Shutterstock

Starting up a new restaurant takes a lot of work from everyone, so having the right team in place is essential.

What would you do if you were a part of that team where a coworker who wanted to be promoted to manager was not only extremely unprofessional to other workers, but was also spreading rumors about the owner of the restaurant?

That is the situation that the worker in this story is in, so he attempted to calm things down, comfort coworkers, and report the issue to the true manager, but he wonders if there is more he should be doing.

Personally, I think he is doing everything he can, and now he just needs to keep focused on work and let the manager work through the issues. Read the full story below and see what you think about it.

Am I wrong for being upset over this coworker?

I recently joined the opening team for a new restaurant in town. It’s a small, family-owned business opening its second location, with a third already in the works.

Not everyone wants to be in management.

During the open interview process, I was asked if I’d be interested in a management position because of my previous management experience.

I immediately declined. I’ve done corporate management before, hated it, and wasn’t interested in being promised something that wasn’t guaranteed. Three other applicants accepted the possibility of management.

This is not how anyone should manage.

Fast forward about two months. Two of those potential managers never even showed up. The third has been a nightmare.

Within the first few weeks, she was yelling at our front-of-house staff—mostly teenagers at their first job—to the point of making them cry. I stepped in, de-escalated the situation, comforted the girls, and reported it to management.

How many chances do they want to give her?

Since then, she’s had at least four coaching conversations that I know of. Things improve for a day, then immediately get worse again.

She’s gotten into screaming matches with our store manager in front of customers after being sent home early because of her attitude. She constantly says things like:

Um, this is a real job.

“I quit a real job to be here.”

“I was promised management. It’s time to pay up.”

The thing is, during orientation the owner clearly told everyone that management was not guaranteed and would depend on attitude, attendance, and performance.

I sure hope they never make her a true manager, though.

Unfortunately, she doesn’t meet any of those expectations. She’s repeatedly been sent home because of her behavior. She yells at coworkers over minor issues.

Her work ethic is… not great. One example:

If you want to be a manager, you should step in and help where it is needed. Not scream unprofessionally.

We were in the middle of a rush, and one of our new cooks was elbow-deep preparing food. Instead of grabbing ice herself, she stood across the restaurant yelling for him to stop what he was doing and refill the ice bin because she didn’t want to walk back there herself.

Everyone—including the manager training our location from another store—told her to do it herself and stop yelling. She rolled her eyes and started cussing at him.

This woman is absolutely toxic.

Later that same shift, she physically grabbed my arm and pulled me aside to complain about management. She started spreading rumors that the owner had fired a female employee because she “wasn’t giving him what he wanted.”

That isn’t true. The employee had ongoing performance and behavior issues, and management had already addressed the situation during our morning meeting.

Spreading this type of rumor is unacceptable.

She then went on to say that all the young women working there must be “giving him something” because otherwise they wouldn’t still have jobs.

I personally know the owner well enough to know how seriously he avoids even the appearance of impropriety. He rarely interacts with the young front-of-house staff unless necessary, specifically to avoid allegations like this. Those girls also work incredibly hard.

And now they have an enemy at work.

I immediately shut the conversation down and told her to stop spreading rumors. That’s when she turned on me.

She told me I was just jealous because “people trust her” and because she was going to get management instead of me.

Nobody should be touching another employee at work like this.

Ironically, in the same conversation she complained that she still hadn’t received the management title or raise she thought she deserved even though she’s currently working the lowest-paid position in the store and has refused training in other positions.

She kept ranting instead of working, and I couldn’t even leave because she still had a death grip on my arm until another manager noticed, read the look on my face, and called her away.

Does this lady even get to decide who gets breaks?

I thought that was the end of it. Later that night during closing, one side of our line had already shut down while the other stayed open. I was cleaning and restocking when she walked up and asked if I was ready for my break because she was “cutting breaks.”

I asked why I’d be taking a break during closing on a six-hour shift. She said she was deciding who got breaks.

This lady is delusional.

I told her that wasn’t her decision and that only management should be changing the schedule because it affects labor and staffing. She completely lost it.

She started screaming that I needed to “learn my place as an insubordinate.” I simply turned away, told her to speak with the manager if she had questions about breaks, and went back to work.

I have to assume she will be fired.

After closing, I pulled the manager aside and explained everything. Before I even got to the false allegations about the owner, he told me she was already on very thin ice because of her repeated behavior issues.

When I told him about the rumors accusing the owner of inappropriate behavior, he was furious. He immediately confirmed the story with another employee who overheard the conversation and then called the owner.

This worker is doing the right thing, it seems.

At this point, I honestly don’t know if she’ll still have a job by my next shift. Here’s why I’m upset:

It’s not just that she’s rude to me.

I’ve repeatedly had to step in to calm down teenage coworkers she’s reduced to tears.

It is being handled; just let it go.

She constantly pulls me away from my own work to complain, spreads serious rumors that could ruin someone’s reputation, physically grabbed me to keep me in conversations, and creates an incredibly hostile work environment.

I know management is handling it, but I leave work mentally exhausted after almost every shift with her.

Honestly, it seems like this person is overthinking the issue. Management seems to be handling the issue.

Am I wrong for being this upset?

Is there anything else I should be doing besides continuing to document incidents and report them to management?

Nope, this person did everything (and more) that could be expected of them. It is time to let management handle the situation.

Read on to see what the people in the comments think about this story.

This commenter thinks he should back off and focus on his own job.

He has every reason to be upset.

She should have been fired a while ago, in my opinion.

It does seem like she is about to get fired, though.

In this case, I agree with this commenter.

It is good to be compassionate about his coworkers, but now it is time to let management do their job. They will almost certainly fire this person, or at the very least, talk to her about how she is acting.

If they don’t do what they should, it may be time to find another job, though. Sometimes, you just have to leave the past behind.