Has anyone had an experience with boss or colleague who rose through the ranks by constantly finding fault with other people's work, putting others down while contributing nothing useful? How to manage such people at work who have an undermining attitude?
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I was sleeping in my car to get by after being stabbed in the back. Engineer here too. I was paying off debt instead of having a lot of savings and was blindsided. It wasn’t performance related but personal issues management had with me. They could have just talked to me but no. I am not working as engineer now because I can’t find a local job. I have no mercy on management not HR for allowing these people to bully. They told me how great my technical skills were. Ha
I lost a job due to “not being a good fit”. That’s all they told me. Then someone came back and told me after the fact that I just didn’t fit in. There were some coworkers going behind my back to manager who wasn’t even my boss talking about me. Not one if these complaints ever made it to my face. It must have been my go getter attitude and lack of participating in dirty jokes. Turned my whole life upside down. I’m not recovered to this financially or any other way.not sure I can ever work with people in a team environment again due to trust issues. I’ll end up punching someone in the face or something stupid.
The psychology of people in corporate environments is interesting. They willfully out away conscience and lie to themselves that their decisions help the nines in some way. They gang up and take out opposition. But this ain’t the senate. This workplace politics has no place when workers lives are involved.
@2hgc+19ac4ymj spot on ! That's exactly what happened to me. Spoke to manager about an incompetent, narcissistic team lead who was setting me up for failure and ended up being gaslighted and laid off. I doubt if my manager had the technical acumen, behavioral skills and the intent to effectively understand my situation and help resolve it. The setup is soo hierarchical and patronizing that management folks are always protected against such complaints. S—s to be a junior engineer working for a toxic boss.
Mobbing co-workers? What do you think the near retirement folks were doing to the retirement eligible who weren’t thinking of taking the retirement package? It’s called HARASSMENT!! Yet, they still got promoted. Talk to your manager about feeling harassed? What a joke! They clam up, never speak to you again but, they do meet up over happy hour to discuss what to do with you. They set you up for failure and push you to the bottom of the ranking. That’s called DISCRIMINATION!! Upstream management stinks!! Bunch of jerks!
@1hyl+19ac4ymj you're management material ! This post is intended to help deal with folks like you.
@ycp+19ac4ymj, @ytb+19ac4ymj Instead of claiming that every company is as bad as EM, think about why EM is floundering and why EM lost 60% cap in 7 years and why EM got kicked out of the Dow. Think about what EM is doing wrong. EM has a toxic culture, does not value technical work and promotes bullies into management and leadership positions. These bosses are lucky they have EM to employ them, because they have no technical skills and no other discernable talent beyond flattering their bosses and stepping on their subordinates. I have seen such people being promoted very quickly into leadership. Everyone else, just find another job and leave. EM is not worth it. Keep looking until you find a better place that values actual talent.
@ytb+19ac4ymj : That's. Most of us are college grads, not some high school dropout from bumfuk, LA.
I feel what OP is saying and I have the exact same experience. Maybe we have the same boss right now lol. Boss doesn’t know anything and always wants to put my work down and take credit at the same time. Doesn’t provide direction cause boss dont know sh–.
Best is our Upstream and Downstream colleagues at LinkedIn. Any post that a senior manager or executives post – these low life individuals rush to "like" on LinkedIn.
You will find a bunch of these individuals from RTD, CSR, Upstream expats in XTO etc. whose full time job is to "like" Linkedin posts made by senior ExxonMobil executives and VPs irrespective of what the content is. Common worker bee can go break the atom and these people won't notice or acknowledge it.
We work with these psychopaths and they are known to be incompetent, selfish and worthless individuals who made a career out of s—ing to immediate management.
People are storming the people's house because of the boss is encouraging. So employees storming you to find fault is perfectly alright. They just cant touch you because of workplace but they can make you miserable so that they don't have to touch you and achieve their goals.
OP it is entirely possible that your boss is unaware of how they are coming across and means well. Talking to your boss would be ideal, however we know that can be political s–c-de in toxic environments. Another option is an anonymous email to your boss’s boss about general behavior issues. I just go through working with a person who talked at people and not to people. They had no idea, I believe. Most people lack self awareness.
I would say hyenas are coworkers and managers who mob another coworker. Which does happen often enough.
What you describe is at times a necessary thing. No need to vilify people who see issues and better ways to do things. That is a talent in itself. An issue comes in when a person does it with the intent to undermine another. There’s no honor in rising up or lifting yourself up on the backs of others.
It’s the attitude it’s done in. Also going after people making it personal rather than about the process.
I would say hyenas are coworkers and managers who mob another coworker. Which does happen often enough.
What you describe is at times a necessary thing. No need to vilify people who see issues and better ways to do things. That is a talent in itself. An issue comes in when a person does it with the intent to undermine another. There’s no honor in rising up or lifting yourself up on the backs of others.
It’s the attitude it’s done in. Also going after people making it personal rather than about the process.
Believe me people like this exist everywhere not just EM. Many people on this board need a little perspective. The world is all in all not always awesome.
OP here. Thanks folks for your comments and suggestions. My boss is soo obsessed with proving that he is smart infront of an audience (especially my supervisor) that he withholds information, unappreciative of all my work, asks 3000 questions in a desperation to prove me wrong and constantly talks in a way that is undermining. He doesn't provide any clarity or direction to my work, yet constantly looks for dirt. As the saying goes, "if you go digging for dirt, you'll find it". I feel like I'm walking on a landmine field every single day where I need to be lucky every time. A narcissistic a–hole!
My S&OP manager.. terrible..
A bunch of people in Lubes threw a party after a manager was promoted out of the department. People like that are revered in XOM.
Sounds like some “leaders” in CSR. If you talk to your boss, she might just yell at you and gaslight. Better to find another job at a less toxic company and quit.
EMIT here, I had a boss like that. I was able to actively work to get out of that job as quickly as possible, but that person is still around. Their peers even joke about how bad of a people manager they are. It seems like this person’s career trajectory has hit an upper limit but I still feel bad for anyone that has to report to them.
You will find such people everywhere. Usually, such people feel unsafe about them and keep on escalating non-issue as major issue to show others down.
Inform about such people to your manager in 1-1. I have recently done this last month about one of my colleague.