Younger, Female Boss = Teh Suckz

I really go on an angry rant, but after having come back from the gym, I need to.

You see, less than 2 months ago, I was hired to a new company to turn around half of their Accounting Department. Apparently the turnover was ridiculous, the hiring process is horrid, and the work is overwhelming. This is what I was told on my first day of WORK.

Of course, everything was painted to me differently in the interview. They lined out that it would be a challenge, but I'm up for challenges. I should have known that the first red flag was that my hiring manager would be younger than me, by at least 5 years.

Apparently she was granted the head of the department by default. She was the only one left from about 4 years ago. In her term, within the last year, my position has seen turnover of at least 5 people. Every other department knows her to be... well, not good. She's good at what she knows and does, but terrible at leading, training, teaching, and holding a department together. Not only that, but other departments hate dealing with her.

Now, I come in and some changes begin to happen but since she doesn't know how to lead, she pretty much tells me in the first two weeks that my half is in disarray... and, "Here, fix it." So I'm learning... trial by fire, trial-and-error, and mistake after mistake. I can take a hit or two, but most of those weren't on me. The back end of the books were a mess and there was 0 communication between our department and every other. That has changed and a lot of people try to come to me now, but still, I am playing catch up.

Every week, I've made a mistake, and as a manager, instead of giving me some sort of reassuring words, I've constantly been met with "Why does this keep happening?"... "We need to sit down and discuss what is going wrong." And it's not even objectively. I know how to take constructive criticism... but this is beyond that. I've had female bosses before but they were older, a little wiser and a little understanding. Now I get that her success as a manager seems to hinge on the fact that I might either sink the department or make it float over the sea, but in less than 2 months, I already want to leave.

Part of me loves the challenge, but for every 9 rights I do.. forget it, if the 10th is a wrong. Today I had a situation where I legitimately screwed up, and tried to come to her about it and stayed after work to fix it. In the past, I have been told that things can get fixed, let's try to not let it happen again and let's analyze how to avoid this from happening again.

Not her. Total condescending attitude, total display of immaturity and absolutely zero leader skills. This is what I have to face from now on.

On a night out, I was told by other departments to keep my resume updated because they wouldn't see me lasting 3 months... because no one does. I was led to believe it had to do with previous incompetent employees. I no longer believe that.

I wish I could say it was just a female being a lack of a good leader and head of a department, but her age and immaturity also play a factor. I'll get past this after our "next chat" tomorrow, but I can already tell that she is either going to sink herself or sink me. It's unfortunate because every other aspect of this job, I absolutely love... except her.

Is there a reason to this post? Maybe. Maybe not. But I just needed to vent.

Thank you for swimming through my sea of crap.
Opinions/advice... more than welcome.

Smile, and outlast her ass.

Women are---generally---terrible leaders. And the younger they are the more incompetence and arrogance you have to deal with.

Anybody with half a brain can be a "manager", but there is a big difference between management and true leadership. Leadership is, at it's core, influence. It's many other things as well, like foresight, relationships with your employees, navigational skills, decisiveness, and accountability for your team....but you cant expect a 20-something girl to know or understand that. They know how to point fingers, pass the buck, condescend, and act like a queen b!tch but there is very little proof in their pudding.

It sounds like she is going to let you sink and take the heat, probably like the last several people in your position. This is what women do. Hell this is what PEOPLE do in the workplace. At the end of the day, everyone in the workplace is out for their own job, and they will step on whatever backs necessary to save face and self-preserve. If you are in a position where you can gain the trust of the employees and start building your influence while you catch up on your knowledge of the job, you may be able to turn things around. But don't go down with a sinking ship that isn't even yours. And stay one step ahead of them by looking for new jobs.

She scheduled a meeting for tomorrow so that I could sit down with her and another person within our department.

She highlighted five points that she wants me to work on and talk about in this meeting.

One of them was "Why are you working overtime, but 100% of things aren't getting done?"

The other four were valid upon asking a friend of mine what tone she was taking. It might be that her boss was asking her what my processes are and she simply has no clue. I sat down and worked on all of this. As far as her point of my overtime, I'll remind her that I've been there for 6 weeks and I am simply trying to fix the messes of the last 3 people that were there for the last 4 months.

As far as today was concerned, I just sat, did the best I could do at my job and moved forward. Tomorrow I'll deal with this meeting, but I have to go into it assertive.

I'll keep in mind what you two said.

As someone who runs **** and manages people, I can tell you exactly what's going on.


She's getting heat from her boss most likely, and becuase the company has no accurate communication process, she doesn't' know what the **** to do. Still, she's taking it out on you.


This, this right here, is where a womans inability to communicate overtly gets to most of them, not all but most. Instead of sitting down and articulating her point of view to you she just spats out "fix my problems, why isn't this getting done"


I am 100% sure that the onlyt hing she really wants, is to look good for her boss. I mean, she's what.. 28... she's your manager, she's not stupid. She know she's 28, she knows people don't like her, she wants to look good. she knows people probably look at her and say how the **** did she get that job. so to her it's more important in her mind to be on her bosses good side, something she can't do if she doesn't know what's going on and why it's going on and when it's going to be fixed, etc.


This is not your problem, but it is. I deal with women clients all the time. I used to lose a lot of them and then my wife would talk to them and translate ******** for me lol and then i would be like OH, that's the problem, why can't they just say that lol, i can fix that.

My former female supervisor was horrible. Very moody and terrible at leading/directing...

It didn't get better

New manager is female but much better (she's a tomboy)

This is precisely why I left corporate long ago and struck out on my own path. It's nice to be able to fire clients who are unreasonable and annoying and to not have to jump to a boss's whim. Best thing I ever did was to develop my own businesses.

Women make sh!tty "managers"!

This might get long but this one is just for you big pimpin!!!!:trouble:

I've been fired and have left so many jobs because of incompetence that you wouldn't believe it. I have a hard time kissing people's a$$ and naturally stick out of the pecking order that's why I'm looking to start a business of my own, on my own terms so I don't have to deal with corporate nonsense.

I was in "management" as well and dealt with so many sh!tty managers it was unbelievable. They had no clue about managing, sales, technology etc and majority of the managers I worked for were women. "Cover your a$$!!!" was being preached. After being the number #1 manager in the entiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiire district in sales and maxing out quotas, goals everything...most managers couldn't stand me neither could my superiors. You guessed it. I've been a top performer at all my jobs. heehee...

This is where it gets fun. I've heard all types of reasons and have dealt with micro-management, bullying, harassment, hostile work environment, passive aggressiveness, exclusion, racial remarks, and the most dangerous thing which is work-place sabotage and a whole host of other things I could get into. I took a sinking store, one of the lowest performing store to the top and was basically told "You are not a fit for the culture"...by the store manager who was a woman. I resigned and told them to go fAck themselves. The store closed down in less than a month as I laughed at how everyone lost there jobs. :rock:

As I'm typing this I'm laughing my ass off at how much sh!t I've brought to myself just out-performing my "superiors" in "management". I still laugh because of my work history, my resume and how many lies I spin on job interviews. I've always been naturally a threat to most people, looks, physique, brains, and brawn to back everything up but working hard and performing to the max hasn't gotten me anywhere so far in life.

This is where you come in to play romeo. I don't see you getting too far either and you will be miserable working for your manager. When you have sh!tty managers as your superiors it should tell you a lot about the company and the hiring practices they have. Even if you manage to perfect your position something will always come up where you will be brought into "discussion". If this position has a high turn-over rate don't be surprised you become just another statistic. I highly suggest you start to update your resume and look for other options.

Most women suck at "management" death to all!!!!!!

Communicate in writing with her as much as possible and verbally as little as possible. Cover your ( | ).

Get copies of company policies and study them. When she misbehaves in a way that effects or potentially effects you personally write her an email and politely tell her she violated x, y, and z and if it happens again you will take internal and/or legal action against her. Put her on defense. Make her afraid of you. Her behavior will change and she will kiss your ( | ) instead

logicallefty said:

Get copies of company policies and study them. When she misbehaves in a way that effects or potentially effects you personally write her an email and politely tell her she violated x, y, and z and if it happens again you will take internal and/or legal action against her. Put her on defense. Make her afraid of you. Her behavior will change and she will kiss your ( | ) instead

Click to expand...

Or, she goes further out of her way to eliminate you. At that point, it's whoever has the ear of management/seniority/power/etc.

I would send these emails to HR or some other supervisor. I wouldn't advocate making an enemy out of your boss.

speed dawg said:

Or, she goes further out of her way to eliminate you. At that point, it's whoever has the ear of management/seniority/power/etc.

I would send these emails to HR or some other supervisor. I wouldn't advocate making an enemy out of your boss.

Click to expand...

In May 2014 I tried to file a grievance on my boss's boss with HR and they said "We will do it for you, but have you exhausted all possibilities in solving it directly with her first?"



Actually no, I haven't told her I would file a grievance or go to her boss (who doesn't like her) if she kept her **** up..

So I did just that. I did it in Email so my words could not be twisted or so she couldn't later say I "threatened her" violently or said things I didn't say..

Fast forward to September 2014, haven't had a problem with her sense. She kisses my a$$ and agrees with everything I say and do now. Compliments my work all the time, stuff she never used to do. All she ever did before was pick on me.

What you have to understand is that yeah, bosses have power, but they are more afraid of their job than you are yours. If they are messing with you, exploit that weakness in them. Get the upper hand. Offense is much easier than defense.

And if you put it all in writing, its much harder for them to lie their way out of the hole they have dug with you.

Also, I leave you with this to read. It's funny, but it's also serious. It's exactly how my workplace runs, to the letter:

http://www.killingmycareer.com/the-sociopathic-business-model/

Awesome replies from many members!!! I've been in a similar situation, so I know what you're dealing with. Good tip on the email too, very important. When a person does this type of game, you gotta play...or be the ref. When I went through this, same thing...trying to throw someone under the bus instead of taking the heat for the mistakes they made when I always gave them the info to get the job done, and always did my best. Little did they know, I'm an SME of not only the product but the equipment also. Make the right connections with the right people and explain the complex situations to higher ups above them, without that person knowing...and always have a backup plan. :rockon:
Don't just be in the game, coach it

Screw that.

No job is worth being miserable over.

I would set her straight and see if you get through to her.

I cannot stand office politics and the suck ups and *****iness.. oh it makes me mad.