Observations? ... Or "per CEPT shuns"?

I'm at a place where I'm having difficulty writing this.  Not because it brings up a backlash of emotions and flashbacks, but because it relies on memory.  Memory of things that occurred in the past in the workplace but still have a significant place in my story both of what happened in the workplace and struggles I've had during the process of recovery afterwards.

I want to make this as truthful and accurate as possible.

I also want to make it understandable to the reader.  After all, as I've mentioned before, workplace bullying is not vague, it's complicated.  Very complicated.  The more people get involved, the more complicated it gets.

I don't want to be accused of using my imagination as did happen once in the workplace.

I don't want people to shrug and say "I don't know.  I wasn't there" as many people have done.

I want people to realize that even though they were not there, that these things did happen and to take what I'm saying as having truth in it.

Until or unless proven otherwise.

This post is about the power of observation.  Specifically my observation of the world around me.  Of the dynamics in the workplace and how I perceive the world around me based on what I hear and observe.

Observations which became translated by the other side as "as SUMP shuns" and "per CEPT shuns".

*****

Words such as assumptions, perceptions were thrown at me in the workplace consistently.  Mostly by a woman who had been our former supervisor.  Ours as in she was supervising all of us on my shift.

She had joined our ranks during the time of transition from the takeover by the multi million dollar conglomerate for her first ever supervisory position.  Although she had initially been friendly with me and recognized my worth in the office and had even verbalized that I knew my job well and was able to articulate it well to others - as in training others, things began to deteriorate as she became friends with all of the other co-workers.  The ones who became the core of the mob.  As she became friends with them, she joined their ranks.

When I say she became close personal friends with A, B, and C thus becoming D, it's not based on conjecture.  It's based on observing her come into our office and chit chat with the others, while ignoring me.  It's based on watching her come into the office on Friday evenings when she was working and joining the others in the meal I was not included in and helping them carry the containers into our building.  It's based on watching her on weeks when due to family issues, she would be working our shift with us, she would come in and spend the remainder of her shift with us when the other management staff had gone home for the day.  The stress of those weeks when she joined the others in our small office were brutal for me.

She was the one who would accuse me of using perceptions and assumptions any time I said anything; however, she would not pronounce the words assumptions and perceptions in what is to me a normal way, but would accentuate the middle syllables and enunciate the "t's" crisply so that the words became  "as SUMPT shuns" and "per CEPT shuns" with what was to me a derogatory inflection and meaning.

It felt like these two things were very, very wrong and that I alone was guilty of having perceptions and assumptions.

However, and here is where those dratted rabbit trails come in, so I have to pick the most relevant one to pursue in this post, I've learned over the last seven years that we all have assumptions and perceptions.  Some are right; some are wrong.

I've also learned that our perceptions have to do with how we perceive life around us.  So that when this supervisor proclaimed that whatever I said was a "per CEPT shun", she was basically declaring that the way I perceive life is intrinsically wrong.

If it's based on observation, is it a perception? Or is it based on observable fact?

I was not picking assumptions and perceptions out of thin office air, but I was forming them based on observation.  Something that I have been doing most of my life.  As an introvert, I became an observer watching life on the sidelines as I grew up.

In my adult life after I became more extroverted (I think I'm something called an extroverted introvert), I would pull back into myself when overwhelmed or needing a quiet place and observe.

I observed the dynamics between my coworkers.  I listened to those conversations which were loud enough that I could not not listen to them. I observed mannerisms, speech patterns and intonations.

When I say I believe I became the office soap opera, it's based on A's behaviour many times in the office when she kept something going for periods of time.  For instance, in the prelude to a vacation, she would book the vacation - and in some cases unbook and rebook - in the office.  Loudly and publicly.  We knew all about her vacation preparations from inception to leaving.  It became our daily entertainment.  What's going to happen next in the saga of A's vacation?  Until the day of departure arrived and there was suddenly a void in the office.  After returning, she never spoke of her vacation experience again. We never got the epilogue.

When I say A was probably a drama queen, it was based on the experience of listening to her keep a bevy of coworkers entertained with an article from the newspaper detailing that one of our local farmers' markets was closing.  She had them all going.  Loudly.  For what seemed like a long time to me.  Especially when I'm sitting at the desk next to hers trying to get work done.  The problem?  She had the wrong market closing.  Eventually, I stepped in and spoke up.  She was defiant.  She was angry.  I showed her the sentence in the paper where it said which market was closing.  The crowd fell silent and dispersed.  But not before I observed their eyes and facial expressions.  I felt that being right was wrong.

When I say A probably fits into the category of a vicarious bully, it's based on the numerous times I observed her bad mouthing an employee.  Which she did a lot.  Based on observation, I don't think she liked a lot of people in the workplace.  I don't think she was a happy person.  I know she was good, very good, at her job, but from observation I came to the conclusion that in her world, there was room at the top for only one person: herself.

When I say that A changed office policy, it's based on her speech patterns and  her observed closeness with that one supervisor.  I began to realize that something was wrong when one day I after a technical failure which disrupted our work for hours and created a backlog, I offered to stay after to help out and was told by the supervisor that I didn't have the seniority to do so.  ?????  Other supervisors had actually applauded the fact that I was willing to work over and help out others.  However, this one was telling me that I was not only not to offer to work overtime, but was not allowed to because "anyone could do my job."  Those were the exact words I heard come from A's mouth.  From that day on, as long as D was our supervisor, I was never allowed to work overtime even when it was directly after my shift.  She would call in someone else, someone with less seniority in our office to come in at 3 a.m. to cover the latter half of the shift because coverage for the entire shift was not needed.  Another A sentiment I'd heard many times.

I didn't like what I was hearing, but was powerless to stop it.  Anything I said to D was sloughed off, minimized or downright dismissed in a derogatory manner.

Based on these things and others, I felt that A was the mouthpiece speaking into D's ear.

There were many other instances which I observed including one in which A's and B's shifts overlapped for one hour one night at a time when all the management personnel were gone for the day.  They spent that hour with their chairs pulled into the middle of our small office loudly badmouthing the company.  For one solid hour.  While both were being paid by our employer for that hour.  That's not an assumption or a perception.  That's fact based on observation.

These are in part the people and personalities I had the privilege of working with.

 This is only a short synopsis of behaviours and conversations, I observed in the workplace.

In this post I've only dealt with observable, verbal interactions.  Not everything that occurred had to do with the spoken word.  There were many non verbal interactions which I clued into while others in the workplace did not.   After observing this non recognition of non verbals, I began to realize that for whatever reason most of my coworkers did not recognize them and, therefore did not exist.  I had intended to go into those as well, but I think it's time to stop now and leave you to ponder this post and decide for yourself whether it was just "per CEPT shuns" and "as SUMP shuns" or whether there is an observable reason for what I say?

This difference will become important soon as the narrative continues.