Comments on: Punk Rock HR Question: Catty Women

By: Krista

Krista — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 17:08:16 +0000

The woman who wrote the letter sounds like trouble. I am in the admin department at a car dealership, and all of our administrative staff is female – both in accounting and service departments. Our finance staff, which is part of the Sales department is also all female. The behavior here at our dealership, while it can be a bit gossipy, is not often catty or outright mean. I believe that the problem is with the person who wrote the letter. What is she resentful about? We here in admin, while we are jealous of the money that our Finance Managers and some sales consultants make, aren’t willing to do the work that would get us there. Acutally, that was poorly worded – not that we’re not willing to do the work that would get us there, it mostly comes down to the working hours. We don’t want to work nights and weekends. We like M-F 8-5 – we have chosen this as our career paths. If we wanted to move into sales or finance we probably could. The woman who had my job before me transferred to Finance and is very happy with her choice.

All I thought when reading the letter from this post was “look at me, I’m being picked on, someone pay attention!” And no offense Laurie, but in my opinion, you lapped it up. Whether you bought her story or not, I really like your column – keep up the good work!

By: Sid Prince

Sid Prince — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 15:15:31 +0000

@Laurie Yeah, she can step up with all that. You would think they’d be happy someone is coming to them with ideas about how to run their business better, more efficient, more profitably. Nope. The “We’ve always done it this way” syndrome will dominate.

BTW, your “friend” has it spot on. Whoever he/she is has a great deal of insight into the business & how it operates. Why they scared to post? Step up playa!

Sid.

By: Kingsley Tagbo, IT Career Coach

Kingsley Tagbo, IT Career Coach — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 23:03:59 +0000

It sounds like this is a company/department culture issue and there may not be much you can do about it if it is deeply ingrained. I think you should evaluate your reasons for working for the company and where you would like to be a year or 5 years from now. If these women are important to your goals (hopefully not), then you may need to reach out to them. Otherwise, ignore them and read a good business book at lunchtime!

By: MattyMat

MattyMat — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 16:20:27 +0000

She shouldn’t do anything— and go hardcore paperwork on these b*tches when there’s anything that remotely seen as slanderous on her character or work. The girly-girls will be shell-shocked– and gun-shy next time they try to pull any shenanigans, believe me. She’s just too chicken-shit to pull the trigger.

By: Jackie

Jackie — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 18:04:37 +0000

Sounds like workplace bullying and mobbing to me. Some states have laws against this type of behavior.

By: class factotum

class factotum — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 14:05:37 +0000

I don’t know that this is a female thing as much as it is a money thing. My cousin owns a hair salon. She employs female stylists (my cousin is also a stylist) whom she pays an hourly wage. The stylists whine because my cousin makes all the profits.

She tells them if they want to make the big bucks, they can invest their money to rent a space, pay the utilities, buy the supplies, do the marketing and pay their wages, even when there are no customers. Yeah, baby, that’s capitalism. She takes the losses and she takes the profits so shut up.

This reminds me of the teachers who want engineer’s pay while keeping teacher’s hours. The women who work in reception are happy to have 9-5 hours but want the money that comes with sales. You can’t have it both ways. If you want that income, you have to put in the work that goes with it.

By: econopete

econopete — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 06:33:29 +0000

It sounds to me that the managers/owners honestly won’t give a crap about the salespeople. If that’s true, would they feel the same with the regular staff? If so, who gives a damn what they think? I’d just rub it in and talk about how I love my job so much, and how I’m going on luxury cruises/vacations/buying new electronics/etc. but that’s only because I’m a catty bitch…

By: H Aria

H Aria — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 06:08:00 +0000

I have to say that I’m very suspicious when any women says that all other female employees are jealous of her. Anytime I’ve heard this complaint from an employee, it always turns out to be a much bigger story in which the one complaining is equally culpable in the situation.

I’m the first admit that women can be extremely catty and tear each other up, and certainly being the only female manager makes one an easy target. But the specific assertion of jealousy sends up all sorts of red flags for me.

I’m also curious what she defines as “typical girly behavior.” If she believes this behavior to be beneath her, her female co-workers are absolutely picking up that vibe.

By: Ryan

Ryan — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 05:13:49 +0000

Having recently left a company with a very unfortunate culture, riddled with negativity, passive aggressive behavior, and gossip, I’ve thought alot about this from both a personal viewpoint and that of overall corporate health. I don’t believe the negativity and gossip survive without a willing audience. The audience provides the fuel for the fire. The combined voice is louder and the individuals themselves spread the risk since there is strength in numbers (a few might be wrong, but many can’t all be wrong). My personal feeling is that these people talk about others due to some insecurity and hope to find others like them who are also insecure and willing to validate them. Their careers have stalled. What else can they do?

At some point, it gets too big for management to alter without long-term planning and committment (and probably money) to the culture change. Any attempt at immediate fix is a move by “the Man” and will just bounce off. Sure, you want to systematically remove the bad apples, but that is difficult unless there is something concrete or it is accompanied by other performance issues. The truly unfortunate thing is that most companies will allow (and perhaps even reward) average performance. Nobody is expected to reach and so they do not. There is no turnover, just festering. If layoffs do happen, it is only to remove the newbies with no experience and the seniors who have accumulated so many years of 3% cost of living increases that they become an issue of salary compression. Sure as hell won’t promote them, but can’t pay them in the 99 percentile for their position either. Whoever is left just keeps festering on the new audience. Rinse and repeat. HR has a big responsibility here with best practices in performance management and comp strategy in addition to the change management related to culture. However, HR doesn’t have a prayer if they don’t have the public support of management reinforcing culture, mission, values, and condemning specific behaviors.

If the company doesn’t commit to change in a wholistic fashion, I think it should be viewed as a temporary stopover. If you need to stick around a while, don’t lose your priciples or your drive. They may bad mouth you for both, but what of that will bother you anyway?

By: Hr Underling

Hr Underling — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 00:14:39 +0000

Bitches.
Just catch one alone in the bathroom and punch her in the throat, it will send a message to the masses.
(It’s Saturday and I have been watching a lot of TV….)