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Females and female bosses...

Posted by: delivery
Date: 1/29/2010 4:14:43 AM

Anyone had this problem?

I work in IT and experienced and good at my job, but for medical reasons I am often late in the mornings.

This has never ever affected my work. I work fast and normally produce more work of a better quality than was expected.

I don't accept a job with set hours, because I know I wont be able to meet them. The job I was working in this particular example i did not accept until I had had it clearly understood that I was able to work flexi hours

I am female and work in a very technical, reasonably male oriented job - well at the techie end anyway. I am (not bragging, just being honest) very good at understanding anything logical and technical and generally find it easy to do what others call a 'large amount of work, too a high standard. Feedback from colleagues has always confirmed that, and even employers who had a problem with me as in this story, have not been able to find fault with my work or output. I've always got along well with male colleagues, and the same with female colleagues who are good at what they do. This includes other females who are techies like me to a great extend, and to a lesser extent females who maybe arent so techie, but are very good at their job in other ways, or are confident with their own skills and contribution. (ie women who dont feel there is any reason to be threatened if another woman does somethign well - because they are confident in their own skills and ability etc

Ive never had any problem with male bosses. But often had problems with female bosses.

In every situation its been the same.....

They start to have a problem with me being late in the mornings, and then start to micro manage, constantly wanting to go over my work with a fine tooth comb, even though everything has been delivered on time to a good standard. And even though they do this and cannot find anything out of place they will keep doing it. Not once has any wone who has done this been able to find any fault with my work in any way, shape or form, and I've always delivered on or before time. The result of this in the recent role was that a project manager started to voice concerns that i was not going to do the work and was basically doubting everything I said and did

In the end I delivered the work and he came and thanked me and his attitude totally changed when he realised that the goods had been delivered. Whether this womans attitude had anything to do with his loss of faith in my i dont know - except that he was questioning my work saying he didnt think I had done it and I spent a whole afternoon going through everything and breaking it down to send him evidence it was done. I had done this exact same exercise 2-3 days prior to this female boss and at the time had said to him more than once, I dont understand why you think it isnt done I just took (female boss) though all of this the other day and she said she was happy that it was all done. We work closely enough that the normal thing would be for him to just go and ask her and I couldnt figure out why on earth he wasnt just going and confirming what I told him with her. Maybe I am being paranoid and hopping onto my own little conspiricy theory bandwagon here, but I just wondered whether he wasnt asking her, because it was her that had given him the impression I wasnt doing the work in the first place....

Because I am lucky enough to work in an area that I am good at, I pick things up quickly and can get a lkot of work done in

a short tiem. Anyway - i get the feeling that its almost that some people just cant put together in their heads, late start

time, and quality work they cant see one co-existing with the other... I am a contractor so only am paid by the hours I work so its not an issue with pay or anything.

I've had my work raked over with a fine tooth, comb, (and she couldnt find a single thing wrong with it), had a number of

situations where other colleagues have come and asked me where work items are that I have already given to her more

than once (and gotten the feeling that they were given some reason to believe my work wasn't getting done).

A couple of days ago my team leader (not this woman - who is my line manager - but the person who manages my team on

a daily basis) came and said he had been asked to ask me about my hours. It came across like someone thought I had

been invoicing for hours i didnt work. The day he was asking about was a day i hadnt even filled out a timesheet or

invoice for yet, so even if I were dishonest like that (which I am not) I had not yet billed for that day at all.

So I told him the hours I had worked, he wouldnt tell me who had asked, and eventually after sitting there getting pretty angry I emailed him and said that I would like him to pass on to whoever did that I felt it was a bit unprofessional to make comments to another colleague in a way that implied I was dishonest, as it could potentially be very damaging to my reputation in a small town, and basically just wasnt on. That if this person felt strongly enough about this to say something to him, why were they not able to approach me directly. Anyway the next day was my last day there as i was on a fixed term contract. As Im sure anyone can realise - any HINT of a contractor maybe being dishonest and invoicing for hours they didnt work, - is basically goijng to totally trach my chances of getting work with any employer that hears it. So I felt that it was really out of line for someone to comment to another colleague anything that in any way implied I might be doing that - especially with no evidence at all, and no discussion with me first... all it takes is one comment like that and next thing there is a rumour and that person is unemployable. So I made it clear that I was pretty angry about it.

And on my last day, as part of my handover documenting a system which Id taught myself to use and created

a lot of useful tools to automate repetitive tasks which would need to be carried out many times in the future. So this would save other people time dioing the same thing manually. I was documenting this as it was pretty complex, and without that, others wouldnt be able to pick it up easily and use it. I also try to always leave a good handover as there is nothing more frustrating than someone is gone and you cant find anything they did and have to redo it all....I dont want my name too be that person when I leave I want to be the one who left it all nice and easily found with instructions on how ti works.

So thought I am going to leave this behind so they (my colleagues) dont waste that time again. I'd discussed this and been asked to do it, by my team lead. I

had also emailed this woman, my formal boss a few weeks prior asking her for a meeting specifically so we could prioritise my time between then and my final date so she could give me her priorities for the handover of my work etc IOi had also created a lot of templates and other reuseable documentation whhich it seemed pointless to not use. She never replied to me.

I put in my final invoice on my last day, being really careful to not be a second out. Next thing she emails back asking me

to give her the hours per day (which I have never been asked for prior and it is not normal practise there to ask for that level of detail. Now when I started there I provided invoices that documented every moment of my day,

and was told they didnt want that - just the hours, and then just rounded to the daily rate and to make up take off any

extra. So I sent her my hours for each day incl lunch etc.

And she comes over and first told me I was not in at 10.30 I was in at 11 and why did I say 10.30. (I know it was ten thirty as after the conversation the day prior with my team lead, Id made dam sure to check what time I got there).

So I said that I knew what time I got in because I had checked my watch and my pc time and they were both 10.30. I then said but dont worry , if its a problem then just pay me from 11, thats fine

(I was thinking this bullsh-t and isnt worth the argument). Then she says so you put 6 hours what time are you working till, and

i said 5.30 and she thought about that for a while going 'oh but you are taking 1 hr lunch like I was trying to rip them off and claim my lunch hour as paid time. TYhen counted it on her fingers and realised that 10.30 - 5.30 is 7 hours so when you take 1 hr lunch u get six! So she goes away and approves my

timesheet Anyway Id been working on my handover stuff and then near 4pmish she comes along and tells me to leave

early and says dont worry about the pay, (after the carry on earlier) and I said its ok I want to finish this properly because

there is no point in ...other colleagues) wasting time trying to figure this out when I've already learnt it the hard way and I want to hand this over so someone can use it - rather than have the company pay them to learn over again in hours and weeks what I can document now.

And she goes 'oh we are going to revamp the whole thing anyway so wont be using it'....And made a point of repeating that a number of times. Its like 10 mths worth of work I put into this, and the person who she says is going to 'revamp' it , has hardly used it and had already made it clear to me that he didnt understand how do to much of what I had done - which is why I was documenting it all. TThere is no way he will be able to 'revamp' it without the info i was documenting for him, without taking weeks to learn and do it - and if you ask me it is unprofessional of her to just decide to spend company money paying for that - when the company have already paid for me to do that work. It didnt make any logical sense to me, and seemed either just senseless, or if she was that anti-me that she was willing to spend a whole pile of money rather than accept that I had created some useful work then how professional is that for someone who is supposed to be more senior and professional than me a lackey contractor.

I honestly felt as though she was just determined not to have anything left behind by me that anyone might look at and go

- hey she(me) did a good job with this....

Theres more to the story than this but i have already written a small novel so will stop now. Just wondered whether

anyone else has had this in particular females? Or whether there is something I'm missing and a better way to have handled this situation? Advice and replies from either others in my situation, or comments on how I might have handled this better are both appreciated :).

She was not the person who employed me originally or negotiated my contract.

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