Question about this really rude girl at work?

Maybe if she tells you what to do, and you already know you have to, she is training you to take orders from her.

Is this the same situation that you posted about here? your story is changing. What's up with that? You wrote about a romantic interest before:

http://able2know.org/topic/249937-1#post-5721828

Yeah, believe it or not, it is the same story. I don't like this girl anymore. In fact, I actively dislike her. She'll call me 2-3 times a day, and then when I call her back, she'll act like she's annoyed to be bothered by me, even though SHE called me FIRST and I am only RETURNING her call. I really, really don't like that. She seems like an a******. Now, I just want her to stop calling me and leave me alone, because frankly I really don't need her calling me every day to remind me to take care of tasks I already know about and am already taking care of! I just want her to stop.

You have at least 3 pathways to stop this problem. Pick one of them:

1. Talk to Human Resources about this harassing behavior.
2. Talk to your boss and be diplomatic. Ask him if he is requesting the calls for her or if she is doing it on her own.
3. Talk to the girl..and be diplomatic but firm and ask her to stop.

Telling strangers on a forum does zero to resolve the issue.

Try:

"Mary, is there a reason why you are asking about projects I am working on?"

Mary, I can make end of day reports to you about these projects. Is that acceptable?"

"Mary, did Mr. Boss ask for follow up on every task I do? I am confused as to why the monitoring on everything I do."

Reading this and the related topic, I wonder about a few things.

Riverstyx, is this your first office/professional work experience?

If it is, I think you're confusing personal relationships with work/professional ones. You're reading aspects of communication in the way you would with someone you are socially dealing with. She's communicating with you purely on a workplace level.
She doesn't look up when you come in because she's working. She calls you about work situations. As others have said in the other topic you made, the co-workers who told you no one who is in their right mind volunteers for extra work are wrong. How do you think you make your abilities known to those that count? When time for raises and promotions come, will supervisors be looking at the people who sit and stare at their computer, pretending to work, or to someone who is actually going above and beyond. Believe me, your supervisors can tell when someone is pretending to work, in the long haul. BTW, you'd actually prefer to sit there doing nothing, being sneaky, pretending you're doing something, than to actually keep occupied by working? Takes all kinds I guess.

This woman is your bosses personal assistant. That means she's privy to a lot of stuff you don't even know about. If you're rude or snarky to her, guess who else is going to know about it?
She's not doing this as a personal thing. As your bosses assistant, she's his gatekeeper, expeditor, ears and eyes. That, in fact, is what she gets paid for.

You're the new guy. However, you've been there a month and you should have been learning how things work around there.

Stop with the silly extreme ideas that she's either got the hots for you, or hates you.
She's there to work, so are you.

1. She's not harassing him.

He's never even mentioned to her from what I read, that this bothers him. Is she a mind reader? How can he talk to HR about something she could rightfully say she wasn't aware was a problem with him.

2. Going to the boss makes him look like a little tattle tale. Does s/he really have time for this school yard foolishness?

3. Yes, maybe she is micromanaging. The OP may present this to her in a way that's geared to letting her know the burden of checking up on him can be curtailed.

Perhaps he can share his calendar with her. He can show her that he has pop up reminders/appointments with himself to keep him on track. If he has a task due by Wednesday, he can preemptively email her on Monday letting her know he is on course, and she will be receiving the work on Wednesday, as scheduled.

In other words, give her the information she needs before she has to ask for it.


Also, down the road, it's building a work relationship that says "If we are having miscommunication, I know we can directly talk to each other about it, and form solutions, like adults.

Holy ****, dude. Let me tell you why she hates you. She was trying to show a little interest by calling you and offering to do your work, and you completely told everybody in the effing office!!! Gossip travels like WILDFIRE in an office and you told - what? - 3 dudes? She's humiliated. No wonder she doesn't look up. I could smack you!

Solution: Order a beautiful bunch of flowers in person at a florist. Pay cash so your id can't be traced. Ask the person at the counter to write the card - simply, "I was wrong. I'm so sorry" and have it delivered to her at work. Of course, not any signature. This is an equalizer. It will soften her. This plays enormously well with most women.

She'll figure it out, but you'll *never cop* to it. One extended moment of eye contact and a nice symbolic statement if she directly asks you if you sent the flowers will be a non-admission admission, like,
Chick: Do you know anything about this? (gestures to flowers)
You: Was there a card?
Chick: Yeah. "I was wrong. I'm so sorry." No signature.
You: Can you think of anybody who was a real ass to you? Anyone who treated you badly?
Chick: (looks at you, thinking about how you crapped on her, wondering) Yes...
You: (extended eye contact) "I'm sure whoever he is feels badly about what he did - just out of curiosity - did you forgive him?"

Of course, I don't know how quick on your toes you are. If the script goes differently, you may give yourself up - or screw up in some other way. Maybe just sending the flowers is enough. Keep in mind, this isn't a ploy to get her in the sack or start an office relationship. You obviously suck at discretion - something MANDATORY in office sex/love. It's a ploy to apologize without admitting what you did and hopefully smooth over a really bad relationship that YOU made really bad.

You owe her an apology, but this mess is all wrapped up in Human Resources, gossip, office politics, and bad feelings,... Don't bring it up to the gossip-y dudes, her, or anyone. Just do something anonymous and nice for her that she can't trace to you that you might be able to spin in your favor.

That was a dumb ass move, dude. You crapped all over her.

Lash, I'll let this play out to see what happens IRL, but frankly, I cannot believe you connocted all this.

Those "3 dudes" that were told? From their response, I'm sure it's well known by everyone there that village has 2 extra idiots. They've got a lot of time on their plate for making up school yard stories....Newbie and the PA sittin' in a tree, K..I..S..S..I..N..G...

This PA is showing her "hate" for him by checking up to see that his work is being done on time? Seriously?

Perhaps she spends a lot of time every day doing followup with people within that office and other locations regarding getting reports and figures in, so she can do her work.
When I was working, an automated email would go out from me on the 3rd of the month, to about 15 people, reminding them they had to have the TPS report to me on the 7th. Almost half the people wouldn't even get started on it until they received my reminder, and it would arrive to me on the 7th. The almost other half had already started it before getting the reminder, and would send it to me on any time between the 3rd and the 5th. Then there were the 2 people that not only had to get the email, but had to be called by me on the 8th to ask where the TPS report was. They always had some excuse, but that's another story.
Some knew, others didn't, and still others didn't care that I needed their reports because my boss, the Reg Director, met w/ her boss, a VP, on the 10th of every month, and had to have all the numbers from those reports correct and variances explained.

Whatever the OP is sending to the PA, he may think it's some "BS administrative paperwork", is something his boss will get raked over the coals about a day later. Yeah, he's getting it in on time anyway. He needs to build his reputation up with the PA as a responsible person. Since he's (a) been there 4 weeks, and (b) hasn't made any attempt to communicate with her that she doesn't have to waste her precious work time reminding him, and btw Ms. PA, I'd love to learn how the info I'm providing you is being rolled up. It'll help me learn more about the company.

Flowers? I'm actually (unbelievably) speechless.

If I received flowers from a newbie, even assuming for a moment it's all about Manny, Mo and Jake tittering around the water cooler, he would for a loooong time remain in my radar as that quasi creepy person who couldn't leave well enough alone, and couldn't figure out the way to get on my good side was to send me his reports on time, or early.

I don't know Lash, maybe this would play well with most women, if you say so. My gut tells me this would send a LOT of women into "ok, this is really weird" mode.
If a man wouldn't send flowers to a man in the work place to anonymously apologize, don't send it to a woman. That's not at all cool.

Maybe he could buy a bag of bagels and smear for everyone, but make a point to go around to her desk first thing with the bag, offering her one before it goes on the lunchroom table.

This is a business. Let's keep it to business. A start would be for the OP to distance himself professionally from the 3 stooges.

If she's got the boss on her side there's zilch you can do.
I went through it myself when I was a lab assistant and the Senior Assistant was a woman younger than me who liked throwing her weight around.
So I said to the Manager- "She won't leave me alone to get on with my job!", but he jumped on her side and said "Well she's your boss", so I resigned and walked out..

Ya, this seems like an office BDSM matter, it is not personal. She wants to show that she has power over you professionally. I bet she acts like this towards a lot of people.

I'll give you this: I made a lot of assumptions. From the other thread, when I saw these first lines:
___________________________________
Ok, so I'm a guy, new at this job (4 weeks). My boss was away the other day, and the personal assistant to my boss called me later in the afternoon saying that she had some "down time" and was wondering if I had any extra work that needed to get done. I told her no but thanks. The guys were joking that she "definitely" likes me, and that no one in their right mind, if they really had nothing to do, would call up a coworker actually volunteering to do work.
___________________________________

The new guy rats her "odd kindness" to "the guys," who obviously spread it all over the workplace - and if where she works is anything like the offices I worked, she has been horribly humiliated.

People don't *not look up* when someone walks in. I don't care how busy they are. She's pissed, and she's communicating that. I mean, I know you're a hard-bitten gal with a salty demeanor - that's why I love you - but we LOOK UP when people walk in?!

I've sent flowers to chicks for a myriad of different reasons - and again, maybe it's a southern thing or a my particular office thing, and a me thing, too - but if someone wanted to apologize to me who couldn't open up a can of worms at work - some under-the-table apology: a beautiful bouquet on my desk is a great way to start.

But, yeah. No name seems like stalking...

I know flowers seems horribly sexist, but his crime was sexist.

Anyway, I was trying to get that abused chick some flowers.

My great plan was predicated on his anonymity - but that seems stalker-y in retrospect, so I guess my plan wouldn't work.

Well, in fact I'm not hard bitten. But that's beside the point.

I don't always look up when someone enters my office. Especially if I can see who it is in my peripheral vision, and I know they are coming in to give me paperwork. Sometimes a word or 2 is exchanged, sometimes not. This isn't done in an unfriendly way. In fact, it kinda shows the comfort level we have with each other.

Conversely, I've walked in and out of co-workers offices tons of times without them looking at me, even if we exchange words, and all this is right here deep in the heart of Texas.

I don't see the woman as abused....in all honesty, I see her as total unaware anything is wrong, and she's just doing her thing.
I envision it that she would be shocked if she knew this thread was even going on, as in "What problem?" I know I would.

Have you ever been the bosses #1? Doubtful. They play by different rules.

For what it's worth - and that may not be much - what I got from his two threads on the subject is
1. Office Woman stuck her neck out a bit when he was new to go above and beyond to "help him."
2. He asked at least a few dudes if they thought she did it as part of the job or because she was into him.
3. All the dudes said "She did what? No sane person would do that unless she's into you."
4. I extrapolate from 1 - 3 that Miss Over and Above Helper of the New Guy is being gossiped and snickered over, and as the normal cycle of office gossip / drama goes around, she has figured out / heard who is the origin of her humiliation.

I accept that you don't see any of that.
Hard bitten means unsentimental and / or tough. Wasn't intended as a criticism. You certainly have a right to say those words don't describe you.

Yes. I have been. For close to 15 years.

I was actually called "#1" a lot of the time.
I was also called Rock Star.

A newb telling the boys I offered him help wouldn't have touched me at all.

If I found out the pump house gang spread word "chai must like the new guy" I'd have considered the source, and would not have lowered myself to comment. Internally, I would have been slightly amused. Certainly not humiliated.
Wow, thinking back, at one point I was actually paired in someone's imagination with someone I worked with. Both of us, upon finding out, thought it amusing. Then again, we shared the same sense of humor, and morals.

In fact though, this entire scenerio of "newbie told 3 guys....3 guys told other people" has no evidence. All we've been told is that he told 3 guys, and they said no one in his right mind would ever volunteer for work.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I didn't read anywhere in this thread, or the other, that he asked any of them if they thought she liked him.

In the first thread he said...

"the personal assistant to my boss called me later in the afternoon saying that she had some "down time" and was wondering if I had any extra work that needed to get done. I told her no but thanks. The guys were joking that she "definitely" likes me, and ..."

He either told the guys, or they overheard, but he doesn't say he ask them anything about it.

Did it say that somewhere else?

Anyway....

Bottom line, I think this guy needs to get over himself and realize this person in all probability neither likes or dislikes him, and is just doing her job.