20th January, 2008
Question
I'm 32 and the only woman in an all-male workplace. The job is kind of a 'man's job' and as such it has not been easy for me to pick up, or to stick with. But since day one, all of the guys have been brilliant and have done everything possible to help. I could not describe how much I love my work.
The problem is with one of the guys. He's quite arrogant and full of himself, but mostly because he's young, as opposed to being a jerk. He's chatty and funny and I used to get on fairly well with him. Everybody else still does. He's a bit condescending towards everyone, but in a joking way, not nastily. However, he seems to have spotted that he can get away with more when it comes to me. He constantly puts me down, pointing out my every mistake and criticising everything I do. I'm not a confident person anyway, and am more than happy to believe anyone who tells me I'm useless. When this happens fifty times a day it wears me down.
As I say, he's not nasty or vindictive. If he was, he would probably be easier to deal with. He's just young and arrogant. A lot of the time he tells me I'm doing something wrong simply because it's not the way he would do it himself. I could constantly defend myself, but most of the time it's about something too petty to waste energy on. Anyway, I find bickering as wearing as anything else, especially as he can't let himself lose an argument.
I often feel like having a real go at him but know I would feel bad afterwards as I suppose his behaviour is typical of someone actually fairly insecure. I'm sure I've put other people down in the past to make myself feel bigger - most of us probably have. I have pointed out to him several times that he is constantly criticising me and he genuinely seemed taken aback and then made an effort to stop. This never lasted more than a few days. He can't help himself.
I've tried keeping my distance, but since we're such a small group, it's hard to stay away from someone without making it too obvious and creating an atmosphere. So I find myself cutting myself off from everyone else too. I try to carry on as normal, but I'm retreating more and more into my corner, and getting more and more depressed.
I felt so bad earlier last year that I decided to leave. I made several excuses as to why I was going, but my boss told me to reconsider. I managed to make myself get over it, but now feel as bad again. I can't tell anyone at work. The lads would say I'm an hysterical woman! And I don't want to create any trouble. Anyway, I'm not fooling myself that the problem is my work-mate. I know it's me. That's why I'm such an easy target in the first place. It's also the reason I can't come up with a better way of dealing with the situation.
I know I sound dramatic. This is not the world's greatest problem and maybe I'm overreacting. But I love my job, it's very important to me, and the thought of leaving really gets me down.
Answer
You're right. There's a young male in your group, picking on the only woman around as he scrambles for position in the pecking order. You've analysed the problem well. You know that this young man's behaviour says everything about him and nothing about you. He's operating from a position of insecurity, or the ignorance and thoughtless arrogance of youth.
It's fascinating isn't it? He tries it on with the others and they're not impressed. But when he nags at you, you're ready to leave a job you love. You feel vulnerable, despite all the commonsense your brain is delivering to you. This happens a lot. We can be mature in our heads and still feel like a jelly in our hearts.
Insight is a necessary step to self-change. It is not the whole process. We have to learn to feel different too. Your brain has the self-confidence to see what's really going on. But that horrible voice at the back of your head, the one which holds sway over how you feel about yourself, is denying the truth. Instead, it continues to insist that you're inferior.
The reason that internal negative voice wins out is simple. It is an echo of negative messages we got when we were too young to contradict them. More importantly, those negative messages of our childhood were emotional messages, rather than just verbal ones. For example, when a young girl is told she's ugly by her mother, it's not the words that convince her. What hammers home the message is her mother's distaste, dislike, distance, dismissal, rejection, revulsion, which accompanies the words. And it's not primarily the young girl's mind which receives this message about her ugliness, but rather her heart, her sense of herself.
It therefore makes sense that it's our feelings about ourselves we have to change. Seeing the truth of a situation is, as I said, the first step. You've done that. Now for the next move.
Life is a lot about a leap of faith. Certainly change is. In concrete terms, you have to start acting as though you believed in yourself. You have to trust your brain, your correct analysis of the situation at work, and act accordingly. Put another way, you need to go against your inner feelings, just on trust. Because the only alternative, as you've said, is to leave the job. And you don't want to do that.
You have a busy little mosquito buzzing around your ear at work. You don't want to beat him to death because yes, it would be over-kill, and the group would feel uncomfortable. You do, however, have to bat him away. You're right. It's exhausting fighting your corner all the time. And it would wear anyone down to be constantly nagged at. So simply ignoring him isn't going to work.
Being nasty is an alternative, but not nice. All of us are capable of being bullies. Only the unhappiest amongst us settle for that role.
As a rather intense and serious young woman, it took time for me to learn the power of humour as a means of resolving sticky situations. I used to argue, instruct, list facts, explain, question, outline my position, and talk ad nauseum, to precisely no effect whatsoever. I was missing the point. People weren't bugging or opposing me for factual reasons - except perhaps when it came to negotiations about power and money. They were doing so for emotional reasons. Reasoning was a waste of time. Anger was unbecoming. Then I discovered humour. The beauty of it was that I could be steel, but yet go softly.
Could you try it? I can't write your lines for you. Each of us has a unique style. But could you approach this young man's behaviour with a clear message couched in humour? He's prepared to listen. You've found that out already when he backed off for a while. It's just that his emotional desire to show off drives him back to nagging you. You need to touch on this truth, namely his desire to shine, without being offensive. It probably won't be a once-off either. It will require a bantering theme, saying the same thing a few times, until he gets the message. Are you prepared to make that leap of faith in yourself and let this baby of the bunch know he doesn't have to prove himself? I do hope so.
