I’m a bit sensitive to condescension. I know that it’s usually not personal, but it still really bothers me and it takes a while for me to get over it.

There are few things as frustrating as having a team member at work who has it in for you, like what happened in this story.

Every email? You got it boss!

For some reason my boss very very much, and unlike any other boss before and after, disliked me.

I had a bunch of projects, some bigger and some smaller but because this was a large international company, many things had to be communicated through email because of timezones.

It just made it easier to work smoothly.

I seriously love that kind of email. I’d probably love to work with this person.

Obviously, having several projects with stakeholders all over the planet, I wrote a lot of emails (duh).

I have a very clear and detailed way of writing business emails, which so far everybody had liked because there were never questions left to ask.

The whole team probably rolled their eyes or sighed every time.

This manager however always had questions.

Everybody else in my team, everybody who would just be in such an email chain for visibility, but not directly involved, would understand.

I really need to drive this home to avoid misunderstandings before I move on.

I’m glad you were in the majority and had allies.

I was not the only person in the team that she would pick on but I was the one she picked on so much more that other people noticed it.

Sounds like an ego trip. Wow.

Well one day we had one of those 121 meetings and she told me that “everybody always” had questions and I need to write emails clearer, nothing made sense, etc blablabla.

She went on about it for about 25 of the 30 minutes.

Ah, something juicy is coming on, I can feel it.

She ended the meeting by demanding that from now on, every time I was wanted to send an email, I was to let her check the email before I would be permitted to send it out.

This must have been so satisfying. Even amusing.

Starting immediately, every time I wrote an email, any email – to anybody – for any reason, I would have her come to my desk and read it.

Not sure this will stop her passive aggressiveness, but at least he got his point across.

She never found anything to correct other than write a different greeting – very literally just that.

I continued whether she was in a meeting, busy, talking to somebody, etc, no email was sent from my computer unless she would come over physically to come check.

Once or twice she did not come over, trying to ignore me, and I made a screenshot and sent it to her through the chat to check.

Good. I’d be relieved.

It took her two days until she came back to me, clearly more than slightly annoyed, and told me I did not have to make her check all my emails anymore.

I’m SO surprised. At least they’re on his side even more now.

And by the way, she continued to ask questions in email threads I started, even when the answer was already in the email, and people started getting more and more annoyed with it.

She still clearly made no effort to understand the projects we, as her team, were working on, and very especially my projects.

Good. It’s a shame, but you need a better quality of life.

I ended up quitting after 2 years of her bullying.

Let’s get into the comments.

That’s a great way to look at it. Use it as fuel, OP!

I’m not sure about this advice. I feel like it might egg her on.

Such a relief, I’m sure! Congrats.

I agree with this person. It’s like they weaponize it to tick people off or exert power.

Haha. I’m sure it’s SUPER common.

Stand your ground when someone tries to manipulate you, but know when to move on to better things.

When it’s time to go, go!

If you liked that story, check out this post about an oblivious CEO who tells a web developer to “act his wage”… and it results in 30% of the workforce being laid off.