is it unprofessional to avoid being alone with a coworker who I don’t trust?

A reader writes:

I’ve read your stuff on why it’s problematic for supervisors to avoid one-on-one meetings with supervisees, but what about peer coworkers?

One of my coworkers, “Ariel,” makes me uncomfortable because she tends to assume the worst possible version of what someone says or project a different version entirely. Any disagreement with her, even about the most abstract issues phrased delicately and professionally, is taken personally. She also tends to assume (and share verbally) that the only motives anyone could have for even a slightly different opinion from hers is bigotry or unintelligence.

Part of this seems to stem from her having preemptively decided (and expressed in nearly such terms) that everyone in our (largely conservative) region of the country is backwards, bigoted, and unintelligent, especially relative to the more progressive region she’s from. It’s like she decided we were racist/sexist/homophobic because of being in/from this region and is looking for proof of her thesis. She’s proclaimed out of the blue that there are no critical thinkers in our region, and has asserted several times that there is/was no activism (anti-racism, LGBTQ stuff, immigrant-related) in our region that famously has (and had) lots of it. We actually have a very liberal department that frequently centers a variety of civil rights and social justice issues. For example, if we are “Camelid Studies,” we have speakers, books, and faculty who study the impact of camels on the environment, alpacas on immigration, llamas and LGBTQ+ safety, etc.

Both faculty and students are pretty open about their progressiveness, but Ariel seems not to read, hear, or see any of that or any nuance relating to our region. On several occasions, she has interpreted incredibly innocuous, bland, or uncontroversial things to be offensive in some way or heard the exact opposite of what someone was saying. The reactions she has are not limited to one person or one setting.

Given how she mishears people in groups, I don’t want to be alone with her and end up misquoted something ugly. It’s dehumanizing and obnoxious how she treats people who aren’t from HerProgressiveHomeRegion with her exact views expressed the exact same way, but more importantly, I don’t want to get bit by an allegation alligator that I said something horrible with no witnesses to back me up. Even if nothing comes of it, I don’t want to start my career with reputational baggage in the air.

To be clear, I do not supervise Ariel, nor she me, and there is no possibility of either. We are in a graduate program, I came in (and will likely finish) before her, and our positions are peers. I’m not responsible for her professional or academic growth in any capacity.

Is it unprofessional of me to never be alone with her? To be clear, I have no intention of discussing this with anyone in my office, just finding ways to limit my own risk exposure. If it would be problematic, how else can I manage the next few years of having a coworker who always hears the worst?

It’s not unprofessional to avoid being alone with Ariel, as long as it doesn’t end up interfering with your work, her work, or your team’s work or creating a weird working environment for others. If you’re coming up with complicated workarounds to avoid talking to her, or if you’re avoiding her in other obvious ways that make bystanders uncomfortable, that would be a problem. But if you’re just strategically avoiding being alone with her in ways that don’t raise eyebrows in people watching, you’re fine.

If this were a more traditional workplace and not a graduate program, I’d suggest you also talk to your manager about what you’ve noticed to make sure they’re aware of it. A manager should be concerned about the dynamics Ariel is creating, and should hear how she’s affecting people (to the extent that at least one person doesn’t feel safe being around her without a witness). And you could still do that in a graduate program too, but there tends to be … less management in that context, to say the least. So simply steering clear of Ariel as best as you can may be the best and most effective option.

But this is different from managers who refuse to be alone with the people they manage — which in theory is doable, but in practice tends to be male managers avoiding being alone with female employees, and only female employees, which then disadvantages the women who work for them because it means they get less access to feedback, mentoring, and relationship-building than their male colleagues do. You’re not Ariel’s manager (and if you were, you’d be much better positioned to address the concerns you have with her), there’s no power dynamic in play, and you’re not obligated to give her the kind of access to you that would be a bigger deal to withhold if you were her boss.

The post is it unprofessional to avoid being alone with a coworker who I don’t trust? appeared first on Ask a Manager.

View the full article