'I was too stunned to speak': Boss tries to earn social approval by mocking overworked employee during meeting, coworkers back them up instead of taking his side

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Bar Mor Hazut • Senior Editor
Apr 18, 2024 9:00 AM EDT

The relationship you have with your boss is almost as important as your personal relationships at home. Employees spend more than 8 hours a day with their employers and likely rely on them with every step they take on their job. You don't have to become best friends, but it is still important to maintain a good relationship with the person who is basically in charge of your professional life.

I would not call the relationship that is being described in this Reddit post a 'good working relationship', and I hope that is going to change for the sake of OP (original poster). OP is an American woman working in a German company, and she describes the difficulties she's been having with her boss. She tells stories about how her boss keeps making fun of her and mocking her, with the final straw being him telling her that 'nobody likes her' in front of her coworkers.

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  • 01
    "I was too stunned to speak"
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    Boss (41M) made fun of me (26F) during a meeting and told me that nobody liked me. How do I go about this?
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    Yesterday we had a team meeting with my boss (41M), me (26F), and three other coworkers. One of the coworkers was brand new to the team, and this was her first
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    meeting with us. At different points throughout the meeting my boss went out of his way to "tease" me. Initially I thought nothing of it, but it quickly devolved into full-on making
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    fun of me for no discernible reason. I was not making fun of him back. When we went to go get lunch, I tried to order my lunch in German (I moved to Germany
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    for work, and German is my fourth language so it's currently not very good). As I was ordering, I could overhear my boss snickering at my German and talking about it with
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    someone (he is German, so of course his German is perfect). I ignored this, and I went about our lunch as usual. However, when we got into the meeting room, he continued
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    "teasing" me. He was laughing and telling me that the lady at the restaurant had to switch to English because of how bad my German was. I was a bit stunned at the way he was
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    picking on me because he knows I spend my own time and money on German classes, and that I don't pretend to be fluent. He then continued by telling everyone a story about how I
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    accidentally pulled open a door instead of pushed it while laughing at me, and of course that story alone makes me look dumb. For context, in the US most commercial buildings
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    have doors that open outwards when you first enter them due to safety issues. This is not a thing in Germany, so when I first landed here this was a bit of a cultural fumble on my end.
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    However, my coworkers likely do not know about this cultural difference since they're not American, so to them I just looked stupid.
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    At the end of the day as people left it was just my boss, me, and another coworker whom my boss considers to be his right- hand man. At this point, my boss just completely took a turn
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    for the worst. He "jokingly" told me, "Are you going to cry to your mom on the way back home about how nobody likes you?". When I responded by saying that I think that's just his
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    opinion, he retorted with, "It's everybody's opinion." I was too stunned to speak, and the coworker we were with looked visibly uncomfortable with the way he was treating me. He
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    later texted me asking if I was okay, and he explained he didn't step in because he wasn't sure if my boss and I just had that banter with each other (we don't). He told me that he thinks
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    our boss is currently having problems with his girlfriend, and that he just doesn't know how to manage the stress of it and is taking it out on me; however, this is purely
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    speculative. It was also an odd comment because I am quite logical and stoic person, so the idea of me going home to cry just isn't aligned with the behavior that I've shown at my job.
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    For more context, I am a high- achieving employee. Seriously. I was moved to a different continent (all expenses paid for by my company), the higher-ups really like me, I work my off
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    every single day, and I go as far as to try to introduce software programs and other projects to help to develop our division. My boss himself says that I do great work, and he hasn't ever complained or said something
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    bad about the quality of my work. And to top it all off, I get along with everybody in my office; I am objectively not this person that everybody apparently dislikes. Moreover, I am the only person my boss is
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    treating this way. I haven't had any disagreements with him recently nor have I made him look bad, so I have no clue what to do here or how to proceed. I tried giving him at
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    call/email to discuss what happened, but I can tell he's avoiding me since he has been uncharacteristically silent. What gives, and what can I do here?
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    Unfortunately, leaving is not an option since I am legally bound to stay in my role for another year. Edit 1: Just for additional context, the parent company for
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    this company is in the US. Because my particular branch works with multiple European customers all across the continent, the business is conducted in English so that there's a common language. Of
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    course, German employees for this division speak in German to each other, as do French employees speak in French, etc. But because it's international business with people of multiple nationalities, English is
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    the lingua franca. The meeting was conducted in English because my coworkers on my team are German, American (me), French, and British. A common sentiment is that people think my boss is
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    threatened by me, but at this point in my career I would be surprised if he is because there's no chance of me taking his job. He's a platform director, and even though he is my direct
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    report, he is decently high up in the company. He speaks both English and German. Edit 2: A common question is whether this is an isolated incident or if it has been a
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    pattern. For the sake of brevity, I did not give a detailed backstory because I thought that would be overlol for a Reddit post. That being said, it's a combination of both.
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    Although this is the first time he has truly gone out of his way to treat me this poorly and to this extent, there has been teasing before. When we're alone, he has playfully teased me before. It wasn't mean-spirited though,
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    so no harm no foul. That being said, he does tend to change based on the people who are around him, and I do know that he does not manage his stress well and tends to be hyper critical and petty when he's
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  • 33
    under stress. For example, if we are having a conversation and he feels that I don't understand him, he has a tendency to turn to his right-hand man and condescendingly smirk as if attempting to say, "Look at how dumb she is." Funnily enough,
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    his right-hand man always has a neutral expression, so I'm not sure why my boss tries to commiserate with him about the dumb foreigner when he's clearly not responding to it. This time I think it may have been a
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    combination of the fact that he might have a difficult personal issue and because he searches for social approval in others I happened to be an easy target for cheap laughs as the
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    youngest on the team, the only American, and one of two women. But again, this is just speculative because I can't read his mind.
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    txstepmomagain · 11 hr. ago "to them I just looked stupid" I seriously doubt that. Your boss, however, is making himself look very stupid.
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    These_Ad_8619 · 7 hr. ago Sounds like he feels threatened by OP which is why he's trying to knock her down a peg
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    mtabacco31 6 hr. ago This is what I was thinking. I have worked with a supervisor like this. They feel threatened so they lash out and try to break you down. Is it possible someone above him talks about them a lot and it's making him feel like he can not compete.
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    psichodrome 5 hr. ago I think OP should take this as a compliment. Not that she shouldn't take any action, but it's kinda truthful and great for self esteem.
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    Extension-Pen-642.9 hr. ago OP, how did you not cry lol I would have bawled. You're way stronger than me. Your boss is a socially inept moron and a bully. You have to report him.
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    baconwrap420 OP · 5 hr. ago · edited 5 hr. ago I definitely did. I just waited until I got home. I learned years ago that you can have whatever emotional reaction you want to have in the
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  • 43
    privacy of your own house, but the second it transfers over to your job (even if it's valid), you're suddenly the one that's in the wrong. It s. And if you're a woman, it takes just one emotional reaction to be written off as
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    irrational or difficult to work with. So much of career success relies as coming across as unfazed even if you're hurting inside. I mastered the skill of coming across as unbothered a while ago.
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    jeanneeebeanneee . 11 hr. ago He did all of this in front of other people, which means that there were witnesses. I would escalate this to his boss and file a formal complaint with HR (or whatever their
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  • 46
    version of that is). I would not have been able to resist the urge to say EXCUSE ME? CAN YOU REPEAT THAT FOR EVERYONE?" when he started in on his . He's totally unprofessional and childish.
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  • 47
    baconwrap420 OP · 11 hr. ago I agree. He's usually not a bad guy, but I have noticed that he has become increasingly childish for reasons unknown to me. I'm glad you agree because I felt like I was maybe being too sensitive.
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