Let's bitch about our stupid, annoying co-workers

my co-worker's uncle got mentioned on an ILM thread ...

this is the "i know more important and influential people than you" co-worker

weird factoid - years ago I found out Dan Perry and I worked for the same company and almost pinged him when I realized that if I did id be the stupid, annoying co-worker.

we typically double up two instructors to a class here, so that if one person goes down, they have a backup. Typically we don't replace that person for the day unless it's 15+ people.

today, one of our instructors had to leave early due to an emergency, and instead of just telling the other instructor they'd be finishing the last last 2 hours solo, the supervisor began panicking and begging the team chat for someone to help take over.

Gee, Mr Supervisor, which makes more sense, letting the person who's been with the class all week finish, while you keep an eye on the class, or introducing a complete stranger to the class on the final day of training, who has had no time to prepare?

(fortunately they couldn't ask me - I'm taking dad to one of his checkups...booyah!)

i kind of need a sanity check / other povs on this.

i opt out of all work-related celebrations. i DO NOT share my birthday on the work calendar. i don't do treats in the break room. i don't go to retirement parties. i will avoid xmas parties if at all possible. and i don't care how it makes me look. i get paid to show up, none of these people are my friends, i don't want to relate to coworkers outside of work, my career 'ambitions' are miniscule compared to my desire to avoid awkward small talk or field happy birthdays from people i dislike. am i too much of an asshole here? should i pick one of these things to just do? i will sign a card if it's handed to me, but that's about it. thank you in advance for your thoughts.

I think these are quite small things and I get what you’re saying, that you’re not there to make friends, but stuff tends to be better when you do opt in to some of this stuff, doing otherwise makes things unnecessarily difficult ime

You're obviously ok with them knowing you dislike them so you must be ok with them disliking you back. Are you trying to show them how much of their reciprocal dislike you can take and still stand strong?

Is the mutual-dislike thing a dance or some other sort of performance that benefits you all? Everybody gets to say "whew at least I'm not THAT person" and pat themselves on the back.

Being pleasant with people I wouldn't otherwise spend time with occasionally lets me in close enough to undermine their bullshit with a smile but mostly I don't let them live in my head.

Yes, much better way of putting it. It’s more energy!

it's kinda unclear whether it's an issue of active dislike and more of a chill apathy? It depends on the culture of the workplace imo. There are some places where keeping to yourself and not participating really makes people think you're a dick, and others where, there are enough other people with stuff going on in their lives that it's less of a deal?

like perhaps you could just be the motherfucker with dark secrets and peacefully coexist while still maintaining your distance.

thanks. sorry i was being dramatic and over-generalizing - i don't dislike everyone at work & i'm actually pretty friendly with two or three people. the first year or so i was maybe more 'let's be friends' until i realized that just wasn't going to work for me, we didn't have very much in common, etc. we're still friendly though. the people i do dislike i'm absolutely ok with them disliking me back. group things are difficult for me (social anxiety).

Is the mutual-dislike thing a dance or some other sort of performance that benefits you all? Everybody gets to say "whew at least I'm not THAT person" and pat themselves on the back.

lol this is interesting. i don't think so? i think there is at least one other person who fills that role more prominently than i do. also i've had feedback from two-three people that i'm very nice and personable (these people don't strike me as super genuine but w/e). so maybe skipping social stuff isn't having that much of an effect.

i'm considering going to the weekly friday morning coffee thing once in a while. but that's a wfh day for me and when push comes to shove it's really hard to get me out of my slippers on a friday morning lol.

thanks for answering when i guess i have no intention to significantly change what i'm doing lol.

and my workplace is full of introverts and people who keep to themselves so i guess this is relatively Not A Problem now that i think about it. maybe just some ambient anxiety about coming across as gloomy - my partner told me the other day that i'm on the cloudy side when i asked him if i came across as dour or not, which is absolutely true and fair and made me lol.

I've got nothing much useful to say beyond I wish I could put a value on the hours I've spent a) manoeuvring and navigating around this shit and ii) worrying about the previous and future manoeuvrings and navigations to do with this shit. If you're good as you are, crack on!

Also, manoeuvring is a vowel-greedy prick of a word to spell.

I don't interact out of work with anybody I work with. I don't give out my phone number to anyone I work with either and beyond a 'have a nice day off' or 'did you have a nice day off' I don't really converse with anyone at work. it seems fine to me, tho I work retail rather than in an office and a lot of the shift is in a single staffed shop or going from shop to shop replenning. mind you I am v v bad a interacting with people in general and even a customers generic 'how are you today?' when said to me makes me uncomfortable to the point where I don't answer and instead ask them if they need a bag with their purchase.

I've worked several places where I've said out loud there's no fucking way I'm spending any of of my free time with you people. Super fortunate now to work with folks I genuinely enjoy being around but thankfully the company culture doesn't expect people to spend free time in company activities.

Depends on the workplace and the people but I feel like everyone workplace has at least one perfectly decent person who Just Doesn't Do That Stuff socially with colleagues. Once that's accepted I think it's ok. It's the pushback on it that can cause the friction and/or any impression that you're doing it to express your dislike. "Treats in the break room" might be the only thing I'm not sure about as not really sure what that is other than bringing stuff in for people to eat at their leisure? In which case it's fine not to do?

My workplaces usually if it's your birthday you bring in treats and no-one really makes a big deal other than asking if you're doing anything nice. I tend to work in introverted places though.

I am fortunate in that I like most of my colleagues and a few of them are close friends. If I didn't want to be around the people I worked with, I would probably look elsewhere.

That said, no one should feel pressure or anxiety about showing up for work shit like "Hawaiian Shirt Day."

I'm a lawyer, so most of my co-workers are anything but introverted.

There is nothing sadder than seeing someone hang out with people they work with outside of work. I will never spend an unpaid minute with a coworker.

There is nothing sadder than seeing someone hang out with people they work with outside of work. I will never spend an unpaid minute with a coworker.

When I was a magazine editor I would occasionally attend concerts with one co-worker or another. I took a guy to see Iron Maiden, and another guy came with me to see Bob Seger.

I have seen past coworkers socially. It can happen. Cripes this chat is depressing.

There is nothing sadder than seeing someone hang out with people they work with outside of work. I will never spend an unpaid minute with a coworker.

― brotherlovesdub, Monday, March 20, 2023 8:33 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is a completely insane post although i am ultimately tilted more toward the map position in this conversation--i have never sought to have friendships or meaningful relationships with coworkers and have dodged my share of social events. but i've also gone to my share of social events, it's a matter of finding a balance and realizing that some of these things are low stakes and can generate some good will in exchange for a couple hours of your time.

if you want to opt out of all this stuff i would advise being super friendly and accessible during work hours so you have some plausible deniability as being a nice person who "just doesn't go to those things"

There is nothing sadder than seeing someone hang out with people they work with outside of work. I will never spend an unpaid minute with a coworker.

― brotherlovesdub, Monday, March 20, 2023 8:33 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

I met one of my all time best friends at my job 18 years ago.

Regarding socializing, it's kind of moot being that my team is all virtual but when I was office bound, I went to some get-togethers, didn't go to others. Wasn't something I thought a lot about, we didn't have em often.

Lived with one of my former coworkers, but I knew him from theatre before he got hired.

Co-workers all being each other's best friends is a big thing in restaurants and bars though

I was close with a lot of my coworkers in the art handling business. I think some jobs are so specialized that they draw a certain type of person together that would often not find each other out in the wild. People not in that job/experience get seen as civilians, or outsiders. We all liked art and music more than the Regular People we ran into outside of work.

Now that I'm in a different city and not working, I don't know how to find people. My wife keeps trying to get me to go to book clubs and things to socialize but it feels weird and I'm resistant.

am i too much of an asshole here?

if this is what works for you, then you are totally justified in doing it that way. just realize that people will notice. but their noticing won't matter so long as you are reasonably cordial, competent and helpful in all the aspects of your job that really matter most to your co-workers. no one resents a co-worker who always delivers what they are paid to deliver and is moderately agreeable in the process. the rest is just hoo-hah that barely matters in reality.

I think I’ve hit all the coworker interaction points from socialization with them when I had absolutely nothing in common to feeling like I have social peers. The weird part is feeling awkward at the latter because the concerted effort to appease or avoid exists when you might just have a possible friend

There is nothing sadder than seeing someone hang out with people they work with outside of work. I will never spend an unpaid minute with a coworker.

Just to give a counterpoint: I don't really give a shit about most of the work I've done in the past, or the places I've worked (teaching is different, a bit), but I do remember the people I worked with. Often, it's the only thing that got me through.

I've worked in places where I've ended up really close to people and I've worked in places where I've known the people just are not for me. I know that in most contexts I'm not an easy person to get on with - niche interests, strong political beliefs shaping everything I do, unconventional home life and background - it can be hard to relate, on both my side and for anyone who gets to know me. I don't go the cinema or pay attention to any sports so a lot of small talk stuff doesn't work either. So it does make the idle chatter at work a little trickier. But I find that it's really easy to build rapport simply by taking an interest in people and asking some questions about specifics. "What's his name and how did you meet?" "What did you pick from the menu and was it good?" "Would you recommend it if you haven't seen the first one?"

I think it depends on the job/role how important it is to do this. I worked in retail for over a decade and my best jobs were ones where I made close friends. My favourite coworkers have remained friends, and it's been organic rather than contrived reunions - it just made sense to keep texting every few days and see what was going on with each other. I worked in one place for a year that was a very masculine, macho environment that didn't suit me - it didn't mean I disliked the people, it just didn't make sense that we would have been pals outside of work as we had very little in common in terms of interests or beliefs. I think in retail and hospitality you need those friendships - you're united by a common hatred of the customer and you need to be able to vent. There's few things that help ease the pressure like having a colleague who you can shoot a look at and they know instinctively what you're thinking and how to help you.

In my current job I work from home 3/4 days a week. I get on with people but I can feel the forced attempts at bonding and it makes me squirm. They're all nice people, some are even lovely, but I'm quite happy for it to remain at pub-every-three-months level.

In my current job I have to speak to vulnerable and distressed people quite frequently. Sometimes you take a call from someone and they disclose things that can be quite upsetting and triggering. My personality isn't one that really gets "upset" by things - I'm more likely to get angry at a colleague's ineffectiveness than upset by a client's circumstances, not because I'm heartless but because I think there's no point getting upset over what can't be controlled and instead it's better to work towards a better result. But I've seen some people get bothered by stuff they've heard, and I find it hard to not want to say something to help them. Of course, my something is usually more pragmatic than consoling - "you can't do anything about this now, so why don't you make a tea and work on something else instead?" But it seems to work, and I find people do respond to my slightly brittle attitude positively.

When we started the job, we did our training completely via Teams. We had a day-long session on dealing with upsetting calls and clients at risk of harm. At the end of it, the trainer asked us how we felt about being able to support each other. The rest of the room was saying "oh yeah I would definitely take someone for a coffee if I thought they were upset" and of course I was the only one who said... actually, I wouldn't, because I don't know anyone well enough, I'm not a trained psychologist so I might not say the right thing, and I've got enough on my own plate mentally without taking other people's stresses on. There was a good ten seconds of awkward silence before the trainer said "well, I respect your honesty." If I saw someone crying I wouldn't just ignore them but it would be to signpost them to support rather than provide it myself.

This thread makes me think that most workplaces are deeply dysfunctional.

I think some jobs are so specialized that they draw a certain type of person together that would often not find each other out in the wild

my current co-worker and I talk about this regularly ... though we have a number of mutual friends outside of work ... but then the job we do is pretty niche?

also we were volunteers in an all volunteer group before there was money to pay us so it isn't a typical workplace situation

do you all have co-workers as FB friends?

I was a bit more lax w/ it when FB was less of a toxic place, and even listed where I worked. then one day I made an off the cuff post about my pay raise, someone saw it, told another person who told another person, who was upset that they didn't get selected for our dept, and made noise about my 'bragging' about my pay raise, and it got back to my boss, who ultimately didn't care but said 'be careful about that' and scolded me mildly. so I removed the place I worked and haven't listed it since.

I temporarily stopped adding co-workers as FB friends, but my dept from 2011 - 2018 loved adding each other and I didn't want to be the one resister, so I added them all, but I immediately added each one to a special Friend group that is blocked from seeing anything I post, so as far as they can see, I have never posted. My current dept, I haven't friended a single person and we just don't do that (other than my boss, who I'd friended when I first met him years earlier, before he was my boss).

did manage to find out one of my former co-workers is a mega dumb Trump fucker, most of the rest are harmless people who post nonsense like "TODAY IS A GIFT, THAT'S WHY IT'S CALLED THE PRESENT".

I had a 'no current colleagues on FB' rule - so when I left I added the people I liked. My friends have a weird sense of humour and I didn't want any worries about who might misinterpret anything. Tbf no-one posts anything on FB any more anyway.

Absolutely refused to allow any of my 2001-2021 clients and their circle into my FB. The owners of the place where I tend bar were FB friends before they opened the place so the waters have been muddied since 2020. I would like to rant a lot more about the bad-tipping assholes of my area but even more about how the whole tipping situation shouldn't be happening because restaurant owners should pay a living wage, but that would burn some bridges I'm still walking across.

OTOH, it would give you the chance for the cool "walking away from an explosion" shot.

sort of lost the conversation thread but just wanted to respond to this.

I've worked in places where I've ended up really close to people and I've worked in places where I've known the people just are not for me. I know that in most contexts I'm not an easy person to get on with - niche interests, strong political beliefs shaping everything I do, unconventional home life and background - it can be hard to relate, on both my side and for anyone who gets to know me. I don't go the cinema or pay attention to any sports so a lot of small talk stuff doesn't work either. So it does make the idle chatter at work a little trickier. But I find that it's really easy to build rapport simply by taking an interest in people and asking some questions about specifics. "What's his name and how did you meet?" "What did you pick from the menu and was it good?" "Would you recommend it if you haven't seen the first one?"

i really appreciate this perspective. i've gotten better at asking people these kinds of questions. being "interested in others" at work. it does still feel like an act though, because deep inside i still long to be known and loved - there's a hole there from what can be summarized as "queer boy raised in conservative environment who has had to cut off his family". obviously stuff for therapy. but anyway my tolerance for being the "considerate gay man who is always interested in your straight & strong hetero family life usually with mormon cultural stuff involved" is not always there. part of this is the fact that i live in the mormon capital of the world, and my "respectable" state job attracts a lot of those kind of people. the other type of person it attracts is "respectable liberal" which also feels like a club i've been rejected from, somewhat by choice. i've also found difficulty in relating to others in my "less respectable" workplace at the gay bar where i dj, because queer people here all have this burden of trauma from being raised in the fucked up conservative background and many of them have really maladaptive responses to that that i don't want to get wrapped up in. it truly feels like i've reached the end of the line in the place where i live, like there are only so many "types" of people who live here and i'm just fucking bone-tired of all of them.

anyway, this is a funny conversation timing-wise, because a position opened up where i work that would be a significant pay raise. it requires conflict resolution skills and knowledge of records law. conflict resolution i am actually pretty good at i think. records law i find boring but could learn more enthusiastically if it was in the service of helping people reach solutions. i may have been ruled out already - this is the kind of position that the director here likely has some leads / recruiting in the bag for. i think i'm going to apply anyway though. even though i'm just civil but honestly cold and withdrawn when it comes to interacting with anyone here including administrators.

There is nothing sadder than seeing someone hang out with people they work with outside of work.

i'm going to assume this hyperbole and not the incredibly judgmental/ignorant statement it reads as.
one thing i loved about my industry is the creative/interesting/funny people it attracts. some of my best friends are former coworkers. my gf is a former coworker. i couldn't imagine working in a place filled with people i had a screaming desire to not be around.

that's not to say there's anything wrong with not doing work social events. even in my industry people understand that some people are introverts or private (or even in recovery) etc.

and even tho i enjoyed the odd work from home day before coivd, i've been 100% remote since i started working again and i am miserable. i miss the people. i feel like i've been in prison for the last 2-3 years. like my growth as a person has been stunted. i'm hearing less new music, going to way fewer events, learning about fewer books/docs etc etc etc – all stuff i'd have happening if i had that group of smart energetic people i used to be surrounded by. of course some people are duds; but idiots and dead weight tend to get culled from this business. and i guess i just did not realize how hard of a time i have been having until i typed all this out just now

generally speaking i wonder if it would be possible to feel more joy at work? instead of just grudging tiredness or dread all the time. which leads me to think that maybe i need a career change. no idea what that would be though. which reminds me i need to get back to therapy with a good therapist i can't find and don't have the money for. xp

There is nothing sadder than seeing someone hang out with people they work with outside of work.

actually this is "funny" because last week, me & my co-worker went out to lunch because we had to go to a work site, and in the main room of the restaurant were a table of people who also worked together who were having the type of interactions that I'm sure this statement is based on observing ... the guy who was obviously the boss making a dumb joke and the underlings dutifully laughing, and I think there was bro-y mentions of targets and deliverables.

do you all have co-workers as FB friends?

Something like 98% of my Facebook friends are musicians, fellow writers, or people employed in the music industry. Maybe twenty of those are people I shared physical office space with at one point or another. The remaining 2% are two or three blood relatives and two or three people I went to high school with.

yeah I guess the music industry would have more social media networking than, say, mine. that's what i see with the concert promoters i'm friends with as well.

apparently my good friend (the one I referenced upthread) has virtual whiskey drinking sessions w/ his boss. that's p cool.

ok I'm not *that* optimistic about work relations, that does not sound cool

drinking w coworkers = definitely a situation i will never be in, mostly because i don't drink anymore

Thanks for your followups, map, cuz the initial post struck me as bleak. I'm coming out of an office where it was like I was strange for bothering to say "good morning". Awful place with mostly ok people when you did have occasion to chat a bit. Terrible workplace cultures can be like that. I avoided any of their (infrequent) extracurriculars because they were horribly awkward. I got by with just friendly greetings and a personal commitment to not spending a solitary unpaid minute in the place (breaktime walks). Clear to me now that I stayed too long.

i did a line of blow towards the end of a shift once (was at a friend's house, we were having a weekend long party after work, and I'd brought my laptop to finish the day). and got a tough work question ten minutes later that only I was left to answer, thankfully they didn't ask me to jump on a call.

anyway i don't recommend that

I mean, I've never tried it, but I understand that coke really puts you at peak performance for at least a few minutes.

If you’re accustomed to it. If you’re really bowled over you will be a rambling, jaw gyrating disaster.