Comment about a boss always needing to be right April 28, 2016 1:16 PM Subscribe
I'm looking for a comment that appeared on the Blue within the last few weeks about someone's boss (or former boss) who was unable ever to admit that they were mistaken about anything.
The main strategy this boss employed involved creating scenarios (sometimes very convoluted or elaborate ones) that chalked up all problems, mistakes, etc. to someone else's incompetence, lack of education, bureaucracy, etc., but never to the boss's own error.
The main strategy this boss employed involved creating scenarios (sometimes very convoluted or elaborate ones) that chalked up all problems, mistakes, etc. to someone else's incompetence, lack of education, bureaucracy, etc., but never to the boss's own error.
For a moment I thought there might be a chance this was the time I talked about a former boss and the argument we had about potato chips, but I must be thinking of all the many many times I've told that story irl because the only reference I can find here on mefi is this which obviously isn't it.
Maybe you're psychic though and are thinking of me and my boss and the potato chips?
posted by phunniemee at 2:15 PM on April 28, 2016
Maybe you're psychic though and are thinking of me and my boss and the potato chips?
posted by phunniemee at 2:15 PM on April 28, 2016
It's slightly older, but might it be Jalliah's cheese story from the emotional labor thread?
posted by janell at 2:43 PM on April 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by janell at 2:43 PM on April 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
CarolynG's link to Jalliah's comment in the anti-bullying thread is exactly the one I was thinking of -- thanks. (I hadn't seen Jalliah's cheese story in the emotional labor thread, but that's a perfect example, too, although I'm sorry that Jalliah seems plagued by such people!)
posted by the return of the thin white sock at 3:31 PM on April 28, 2016
posted by the return of the thin white sock at 3:31 PM on April 28, 2016
Oh, and phunniemee, I would be happy to hear about the Great Potato Chip Dust-Up of 2013, if you're in the mood to share.
posted by the return of the thin white sock at 3:33 PM on April 28, 2016
posted by the return of the thin white sock at 3:33 PM on April 28, 2016
It is a plague! The people in those comments are romantic type partners with each other.
posted by Jalliah at 4:14 PM on April 28, 2016 [17 favorites]
posted by Jalliah at 4:14 PM on April 28, 2016 [17 favorites]
It is a plague! The people in those comments are romantic type partners with each other.
1. I'm kinda glad they're not inflicting their never-can-be-wrong-ness on other people.
2. I'm now perversely fascinated about what happens when they disagree with each other.
posted by lazuli at 6:44 AM on April 29, 2016 [6 favorites]
1. I'm kinda glad they're not inflicting their never-can-be-wrong-ness on other people.
2. I'm now perversely fascinated about what happens when they disagree with each other.
posted by lazuli at 6:44 AM on April 29, 2016 [6 favorites]
Or maybe "I can't hear you la la la" is a coping mechanism she's developed to learn to deal with being lectured about how she must like the cheese?
posted by lazuli at 6:47 AM on April 29, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by lazuli at 6:47 AM on April 29, 2016 [3 favorites]
"I am not always right, but I never been wrong..."
posted by AugustWest at 7:50 AM on April 29, 2016
posted by AugustWest at 7:50 AM on April 29, 2016
I'm now perversely fascinated about what happens when they disagree with each other.
1. We sit in the office space next door and pretend that we didn't hear anything even though it can get really loud.
2. She is usually always right.
3. We try to laugh or else we would cry.
posted by Jalliah at 8:44 AM on April 29, 2016 [6 favorites]
1. We sit in the office space next door and pretend that we didn't hear anything even though it can get really loud.
2. She is usually always right.
3. We try to laugh or else we would cry.
posted by Jalliah at 8:44 AM on April 29, 2016 [6 favorites]
Oh, and phunniemee, I would be happy to hear about the Great Potato Chip Dust-Up of 2013, if you're in the mood to share.
There's a bourgie sandwich chain here in Chicago that my old boss liked to order from a lot. (By "order from" I mean he'd say "go get me a sandwich" and fling some money at me.) At this place they include a small paper packet of "house chips" with every sandwich. Boss loved those fucking chips, but they only ever portioned a few chips out into that small packet. Sometimes boss would get a sandwich just for the chips.
Now I had special knowledge about these chips. Having spent considerable amounts of time waiting in that restaurant (because sometimes boss would do the money fling/sandwich demand at 10am, which is 30 minutes before anyone there will actually make you a sandwich, and with that boss it was safer to just leave the office and go wait for a half hour than to try to explain how clocks worked), I knew a lot of the secrets. The house chips are Kettle brand salt and pepper flavor. I've seen them early in the morning portioning them out from the big bag into their little paper packets.
So when I discovered boss was sometimes ordering a whole expensiveass sandwich just to get his chip fix, I helpfully said I'd just buy a whole bag of them so he could eat them whenever he wanted. It's been a while now, but a conversation along the lines of this ensued:
Boss: You think [sandwich place] would sell us just the chips?
Me: Oh I don't know, I just meant I'd buy them from Peapod. I'll put them on our weekly order, you can have all the chips you want!
Boss: No, not these chips, you can't get these chips from Peapod.
Me: I'm sure they have them, Kettle is a pretty popular brand.
Boss: No, these are house chips.
Me: ...
Boss: They make them in house.
Me: Oh! No, they're Kettle brand salt and pepper. I've seen them in the mornings putting them right from the package into their packets.
Boss: Well then you saw something else. I like the house chips.
Me: They are the same chips. It's like when you go to a restaurant and they have a house wine. They're not in the kitchen stomping grapes, it's just the wine they're presenting as an option so you don't have to make a choice about wine. This is the chip they have so they don't have an ugly rack of chip bags messing up their decor. House chips.
Then he proceeds to explain about how he knows his fucking chips and blah blah blah not the same they definitely make them in house because he knows they do (lol wat) and on and on.
I bought the damn chips anyway. They became an extremely popular office snack item. Boss eventually ate a couple of them one day, and trotted over to my desk all smug as shit saying "I know why you think these are the chips they have at Hannah's. They look very similar. But they don't taste the same at all, you can really taste the difference in a fresh chip."
In the middle of all this nonsense, I confirmed that they were indeed the Kettle chips by going in on one of my sandwich runs and asking "hi, could I please ask what kind of chips you use for your house chips?" and having one of the sandwich mavens helpfully say "sure," scrabble in the trash, and hold up an empty Kettle salt and pepper packet.
For those of you playing along at home, this is the same boss with the fucking berries.
posted by phunniemee at 9:55 AM on April 29, 2016 [44 favorites]
There's a bourgie sandwich chain here in Chicago that my old boss liked to order from a lot. (By "order from" I mean he'd say "go get me a sandwich" and fling some money at me.) At this place they include a small paper packet of "house chips" with every sandwich. Boss loved those fucking chips, but they only ever portioned a few chips out into that small packet. Sometimes boss would get a sandwich just for the chips.
Now I had special knowledge about these chips. Having spent considerable amounts of time waiting in that restaurant (because sometimes boss would do the money fling/sandwich demand at 10am, which is 30 minutes before anyone there will actually make you a sandwich, and with that boss it was safer to just leave the office and go wait for a half hour than to try to explain how clocks worked), I knew a lot of the secrets. The house chips are Kettle brand salt and pepper flavor. I've seen them early in the morning portioning them out from the big bag into their little paper packets.
So when I discovered boss was sometimes ordering a whole expensiveass sandwich just to get his chip fix, I helpfully said I'd just buy a whole bag of them so he could eat them whenever he wanted. It's been a while now, but a conversation along the lines of this ensued:
Boss: You think [sandwich place] would sell us just the chips?
Me: Oh I don't know, I just meant I'd buy them from Peapod. I'll put them on our weekly order, you can have all the chips you want!
Boss: No, not these chips, you can't get these chips from Peapod.
Me: I'm sure they have them, Kettle is a pretty popular brand.
Boss: No, these are house chips.
Me: ...
Boss: They make them in house.
Me: Oh! No, they're Kettle brand salt and pepper. I've seen them in the mornings putting them right from the package into their packets.
Boss: Well then you saw something else. I like the house chips.
Me: They are the same chips. It's like when you go to a restaurant and they have a house wine. They're not in the kitchen stomping grapes, it's just the wine they're presenting as an option so you don't have to make a choice about wine. This is the chip they have so they don't have an ugly rack of chip bags messing up their decor. House chips.
Then he proceeds to explain about how he knows his fucking chips and blah blah blah not the same they definitely make them in house because he knows they do (lol wat) and on and on.
I bought the damn chips anyway. They became an extremely popular office snack item. Boss eventually ate a couple of them one day, and trotted over to my desk all smug as shit saying "I know why you think these are the chips they have at Hannah's. They look very similar. But they don't taste the same at all, you can really taste the difference in a fresh chip."
In the middle of all this nonsense, I confirmed that they were indeed the Kettle chips by going in on one of my sandwich runs and asking "hi, could I please ask what kind of chips you use for your house chips?" and having one of the sandwich mavens helpfully say "sure," scrabble in the trash, and hold up an empty Kettle salt and pepper packet.
For those of you playing along at home, this is the same boss with the fucking berries.
posted by phunniemee at 9:55 AM on April 29, 2016 [44 favorites]
oh god phunniemee. I read about the Kettle chips and then I went back and read about the berries and the cream cheese and the peanutbutter knives. I am directing huge fiery blasts of disdain at those people. Internetstranger disdain from the future: the most lethal and injurious kind.
posted by Don Pepino at 10:21 AM on April 29, 2016 [6 favorites]
posted by Don Pepino at 10:21 AM on April 29, 2016 [6 favorites]
It's like when you go to a restaurant and they have a house wine. They're not in the kitchen stomping grapes...
I snort-laughed. Also: that is mansplaining taken to the next level right there. "No, your reality is not real. My reality, the one I imagined in my head without doing any research whatsoever, is true. Because I said so."
How many of you with these stories also got remarks along the lines of "you need to develop your self-confidence and be less aggressive?" When I know how my job works, it's not because I know my clients, it's that I don't know how my job works and am mooching with clients because I "lack self-confidence". When I get a touch irate at this reimagining, I am "aggressive." Note that there is only one personality type that calls me this, and that personality type is arrogant white male manager.
I got fun treatment after gently, carefully, thoughtfully working up – over a period of six months – to a proposal to help improve our diversity management too. If you guessed that it was re-explained as "aggressively calling out racism" you are correct.
posted by fraula at 11:34 AM on May 1, 2016 [2 favorites]
I snort-laughed. Also: that is mansplaining taken to the next level right there. "No, your reality is not real. My reality, the one I imagined in my head without doing any research whatsoever, is true. Because I said so."
How many of you with these stories also got remarks along the lines of "you need to develop your self-confidence and be less aggressive?" When I know how my job works, it's not because I know my clients, it's that I don't know how my job works and am mooching with clients because I "lack self-confidence". When I get a touch irate at this reimagining, I am "aggressive." Note that there is only one personality type that calls me this, and that personality type is arrogant white male manager.
I got fun treatment after gently, carefully, thoughtfully working up – over a period of six months – to a proposal to help improve our diversity management too. If you guessed that it was re-explained as "aggressively calling out racism" you are correct.
posted by fraula at 11:34 AM on May 1, 2016 [2 favorites]
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posted by beerperson at 2:04 PM on April 28, 2016 [55 favorites]