Well, look at the bright side. If she’s already a known loon, and took a couple of days off, she’ll at least get wrote up (or ought to). That’ll make it all the easier to get rid of here when she flys off the handle over “Somebody put a TACK in my CHAIR! AND they DRANK all of MY coffee!” 
See, that’s just it. Your boss acknowledges that the complaints from Elma are “ridiculous” and “nitpicky” yet he doesn’t want to talk to the ridiculous nitpicker. He wants you to put up with it instead of dealing with the problem.
He’s avoiding the issue. IMHO, he is not a good boss.
It makes me wonder what else he wants his employees to put up with so he can go stick his head in the sand.
Hey, Rebekkah. It’s Monday. Unless you’ve got some holiday thing going on, everyone in your office should be back at work today.
Could we have an update?
This so reminds me of the ‘missing coworker’ thread from last year.
That is nit-picky stuff and only takes a verbal “Knock that crap off”…that doesn’t warrant a termination. If that actually happens, unemployment would be in the double digits again, but not because the national economy was in the shitter. Of course you tell each employee to accomodate each other; you wouldn’t tell an employee (no matter who’s in the right) to “Keep that attitude up”. The boss should never be viewed as some Pit Bull that bites someone in the ass just because you felt verbally slanted. He/She is the in-house arbiteur, one that investigates firsts and then makes recommendations and then executes those recommendations…not just blindly react because you said that someone got on your case/nerves verbally.
I’ve been there and done that…it used to be uncharted depths to me at first, now it’s just scientific procedure to me. Somehow you think that this should be some sort of contest…“Who Can Get Their Co-Worker Fired First?”.
Homey don’t play dat.
Update time, and it’s a doozy.
So what happened?
Nothing.
Absofuckinglutely nothing.
Boss talked to E. this morning. No idea what he said. He’s docking her pay for two days. He talked to the office mgr, asked her to apologize to E. for the way the situation was handled, to “be the bigger person”. Office mgr told me that my boss is going to ask me to do the same, but he was too busy today to talk to me, so the simmering resentment was allowed to fester further all day, to the point where I am royally pissed off. Boss has asked me to come in am tomorrow to talk about the situation. On the plus side, cuntface has told neutral third party coworker that she will be looking for another job.
What do I plan on saying? I plan on telling my boss that his response was, imho, unacceptable. I’m going to say that he sets the tone in our office, and whether or not she stays, his inaction has given her tacit approval for her actions, which she will take from this job forward. Beyond that, he has made me feel maligned and unappreciated by making it clear that it is ok for me to be talked to in this manner. I’m fuming mad, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to maintain my composure.
I’ll post another update after work tomorrow.
That’s fucked up. Your boss sucks. I hope your anger mellows enough for you to be able to sleep well tonight. You’ll need to be rested to stick to your guns and tell your boss exactly what you think.
This is completely true, in my opinion. To me, this is a quitting offense - now that you know that your boss was lying to you when he said he valued you as an employee, it’s time to move on. If I were you, I would go to the meeting with him with a resignation letter prepared in advance to slap down on the desk if he asks you to apologize. Homey really don’t play dat.
I’d love to do that, but I really need the work 
You don’t want to quit–or threaten to quit–unless you have something else lined up.
Take a deep breath and try to calm yourself down. Then, sit down and write out what you plan to say to your boss. Read it, then write another, less emotional, version. You want to state your case, but you don’t want to say something you’ll regret.
Your boss’s objective is to get peace in the office. Unfortunately, it seems he’s taking the “let’s just have everyone apologize and get back to work” approach. Your objective is to stop being pushed around by this co worker. Right now, your objectives conflict, so you’ll have a bit of a struggle.
I would state to your boss that you understand that having a good working relationship with someone is often more important than your pride. That’s why if this were an isolated incident, you’d be more than willing to apologize even though you don’t believe you did anything wrong. However, this is not an isolated incident. You’ve compromised before in an effort to make peace, but peace isn’t happening. You want a good working environment, but it’s extremely difficult in this case. Give him examples of what you’ve done. Bring in notes in case you get nervous and forget things. Be professional and try to keep emotion out of it.
Basically, you want to assure him that you want the same thing he does: a good working environment where you can do your job. However, you’ve tried compromising, and it’s not working.
You may not get what you want. However, you will be on record as having professionally discussed the problem with him and stated your case.
I’m surprised no one else has asked this yet:
Just what kind of hold does this nutcase have on the boss? What dirty little secret does she know that makes her immune to discipline?
Unfortunately, I’ve worked for a Quivering Tower of Jello in the past and I’m confident that the misbehaving employees didn’t “have” anything on him. It’s a piss poor management “style” and my experience is that it comes from putting people in management positions without any training.
Thanks for the update, Rebekkah.
So, now that you know that Elma’s staying for a while, what are you going to do? She says that she’s looking for a new job, but that’s no guarantee that she’s leaving any time soon.
Are you looking for a new job, yourself? Not that you should quit before you have something else lined up, but it might be a good idea to find other places that would value your efforts a little more than your boss does. Maybe my ego’s too big, but I’d be pretty insulted by all this “just appease Elma the Nutcase” stuff by now. She’s creating a really hostile work environment for you, and I just can’t see anyone putting up with that for a second longer than they have to.
I had your office, slightly larger at 9 people. I had your Elma. In my case she was the office manager with 24 years seniority. I had your boss who sat back and catered to her and did nothing. In my situation, I absolutely was a threat to her…I was coming in under a created job position in which she was to hand over many of her duties (which she never fully did). I spent 15 months - way too long - jockeying and fighting for the right just to do my job.
Now, I feel mostly sorry for my Elma and how insecure she must have felt. But mostly, I blame my boss. First he told me just to ignore her, she’d get over her resentment in time. Then, he told me to cater to some of her unrealistic demands (are you seeing the resemblance here?). Finally, he instructed ME to confront HER directly, unofficially and without going through the proper office procedures (HE didn’t want to do it and wouldn’t even sit in to mediate). That went over about as well as you’d expect.
I went from being a happy, motivated, productive employee who routinely worked 60+ hours per week to a demoralized, miserable employee who could barely stand to put in the required 40 and who spent all my time (lunches, etc.) holed up in my office to avoid “Elma” and the office politics that went with her. She just had way too much seniority and control over that office for me to do anything without the intervention of the person in charge - my boss. Finally, I ended up being “let go” - it wasn’t so horrible, as I got a very nice severance package, recommendation, etc. out of it. Apart from the stigma (my first firing) the only thing I felt on the day I got let go was incredible relief, and I walked out of that building feeling like a thousand pound weight was off my shoulders.
But I very, very much blame my boss for being absolutelyfucking ineffective. I held my tongue on this thread because I hoped that your boss would pull through. But, if he hasn’t yet, there’s every possibility that he never will. Just something to keep in mind.
So does your Boss have a boss?
Here in the states a “hostile work environment” is not something a person has to put up with and if my boss told me to “be the bigger person” I would respond that I AM the bigger person and that E needs to be A person.
A little late to the thread, but I wanted to throw some more support Rebekkah’s way. In a similar situation, I would have done exactly what she did initially. Provided it didn’t send me too far out of my way, I would have tidied up my Inbox, expanded my working hours somewhat, etc. to make sure that I had demonstrable, documentable evidence that I had tried to accomodate the complaints of the other party. In a situation like this I, and I suspect Rebekkah, like to be able to stake out the moral high ground, so to speak. Before things come to a head, I want to make sure that I have taken reasonable steps to defuse the situation - steps that I can show to my boss to bolster my side of the story.
Good luck, Rebekkah. Sounds to me like you’ve more than done your part.
Her boss more than likely doesn’t have a boss as it sounds like a small insurance agency. He is most likely the owner of the agency.
As you mentioned, a hostile work environment is troublesome and if his policies directly contributed to said hostile work environment, Rebekkah might have a leg up on him, legally.
Sam
If you quit with what you’ve documented, Rebekkah, you will probably get Employment Insurance. My situation was similar, and I did get it after leaving a hostile work environment. I’m currently laid-off so I’m looking at the jobs every day, and there are always ads for insurance CSRs.
Look at it this way; sure you need the job - we all do, but you need to keep your physical and mental health more, and staying in a position where you know you are being treated badly is bad for your mental health.
Good luck, remember to stand up for yourself.
Good luck, sweetie. I’ve been in this situation before myself–my bully backed off when I confronted her about not being my boss, but she was much more reasonable and more of a cold fish than E.
She runs on adrenaline and emotion. Your boss (who I agree is wussing out) would rather not deal with either, he just seems to be that kind of guy. So you’re doing the right thing, using facts to show a pattern of behavoir. He needs something he can grab onto so he can trump the emotional tirades with cold hard reason.
It won’t be easy, but try not to show anger to the boss. Like I said, he doesn’t seem to be comfortable with emotions and confrontation, E’s specialty, so stay as calm as you can and he’ll flock gratefully to your side.