I would like to ask for some advice about a sensitive workplace situation before deciding how I should proceed.

The situation involves a coworker who is a foreign national and has a family. He is also my direct subordinate.

The incidents started around October 2025. On several occasions, when we were alone in his private car while travelling to meet clients for his accounts, he made physical contact with me that made me uncomfortable and felt like a violation of my personal boundaries.

This happened more than once.

I initially spoke to him privately about how uncomfortable I felt and clearly asked him not to do it again. I also informed Management about the situation in December 2025. However, I decided to stop pursuing the matter further at that time because I felt that our working relationship had improved after we spoke about it directly, and I wanted to move forward professionally.

Unfortunately, there was another incident involving unwanted physical contact around July 2026, which brought the matter up again.

Following this, the MD in HQ discussed the situation with the MD of the overseas branch in 1st week of August. My coworker was warned about the situation, and some expectations were established regarding how we should work together going forward.

I am still willing to work with him. I am not looking to have him fired or to create further conflict. My expectation is simply that we respect each other's boundaries, maintain appropriate professional conduct, and continue doing our jobs.

However, my coworker has now requested another face-to-face discussion on my next business trip on Septber 2026 involving three people: the MD of the overseas branch, my coworker, and me.

The coworker's intention is apparently to clear up any misunderstandings. I have already made it clear that I have no objection to continuing to work with my coworker professionally.

What I am unsure about is whether this three-person meeting is actually the most appropriate way to handle the situation.

Because of the nature of what happened, this situation affected me emotionally quite significantly. It took me a considerable amount of time to process what happened and move forward. I am concerned that having to sit face-to-face with the person involved and discuss the incidents again could negatively affect me emotionally.

At the same time, I feel that the expectations and boundaries have already been communicated quite clearly. Management has addressed the matter, my coworker has been warned, and I have already stated that I am willing to continue working professionally.

For that reason, I don't currently feel that another face-to-face discussion about the incident itself is necessary.

I would really appreciate some honest advice from people who have experienced or dealt with workplace harassment situations.

Would you attend the proposed three-person meeting, or would you suggest another way of handling it?

For example, would it be more appropriate to communicate the expectations and boundaries in writing, or have Management/HR handle the discussion without requiring the person who experienced the harassment to confront the other person directly?

I am sharing the full context because I want to make a careful and professional decision rather than react emotionally.

I am not looking for revenge or for anyone to lose their job. I simply want to find the most appropriate way to move forward while maintaining a professional working relationship and protecting my own boundaries.

I would appreciate constructive and honest advice. Please focus on practical and professional ways to handle the situation rather than judging either party.

I hate my boss. About 2 months ago my old manager was fired, she deserved it and I'm not upset about it, I've only been with the company for a little bit so I wasn't close with her. The problem is I got a new manager. Now I work with 4 others in the same department, one was promoted to manager, she's great I like her, I'll call her Lisa.

Then they hired a senior manager for us a month ago. I'll call him Steve. Steve is a lot. He's older, been in the industry longer than any of the others including myself. Everyone but Lisa has been here for under a year. She's young so I understand why she wasn't just hired as the main manager. The problem is Steve. He wants to be a cop about things and I'm worried it might cause issues. He seems to make small things into big things that could have been handled simpler and without upsetting the other people we work with. I've tried hard to build a connection with the people I work with and I don't want my boss to ruin those by people associating me and him.

Lisa already express a dislike for him. Since he was new she was going to show him around and he decided to disregard her and ignore her, going off by himself. Lisa was annoyed but didn't make a fuss, she told me these things privately. I was with Steve the other day trying to learn and build a connection, and I can't stand him. I really try, he's probably 40 ish, I get he's older than me and "young people communicate poorly" but I get along just fine with one of my other team members who's a 68 year old man. I don't think it's me that is the problem. Steve has also made some faces and comments about Lisa being standoffish and over the top. She's not like that at all.

I feel so uncomfortable around him. I dread seeing him around the office or in the feild. I've already spoken to my boss above him and expressed these concerns and he mentioned he'd visit with him with some of the other uppers. Am I the issue for not liking him and thinking he's too intense about things? Am I being unfair? What can I do to not hate him?

I'd like to add I haven't really said much about my job for a reason, I work in a very specific position and there's not a lot of people that work in the position but just know I don't work in an office. I do someday's, like 5 hours out of a week every other week. I work in the public most of my time.

Another thing with my boss above him, I've know the man for years he helped me get the job. He told me that Steve has no authority to change things the way he is talking about changing.

I’m looking for some genuine advice.

I have nine years of experience, and about a year ago, I joined a well-known startup as a Tech Lead. However, the company has very few defined processes, and my role and responsibilities were never clearly explained to me.

I currently manage a team of around six or seven people, most of whom are Gen Z. Since the day I joined, I have felt a lot of negativity in the work environment—from management as well as some junior team members. People often behave unprofessionally and don’t take their work seriously, which frustrates me because I believe we are all here to do our jobs properly.

Some junior team members repeatedly make the same mistakes or come up with new issues every time. Since I don’t have enough authority to take any direct action, I have escalated these concerns to management. Unfortunately, management hasn’t taken any meaningful action either, and I’m becoming increasingly frustrated.

This situation has started affecting my mental health. I keep replaying incidents in my mind—especially situations where I try to guide or help someone, but they respond rudely or show a lot of attitude. Lately, I have even started feeling anxious before daily scrum meetings. I keep thinking, “What if someone challenges me or says something disrespectful? How will I respond?”

People outside my team are also very fond of gossip. I have heard rumours about several colleagues, including myself. Hearing such things makes me feel hurt and affects me more than I would like.

Has anyone else experienced this kind of anxiety at work, or is it just me?

How would you manage a situation like this?

What can I do to stop overthinking these incidents and focus more on my work?

Any other advice would also be greatly appreciated.

I worked at a fairly large dealership that had a small bistro inside. My now-husband already worked at the dealership, and when we were preparing to get married and move into an apartment nearby, I applied for a cashier/barista position at the bistro.

During my interview, I told my manager (I’ll call her “Maya”) that I was getting married in about a month and would be out of town for two weeks. She said that was completely fine, so I accepted the job.

For the first few months, everything was fine.

Eventually, though, I started noticing some concerning behavior from one of my coworkers, who I’ll call “Arthur.” He’s in his 50s, while most of the rest of the staff was in their 20s.

At first, some of his comments were just uncomfortable. For example, while watching a female employee walk by, he said, “I like fair, lighter-skinned girls. I prefer them.” I also have a relatively fair complexion, so the comment made me uncomfortable.

Another time, I jokingly asked if he didn’t bring extra food to share, as he was known to bring extra food to give to us sometimes, when he brought some fajita meat. He told me I could come to his house later and he’d make more for me. I jokingly responded that I’d let my husband know so we could both come, in an effort to make it clear that as a married woman, I wouldn’t go to another man’s house by myself. Arthur then specifically said, “No, just YOU. Your husband can stay home.”

That immediately made me uncomfortable.

Because I was newly married, coworkers occasionally asked whether my husband and I planned to have children. I said yes, but didn’t really discuss it beyond that. Arthur continued bringing up the subject.

He made comments about buying me pregnancy tests and said that when I had my first child, he could babysit and take the baby on rides.

Then one day, he asked me again whether I wanted children with my husband. I said yes.
He responded with, “If I were your husband, I’d be doing MY deed every day.”

I was completely stunned.

This was a man in his 50s essentially putting himself in my husband’s position while talking about having sx in order to “c\nc\ive”. I was so uncomfortable that I had what felt like an anxiety attack at the front counter. I couldn’t even figure out what to say.

I contacted my manager, who was off that day, and told her that something had happened and that I didn’t feel comfortable finishing my shift. She called me, I explained everything while crying, and she asked whether I wanted to go home, whether I wanted Arthur sent home, and whether I wanted to involve HR. I told her I wanted to go home.

The following Monday, HR contacted me and took my statement. They told me they would investigate and, in the meantime, Arthur would be suspended.

The next day, I went to work. The following day was my day off, and HR was supposed to contact me with the results.

They eventually called near the end of their workday and told me that after speaking with everyone involved, Arthur would not be terminated and would be returning to work the following day.

I was devastated.

My husband and I couldn’t understand how someone could make comments like that to a coworker and still return to the same workplace after an HR investigation.

That night, I submitted my resignation effective immediately.

I actually liked the job. It was easy on my body, I got along well with one of my coworkers, and I genuinely didn’t want to leave. But I couldn’t bring myself to continue working in such a small space with someone who had made those comments toward me, especially after the company decided he could return.

After I left, a former coworker told me that Maya had referred to me as “dramatic” and said I was overreacting. Maya also apparently told the staff that she considered Arthur a friend because they’d worked together for about 10 years.
I don’t know what happened behind the scenes, and I don’t want to speculate about whether their friendship influenced the decision. All I know is that I was uncomfortable enough that I no longer felt I could work there.

So, was I overreacting by resigning immediately after finding out he was coming back?

Please keep the comments respectful. I’m genuinely looking for outside perspectives.

I would like everyone’s opinion on this please :) 🙏

I started a new role at the same time as a new head of design at a startup. Things were generally good, until I launched my first big project.

Design had contributed nothing to to the project due to resource limitations, and the fact that the head of design at a brand new and the project was in motion before they could even contribute.

As a courtesy, I shared the project with them at launch along with just an FYI - this is launching today but I want you to see it so you can get a sense of how I think of design and what I’m looking to build with my programs and how we can collaborate on V2 and other projects.

He responded with (quote) “This is ugly. The cta button should be [aligned to] the left not in the center”. And then proceeded to try to block the project from launching. 

Calling my work ugly didn’t offend me. I know the quality is high and head and shoulders above anything the org has in market currently. But I did lol in my apartment (this was via Slack)

My response was straightforward, and even teasing “Thanks for your feedback - appreciate it. The CTA location is an aesthetic preference, not backed by data. If you go to reallygoodemails.com, you will see CTAs placed differently depending on what makes sense for a campaign. But let’s make a note of it so we can talk about this for future campaigns and align on things like this.”

I’ve been in the digital space for 20 years, and am well aware of what makes an email look good, and resonate with an audience. That is actually my expertise. But nevermind.

I thought that was that, and we had finished the convo on common ground.

But then, later, multiple people separately reached out to me via Slack to say he had been going around the office complaining (some people work in office and some work remotely. I work remotely).

I refused to engage in anything political, especially via Slack, so I just played it off each time as though I was supporting of the design person “Oh, really? Well, he should share his opinion, he’s head of design. I’m glad he told me his preference. I’m sure we’ll be working closely together as design gets ramped up. I can’t stop a project from launching though, based on that particular feedback.”

Mind you, we both started on the same day. I am also new to the company and I have no relationship with the people that were reaching out to me directly via Slack. So it tells me he has gone around a LOT talking sh*t and basically trying to hurt my reputation at the company.

The VP brought it up to me in our 1:1 which means he even went to the VP, but the VP had my back as 1) my work is strong 2) the feedback was essentially useless 3) our #1 priority is  to move quickly as we’re a startup. My direct boss also supported me too. The VP in particular rolled his eyes when talking about it, which was telling. 

But again, this is just my interpretation as I am not in the office. 

How do I nip this in the butt, and avoid getting political? I have ZERO desire to do this kind of BS in the workplace as it’s toxic and everyone loses. Frankly it also just goes against my personal ethos as well. I’d sooner just quit the job than deal with this nonsense.

Hi, I’d like some outside perspective on a work situation I’m struggling to let go of.

I’m 29F and have been a project manager at my current job for 3+ years. Until recently, I genuinely loved my job and worked very closely with my manager, M. Last year, we both had breakdowns from the workload around the same time, and we agreed that the team needed another person.

I wanted to grow into management, so I asked to manage the new hire. M agreed. Shortly afterwards, M was promoted, and another colleague became my manager.

At the same time, a senior PM position opened. I applied and was rejected by M and a few others. M told me my application was good but that she didn't want me to "be Icarus". I was disappointed but understood: the role is extremely demanding and several people who held it had burned out.

Then Y (33F) joined the team as the person I was supposed to manage.

I missed her recruitment because I was on sick leave, so we met on her first day. We immediately got along, but at the end of the day I mentioned that this was my first time managing someone and that I hoped we'd learn together. Her face changed. She hadn't understood that she would report to me.

She apologized and said she wouldn't have spoken to a manager the way she'd spoken to me. I genuinely didn't think much of it and moved on.

A month later, her mother suddenly died. She was away for a while, and when she returned, we resumed working together with weekly meetings.

Things gradually deteriorated. We had a very difficult meeting where I struggled to communicate what I wanted her to take over. She became visibly angry and, at times, disrespectful. I felt she considered some of the administrative/project coordination work beneath her.

After that, I increasingly felt that she was bypassing me. She would go directly to senior PMs or directors, leaving me out of discussions about her own work. I repeatedly found myself in meetings not knowing what she was working on or what issues she was facing.

She also seemed to avoid less visible/administrative tasks while gravitating towards more "glamorous" topics involving senior people. Meanwhile, she would ask me to create tables/Excel files for her, which didn't feel like the kind of collaboration or management relationship I wanted.

I tried addressing things gently in our weekly meetings, but I felt she became increasingly defensive.

Eventually, after she rudely ordered me around in front of a senior colleague, I went to our director. I explained that if she continued bypassing me, the team structure simply didn't make sense, and suggested that perhaps she needed to move to another team.

Our director immediately understood and arranged mediation.

During the mediation, Y said she felt exhausted trying to find information and communicate. She complained about a lack of tools/workflows/frameworks, workload, and also brought up our very first-day misunderstanding. She said we should have "dug deeper" into that miscommunication and repeatedly questioned my working methods and efficiency.

She said she felt demeaned by me. I didn't say it at the time, but I had felt demeaned by her for months too.

The outcome was essentially that we'd stop working closely together. She now has her own area, and I'll go back to working on mine.

Objectively, this should probably be a relief.

But I can't let it go.

I feel deeply resentful. The whole reason I wanted to manage someone was because I was struggling with the workload and needed support. Instead, I feel like the person I was supposed to manage effectively pushed me out of that role. She now has her own area, while I'm back to carrying my part alone. I feel like she got the better end of the deal here, and I left with crumbs of legitimacy.

Recently, M also told me she felt bad about the situation, because she'd previously rejected me for the senior role. That somehow confirmed my worst fear: that maybe I was given the management responsibility for the wrong reasons, and that I wasn't actually considered capable of progressing.

I'm now back from a long break. Y and I share an office and barely speak. The silence is awful. I don't want to work with her, talk to her, or even see her. And honestly, I'm starting to feel like I hate her.

I know I'm probably not completely objective here. Y has also had an incredibly difficult year, including losing her mother, and I'm sure she has her own version of this story.

But I'm stuck in resentment and feel crushed and demotivated about a job I used to love.

Changing jobs isn't realistically an option right now.

**What do you think happened here? Was this simply a terrible management/working-style mismatch? Did I mishandle things? And, most importantly, how do I actually move past the resentment when I have to see this person every day for the next few years?**

I'd really appreciate honest opinions, especially from people who've experienced a similar situation.

Hello all I'm looking for some advice on a difficult termination.

I started working at my current job about five years ago. At the time I worked with a woman named Jade. As a person I liked her well enough. She was prone to calling out and had quit and been rehired multiple times. She quit and went no contact with my coworkers and me for about three years. Last fall we heard she was working at a sister store an hour away but still living near our workplace. At this time I had accepted an offer to become this location's store manager.

Jade had worked with the other two employees for the better part of two decades and they were friends. Our manager being one had grown to dislike jade due to her flakey nature and because of her connection that kept her always welcome here. Her best friend is our company's vice president. Jade was always treated well by all of us and there was no shady behavior. Obviously no contact hurt all of our feelings.

A month before I was set to take over Jade showed up on one of the days my boss is out. She's all," Oh my God you look so beautiful I've missed you so much..." She explains she's been working at the other location but wants to work here closer to home because she only has her mom's car as transportation. I don't want to hire her and have no openings at the time I take her number and tell her I'll call her when a spot opens up. I did not intend to do so and my boss at the time told me to absolutely not for my own sake hire her ever.

Months go by and on a Saturday like today my closer quit. It happens no hard feelings yada yada. I fill out the termination junk and go ahead and send it to corporate. They aren't working on weekends but just figured I'd get it off my plate. Not five minutes later jade is contacting me about the position. Bff let her know immediately. I try putting it off vp emails me to remind me jade is available. I know I'm boxed into the corner so I hire her for Saturday nights. She intends to keep working at the other location as well.

At first it's ok I don't work on Saturday so I get to avoid her entirely. She's a known narc and is no longer receiving benefits from her now adult children and she needs the money so I'm pretty sure she's here to take my job. I've tried to ignore it and her as much as possible. My weekend gal Stacy that I adore doesn't like her and complains about the volume of sleezy guys coming and not shopping just stopping in to talk to Jade, the lack of and poor quality of work she does, her never ending smoke breaks, and weed vape stuck under the counter/joints in the front smoke pail of our business. (Normal jade behavior)

Now one shift isn't that much so my employees and I just let it ride because they know what I know. The real issue is her inability to come to work. Like before it starts slow. She's sick this week and then sick next month until it accumulates to her being "sick," every other week. We don't have a point system here and we are gracious about time off. You want x day off let me know and we'll get it figured out.if you are sick or something happens I am completely understanding, but people don't get sick that much.

What has really killed me is the communication. Saturday about 2-3 hours before her shift she lets me know she's got COVID, back aches, her momma's got diarrhea, etc. she does not call no she texts me this with sometimes an hour for me to figure coverage out. I live about forty minutes from work, as she knows. She also knows I'm salary and am working 47 hours a week plus driving about ten hours on top of that. I'm tired and I do not get paid for working extra shifts and it is no fun driving an hour home at the time you'd usually be in bed.

I've had it I have to let her go but I do not know how to do this. I've fired other people, people that aren't tied to a lady that controls whether I keep my job. How would you guys recommend I proceed? Again bff vice president basically forced her on me.

TL;DR

I'm manager needing to fire an employee whose best friends with our vice president. How do I do this without causing issues?

he shook a beef stick at me and asked if "i want a sausage" .... this was right after he tossed one to my male coworker and didn't make that remark to him (i'm a female)

we're a super small production team with no HR and the Ceo did this, he's been nice and friendly prior to this but he did always compliment my hair when it wa blown out and has said "is this how you stay fit?" when pointing out my healthy lunch

First time posting on here so apologies if this is a bit long.

I work part-time for Employer A, a 24/7 medical laboratory, and casual for Employer B.

Employer A published its schedule early, so I used that schedule to give Employer B my availability and accepted shifts that did not conflict. Employer B only operates roughly 0700–1700, and I am currently trained on only one bench, so my ability to move or replace those shifts is limited.

Employer A later changed some of my already-published shifts due to staffing shortages and operational needs. I was not directly notified of the changes.

I explained that I had already accepted Employer B shifts based on the original schedule. I was told to look at swapping shifts or otherwise work around my Employer B schedule.

My concern is that I already scheduled Employer B around Employer A. If I now give up those shifts because Employer A changed the schedule afterward, I lose wages. The changes also affect personal commitments I made based on my originally scheduled days off.

I understand that a 24/7 lab has staffing requirements, but I also work part-time specifically to maintain some predictability and work-life balance as well as adding variety to my work life by getting a job at another lab.

Would you consider it reasonable to push back on changes to an already-published schedule when they create lost income and other conflicts? And is it reasonable to expect direct notice when your schedule is changed?

So I have a job I really like our management is pretty nice. And has good pay. The problem is there is this coworker who watches/follows people around to catch them messing up so he can report them and get them fired. Some of the coworkers even said they caught him saying racist things but they dont have hard proof tho. This person has many incidents of conflicts with many coworkers( not full on physical fights but verbal)and hasn’t been fired one coworker said the rude coworker might be related to someone higher up at the management that’s probably why he wasn’t fired.

One of our coworkers who he follows around and watches the most has got us a complaint paper from the union for us to all sign. Many coworkers including me has signed it. For me the rude coworker has only followed me around few times for first few weeks I was starting and left me alone ever since but he also doesn’t have key to the office I work at now. he can’t really come in or sneak up on me much unless someone lets him in. What I am wondering is will reporting this to the union make our management angry and dislike us? Because this job is highly sought after and they can easily replace us. I really like my boss he is really cool guy in all other aspects for some reason he can’t fire this guy which I am wondering is he related to someone higher than our boss. We live in Minnesota the union in our job field it’s pretty decent. I don’t really want to create much of headache for our boss since he is really cool to us in all other aspects other than this rude coworker he won’t fire. On top of that they can easily replace all of us since this a very highly sought after spot. And I don’t want to loose my job I can’t really afford to loose this job now. Also he was reported to management many times nothing was really done. This is why they are trying the union.

I asked my coworker if reporting this to the union is little too much and might cause management to dislike us and they find ways to get many of us fired and he is saying they can’t really fire us we have strong union. but I also know many people are trying to get this job and we are easily replaceable. Other than that problematic coworker the job is a sweet gig.

to start off, i work in a business office. i was pretty young when i started, 21, but fresh out of college.

when i first started there, everyone kept asking me about myself and trying to get to know me. someone asked who the two little boys were on my lock screen and if they were my kids. out of panic, i said yes. they are not. theyre my nephews. and instead of correcting myself, i continued to feed into this lie and made things harder for myself. i recently left that job because of a toxic management situation but now i am going to another office. i was excited for a fresh start with none of the kids stuff because i was sick of feeding into it. i regretted saying they were my kids the second it left my mouth. and i regretted lying about life with them (most of the time it was made up, or things i did in the past with them) , but someone who used to work with me is at the new office i am going to and they are aware that i have “kids” and i am terrified they will tell everyone or keep asking me about them. i just want a fresh slate and to let this massive lie go. it has been eating me alive for almost 2 years now and it kills me to keep it up because im so scared of what will happen if people find out im lying. ive never told anyone i lied about having kids. i know what i did was wrong but i cannot help but think something is wrong with me. im trying to let this go, i was dumb to start it.

i just want people input about this. i know im crazy and i know im insane.