I know I haven’t actually been present in my own blog recently. I’ve written several lame posts talking about inconsequential things, avoiding any mention of myself and recent developments, and it’s time for me to re-emerge from the shadows. Since this is my blog, you can skip the following bit of cathartic writing if you wish — but it’s become somewhat obvious to me that my refusal to discuss certain goings on in my life is blocking my ability to move on and think of other things. So here goes.

My work environment has been rather tense lately. Last week there was high drama that literally had me feeling physically ill (when Chris is too upset to eat, you know it’s a bad sign. Chris enjoys the eating) that has devolved into an unhappy détente this week which, I’m afraid, won’t last much longer. The problem is that I am both in the middle of the high drama and yet not actually part of it, which means that there’s precious little I can do about it.

Lemme ‘splain. We recently hired a new employee. She works part time for me, and part time for Professor X — the two parts make a whole, this being one of the weird ways that we had to get around an unofficial official hiring freeze (anyone who works for a government agency will understand what I’m talking about). There have been what I will vaguely refer to as “adjustment difficulties.” The biggest issue is that the new hire, who presented so confidently in the interview, is massively insecure.

My first clue to this was that in her very first days, while she was still learning the ropes, she wouldn’t ask questions of Professor X because she was afraid she’d look stupid — so she would spend three hours combing the files trying to figure it out for herself, thus sending Professor X into a tizzy because it had taken her three hours (and counting) to accomplish a task that would have taken 30 seconds if she’d just asked him the question.

When she realized that he was unhappy, we identified a second issue: her defense mechanism is to present a slough of excuses (the computer wasn’t working, so-and-so hasn’t called back, etc. etc.), something that I happen to know Professor X has no patience for. He’s one of those people who likes people to be straight up with him: if something’s not done, tell him it’s not done and when it will be done. He doesn’t want to know the 10 billion reasons why it’s not done. It’s not my style of management (frankly, I don’t really have one), but at the same time I can appreciate it.

What I didn’t realize until much later was that she was actually afraid of Professor X and avoided him as much as possible – not a smart move for a new employee getting used to a new supervisor. She made constant references to me being “the nice boss” and him being “the scary one,” but I didn’t realize that she was being quite literal. She literally wasn’t meeting with him to talk about priorities, progress, anything. He sent her e-mails and she wrote back. That was the sum total of her communication with him, except for when he absolutely needed to know something and came to her office, which started happening more and more regularly.

And like the Cylons: then came the day when Professor X got so frustrated with her that he just got up and walked out of her office. No words were exchanged — it might not have been the most productive way to deal with the situation, but the alternative was that he was going to snap at her (or worse) and so he just excused himself and left.

And I spent the next two hours watching her bawl on my sofa. This was the part I wasn’t expecting. When I make someone angry like that, my first reaction is to try to figure out how to remedy the situation. When it’s related to my job performance, I go into overdrive to get the job done. It would never occur to me to sit on the sofa in my boss’ office and sob about how my other boss doesn’t like me and what am I going to do? Excuses are Professor X’s button, spinning wheels is mine. I just don’t have patience (or, frankly, sympathy) for people that want to sit around and feel sorry for themselves … for hours … in my office. Especially when it’s related to a set of duties that I have nothing to do with.

This pattern continued for a couple of days until things went into overdrive. Professor X went to our office manager. The office manager came to me. Meetings were had. The office manager met with the new employee to let her know that Professor X was unhappy with her performance and to let her know that ‘coaching’ would begin to help her meet goals worked out between the two of them and Professor X.
Immediately after the office manager left her office after the above conversation, she came to my office and burst into tears. Again.

“They’re trying to fire me,” she said.
“What are the goals they want you to meet?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. “They never mentioned goals.”

I thought this sounded fishy, so I went to the office manager, who gave me a checklist of all sorts of goals. The office manager and I have a rather rocky relationship — we have since the day she started. We work fine together, but we don’t like each other, and I think we’re both OK with that. And now I’m even more unhappy because I’m in a situation where I feel like I need to defend her against unfair accusations, which ranks right down there with having to admit that Fred Phelps has rights under the Free Speech Amendment.

In order to prevent the now-daily sob sessions on my couch (I just can’t lose an hour every time she has a tense interaction with someone in the office), I’ve started working with my door closed. I feel like I’m hiding. I am hiding. As much as I have been known to complain about it, I actually enjoy the fact that my office is in a high traffic area. People are constantly coming and going, and sometimes they drop by to chat. Being gay and Greek, I belong to two of the gossip-iest cultures on Earth — my genetic makeup compels me to know everything about everyone at all times.

So, the last few days I’ve left my door mostly open, but I’ve been rather short with her. I don’t like being mean to people. I don’t like watching their facial reactions when I know they want more from me, but I’m not willing to give it. On the other hand, I feel like my goodwill and kindness is being used as a crutch, and I don’t have any more to offer. Not without a good faith effort on her part to show me that she’s taking the advice we’ve been giving her since day 1, which she’s refused to take because she’s too insecure. I’m willing to be supportive of anyone that shows even an ounce of initiative, but thus far … nothing. And it’s becoming harder and harder to be patient.

And so, my days are much more stressful than they used to be. I used to enjoy coming to work in the morning. Now, my heart starts pounding as I trek down the hall to my office. Will I be able to get in without getting sucked into another session of sobbing and endless questions to the effect of, “Why doesn’t anyone like me?” Will today be the day that it all goes to shit and she just walks out? How many meetings do I have that will take me away from my office to the relative safety of other buildings on campus?

How much longer is this going to go on? And so, fair readers, now you know what’s going on with me. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to move on from this toward greener pastures. Thanks for listening…

Tags: meetings, SHE, stress, work