Those things are hard to communicate in writing. I believe you, of course, but you should have seen the thread a bit back about people who just give others the creeps. A large number of people basically insisted that finding another person creepy means that ipso facto the whole office has ganged up on the creepy person and deliberately (and randomly, I guess) decided to make them the pariah. Sad to say, a large portion of the SDMB is apparently composed of folks who are “off” or “creepy”, and don’t wish to take responsibility for their own role in driving others away.
Given Biggirl’s “wagon circling” comments, I think we can surmise that she’s one of those people as well. Remember: no one is actually responsible for whether other people like them! If everyone hates you, it’s because they’re all conspiring! It’s never because of your own behavior!
Apparently, some of the people posting in this thread are so grossly socially incapable that they aren’t even aware of the fact that screaming swear words in the workplace is completely inappropriate behavior.
OK, everybody, stand up straight and bend your knees slightly, then pull your underwear out of your ass.
There are too many things to consider in this situation and we don’t know the whole story.
Did the boss know what he was doing when he gave the new guy the ‘better’ schedule or is it possible he didn’t look at the calendar for the next twelve months and figure out who would get the best Fridays off?
Maybe if the boss had known what shift (B or C) had the better Fridays he would have given those to the senior members. This whole thing could be the bosses fault for not thinking ahead. If this is the case then the senior workers should have been given the ‘best’ schedule and none of this would be necessary. Even retroactively when brought to his attention.
The next thing is this;
Next year the holidays and the Fridays off will change, so if you have the good Fridays this year it’s likely you may not have the ‘best’ Fridays off next year. It’s a give and take thing, this year you win, next year the other guy wins. It would be in the best interest of the business to award the first choice to senior members (those are the people you have, presumably, had the most faith in and relied upon the most to do their job) - nothing wrong with that, and if I was a senior member I would have said something to the boss too, instead of the new guy. Like I said, maybe the boss didn’t know the ramifications of the scheduling until Dolores brought it to his attention.
Has anyone in this entire thread suggested that it isn’t? For that matter, where’d you get “screaming” from? At most, people have pointed out that Chips guy reacted inappropriately to something that was nonetheless pretty rude in the first place, and that his creepiness is pretty irrelevant to whether Dolores acted properly or not. All of which Dolores seems to have agreed with. I don’t know where you get off accusing people of being socially incapable, just because they don’t think it’s nice to ask for something, then take it anyway because you can. Really; do you think that’s perfectly acceptable?
Your self-righteous tantrums in this thread and (if memory serves) in the “creepy people” thread are pissing me off. It might perhaps be the case that if I was one of those friendless people, I would be so pathetic that I’d be grateful for even a charity friendship. Nevertheless, I feel no obligation to hand them out to other people.
I recommend therapy for folks who simply are incapable of engaging in normal social intercourse. Actually doing the work to improve yourself is probably going to be more effective than becoming holier than thou on a message board and demanding that the rest of us extend pity friendships.
Though the extroverted T mentioned above in this thread sounds like a wonderful person, I’m not even capable of doing such things. I don’t feel guilty for that, either.
C just came in and apologized to me. He said he’d been stressed lately. So I told him that I handled it wrong, and I was sorry. All better! He also said the “fucking coward” was meant for my boss! :eek: He of course didn’t tell the boss that. Neither will I. Time to let it die.
Non-minor nitpick: If I am understanding the schedule correctly, C is not losing days off. He is losing the better consecutive-days-off schedule, but not the actual days. In either version of the plan the actual number of days off is the same – 26 additional days off a year (every other Friday).
I do appreciate the position being voiced by several in this thread that Dolores’ actions were out of line; I agree. IMO, when he said no to swapping schedules that should have been the end of it. However, I think she’s shown a remarkable level of acceptance of criticism and is not being given credit for it by some. As **Excalibre **points out, many of us here are candidates for the Island of Misfit Toys; that doesn’t mean we need to project onto others all the damn time.
What I don’t recommend is that other people try to screw them over as much as possible. That doesn’t help things either. I’m not saying people even necessarily need to go out of their way to be extra-nice to them. Just use common human decency. As someone else asked, would Dolores have handled the situation the same if the coworker in question had been there five years to her ten, or nine to her ten? Would she have done the same if it was a coworker she didn’t think was creepy? One she liked?
Good for you (both) that everything worked out alright. Hopefully he will adjust to your working environment (and maybe your group will adjust to him a little) so you can all get along better in the future.
And FWIW, the comment makes way more sense directed at your boss than it does at you.
Dolores potentially may have more off-day. This is from my understanding.
Actually, most of the posts after which Dolores admits that she’s ripping her off were directed towards light strand’s view that what Dolores did was correct.
I think what’s bizarre is that Delores asked the guy herself rather than simply going to the boss and asking if she could switch since, after all, she had seniority (preferably without suggesting who should be switched back in her place.) I think what Delores did was a bit of a social faux pas - it’s expected that many minor perks in an office are given on the basis of seniority. But if you ask me, personally, to give something up because I “owe” it to you since you were here longer (rather than, say, asking me as a favor), I’d be pretty turned off.
Nevertheless, the choice of which Friday each person gets to take off is of such minor importance that it’s ridiculous. Every shift-type job I’ve had, decent schedules are awarded on the basis of seniority. The fact that Delores is now getting a five day weekend followed by a two day weekend, versus a four day weekend plus a three day weekend, once, is such a tiny issue that it’s amazing what people are making out of it. The comparison of, for instance, the more senior employee who tried to steal a junior employee’s property (the boombox contest thread) is so inapropos that it’s completely ludicrous. This is about an incredibly minor issue of which Fridays you get to take off; unless I misread the OP, it’s not like Delores gets even one extra day off for being on List B. The idea of someone throwing a fit over such a minor inconvenience absolutely floors me.
Delores was reasonable to ask the boss to switch her since she had seniority. She would have been perfectly reasonable to ask the social misfit to switch with her as a favor. Her only error here is asking him to switch on the basis of her seniority. I agree that this is an awkward, inappropriate request. But that’s all it is - Delores made a minor social faux pas. The social misfit chose to read it as some major snub, and then threw a fit in his workplace. The fact that the issue was which Friday each person gets off just makes the entire situation the more ridiculous, since the “privilege” of having one set of alternate Fridays off over another is such a miniscule perk that any argument over it is silly. Delores did not take anything from the misfit. She didn’t even try to do so. She tried to get him to switch around his days off with her. It’s absolutely ludicrous to imply that this involved “taking” something that was his.
As to whether someone with seniority should get preferential scheduling, I have little problem with that, as long as it’s not excessive. Should you get fist pick of weekends? Sure.
But let’s consider this scenario: Suppose a newbie coworker requested Christmas week off. The boss says yes. The newbie goes on to purchase non-refundable plane tickets, and promises his family that he’ll be home for the holidays. By around Thanksgiving, you decide that you’d like that time off yourself, and so you ask newbie to cancel his plans. He says he can’t. You then go over his head and ask the boss to force him to work that week.
Good, I’m glad. See my post for my analysis of the situation: you made a very minor social faux pas, and you’re being absolutely roasted for it in this thread at least. I think you’ve handled the misdirected outrage in this thread with a good deal of aplomb; it sounds like you’ve handled the office situation equally well.
Dolores Reborn, I just wanted to tip my hat to you. You always struck me as the sort of person who’d try to do the right thing, and you’ve lived up to my expectations. Who knows? Maybe C will turn out to be an all right sort of person after all?