How do u cope with feelings of inadequacy at work?
I have been working at a company for close to 6 months after graduation. I had a rocky start when I first started. I was not that sharp enough to pick up details quickly and did things haphazardly that resulted in my co-boss making harshly comments at me in the office. Apparently her voice is so loud that everyone at the same office can hear. There was a colleague who sat at the far end of the office came to look for me to ask what happened, showing that her voice is that loud. I felt embarrassed and hurt but sucked it in.
Fast forward to a few more months later, I thought I am doing slightly better with more workload and assignment. I am also assigned to a project team. I was not that smart, but whatever administrative or tedious things to do like meeting minutes or collating information I would always produce these results fast. I was also assigned by the main boss to cover work for a colleague who left the company.
One fine day, I returned back to my office desk and I overheard my colleagues gossiping about me. My co-boss actually commented that “all I did was printing and scanning” that makes me feel hurtful. The other colleagues didn’t bother to help out. Apparently I wasn’t just doing that work and in fact, I was assigned other tasks by my main boss also. I felt inferior. I was actually disgusted because my co-boss is actually my lunch buddy as well who we can talk about lifestyle etc. for her to say something like that, I felt very shocked and uncomfortable.
what would you do if you were me?
Here are what netizens think:
- welcome to the working world. Your incident was what used to happen in my ex company, my Snr mgr has been a famous one doing all the screaming, got to a point that another BU VP told her off, yet, my ex boss responded. I am who I am..lol..if u cannot bring yourself to keep focus on other stuff and is mentally torturing you, start seeking something else
- Learning to document your efforts and raise them during meetings to “table” them and ask for help is an important skill to learn. Visibility is very important.
- I know it’s hard to hear these nasty comments. Perhaps, have a chat with your main boss and co-boss on what he/she feels about your work directly and position it as wanting to learn from them. It strokes the ego and also helps you collect more information. Just remember to protect yourself and practice critical thinking as you do this and use what helps you and discard what doesn’t. Asking for help in a thought out way is a powerful way to grow and build relationships. You can read more about this online – plenty of resources on how this works. You can also hint about the heavy workload you carry in tedious tasks and broach if they are important or not and what you can focus on to make it helpful to these key people.
- This is misinterpreted in a negative light and people tend to assume “playing politics” is bad. I think reframing everything is a critical life skill. Playing politics is not a negative thing if you use it to defensively take care of yourself and help those you work with. I’d recommend watching Korean drama Under the Queens Umbrella to understand how playing politics and understanding the game being played can be used for positive outcomes.
- Eh, u r the unlucky one that your colleague finds pleasure in bullying. This always happens to new and slow staff. Stay long enough and u will.be doing that to new staff too when you are older.