I’m a consultant and got a very big contract recently. I’m doing a great job and everything is going great. I’m a 28 year old woman. The 46 year old manager who I was being friendly with – and I am friendly towards everyone the same way- started hitting on me , which at first I didn’t even notice, until I analyzed what happened after the fact. I’m not interested at all, and would just never get involved with colleagues in any way shape or form, I value career a lot more. I’m also creeped out by the age difference – he could have been my father – no thanks. Not to mention, I am also taken. He asked me out, I rejected him as gracefully as I could – left him a “way out” to save face basically, and just returned to business as usual. I don’t blame people for being attracted to someone else, that’s life. But since then, he has been nitpicking everything I do and starts petty arguments, which is really starting to annoy me. He gets into these ego battles that I have no time for, nor am I remotely interested in engaging in. What do I do to stop this dynamic and put more distance between us to avoid him sabotaging what I’ve got going for myself ?
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I would personally copy this post and send it to your HR department.
Even if they don’t immediately confront him you should have this as correlating evidence for the future. Also, this is once of those moments where you should get your boyfriend involved. Something like this happened to one of my ex-girlfriends and the guy was literally trying to blackmail her. And I got approval to handle it by any means.
So I drove to her job with her, told HR what was happening myself, and then told the HR rep there is going to be an anonymous mention about this in the news if it’s not handled by COB that Friday.
Sure enough, he got fired.
Does your company have a HR? You should absolutely report his behavior. Gather as much proof as you can, document everything and report him to HR/corporate/etc.
Talk with your HR, or supervisor/management team member about the situation.
HR. Keep any written correspondence from before and going forward.
Tell your manager or HR what happened. Leave out the reasons that you turned him down because they aren’t relevant in the sense that if you were both single and closer in age this would not be okay either.
You mentioned you were a consultant, so as I see it, you need to mention it to your chain of command, as the contract tasked could be impacted.
Your management could then reach out to the company HR. I may be misreading the circumstances.
Document everything.
I would report the issue to HR.
This is a hard choice. Who is the decision maker(s) there ? Is there someone else who you can tell what is going on ? If you can get some other insiders on your side you could circle the wagons so to speak around this objectionable fellow. You could go corporate HR and tell them but i doubt they would take your side as a consultant.
This is the textbook reason why there are HR depts. you did everything correctly- you turned down his advances respectfully and now he has a bone to pick with you because his ego is bruised. He’s in a position of power over you, beat him to HR before he tries to get you fired because he’s a baby and can’t accept no.
Get a voice activated recorder. Then discuss his changed critical behavior following your rejection of offer to date.
Get proof.
Really delicate situation and have a hard time believing this is the first time he’s done this. Most companies have policies against managers asking out younger associates to avoid this scenario. If you have proof (email/text/witness) then I would definitely take it to HR, otherwise its your word against his and if you take that step be ready to accept that situation could get worse.
Without solid evidence consider this alternative — a 1:1 conversation explaining that you feel he is being overly critical of you because you rejected him and you hope he is able to keep things professional. He will probably be taken back by the accusation and categorically deny it (deny it even to himself to save his own ego because he is above it) and say any comments from him are purely about performance and he also wants to keep it professional, at which you shake hands and part ways. Realize it sounds like nothing was accomplished, but now it’s out there that if you catch wind of him bad mouthing you to other managers there could be serious repercussions and he could be publicly embarrassed. He may even over compensate and start saying great things about you and your work. At the same time align yourself internally with another manager who will be your advocate.
I literally just had a sexual harassment training course and your experience was a scenario I watched in the course. Text book.
Hopefully you’re in CA. Because CA don’t cuss around with sexual harassment.
Yeah you need to go to HR on this one…
Speaking from similar experience – speak to your direct manager about the timeline of events, be factual, up to the rejection to show the shift from friendly behavior to combative and domineering. HR will be involved. Provide same information. Stress how you are a professional and don’t want to engage, value your professional reputation, and his retaliation is impacting your ability to do your job based on his focus on your work which was not previously there until said rejection. Chances are he has a history of this behavior which needs to be addressed. – my offender did.
uhoh, sounds like a Nice Guy
I think the problem with some people saying to report it to HR is that you are a consultant. So you are not employed by his company and even though, sure, HR could intervene, legally it’d be incredibly difficult for you to get anything from this other company.
First, I think you need to put your professional goals into perspective. What are they? Are you an independent consultant or do you work for a company? How much does this manager’s opinion weight on your career/performance? For instance, you work for a company and they send you to this client, you should speak to your supervisor about it.
Second, can you bring witnesses into the conversations with the manager? Other consultants or people in his team. Bring anyone who would be supportive so this guy keeps embarrassing himself.
Third, what can you do to cover your ass and leave trails of evidence in emails? If people nitpick, then the time you have to spend on whatever new they want is going to have to be taken from something else. So you should try to shut it down and say something like, doing that is going to take 10 hours and not going to improve the product considerably. I would also have to take those 10 hours from X and Y, and this was also not in the original list of things we had decided to do which is why I had not allocated time to that. If he wants to waste 10 hours and miss deadlines, that’s on him. Minimize how long you spend in person or zoom with this person. Try to do as much as possible over email and if you have to meet, send him a summary of what you talked about after.
Finally, don’t engage in petty arguments. Ignore him and go back to the original goal of the meeting.
I’m not sure he stepped over the line asking you out. It depends on where you work but than retaliating when you reject it most certainly is. It’s time you either firmly tell him to stop the bullshit or go straight to the HR department.
Everyone else has given great advice. I’m just sitting here like… that’s some freaking audacity. Some guy hits on a woman young enough to be his daughter and he doesn’t even have the self awareness to realize that there’s an incredibly high chance she wouldn’t be into an old dude? Incredible.
Some things don’t need HR. Tell him to grow up. Move on. Don’t let it become bigger.
Omg do we have the same coworker? Jk but but for real I’m 26 and had a 43 year old co worker try asking me out. I lied and said I had a bf so he stopped.
He then proceeded to ask out the 22 and 24 year old in another department. He used to complain that “there wasint any older ladies in the company”. [There are]
Who the heck uses their job to hunt for a date??
Welcome to life as a woman.
Document every single interaction with him from the the time he hit on you until now. Meet with your HR. If they do nothing to correct his behavior, report it to the EEOC (don’t tell HR about that part).
I’m going through a similar situation.
He will never be allowed to confront you about the conversation with HR and if he does it would be retaliation and if your HR still does nothing, you can move forward with the EEOC and sue them.
This is sexual harassment. Do not let it slide for even another week.
You deserve better from your managers.
Wow a slam dunk lawsuit you have, so lucky.
He tried to dip his pen in company ink. You said no. That’s a two to tango situation. If he let it be, then that’s that. But he isn’t. *He’s creating a hostile working environment because you said no.*
Report to HR.
Include him hitting on you, asking you out, you declining, and this bullsh*t starting. Make it clear that you did not feel sexually harassed by him asking you out, but that him making your work life difficult because you didn’t consent to starting a romantic relationship with him ***is*** sexual harassment.
Welcome to workplace misogyny. Some men are incapable of treating women as coworkers. Either he thinks he can fuck you so you get sleazy obsequious treatment, or he can’t fuck you so he treats you like a punching bag. There’s a hidden 3rd option (he’s not sexually attracted to you in the first place and therefore treats you like you don’t have a right to exist).
Some people are advising you to go to HR and you definitely should but don’t expect too much. HR is there to protect the company and this will likely extend to the manager. I’m sorry to say that this job is probably ruined for you and you will need to eventually move on.