When Egos Enter the Room
I have worked with difficult people before, but there is a special kind of frustration that comes from working with someone whose behaviour is childish, bitter and completely unbearable.
A team recently moved from one manager to another. There were clearly feelings about the decision. Fine. We are all human. You can be disappointed. You can disagree. You can even believe the wrong decision was made. But there is a point where disappointment turns into something ugly.
Today, I was having a normal work conversation with the team’s new manager. We were discussing upcoming work and making sure everything was ready. She innocently invited the previous manager into the conversation. He came over smiling, listened for a while, brushed the discussion off and left.
Later, he came to me and told me not to involve him in anything I discuss with her.
Then the bitterness came pouring out.
Apparently, he believes she went behind his back to get the team moved under her. I do not know if that is true. What I do know is that he openly said he does not like her and he is waiting for her to fail. He wants her and the senior person who made the decision to learn a lesson.
That is vile.
You are a grown adult in a professional environment, managing people, and you are sitting there hoping another manager fails because you are angry about a decision?
Grow up.
What makes it worse is the fake smile. You can stand in front of someone, smile, speak nicely and pretend everything is fine, then turn around and tell another person how much you dislike them and how badly you want them to fail.
That behaviour is disgusting.
If you do not like someone, fine. Nobody is required to like everybody they work with. But there is a huge difference between not liking someone and actively hoping they fail.
And what exactly happens if she fails?
Her team struggles. Work suffers. Other teams are affected. Deadlines are missed. The business takes the knock. But apparently all of that would be worth it just for the satisfaction of saying, “I told you so.”
That is how ridiculous workplace egos can become.
The sad part is that she probably has no idea. She sees the smiles. She sees the professional conversations. Meanwhile, somebody is quietly sitting on the sidelines hoping she crashes.
That is not leadership. It is childish behaviour with a job title attached to it.
I genuinely struggle with people like this. Difficult personalities are one thing. But bitterness, fake behaviour and actively wishing failure on another person make someone unbearable to work with.
If your ego has been bruised, deal with it.
If you disagree with a decision, say so.
If you believe somebody is making a mistake, explain why.
But smiling in someone’s face while secretly waiting for their downfall is cowardly.
At some point, you have to stop blaming workplace politics and admit that some people simply bring poison into the workplace.
