Do you have a Weasel at work?

While someone doesn't mean to be a brown noser, a close friendship does give the appearance of impropriety in what should be a distinctly business atmosphere. Other staff members may not feel comfortable going to the manger if they have problems with you, I myself would have to question if my evaluations were accurate or biased by the friendship. Many of us talk to our friends about people we have in common, usually those in the workplace. If you and your manager/friend can assure yourselves that this doesn't happen and will not happen, I see no problem, BUT, it just ain't human not to talk about others we know. I agree that you should continue the friendship but work on another unit!

They like being kissed up to so much they are not about to do anything about her. :stone

I don't believe that it is a matter of liking it as much as it is that they don't usually have the intelligence to see past the sucking up.

Oh yes. At my work, we have a training manager. No one knows what the he** she does, though, because anytime any of us have to do a training, she and her assistant are nowhere to be found. We have to make our own Power Point presentations and put together our own packets. They also have our ED snowed that they've written all of our PP trainings, even though we put our names on them! This woman has "8-5" written on her schedule everyday, but it is a rare day that she's in the office before 9 or after 3. She brown noses the ED and Associate ED to the point that its nauseating. She'll come in and get on the phone talking to her daughter's doctors or caseworker for hours at a time. Last fall, me and the other project managers put together an all day staff training. The day after it was held, a couple of the line staff complimented her on how well it had gone, right in front of me, and she thanked them. Didn't bother to mention that she had nothing to do with it!!! She spends half of every staff meeting *****ing about what the rest of us do wrong, or telling us why she's being treated unfairly. At our last meeting, she pitched a hissy because she couldn't understand why the fiscal person sits in on the administrative team's meetings. Duh, do you think the fiscal person's viewpoint might be important in matters of program administration? Eejit!

:Melody:In my work place, there are many weasels but the queen is supposedly part of the social services department. She seems to think she is qualified in every area. She knows more than anyone else. It goes unnoticed that no one can work with her for very long and that few residents go out when she schedules day trips.She is unpleasant but somehow her air of confidence mixed with authoritarianism leaves her untouchable. Like all weasels she manages to avoid any repercussions. This person has no special training yet she is in meetings with the DON and the RNs. I am venting now because I am her latest victim. She is a viper and she makes the others pale in comparison. I go in tomorrow wondering what havoc she has created the past two days. It amazes me that these people keep their jobs forever and nicer people get pink slipped because of their lies. I could say more but we all know the type. It is too easy to dump on the overworked floor nurses and this weasel knows it.

We have a unit secretary that I have a secret name for and it is the "Weasel". This name reflects the fact that she spends a great deal of time weaseling in with people in managment positions. Knows them all by name, jumps up to glad hand them every chance she gets. She also does a lot of personal favors for managment people especially the nurse manager. Everyone knows to be careful what is said in front of her because managment will hear it from her and again carrying tales is a way of weaseling in with managment. I would be very impressed with a manager that was not fooled by this stuff but I have yet to meet one that wasn't. It does a lot of damage because inevitably the weasel will dodge real work every chance she gets. Everyday when she leaves charts with orders stacked a mile high sit waiting for the next shift. She loves the phone but not to do unit business. She is yacking to family and friends constantly and her children seem to think they can call anytime about the stupidest things. Even when she takes her two hour lunches they continue to call and the staff had to take the calls. These behaviors pay off because she is in as tight as you can get with the bosses. They like being kissed up to so much they are not about to do anything about her. :stone

I haven't looked at this thread in a while. The art work of some of our posters is really funny. Thanks for making me laugh.

AHHH I have had the pleasure of meeting our unit weasle this past week end. She is very nice to everyone in fact she was nice to me as well. Then when she found out I had been trained to do her job.....all H*** broke loose. From that point on she decided to ignore me, or when she did need to speak with me she made no eye contact at all. She hated the fact that I had been trained at her job and told me that I needed to follow my nurse until I had talked with our unit manager about getting the O.K. to do the job I had been trained to do. Yep, that made no sense to me. Well guess what? Seconds after she told me this I heard our ER doctor yelling at her because she did not enter the correct labs that had been ordered! This only added fuel to the fire. She knows how to play the game and any time the unit manager is around our unit weasle is nice as pie and I just pour on the kindness. Her behavior is ignored by most of the staff and that is o.k. with me, because at least I know not everyone is fooled by this type of b***sh**. The fact that the most passive doctor yelled at her had me giggling my butt off for the rest of the day. Since I am new I will give her another chance but then the gloves come off.

That's a bit of a problem if you live in a town of 600 people and work at a small rural hospital. :chuckle

steph

That's what long distance phone calls are for :)

I figured out one day: vent with friends you don't work with about work, and you can vent about those friends with folks at work. That way, you can let off steam without damaging your relationships or your reputation. Everybody needs to have safe outlet values for venting. Usually you vent with your friends about work, but occasionally, you need to vent about your friends, too. We all have our trials and tribulations in learning to get along.

(Of course, message boards *can* be another way to vent...but you should be careful.)

NurseFirst

We have weasels as well, but I have seen that if they are not humbled early on, it tends to bite them in the back side when they least expect it. You can only suck your way so far up the ladder before someone is on to you. Contrary to popular belief, there are decent people in upper management who care about hard work, honesty and loyalty rather than an ego trip. Ignore the secretary, steer clear of her and wait- she just might get bit. If not, she might get promoted to "super-secretary" or something and maybe she'd leave your unit- either way you win.

If you work with weasels, don't be chicken, don't put all your eggs in one basket and don't leave the hen house unguarded!

Don't worry, what goes around comes around.:monkeydance:

Everyone has a weasel at work.

We have one like that where I work. She is very tight w/the managers, and they respond to butt-kissing, unfortunately, b/c she is the most negative person in our dept. but the managers don't see that. Several people have left b/c of her, but she stays on. I suppose there's one everywhere you work, so I just keep my mouth shut & do my job- but some days it's very hard b/c she brings down the morale of the whole staff! How do you deal with it when management won't listen??