is only going to get worse if it doesn't get stopped now. Maybe mentioning to his supervisor that he is being distracting is a good first step, but if it continues, then the both of you need to go to HR.
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Jul 26, 2012 17:32
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Aquatic Giraffe posted:I just started about two months ago so I'm hoping that the novelty of having someone new to annoy will wear off soon combined with me continuing to ignore him will make him go away on his own. I'd totally do what you suggested, but he also uses the programs I use and he interprets any concentration as me having difficulty with using my computer and tries to offer to help, of course with the attitude of "Oh, look at the little girl trying to use a computer. How quaint!" And I absolutely guarantee any sign saying "Concentrating! Do not disturb!" would result in him barging into my cube asking "WHATCHA CONCENTRATING ON SO HARD?! HUH?!" and grabbing and rocking my chair and/or shoulders. Listen to the other posters: what they say is correct. He is harassing you and you absolutely should not have to accept this. It's not acceptable at all and you should not have to put up with it. 1) tell him to stop 2) complain to your boss 3) complain to HR If you feel that you don't want to make a fuss (and I can sympathise), then ask ask them if they can handle it unofficially. Perhaps a quite word from your boss to him will make him stop. If doing it unofficially doesn't work, then you go official.
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Jul 26, 2012 17:49
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CitizenKain posted:I think as soon as he started touching the two of you that he crossed a line. If someone thinks that is acceptable and they've only known you for a little while, I imagine that it is only going to get worse if it doesn't get stopped now. It's ok to get a pass the first time, but once you've told them to stop it's completely unacceptable for them to continue.
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Jul 26, 2012 18:20
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Honestly, I don't even think it's your job to tell him to stop, though if you feel comfortable doing so, it's certainly a good idea. And if you don't, that's what managers and HR reps and flamethrowers are for. It's actually his job to know that this poo poo is unacceptable in the first place.
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Jul 26, 2012 18:45
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Has anyone here tried to quit and have their boss fire their [only] co worker? This just happened to me a few weeks ago. I got a raise to pacify me but..I think I'm being hosed over somehow [working alone for 3 weeks is insane, no sign of wanted ads yet either...and he went on vacation for a week on a whim after this]. I have a stress disorder brought on by being trapped in situations that I think I can't get free from. So part of me is happy I got a big raise, but part of me is panicking and freaking me out causing nightmares and poo poo. Actually I had a nightmare my boss was being an rear end in a top hat to some guys pressure washing outside and he was beaten to death. That was pretty hosed. I still remember the sounds and seeing the body going limp and falling under a truck in the mud. My brain thinks it's real but I know its not. I don't hate my boss I actually think he's kind of a square like me. He doesn't make the best decisions though. I work in animal health but I'm also computer/database lady. If it wasn't for the animals and owner's convenience I would gently caress off a lot easier. The emergency center we work with was just bought out by a corporation, making some weird rules come up and the basic fluff you get about team work. They wanted all the competitive clinics in town [we are technically joined by the center as we have exclusive rights] to make a forum and share ideas  . I was there at the meeting representing my boss and I was the only person to stop and say "If we start copying one another to make [corporation] happy what will make our services unique?". The only people that applauded that were male veterinarians that also had strong business structure. The women thought I was a meanie. I have other stories but I'm getting long winded.____ Aquatic Giraffe, creepy men flock to me at times. If someone ever touches me I just look at them and go "Hey buddy, personal space". If they're an rear end in a top hat, just tell them "Don't touch me it's my right, if you don't appreciate it, it will become a problem". That is if you don't want to go to HR right away. His supervisor might like to know he's wasting time distracting you though.
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Jul 26, 2012 19:08
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Infinite Might posted:Has anyone here tried to quit and have their boss fire their [only] co worker? This just happened to me a few weeks ago.  My response to this situation would be "hey great, now you have 0 employees to do the work!" and quit anyways.
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Jul 27, 2012 00:27
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Well, as luck would have it my coworker and I were talking about it on our walk back to work from lunch and unbeknownst to us our supervisor was walking behind us and presumably overheard. Dude only stopped by once today and remained outside my cube. Hooray for accidental and painless problem solving. If he starts again our supervisor already knows we have an issue with him if we have to do anything through official channels. Infinite Might-- I'd leave ASAP. You don't owe them anything, and I would imagine future potential employers would understand your reason for leaving if they ask.
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Jul 27, 2012 00:45
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Has this been posted: https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm? Because if not then it certainly belongs here. The language of corporate bullshit: 70 years and still kickin'.
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Jul 30, 2012 04:15
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= Me = Coworker Uh, guys, why are you doing things this way? Because  We've always done it the other way because Well it was decided by [person] When? In a meeting a few weeks ago. You think that, just maybe, everyone should've been notified? It wasn't my decision, and it's not my job to notify everyone of changes. I understand that, but you were one of the few people in that meeting. This is yet another example of [Person changing process/format/whatever that affects the entire team without notifying anyone]. How are we supposed to get aquainted with a new system and processes when things that affect us are being changed without our knowledge? Well I'll go talk to [Person] and ask him to notify everyone.Still waiting for some sort notification. I think I can take consolation in the fact that I can piss these people off with the statement "Until there is an official notice of a change from management, I'm directing my team, and anyone else who asks, to follow the approved process." The best part is that management has backed me up on it and people usually come to me to ask questions.
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Jul 31, 2012 18:39
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Sundae posted:North of it, there's a double-fence around the train tracks, which in spite of being out of service, are still pretty much constantly locked. In theory you can open them, but it doesn't help much since all the entrances on that side are disused semi-truck loading sites IIRC. The gates are electric sliding gates on tracks, and they have a nifty amount of barbed wire on them. Having to take an elevator 5 feet is hilarious. I thought our building had some questionable construction decisions, but you win.
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Jul 31, 2012 22:30
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Pope Mobile posted:Still waiting for some sort notification. I'd almost swear we work at the same place based off that alone. No no, the overnight support guys certainly don't need to hear policy changes that directly affect the support team or anything. 
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Aug 1, 2012 01:49
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I work with a project manager who spends his entire day hiding from anything that looks like work. He actually got IT to change his email address slightly and silently blackhole the old one so he wouldn't get email requiring him to do things. On the rare occasion you can locate him long enough to get him into a meeting he'll spout stuff that shows just how completely lost he is, agree to follow up with stuff he has no intention of doing. If you're lucky he'll duck out early with a fake phone call. All of this behavior is obvious to everyone (how could it not be?) including his superiors however due to reorganizations he has no direct supervisor and therefore seemingly cannot be dealt with. What is happening now is whenever a project comes up everyone involved begs for it not to be assigned to him. Unfortunately this means his plan to avoid work is actually working.
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Aug 1, 2012 11:04
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He is probably a contributor to this thread, who we'll be hearing from shortly.
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Aug 1, 2012 11:14
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door.jar posted:I work with a project manager who spends his entire day hiding from anything that looks like work. He actually got IT to change his email address slightly and silently blackhole the old one so he wouldn't get email requiring him to do things. On the rare occasion you can locate him long enough to get him into a meeting he'll spout stuff that shows just how completely lost he is, agree to follow up with stuff he has no intention of doing. If you're lucky he'll duck out early with a fake phone call. Now that's a genuinely bad PM. And it's also a massive failure of management. That guy should be out the door yesterday, although I have to give him some kudos for the email trick.
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Aug 1, 2012 11:48
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door.jar posted:I work with a project manager who spends his entire day hiding from anything that looks like work. He actually got IT to change his email address slightly and silently blackhole the old one so he wouldn't get email requiring him to do things. On the rare occasion you can locate him long enough to get him into a meeting he'll spout stuff that shows just how completely lost he is, agree to follow up with stuff he has no intention of doing. If you're lucky he'll duck out early with a fake phone call. Honestly, does firing at your place have to be done by the direct supervisor? Because HR should pin this rear end in a top hat to his chair and say he either shapes up or he's out. Or, y'know, you could reorganize things so he actually has a direct supervisor who could then fire him for this sort of behavior. Or you could assign projects to him so he'd get fired when they weren't done. Seriously, this poo poo happens in real life? How has he not been called on this?
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Aug 1, 2012 13:31
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door.jar posted:I work with a project manager who spends his entire day hiding from anything that looks like work. He actually got IT to change his email address slightly and silently blackhole the old one so he wouldn't get email requiring him to do things. On the rare occasion you can locate him long enough to get him into a meeting he'll spout stuff that shows just how completely lost he is, agree to follow up with stuff he has no intention of doing. If you're lucky he'll duck out early with a fake phone call. This sounds like the guy is following the example of Moonshine from that "The American Dream" thread posted a long time ago on here. I found a copy of it at http://shii.org/knows/American_Dream, I had it saved as a pdf.
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Aug 1, 2012 13:48
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ObsidianBeast posted:This sounds like the guy is following the example of Moonshine from that "The American Dream" thread posted a long time ago on here. I found a copy of it at http://shii.org/knows/American_Dream, I had it saved as a pdf. He's doing a pretty piss-poor job of it, since everyone seems to be aware of what he's doing.
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Aug 1, 2012 14:04
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ItalicSquirrels posted:Seriously, this poo poo happens in real life? How has he not been called on this? Probably the same reason no one in my place of work has been let go for piss-poor performance and/or continually shoving their work onto others and doing nothing: a lack of documentation and management oversight. Unless you actually document someone's continual fuckups, management isn't going to do anything. You can sit and bitch about someone all day long to co-workers and management, but nothing's going to happen unless you physically track what they're doing (somehow). Top that with management that is either incompetent themselves or just doesn't want to cause problems by firing people. It's why I'm doing the work of people who are paid almost twice what I am and answering questions they should know. I mean, poo poo, half the people here can't even fill out their own timesheet. Someone was literally hired to do that every week on Thursday. Thank god we have new management after the recent reorg.
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Aug 1, 2012 15:12
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The small (~30 employee) company I work for showed flashes of soulless corporation at my performance review yesterday. The entire first half of the year has been a bit of a shitshow, 3 of our 4 project managers quit during the time with me being the only one staying. That meant a lot of extra work both in handling existing projects, accommodating new ones, and then training the replacement hires. On top of that, I helped assume responsibility for a product line that I had helped develop, which is a crazy time-intensive thing to oversee. And to top it off we transitioned a different product to another team who has no background in the industry so they required, and still require, handholding any time they run into a problem. What this means, of course, is that in my efforts to keep 2 product lines afloat while training new hires, I was not doing my job and so my QPR rating was a record-low 8/20 which also excludes me from the personal bonus program. I was basically dumbfounded at the time so now that I've had a chance to process things and compile a few arguments, mainly "why the gently caress should I ever help anyone at the company again if it does not directly improve my personal metrics", I need to pull my boss into another meeting. And work on my resume, just in case.
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Aug 1, 2012 15:14
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GWBBQ posted:Ah, that's why I couldn't figure it out. On one of the angles in Bird's Eye View, the gate at the tracks is open http://binged.it/OA1bCg Ahh, okay - confusion totally makes sense there. Those gates are almost never open. The 5-ft elevator thing *almost* makes sense; it's that B156A has extended ventilation systems for the first floor manufacturing-style laboratories that B156, as a wet-lab / office environment, didn't have. (Of course, why are you merging two completely incompatible building designs in the first place?) It's just really funny to see that you've got a 5-foot-tall staircase next to an elevator that literally only goes up and down a few feet. What an absolute waste of everything. Just put in an elevated hamster-tube or something and don't merge the buildings in the first place!
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Aug 1, 2012 15:45
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Sundae posted:Ahh, okay - confusion totally makes sense there. Those gates are almost never open. Man, I'm so glad that every building here is numbered and the layouts are labeled like an excel spreadsheet.
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Aug 1, 2012 17:08
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One of the work at homes has been in the office more lately. This person laughs and laughs all day, either on phone conversations or when people stop by her cube. Probably 3 hours a day of laughter added up. One of the other people in my row went to their supervisor and nothing was done. So the row person put a note on laughter ladies desk politely asking her to keep it down. The laughter was cut down a lot today but it appears that she has turned on instant messenger/outlook/ and cell phone sound notifications. One of which goes off every 30 seconds. If it wasn't for headphones I might have flipped already. I can't have headphones on all the time so there might be a confrontation this week. Pretty sure I've said it before in this thread, but there seems to be a direct correlation between position on food chain and amount of noise created without regards to people in the area. ChaiCalico fucked around with this message at 00:05 on Aug 2, 2012 |
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Aug 2, 2012 00:00
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madpanda posted:Pretty sure I've said it before in this thread, but there seems to be a direct correlation between position on food chain and amount of noise created without regards to people in the area. One of the programmers in the next cube bank over spontaneously whistles, hums, and sings along to his music. I swear to God I have never wanted to throw a stapler at someone as badly as I want to throw one at him.
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Aug 2, 2012 01:15
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I have a new project manager at the desk beside mine and I am interrupted literally every three minutes because she has a question. Noise in your work space is a teeth-grindingly annoying thing.
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Aug 2, 2012 01:25
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The Berzerker posted:I have a new project manager at the desk beside mine and I am interrupted literally every three minutes because she has a question. Noise in your work space is a teeth-grindingly annoying thing. Are these questions about her job or more like "what are you doing this weekend?" questions. To contribute, I love the people in my office but we're renovating at the moment and the mail room has jumped around a couple times. Today I knew I was gonna get asked about it all day so I struck preemptively with a sign.  Apparently it is more worth it to bother someone with a simple question than to look around for two seconds for a notice. 
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Aug 2, 2012 02:23
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GWBBQ posted:Are your rooms at least in order? Here's the main part of our second floor. 30 Goddamned Dicks posted:One of the programmers in the next cube bank over spontaneously whistles, hums, and sings along to his music. I swear to God I have never wanted to throw a stapler at someone as badly as I want to throw one at him.
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Aug 2, 2012 02:28
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Cup of Hemlock posted:Are these questions about her job or more like "what are you doing this weekend?" questions. They're about her job. I have the most experience out of our team of 9 (save for one guy who sits in another room) so I get why she asks me, but it's still frustrating to be interrupted so often. The problem stems from the fact that the office is relatively new and grew quickly (when I was hired there were 3 PMs, including me) and we've never had proper training procedures, or process documentation, or whatever else a proper workplace should have. But, you know. We're busy. e: It's all okay though, because as of the 13th I will be at a different campus on the other end of the city, in my own office with a door, instead of sharing a half-room with 4 other people.
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Aug 2, 2012 02:56
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The speakerphone guy in my office is gone for the week. It's so blissfully quiet. Not only does he use speaker phone for every call (and uses the voice commands in addition to speakerphone on his cell phone when not using his desk phone) but the subcontractor he calls 90% of the time has the most grating, annoying stereotypical New York accent.
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Aug 2, 2012 04:53
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30 Goddamned Dicks posted:One of the programmers in the next cube bank over spontaneously whistles, hums, and sings along to his music. I swear to God I have never wanted to throw a stapler at someone as badly as I want to throw one at him. I've worked with 1) a guy who jiggled his leg up and down when concentrating, making the false-floor bounce and my monitor wobble. 2) a guy who listened to his music so loudly that I could hear his headphones while wearing my own. He also tapped his foot in time to the music, bouncing the floor and my monitor. 3) a guy who wore heavy cufflinks so every time he moved his mouse they would loudly bang on his desk. 4) a guy who seemed unable to slide his mouse backwards, and always lifted it and dropped it again when mousing around. 5) a guy who had a habit of tapping on each desk as he walked down the aisle in the office, causing me (and anyone else wearing headphones) to look up thinking someone was tapping the desk to get their attention. All fairly minor, but when they go on for months you start wanting to stab people with office supplies.
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Aug 5, 2012 10:52
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I worked corporate for two and a half years, IT Jockey at a small town hospital in some weird area between IT Janitor and Cable Monkey. I got 0 days off, I worked through a contracting company that had the most bureaucratic hiring process I've ever seen, it took me a week before I started work and two weeks after I started to finally finish the process because it required a dozen forms to work out. That whole job was hell, I had a supervisor who answered to a regional manager of the hospital who was in no way connected to the contracting company, and my supervisor also answered to a corporate manager in the contracting company. So my boss had two bosses who also had two bosses, the IT Lead Coordinator and the director of the hospital, and through the contracting company it was the manager above the corporate manager and then the lead for our region's IT contracting area. The work itself was montonous computer setup and running cable to new office rooms being built. I fished a lot of cable, set up switches, organized server rooms, and even did the cart-full-of-new-keyboards-replacing-old-ones schtick. Everyone expected a cheery face and the same tired office jokes get used all the time. I don't understand how people can do it for so long. And that was just the administration side, I hardly ever interacted with the nurses and real staff unless they royally hosed up their workstation computers (which was too often) I quit that job and have been working for a moving company since. The lack of a concrete schedule is bad but I'm getting paid the same amount and physical labor is so much more rewarding. I lost no benefits because I had no benefits. Basically if you hate your job and your life and can't stand corporate, life really is like Office Space in some regards and you can work at someplace that lets you clear your head while you work without having Milton burn the place down first
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Aug 6, 2012 21:04
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I am proud to announce that after two years of pestering management and HR my department will finally have titles which make sense, thus allowing my work experience to be identifiable if I ever move on and to make it so people looking for jobs don't see the title and have no idea what the hell the job is.
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Aug 6, 2012 21:36
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Holy poo poo. Is this actually happening? I'm scheduled for a new computer on Friday. I'll have up to date software! Websites required for work will stop telling me that my browser is out of date! I'll no longer get "done but with errors on page"!!
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Aug 7, 2012 15:09
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Stoatbringer posted:I've worked with I work in an open office setting because my boss thinks it makes us look hip (he never quite left the dotcom mindset). It's a loft conversion so there's nothing dampening any sounds at all. No cubicles, just a room full of desks. Having to hear 5 people playing pandora stations at once is pretty maddening, but my boss is the worst offender when it comes to lack of self awareness. Throughout the day: • Clips his fingernails and toenails loudly at his desk • Farts constantly; hacks loogies into his trashcan • Takes all his business and personal calls on speakerphone • If he's put on hold, he puts it on speakerphone, turns the volume up to max level, and wanders around the office • plays audiobooks loudly (no headphones) • edits movies of his granddaughter in iMovie (no headphones), so you have to hear the same clip of a baby crying 30 - 40 times in a row while he "perfects" it He complains whenever any of us put headphones on and accuses us of not being "team players". Cubicles might be oppressive-looking, but I miss my old jobs where I was actually able to work in peace.
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Aug 7, 2012 15:59
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Scurvy posted:• Takes all his business and personal calls on speakerphone I had a boss once who would take all his calls on his Bluetooth headset, and stroll up and down the office talking loudly into it, often even sitting on the edge of people's desks while he carried on his conversation.
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Aug 7, 2012 22:05
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Stoatbringer posted:I had a boss once who would take all his calls on his Bluetooth headset, and stroll up and down the office talking loudly into it, often even sitting on the edge of people's desks while he carried on his conversation.
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Aug 15, 2012 19:34
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