So ive been working with someone a couple of years now, we work in sales.
During their first 6 months or so at the company they got quite friendly with me from their first few weeks of working. We were in different teams but would chat quite a bit and have lunch every now and then. Around the 6-8 month mark they mentioned some issues with their team and how they didnt really feel included in their team. I felt terrible and said how maybe they would be a better fit with my team, i spoke with my manager and after a few weeks they moved teams. This brought us a bit closer and we would talk much more and became quite good friends. Around the 1 year mark we got a new manager, this coworker wasnt happy losing the previous manager and there was some friction between them and the new manager. They ended up having a fairly big altercation and i stepped up and tried to cool the whole thing down, the manager told me that HR had recommended he fire the coworker. I advised against it, being the manager was a bit newer it wouldnt look great and the coworker had a good standing with the rest of the sales team.
Things moved past that point and fast forward almost a year, it was the coworkers birthday. Because we had become good friends, i offered to take them out for dinner along with my fiancé, we had a pretty good night the three of us, i paid for dinner and we had a few laughs together and got some desert after. The next week at work, we were fine as normal, however at the end of the week, the coworker had stopped responding to my messages. I thought maybe they had possibly had a bad week and left it at that, on the weekend they said they would speak to me in the office.
That next week in the office, we had a chat in a meeting room, they said to me that the night we went out for dinner they had reflected on it and were upset that my fiancé and I hadnt said anything nice about them that night, I was obviously very confused and wasnt sure what to even say.
Then the coworker mentioned that they hadnt appreciated my comments at work, as id been asking them about their walks into work, when i explained that I was asking because they live over 50 minutes walking distance, I was asking because i was genuinely curious, that and also one week the coworker lied and said they twisted their ankle on the way to work and took 3 days off. They said that I was always asking them about their walking into work because they are fat and I must think they need to lose weight.
To top this whole conversation off, they then said that they were relieved they had managed to have an emergency appointment with their psychologist, had they not had this, they fear they would of been suicidal from how they felt about everything.
Needless to say I didnt say too much as i didnt want to make the whole situation any worse.
Since this all happened I've avoided the coworker as much as possible. Ive spoken with my manager and even the director about all of this.
The director who was their manager at the time explained to me that they were actually lining up to performance manage the coworker and was possibly wanting to fire them, however they changed teams so this wasn't acted on.
I'm looking back at all of this now and realising this coworker used me as I was a more senior staff member, they manipulated me into protecting them from managers and help cover up some of their incompetence. I feel so betrayed.
My question is, how would you handle someone like this going forward? I honestly wish their was something I could do to get them fired!
Apologies for the long post.
First, I would suggest establishing a clear line between work and social, the higher up you go, the less friends you have. It’s great that you tried to help them initially and now it looks like you’re getting fucked unfortunately. I would advise staying away from these people on a social level and continue to work together professionally, clear line of separation.
Since the company was lining to performance management them, then they must have not been performing. Unfortunately in the corporate world, people are happy to palm problems off to other departments. From what I’ve read, it has been 2 years since, and not knowing how long they have been in the company, making performance management and termination a tad more complicated.
You can’t get them fired for no reason, but you can report your conversation to HR and have this logged as inappropriate and troubling. In all reputable companies there’s a whistleblower system where you can anonymously report things on ethics, mismanagement, toxic behavior etc.
In sum, keep it professional and avoid social, if they are not performing, they’ll end up getting performance managed out soon enough.