A personal note before I continue... I think he should go be a teacher if he thinks it's so easy. I know a lot of teachers and it is NOT easy, not if you're doing it right. Okay, that being said, it was completely inappropriate to say this at work. This coworker's reputation is now completely ruined in the eyes of several females that sit right near him. His diatribe was the talk of the office this afternoon.
It would be one thing if this coworker was in a break room or perhaps at the smokers' station outside or in the hall with another person having this conversation and someone happened overhear him, but he stood up at his cube and declared this publically. So before climbing on your soap box and announcing personal details about yourself or personal opinions/beliefs consider who's within ear shot. If you don't know where someone stands on a particular topic, air on the side of cautiousness. It's okay to dish about your life and your outlook on life, just lower your voice if you're not 100% sure that the people around you will be understanding.
What's the most offensive thing you have ever heard in the workplace?
One day at work a coworker was on the phone with a client and for whatever reason every time he meant to say WORKAROUND he accidentially said REACHAROUND. He said it probably 5 or 6 times. Most of the team heard him and we've never let him live it down. As a result, when we got ready to go on a team bowling outing we named our team The Reacharounds and made shirts. This joke, probably would not be safe in most workplaces but on our team it was fine. We asked- no one was offended. This illustrates that it's not what you say, it's who you say it to.
ReplyDeleteOn a whole, I think people need to watch what they say at work. It's harmful in so many ways. It's interesting, as well, depending on the type of work environment. A friend of mine works in a very casual environment, where women openly discuss their sex lives, hookups, and when flowers come in, comments such as "So you put out last night, huh?" will fly around. They also wear jeans and t-shirts everyday. Nothing like that would fly where I work. I think one time we were talking about third world countries and I exploded about how Beijing rated their bathroom system from one star to five stars (4 stars = has toilet paper). As the night went on, I talked about how in some areas we backpacked, there were no bathrooms at all, and everyone had to pee/poop in rivers. Yeah, bad nicknames came from that...
ReplyDeleteHAHA I can only imagine what they're calling you now!
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