There’s an absolute limit to our access to the universe beyond our own galaxy. There’s a limit to what we can ever hope to explore or send signals to, and a very different limit to what we can ever hope to witness. Today we’re going to explore the latter. We’re going to figure out the absolute limit of our future view of the universe, and of the universe’s ability to influence us. Next time we’ll turn it around and ask: how much of the external universe can WE potentially influence, and even explore?
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U.S.A. – In another ‘you have to read it to believe it’ situation, a few wacky experts are blaming the latest mass shooting on the shooter’s easy access to things that shoot. Seriously! I mean, we all know that it can be kind of tough to figure out why one of these shooting people shot […]
Holy motherfucking shit it’s Budget season! The time when the government announces how it will spend all our money and we all pretend to understand the difference between the debt and the deficit. Check out these highlights of the Liberal’s latest effort. 1. Going even greener than we were before 20.9 billion has been earmarked […]
OTTAWA – As part of their latest budget, the Trudeau Liberals have announced an additional measure to help financially squeezed Canadians: a new tax free savings account to help Canadians save for groceries. “Across the country, Canadians have told us that it is taking them weeks, sometimes months to save up enough money to fill […]
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
A reader writes:
I’ve got an older employee who has been very forthright with me about his opinion of LGTBQAI2+ people based on his conservative religious beliefs. He says he doesn’t have a problem working with them, but problems started when I explained that if we ever hired someone in our department who identified as non-binary and used they/them pronouns (for example) he would be expected to use them. He has told me his religion (and therefore, he himself) believes people are going to hell if they act on homosexual feelings and I believe he also includes transgender individuals under this umbrella of sin.
He said he felt that if he used those pronouns, he would be accepting that “lifestyle” and he didn’t feel comfortable doing so. He would rather just use their name. I told him it’s a matter of respect for our fellow humans to use their pronouns as requested.
My organization is more and more outwardly supportive of DEI initiatives, including public support of Pride, an employee support group, etc. and I do not feel this is in line with our institutional values. He has said he would quit over this if he felt our organization forced him to accept it, and in his mind having to use someone’s correct pronouns would be an example of being forced to accept it (I think?).
However, how do I handle this if he is claiming his feelings on this matter are due to religious beliefs? I am not going to change his mind about this and am curious from an HR perspective about what to do. I want to create a welcoming space for all employees but am at a loss here when his identity is so at odds with others’.
He can privately feel however he wants, but he can’t refuse to use people’s correct pronouns at work because the law says that’s discrimination based on gender identity, which is illegal.
The fact that his reasons are religious doesn’t change that: The law is clear that employers cannot grant religious accommodations that violate state or federal law.
So you can’t legally permit an employee to discriminate against or create a hostile environment toward employees with gender identities he doesn’t approve of (or recognize, or whatever his argument is).
I suspect you’re getting tripped up by his invocation of religion since you know you’re supposed to try to accommodate people’s religious beliefs when you can. But the law doesn’t require accommodations that would pose an “undue hardship” to the employer — and courts have repeatedly affirmed that creating legal liability would be an undue hardship. It might be more intuitive if you think of other situations where someone’s religious beliefs would conflict with your legal obligations to your staff as a whole; for example, if an employee requested a religious accommodation allowing them to treat colleagues differently if they were women, or of a different race, you wouldn’t be able to grant that either.
The law does encourage employers to engage in what it calls the “interactive process” to figure out if there’s any other accommodation you could offer, although I’m hard-pressed to think of a workable one here. In one court case (Kluge v. Brownsburg Community School Corporation), a teacher who refused to use his students’ correct pronouns on the basis of his religious beliefs was offered an accommodation where he’d refer to everyone by their last names only — but they had to rescind that after getting complaints.
Regardless, you can’t legally grant an accommodation that allows an employee to use the wrong pronouns for their colleagues. Your employee will need to treat all his coworkers with respect or you would need to deal with it like any other serious disciplinary issue.
Correction to what I say at 9:45 -- That should have been *billions* of course, not millions! Sorry about that.
Today we’ll talk a new explanation for the interstellar object Oumuamua, what’s up with the W-boson anomaly, two new institutes founded by NASA, an airplane powered by hydrogen, a gigapixel 3D microscope, vaccinations without the needles, concrete that talks, nano-labels, and of course the telephone will ring.
00:00 Intro 00:33 A New Explanation for `Oumuamua's Path 03:13 ATLAS Checks the Mass of the W-Boson 05:35 NASA Founds 2 New Institutes 07:27 Test Flight of Hydrogen Airplane 10:10 A High-speed Gigapixel 3D Microscope 11:12 Puff Vaccines 12:46 Concrete That Talks 13:59 Nanoscale Security-labels 15:30 Ground News
This week NOAA said a three-year La Niña event in the Pacific Ocean is finally over. While neutral conditions are likely to exist for the next few months, forecasters now expect a fairly strong El Niño to develop later this spring or early summer. Typically, for Texas, this means a warmer than normal summer, and a cooler and wetter than normal winter.
Modeling indicates a likely transition to El Niño by April or May of this year. (NOAA)
Perhaps most critically for the Houston region, El Niño tends to sap some of the strength of the Atlantic hurricane season by increasing wind shear levels. The effect is moderate, but notable. During El Niño years there are an average of about five hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea, and Gulf of Mexico. During La Niña years there are closer to an average of seven hurricanes. So the dice are more loaded toward impacts in La Niña years.
Wednesday
Some light showers have developed north of Houston this morning, extending as far southward as The Woodlands, in response to a passing disturbance in the upper atmosphere. This will continue to produce a chance of (very) light rain throughout most of today. Otherwise, we are going to see partly sunny skies with highs of around 70 degrees. Winds will be light, out of the northeast, before shifting to become more eastward tonight. Lows will drop into the low 60s.
Thursday
Skies will be mostly cloudy on Thursday, and winds will turn southeasterly. This flow off the Gulf of Mexico will pick up significantly, with gusts up to 25 or 30 mph. Highs will reach the mid-70s and humidity will return as well with perhaps a 20 percent chance of light rain. Lows on Thursday night will only drop into the low 70s.
Forecast for maximum wind gusts on Friday in Houston. (Weather Bell)
Friday
This will be a warm and humid day, with mostly cloudy skies and highs in the mid-80s. Winds will be significant, gusting to 35 or even 40 mph out of the south. It will be another warm night.
Saturday and Sunday
So here’s the deal. A weak-ish cold front is going to approach our area early on Saturday morning. This system is going to bring storms well to the north of the Houston metro area, but if we see any precipitation in the Houston metro area it likely will be light. The bigger question is how the front will affect temperatures and dewpoints. My sense is that the front will essentially push down all the way to the coastline by Saturday mid-morning and then start pulling back northward by Saturday evening. So how much dry air you see will depend on how far inland you live. In any case, the front should pull northward of even areas like Conroe by Sunday.
In terms of temperatures, I’ll ballpark low-80s for Saturday, with partly sunny skies, and increasing clouds for Sunday with a high of around 80 degrees. As moisture levels return we will probably see a decent chance of showers later on Sunday, perhaps 30 or 40 percent during the afternoon hours.
Next week
Most of next week looks warm, and humid, with highs in the mid- to upper-80s and partly to mostly cloudy skies. Perhaps some kind of front will arrive by Wednesday and Thursday to offer us a temporary reprieve and bump up rain chances. But my overall confidence in that happening is far from high. In tomorrow’s forecast I’ll offer an early guess about the forecast for Easter Sunday in Houston.
RALEIGH, NC—Multitasking with the phone on speaker, local man Tim Cahan was clearly just waiting for his turn to speak Wednesday rather than really listening to what the automated menu had to say. Sources confirmed that, despite the menu selections having changed since their last conversation, Cahan barely paid…
A new study has found that people with social anxiety may benefit from mindfulness therapy combined with exposure to odors from others’ sweat. What do you think?
LOUISBURG, KS—Acting like he was better than everyone now that he had a new fancy term to use, pretentious baby Cooper Landrey, who just learned the word “daddy,” reportedly wouldn’t stop inserting it into conversation Wednesday. “Ever since he was able to sound it out, it’s been nonstop ‘Daddy this’ and ‘Daddy…
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. My male boss is getting impatient with my morning sickness
I have been in good standing in my government analyst position for four years, and all of my performance evals are glowing. I recently became pregnant with my first child. Morning (all-day!) sickness has been very rough, and I’ve left work early once or twice per week for the past couple of months to deal with nausea and vomiting. I have plenty of sick leave built up, and my organization as a whole generally encourages using leave as needed. My male boss has known about my pregnancy since week 7 because I was getting so sick.
I’m now just entering my second trimester, and though I’m getting a tiny bit better, I am still struggling with the morning sickness pretty much every day. Despite all this, I have managed to keep up with all of my deadlines; however, my boss is getting really impatient with me being ill. He keeps making minimizing comments like:
“You’re having a pretty easy pregnancy—I know someone who had to be hospitalized multiple times for how sick she got! This is nothing.”
“You should be feeling fine now. You’re past the first trimester.”
“My wife was never sick with our six kids. She kept working full-time with no problems.”
“People might start thinking you’re slacking off.”
Do you have any advice how to manage this situation? I don’t know what to do. I’ve tried telling him everyone is different and I can’t control how my body reacts, and he keeps vaguely threatening that higher-ups may start questioning the amount of leave I am taking (2-8 hours per week) and if it is justified.
How generous of your boss to share his knowledge about pregnancy with you! Aside from the utter obliviousness it takes to do that, the contradictions are a mess too (pregnancy should always be a breeze to manage because his wife’s were, and also be grateful you’re not being hospitalized multiple times for how sick you are!).
Please talk to your HR and let them know what your boss is saying. They’re likely to be highly displeased that he’s hassling an employee over her pregnancy, as well as pressuring you not to use sick leave. They’ve got potential FMLA and pregnancy discrimination issues here.
2. My coworkers expect me to be devastated I didn’t get a promotion
Earlier this year, I was asked by leadership to apply for a promotion that would have me supervising many of my current coworkers. Another junior coworker, Mark, had applied, and they were hoping to have more than one internal candidate for the position. After several requests, I applied and put forth my best efforts in the interview process, which went exceptionally well.
Mark was hired. I was fine with this because he is someone I have supported throughout his career and feel will do a good job. Unfortunately, the reason given to me was that my coworkers expressed a clear preference for him, despite his more limited experience. I’m now trying to deal with the sting of knowing I was not preferred by colleagues with whom I seemingly have a great working relationship. I’m also frustrated by having so many coworkers come to me in ways that want me to manage their emotions about this process. Some are outraged on my behalf. Others are very upset and want me to console them. A few keep checking in on me to make sure I’m “okay,” with overly sympathetic expressions, as if someone has just died. I even have a couple of folks from the hiring committee approaching me in ways that seem as if they want me to absolve them from guilt over being part of the decision.
I’m fine with not getting the promotion, but I’m beyond frustrated with having to deal with all these coworkers. Frankly, I don’t even want to attend the meeting with my supervisor in which he will tell me the reasons why my coworkers preferred the other candidate because they will be personality issues and not performance issues, based on our compared work histories and the tenor of the email notifying me of his decision, a note that was explicit in stating I would do a great job in the position but that he preferred to lean heavily on the preferences of the employees on the team. Any advice on shutting down conversations with coworkers or avoiding the aftermath of a rejected promotion? I sent a very professional and complimentary note to my colleague who was given the position, and he has been nothing but gracious to me.
When coworkers approach you gingerly or with sympathy: “I’m fine with the outcome, and I’m excited for Mark.” And if they continue to give you sad faces after that: “Oh, stop! Mark’s great.” And then if necessary: “Do me the favor of believing me.”
You definitely need to attend the meeting with your manager for feedback about the decision! It’s possible there’s something legitimate that will be useful to hear … and personality differences aren’t always irrelevant, especially in a management role. For example, if you’re perceived as less approachable, less empathetic, or not as clear of a communicator, those would all be relevant, not just personality differences. On the other hand, if the reasons are BS ones, that would be good to know too.
3. Why don’t they trust me for a simple volunteer task?
I’ve run into an issue as a volunteer at a large charity resale shop where I’ve been volunteering for several months. The task I do is simple, think something like measuring picture frames (not picture frames). I tag the frame with the measurement, and then paid staff mark the prices based on the size. Jane and Julie work in this department, and usually it is Julie who tells me which boxes of frames to work on.
Several weeks ago, early in my volunteering, Jane asked me to measure and price some frames on a day Julie was not there. On my next day, Julie told me that only staff mark the prices, and that I measured something wrong. I felt that I was being reprimanded for something that Jane asked me to do. I decided I’d just let this go.
I started volunteering one day, then two. Last week I wanted to volunteer on another day when neither of those staff work, though others are there. They did not want me to measure frames during this time or do other work for them. This week I want to come in again on this other day. They are losing 3-4 hours of time I could contribute to their work and there are always more frames. I will do other work.
I was just going to let this go, but I’m finding that this really bothers me. They are making me feel unqualified to measure frames when they are not present. I’m an accomplished person who is very familiar with frames. Could this be a control thing? Are they worried I’ll take their job? I don’t want their jobs. I’m befuddled, and, I guess, hurt by this lack of trust.
You’re interpreting this as something personal about you (and their assessment of your skills and reliability) but it’s much more likely that it’s something about the organization. For example, while working with volunteers is part of Jane and Julie’s jobs, it’s possible that no one else is charged with it (or trained in how to oversee volunteers, or wouldn’t have the time/expertise/authority to answer the questions that might come up as you work or spot problems that they’d want caught early). That doesn’t mean they don’t think you’re capable of doing the work without close supervision, but it’s normal for questions/issues to come up as a volunteer works and it’s very reasonable for other staff not to have time to field those, while Jane and Julie do. It’s really common for organizations to be structured that way, and to only be equipped to have volunteers on certain days or during certain shifts.
4. Can I give myself credit without looking like an a-hole?
I work a new nonprofit with less than 30 employees. I am in the lowest tier of seniority, but I have been there the longest. My org has encouraged giving kudos as a practice, on calls and in Slack and emails.
I think it’s great that my team is trying to build a culture of gratitude. But I’ve noticed that the kudos is often from one senior or mid-ranking staff member to another, sometimes leaving out the contributions of junior staff such as myself. For instance, a member of the leadership team once gave gushing kudos to multiple people who participated in a recruitment process, and extolled one person in particular — who’s also on the leadership team — for having the idea to split the role into two. Even though I coordinated all the interviews and did the initial review of 100+ applications for that recruitment process, which I’m sure took much longer than my coworker’s lightbulb going off, I was not mentioned at all in the post.
Would I sound like a total asshole for chiming in to give myself credit in such instances? I’m sure that a comment like “I was so happy to contribute to X” would come across as passive-aggressive, but at an organization as small as ours, I think it’s preposterous to leave anybody out when giving kudos, and especially junior staff. I’ve chimed in to give credit to others when I’ve noticed people left out of kudos.
Yeah, I think it’s hard to pull off “I also contributed to X” in that context, but the pattern is something worth raising with your manager. It’s not terribly uncommon for public credit not to mention everyone who was involved in a project — sometimes that’s a long list, or there are differences in the relative value of each person’s contribution — but when you’re noticing a pattern like this, it’s definitely worth speaking up about it. And the fact that it’s always junior staff who are being left out — at the same time that your leadership is trying to encourage credit-giving as a org-wide practice — really sucks. Say something to your manager, or to someone else in a position to impact this!
5. Should I tell an employer I’m still interested in the (still open) job they rejected me for in October?
I applied for, interviewed for, and was ultimately rejected for a job back in October. The job has consistently continued to be relisted every two to four weeks ever since. At the six-month mark, would it be unprofessional to send a message letting them know I’m still open to a position if they’re interested in revisiting my application, or is that a gross overstep?
It’s not unprofessional or an overstep, but it probably won’t make a difference since they already interviewed you. If you had only applied and not been interviewed, I’d be more encouraging — but at this point they’ve taken a pretty close look at your candidacy and decided it’s not the match they’re looking for. There’s nothing wrong with giving it a shot anyway, but I’d expect the chances of it changing anything to be low.
quonset writes: In what has to be one of the most inconceivable confluences ever, the Norwegian company Nammo says it is unable to expand its production of artillery shells to support Ukraine because of "cat videos" on TikTok. To placate European scrutiny, TikTok is opening two data centers in Europe to house European user data locally. One of those data centers is in the Hamar region of Norway. Because of this expansion, there is no excess capacity for the factory to ramp up production of artillery shells.
"The chief executive of Nammo, which is co-owned by the Norwegian government, said a planned expansion of its largest factory in central Norway hit a roadblock due to a lack of surplus energy, with the construction of TikTok's new data centre using up electricity in the local area," reports the Guardian. "Elvia, the local energy provider, confirmed to the Financial Times that the electricity network had no spare capacity after allocating it to the data center on a first-come, first-served basis. Additional capacity would take time to become available." "We are concerned because we see our future growth is challenged by the storage of cat videos," Morten Brandtzaeg told the Financial Times.
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This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
Recently we talked about workplaces holding egregiously clueless “celebrations” for various awareness days/months. Not surprisingly, a ton of the stories shared were about sexism. Here are eight stories of companies getting sexism awareness events remarkably wrong. (Note: some of the stories shared were so offensive that it’s hard to laugh at them, so these aren’t even the worst of the worst.)
1. Let men speak
We had a women’s month event at my last job called “it’s women’s month … time to let the men speak.” It was exactly as tone-deaf as you think it would be. It featured men with their chairs arranged in a circle talking to each other about how to be good allies. Every other chair in the room encircled their circle in the most bizzaro meeting layout ever. By the end of the event all women had left the room out of anger and it was only men remaining.
2. The book
At my old law firm (now defunct) the women’s resource group asked people for advice they could share in a book. When we got the “book,” it was covered in pink bows and flowers. On the “could you get more gender essentialist than this crap” front, one of my colleagues said it looked like the pamphlet her doctor gave her when she got her first period.
3. The honorees
At my (very large, recognizable) tech company last year, they honored four people for International Women’s Day, and three of them were men.
4. The slideshow
My last company celebrated International Women’s Day by inviting all the women to gather at noon to take a picture. The celebration for AAPI month was showing a slideshow of 15 pictures of Asian-American celebrities on screens around the office (six were of Lucy Liu). At least they had the spirit?
5. The missed point
In honor of women’s day, the DEI lead authored an article on how every successful man has a successful woman behind them and how amazing it is that women give birth, wear high heels and be beautiful, AND work…
6. The roses
Small company, Valentine’s Day. IT men bought lotion sets and fake roses to give to all the IT women and came into the department in a kinda parade to present to each woman.
(Okay, this wasn’t a sexism awareness event, but it’s still pretty wild.)
7. The repeated misses
We had a women’s history month event and it was unbelievably tone-deaf. Here is an excerpt from the actual email:
“The Planning Committee has organized a wonderful event in recognition of Women’s History Month, which will focus on the theme ‘Recognizing Women through the Voices of Men.’ In order to celebrate women, a panel of distinguished men will speak about the important women in their lives that have served as an influential figure to them.
Not only is it women through the voices of men (bwahahahaha!), but also, men who would definitely be talking about their moms or grandmas right! Ultimately, it was cancelled, probably due to feedback. Just amazing. It seems fake, but I have receipts.
Also each heritage/history month, posters would be display, which somehow were always insensitive. For Pride, the poster was very … sensual with people dressed … like the Village People. For Caribbean heritage month, the poster was a white family walking along a beach with a cruise ship in the background with Caribbean men playing steel drums. WHO APPROVED THESE?
Twice other offensive ideas were successfully shut down. One was senior leadership using wheelchairs all day for Disabilities Awareness Month. Another was for Pride, in which coworkers would film themselves saying nice things about their gay colleagues (potentially outing people) and draw a picture honoring them. The pictures would then be put together, in what people began calling the Quilt of the Gays … just wow!!
8. The cake
My best friend was asked to bring a cake to work for international women’s day. She brought a cake with a large chunk already cut out of it, and a note stuck on it about the pay gap. She is my hero.
CHICAGO—In an ongoing effort to secure an actual job that would allow him to earn an actual living, reports confirmed Tuesday that local man Tim Upshaw, 36, was earnestly looking for career opportunities on a website called something like Job-a-Dabba-Doo.com. According to sources, the site—which has a humiliating name…
Good morning. A cold front has moved through the Houston region overnight, and if you live along and south of Interstate 10 you probably felt it as lots of lightning came along for the ride. Areas further inland saw less fireworks and little to no rainfall. We’ll now see a couple of days with some drier air before a warmer and more humid pattern returns.
Tuesday
A few lingering showers will clear out this morning, and we should see partly sunny skies by this afternoon. Winds will be fairly brisk, out of the north at 15 to 20 mph with higher gusts. Highs today will reach the mid-70s. Temperatures tonight should be the coolest of the week, dropping into the 50s for most areas except along the coast.
Low temperature forecast for Wednesday morning. It’s not that cold, but it will be the coldest for awhile. (Weather Bell)
Wednesday
This day will start out with some clouds, but skies should turn mostly sunny during the afternoon with highs in the low 70s. Winds will veer back to come from the Gulf of Mexico, that this should nudge overnight temperatures up slightly, into the low 60s for Houston. A few, scattered showers are possible later on Wednesday as this onshore flow returns.
Thursday
This will be a breezy, humid day with mostly cloudy skies as high temperatures push up to near 80 degrees. Winds could gust as high as 25 or 30 mph out of the south. There will again be a slight chance of afternoon and evening showers. Lows Thursday night will only drop low 70s.
Friday
Expect another breezy and humid day, this time with highs in the low 80s.
Saturday and Sunday
The details for this weekend’s forecast remain a bit iffy, but generally you can expect a (very) weak front to move into the area on Saturday morning, perhaps with a few scattered showers. The front won’t provide too much oomph, so we’re probably looking at partly to mostly cloudy skies both weekend days, with highs in the 80s, and lows in the upper 60s.
Hello heat! (Weather Bell)
Next week
Frankly, most of next week looks warm, with highs in the mid- to upper-80s. Some areas may well touch, dare I say it, 90 degrees? It looks like some sort of front will work its way into the area by Thursday of Friday next week, which should finally cool us down and bring another splash of rainfall. That’s far enough in the future to be fairly fuzzy, however.
“This and That” is an occasional series of paired observations. See past “This and That” posts here. – Ed.
Today: Segmented sticks of butter
Sasha Alexandra, “Interiority Complex,” 2020, ceramic, Velcro, foam, wood, metal, 40 x 74 x 26 inches. On view at Rule Gallery in Marfa, 2023.
Wooden play food, stick of butter.
*************
No matter how original, innovative or crazy your idea, someone else is also working on that idea. Furthermore, they are using notation very similar to yours. – Bruce J. MacLennan
WASHINGTON—Smiling coyly as entrées were set on the table for the first family Monday night, President Biden is said to have casually mentioned to White House executive chef Cristeta Comerford that it was his birthday in an attempt to scam a free dessert. “You’ve really out done yourself, Cris—I don’t think I could…
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
I’m off today, so here’s an older post from the archives. This was originally published in 2017.
A reader writes:
So I bit a coworker yesterday. Obviously, I’m mortified.
I work in an incredibly dysfunctional office. The tone is set by our office manager. He’s in his fifties, has always worked in an office setting, and is difficult. Things are right if it’s in his favor and wrong if anyone else does it. He once cursed at me and called me a child for asking him not to say I’m prettier if I smile. He then didn’t speak to me for a year — which was a relief.
Well, yesterday, I had a meeting with a coworker. (If it makes a difference, the office manager and I are on the same level, as is the person I was meeting with.) My hands were full of paperwork and a full mug. When I got to the coworker’s office, the office manager was in the doorway, braced with one arm stretched across the opening. I stopped, said, “Excuse me, I have a meeting.” Aaaaaand he refused to move. He replied that he didn’t give a s*** and it wasn’t his problem. The coworker grimaced but said nothing, as is usual for our office.
Normally, I’d sit and argue. Rarely, I’m able to convince him to move. In those cases, I’d put down my things in the office and wait for the colleague and him to finish speaking. They don’t work together or like each other, but they angry-gossip frequently.
This time — this time I bit him. I don’t know! His arm was in front of my face, my hands were full, I know from experience he almost never moves, and I’m reaaaaally busy right now.
In any case, I bit him, over his sleeve, pulled back, and we just sort of stared at each other for a second, because … wow. He finally got his feet under him, figuratively, and retaliated by stomping on my feet (I was in ballet flats and he had heeled dress shoes) and shoving me. As I’m regaining my balance and trying to save my feet, I dropped my mug, which shattered. At that point, he stopped and bent to pick up the shards. I ducked into the office and shut and locked the door. Not helping him pick up the shards angered him more.
I’ve since apologized. He accepted gracefully, while admitting no fault on his part.
This office is bad. It’s warping my perceptions of normal behavior. I know there is no one above us who would address this issue with him and short of quitting, I have to deal with him every day. What is the right way to deal with difficult coworkers in these situations? Just keep arguing? Walk away and reschedule the meeting? There are no magic words to deal with impossible people, but how do I reason with myself mentally to stop myself from going down this road again?
Thank you for considering my question. I suppose most everything is solved by “walking away,” but I feel helpless and clearly spiral a bit into wild behavior when at a loss…
Oh no.
I think the thing to do here is to use this incident as a way of seeing really clearly that this office is messing you up. It’s destroying your sense of norms, it’s making you act in ways that (I assume) you would never normally act, and it’s turning you into someone who you don’t want to be. (Again, I’m assuming, but it feels like a safe bet that you don’t want to be someone who bites coworkers as a means of conflict resolution.)
It’s also going to start messing with your professional reputation, if it hasn’t already. It’s going to be hard for people to recommend you for other jobs if they know you bit a coworker.
So, three things:
1. You need to start actively job searching right away. Not like sending out a resume every few weeks when the mood strikes, but seriously working to get yourself out of this situation as soon as you can.
2. You should apologize to the coworker who saw the incident. It’s all kinds of messed up that she didn’t say anything at the time or afterwards, but that’s probably a further illustration of how out of whack the norms in your office are. Regardless, though, she did see it, and you don’t want her to think that you think it was okay. So talk to her and explain that you’re mortified and that you know it wasn’t okay.
3. For whatever amount of time you have to continue working there, it’s crucial to keep in the forefront of your mind that you are not somewhere that supports normal behavior. You should expect that when you deal with the office manager, he will be rude, unreasonable, and hostile. You should go into your interactions with him expecting that, so that when it happens, you’re not surprised by it. You want your reaction to be an internal eye roll, not outrage. You should also be prepared to have to alter your plans when he obstructs you. So for example, when he blocked your path to your coworker’s office, ideally you would have said, “Jane, I can’t get past Fergus, but let me know when you’re ready to meet” and then left.
It might help to think of yourself as being in a foreign country with completely different norms than the ones that feel obvious to you. Hell, pretend you’re on another planet where the inhabitants have their own, seemingly bizarre rules for interacting. If this were happening during your interplanetary trip to Neptune, you probably wouldn’t go into a rage and bite an alien — you’d more easily see it as their own particular culture. You might also try very hard to get off Neptune very quickly, and that would be reasonable. But while you were there, you’d understand that they were playing by different rules.
But really, this is as clear a sign as anyone will ever get that you’ve been there too long and it’s time to go.
A careful choice of words can perhaps prevent a tragedy. Here’s an example. A minority of human cannibals might become overexcited when they see the title of this study:
CHICAGO—Extolling the virtues of the cracked polyethylene container, local real estate agent Thomas Bartlett was reportedly trying to pass off an apartment’s window box planter Thursday as something called a “Romanian balcony.” “Now this feature is a real treat—simply open up the window, and voilà, you have your own…
