While I consider him something of a friend and am going to be gaming with him, I was just reminded my his actions today about how I constantly need to watch my back around him. (And seriously rethink that “friend” thing.)
Three things really bug me, and I think he’s oblivious to how he comes off.
1> When he started the job, he had no experience in the field. He started one week before me. On my first week, he told me ‘in confidence’ that they were going to open up a new Supervisor position and that they had told him that he was the only one qualified for the position. I pointed out that I had previous supervisory experience in the field and was therefore qualified for the position, while he had less than two weeks experience. Completely oblivious, he blew me off and continued with his oratory about how the job was his. (Never happened, the job didn’t exist).
2> Idea Theft. We worked closely together. I had a couple of really good ideas that I talked over with him before presenting to the bosses. He latched on to one and was hellbent on presenting it himself, despite my clear objections that it was MY idea and I wanted to present it myself. Now that’s just asshattery, to openly steal an idea and tell someone that you are going to present it yourself, over their objections.
On another occasion, I mentioned a suggestion I had and was going to present to the boss when she got out of her meeting. Then I got called away and he got called to the office. When I got there, boss tells me about “his” idea. DAMN! I mentioned that it was my idea and attempted to expound on it, only to get the look of death from the boss, who clearly thought I was stepping on co-worker’s toes.
3> Running Mouth. OK, I’ve had some problems at the place through repeatedly attempting to make points that my bosses don’t want to hear. While Cow-orker tried to come across as everyone’s friend. He’s outright slammed me as being less than discrete. BUT;
We were told something in extreme confidence by someone who asked us not to repeat it because this person was the only one who knew it (outside a couple of upper management people) and therefore, they would know the source of the leak. Half an hour later, cow-orker repeats this “rumor I just heard” to the one guy that he absolutely should never have said a word to. Just to curry favor and make that person think he’s a good guy.
Well, he left because the job didn’t pay enough. Fair enough reason, the man has a wife and four kids.
But now we have a supervisor position opening up for real. I mention it to him today and suggest that they might not consider me because of the problems I’ve had with our other two co-workers, both of whom are lazy bastards who freely screw off when the supervisor isn’t there. (That’s where I’ve run afoul of the bosses, because the two deny it and our bosses are too lazy to actually check the records and see what happened. So it’s “just your word against theirs (, shut up).”
Ex-Cow-orker tells me that they won’t consider me at all. (Yeah, thanks for the vote of confidence) But that he might just come back to apply for it because they’ll give it to him.
Personally, I think the man is delusional and overconfident on his own part. This is the man who was fired or laid off from his previous five jobs. The man who, while working with me, kept applying for jobs paying $85k-$150k, jobs he had NO qualificiations for, because "I can do those jobs’. (As opposed to applying for jobs similar to the ones he’s done in the past that pay $35k-$50k and would pay the mortgage.)
You know, now that I think about it, he was always pretty quiet about the reasons why he was fired or laid off, blaming his bosses for various things. I’m thinking that maybe they noticed the behavior above and didn’t care for it.