I'm coming up on 14 years of experience in my field, and I feel like because I like to have fun at work and joke around while we work, I don't get treated like an adult. I'm 37. I work circles around some people and I feel like I leave it all on the field every day. I help everyone, I do just about anything they ask, I help get new people up to speed, I come in early often, I don't come in high.. you get the picture.
So my manager has like a year of on the job experience and is just about the worst manager I've ever had. Nothing is ever good enough and I'm always "wrong". I've tried standing up for myself, and I've tried letting it roll off my back. Neither approach solves any of my problems.
Today, my manager waylaid my team member on a break and asked her what I do back there. I'm never not doing stuff and everyone but my manager sees it and knows it. I'm the type of worker that you don't have to worry about.
So I text the manager after she left and asked if she had a problem with my work. Of course not! I'm gods gift to bread! Blah blah blah...
She calls my teammate after hours and discusses why I have a problem.. doesn't ask me why I am upset. Instead I'm the asshole for standing up for myself.
There's a guy I work with that is basically checked out and refuses to make decisions or small talk. He's a good worker though. He told me one day that I should just turn off my brain and do what management says no matter how stupid and just let the pieces fall where they may. I'm trying. I really am. But the leftist in me is screaming at me to stand up and try to fix it. It's against my nature to prostrate myself to people like this. My new strategy is to turn my brain off and just be a soulless husk of a man at work who just keeps his head down and isn't friendly toward anyone. I'm only going to talk about work and work related stuff.
It's hard to do and it's so lonely! I have to listen to the same garbage music every day hear the same "working hard or hardly working" jokes every day and eat the same bowl of shit every day because the management doesn't pay any attention to the yahoos they pull off the street to do this job that should realistically have some training. It's a daily shit show and me and a couple of people have to "deep state" fix everything behind managements back while they chortle at the wine bar and take credit for all the fires we put out.
I should just quit, right?
My job is recession proof, it pays pretty well and on a good day, I enjoy it. I'm also hitting that age where I'm slowing down a bit and I don't know how to do anything else. I live at least 25 minutes from towns where jobs are, and they all would be a significant pay cut. I'm scared of the trump economy and rolling the dice on a different job.
Kinda curious what your teammate's thoughts were on this manager chatting them up about you...
Is the manager aware that doing these things comes off as "I'm looking for a reason to fire this employee"?
If you're worried about jumping ship right this second, you might think about quietly looking around for another place to work. If you get some solid leads, there's options to either move on to the new job or tell your problematic micromanager that they need to back off or you'll walk. (Unless there's some Unemployment Insurance stuff you would like to try to work that requires you to get fired to take advantage of. Then its just malicious compliance time.)
My co-worker is actually a pretty good friend. We met at a different bakery and she ended up rage quitting that job because of poor management and ended up where we are now. I took her role over and then quit like nine months later.
This friend is a little weird about work stuff. She says all the right things and feels the same way I do when we are complaining about work, but the second she can be on the "other side" she kind of goes along with it. Honestly I think she just loves the gossip element of it. She also has a not so great life outside of work and I think it makes her feel like she has agency
It makes it hard to be her friend when I'm the one getting picked on. I think she feels like she's a double agent, but all she's really doing is enabling our bosses shitty behavior.
Well... that's disappointing.