I'm a manager at work, I made a grievous error, help wanted

May 18, 2023 3:10 PM

I am a manager at my job. We work remotely. This week my team is having an in-person offsite for team connection and bonding. I have high social anxiety even though I'm a manager. All day yesterday, I had been feeling bad because I'm not outgoing enough, not interesting enough, not really fitting in with the group, etc. In hindsight I think that was just my skewed perception and not reality, but unfortunately I couldn't see it then.

When we were at dinner yesterday, one of my direct reports who I'll call J made a comment that I unfortunately felt hurt by, but I only caught the tail end of her comment and didn't get the full context. Instead of probing further and asking for more context, my emotions got the better of me and I broke down crying as I told J (in front of the rest of my direct reports) that when she made that comment, I felt left out, as the only manager in the group (her comment had been related to removing team/division leads from AMAs with the CEO and I wrongly initially interpreted her comment to be implying that we were filtering AMA questions which we are not).

She explained that that wasn't her intentions and she was sorry I felt that way. I left my team and went back to the hotel, upset. I am now full of shame, embarrassment, and sky-high anxiety. I could not sleep last night, worrying about this. I reached out to J right away last night after I got back to the hotel, in a private Slack message (we use Slack as a company) to apologize to her for my reaction and I told her that my emotions got the better of me. I also apologized for not getting the full context for her comments, and that this would be something I'll be working to improve in the future. I noted that I should have not put her on the spot and should have reached out to her privately. I explained why I was upset but noted that I know that I was wrong and that again, I should have gotten more context from her before reacting the way I did. I offered to talk more with her about it either during our next 1:1, or at any time or even in person while we're still at the meetup. I felt so bad for potentially ruining her trip. :(

Of course she did not respond to my private message since it was late at night. This morning she had not yet responded. I was terrified and very much ashamed to face everyone because I thought they'd all hate me and that I have lost all respect as a manager.

Once everyone was present, I apologized to the group as a whole for my actions and also apologized again to J. Everyone was being understanding and were not acting any differently. Except for J, who was quiet and afterward she responded to my private message to say she was still processing what happened and given my reaction to her, she honesty didn't want to talk about it further because she was worried what she'd say would be taken further out of context and put her in an uncomfortable situation.

I told her I understood, reiterated my apology and explained that I only wanted to talk about it further so that I could get a better understanding of her comment, just between us. I told her I don't plan to share it with anyone and that I would be working with my coach to improve my emotional regulation, and I also apologized for the apology I gave to the team, incase that made her uncomfortable (I had debated whether or not to go that route, but given that I cried in front of everyone, I felt that an apology to the entire team was warranted). I then told her that we could proceed however she would like, even if it's not to talk about it further.

Now I feel so ashamed of myself and like a terrible person. I don't know what else to do. I'm not going to tell my own boss or HR, and I'm not going to talk about it further with anyone. J seems subdued and not engaged during the rest of this meetup, which is fully understandable. I wish I could say something to her about this, but I don't want to approach her just yet since she said she's still processing what happened. I want to give her space. But I can't live with myself, having done what I did. I feel like I should resign from my job because I'm a terrible person. The rest of the team seems like they are fine but I don't know what anyone is really thinking, and I don't know how to reconcile with J. I have been avoiding being alone with anyone, that is how ashamed of myself I am. All we can do at this point is wait, until J is feeling better. But I can't handle the anxiety and shame in the meantime. I hate myself and wish I had better controlled my emotions in that moment. I had been feeling shitty all day yesterday and J's comment took me over the boiling point but I didn't even take the time to consider the full context of what she was saying before reacting. I want to die. What is wrong with me?! What kind of manager am I?!

posted by starpoint to Human Relations (33 answers total)

Ah, this is tricky.

You're right to give J space-- definitely do not reach out to her again about this. You're right to feel that this was a misstep, and that you've likely made J feel very uncomfortable. I have to agree with you that this was not good managing; if it was a one-off incident, it's an uncomfortable story but nothing worse, but if this is part of a pattern of behavior, then it's definitely something that needs to be addressed.

And. You're saying "I can't live with myself" and "I want to die" and "I should resign from my job", and that is totally, totally not necessary. I've had way worse managers than you and they never apologized! Is there someone you can talk to who doesn't work with you-- ideally a close friend? Someone you can express the very understandable feelings you're having to, safely, so you can get through the rest of the retreat without letting them show any further? Maybe somewhere you can go to primal scream and get a huge amount of ice cream or whatever your equivalent of bad-mood emergency medicine is?
posted by peppercorn at 3:33 PM on May 18, 2023 [16 favorites]

This question stressed me out. I would drop it - don't apologize, don't say anything else, and try to focus on letting it go.
posted by coldbabyshrimp at 3:33 PM on May 18, 2023 [33 favorites]

Gently, it sounds like you are catastrophizing in all sorts of ways. I'm sorry you're feeling so much distress.

First, even if J had said what you thought she said, i.e. that managers were filtering AMA questions, I don't quite see how that would be a personal attack on you? You say there are multiple managers, so had this been what J said, she would have been pointing out a potential structural problem, not a problem with you as an individual. There is a lot in instances in your narrative where you are jumping to assume that people think the worst about you.

Anyway, you don't sound like a terrible person to me, but you do sound potentially depressed and anxious. I realize your comment that you "want to die" may be hyperbolic, but please know you can call the suicide hotline (in the US) at 988. You don't need to be on the verge of suicide to call, you just need to be in emotional distress - which it sounds like you are. If you want to talk to someone before you can meet with your coach, don't be shy about using this resource. This is what it's for.
posted by coffeecat at 3:37 PM on May 18, 2023 [30 favorites]

Stop.

Breathe.

You are having what is basically an anaphylactic anxiety reaction - your body has gone into wildly overblown overdrive in an anxiety response. It is not a reasonable reaction to what happened, and I'm telling you this a) because you need to settle down in your outward behavior before you actually get yourself in trouble b) you need to hear that you are not as important as you think you are unless you are, like, a pediatric brain surgeon who read the wrong chart on the way into the OR. THAT is a grievous error. You did something a bit cringe.

Let. It. Blow. Over.

That's all anybody wants. Nobody wants to be forced to hear you make a giant self-flagellating production out of a very minor awkward bad moment. Nobody wants you to die or quit, nobody thinks you are a terrible person. Nobody wants to endlessly perseverate on this with you. NOBODY cares about this as much as you do, and that's great! That's absolutely awesome as far as the situation goes!

Now focus on getting yourself some help for the crisis you are in right now.

You will not die of embarrassment, you should not take actions to do so just because you are embarrassed, and you should not torpedo your career over a bad moment. Please go to an emergency room if you keep having thoughts of harming yourself. If that part subsides, is there a friend or family member you can call or text with for a few minutes? You don't have to tell them what happened, just tell them you had an anxiety-related bad moment and you are really scared and having trouble calming down and just need a connection to someone while you try to get your nervous system to re-regulate.

When you are able, go get into a decently warm shower and slowly turn the temp down until it is tepid to a bit cool. Get your head and face wet so they cool off. This will help reset your adrenaline levels.

I once had a manager shit her pants next to me for like a good 60 seconds, because the medication she was on to prevent her cancer from coming back caused digestive issues. She then ran away, and then my coworkers explained what had happened and that the protocol was to just never talk about it because it's not like she has extensive control over it and bodies are human and terrible and sometimes they really let us down.

Let it go. It's entirely possible J will never be able to not think about this incident, as is her right to be a little scarred by this, but what you need to do from this point forward is NOT do that to her again. The rest of the team will recover with little to no lasting damage.

It will be okay. By Monday you will have regained perspective and be able to calmly feel slightly awful about this in a much more proportional and non-freakout way.
posted by Lyn Never at 3:43 PM on May 18, 2023 [65 favorites]

(a) You're not a terrible person.

(b) Let J decide how she wants to handle it going forward. Since you yelled at her publicly, you did the right thing in apologizing publicly, but anything more than that is trying to force her to soothe your feelings, which is the opposite of what she owes you.

(c) You're not a terrible person.

(d) All day yesterday, I had been feeling bad because I'm not outgoing enough, not interesting enough, not really fitting in with the group, etc....Instead of probing further and asking for more context, my emotions got the better of me and I broke down crying as I told J (in front of the rest of my direct reports) that when she made that comment, I felt left out... That said, I find this baffling as a managerial mindset. It's not about whether you probed enough or got enough context, it's about the emotional transactions you seem to be expecting to have in the workplace. If a manager did this to me, I would assume that their mom had just died and/or they were drunk and they were temporarily spiralling out of control. Are you new to this kind of position? Are you very young? Were you using some legal or illegal substance? Are you having a mental health crisis? If either of the first two, time to assimilate tout suite that your colleagues and especially your subordinates are not your friends, your job is not about "fitting in" socially, and no one is responsible for making you feel included. Look for your validation as a human being among the people who will actually be around when a paycheck is not involved. If the third, time to take a good hard look at your relationship with said substance. If the last, I would seek some assistance now, before I started jeopardizing my job.

(e) You're not a terrible person. Every one of us has done something at one time or another at work that we wish we could take back. You didn't cause any serious damage to J. Beating yourself up about it is just another way to keep yourself in the heightened bad emotions/drama. Resolve to do better next time and take steps to do so. That's all anyone can ask.
posted by praemunire at 3:48 PM on May 18, 2023 [22 favorites]

And PLEASE get some sleep tonight. If you're still at a hotel see if they have some Benadryl at the front desk or little shop, or get a delivery of Unisom and some electrolyte drinks and some B-Complex. Get some cookies too, you need comfort and carbs to make you sleepy. You're at something like 40 hours awake now, you are no longer in a zone where any sort of problem-solving is allowed or possible. It's all lizard brain and recovery for the next 36 hours.
posted by Lyn Never at 3:53 PM on May 18, 2023 [8 favorites]

Response by poster: > Since you yelled at her publicly

I wanted to clarify that I didn't actually yell or raise my voice, but still.
posted by starpoint at 3:53 PM on May 18, 2023

I'm so sorry that you are going through this. It sounds like you've tied your self-esteem to external validation. Most people start the habit in school, then transfer it to work. I'm here to tell you to quit the habit. Work is not a family. Work is not your life.

It's just a job.
Everyone is expendable.
Work does not define your personal worth.
posted by dum spiro spero at 3:53 PM on May 18, 2023 [4 favorites]

What sort of manager are you? You're a human one, with all the foibles and imperfections that come with that.

As a human, you're allowed to make mistakes and sometimes the best way to deal with that is just to move on and try to do better next time. It's highly likely that J is feeling much the same way as you and, if they don't want to talk about it, they aren't going to be part of you accepting you made a mistake and moving on, so just do so yourself. Unless they bring it up later, just don't bring it up and it will be forgotten by all involved.

You're definitely not a bad person because you made one mistake, but recognising it as a mistake makes you a better person. This too shall pass.
posted by dg at 4:00 PM on May 18, 2023 [3 favorites]

There's only one thing fixes a situation like this, and that's time. You're going to feel guilty for a while, and things will be awkward with the person involved. Slowly, and very gradually, that will get better. I obsess over stuff sometimes too - though to a far lesser extent than you describe - and that's the one lesson it's taught me. You've apologised, and that's good. Now leave it alone.
posted by Paul Slade at 4:00 PM on May 18, 2023 [12 favorites]

+++ on the "get some sleep" advice from LN. Being sleep-deprived literally, objectively, impairs your brain functions. I think you'll be surprised how much better you feel, and how much more solvable the problem seems, after you've slept.
posted by praemunire at 4:07 PM on May 18, 2023 [3 favorites]

You did absolutely fine in the remediation responses! I wonder if your workplace is the kind of spot that doesn’t sit well with women making mistakes, and that’s why you’re panicking. Looking through your questions I am brimming with compassion for you. You’re in a tough, stressful part of your life and ya know what, you’re allowed to fuck up, to exist having fucked up, and for people to still treat you as a human being even though you made a fuck up. You’re a very good person, with empathy and respect for those you work with, and by God, you have the right to failure. Human, woman, anxiety sufferer and all.
posted by The Last Sockpuppet at 4:46 PM on May 18, 2023 [3 favorites]

"Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria" is a thing that exists and that you might want to read up on.
posted by McNulty at 5:04 PM on May 18, 2023 [16 favorites]

It always bears repeating: “A sense that your job is terribly important is a sure sign of an impending nervous breakdown.”

It does sound like you screwed the pooch a bit, but your reaction grants far more importance to your employment than is warranted by anything short of handling nuclear launch codes.

In the narrow confines of work I would suggest just letting it blow over. If J ever wants to talk she knows the door is open. Otherwise people have work to do and they’re going to go do it. It is unlikely that anyone has time or interest in participating in your personal anxiety attack.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 5:22 PM on May 18, 2023 [6 favorites]

I dunno, I feel like I’m missing some context here. Like, you made a mistake, but from what I can tell it doesn’t seem to be a big one. Just an awkward one. It doesn’t seem to be the kind of mistake that warrants repeated public self-flagellation. Honestly, the over-the-top apologizing would be weirder to me than the initial comment. Years from now, nobody is going to remember what J said or how you responded in the moment, but they will remember that you said you felt like you wanted to die because of some insignificant misunderstanding. Just chill, it’s not a big deal.

I’m honestly going to put some of the blame on J here, too. Nothing you’ve told us seems like something that needs to be processed for more than a few minutes. You didn’t say “J you fucking suck and you’re lucky I let you keep working here”. You just said you felt left out. That’s… a thing people say. Often as the result of misunderstandings or missed context. You apologized. If she wants to keep holding onto it, it’s her problem, not yours.

That said, I do think you might want to either reconsider your role with your company or change how you interact. People rightly have an expectation that their manager will behave predictably and rationally. If you’re not capable of doing that, it’s not fair to your team.
posted by kevinbelt at 5:46 PM on May 18, 2023 [4 favorites]

This is definitely a "don't do anything about this until, at minimum, the event is over and you've gone home and gotten some actual sleep" thing.

This was a managing screw up, yes. It wasn't an indictment of you as a person. The important thing right now is to respect that J doesn't want to talk further with you about this, which you're doing, and to hold off on further steps until you've gotten through this freakout spiral.
posted by Stacey at 5:58 PM on May 18, 2023 [1 favorite]

There's a whole bunch of awkwardness and it sucks. But trust me, no one is calling for your head over this. If I were in your team, I'd feel almost as awkward as you and would feel more so if you continued to bring it up. If I were J, I wouldn't want to talk about it either. If she can't move past a small misunderstanding, that's on her, not you. (Assuming this is a one off and you otherwise have a good working relationship)

You did something slightly (really slightly!) unprofessional, you've apologised, and that's all anyone can do. Please be kind to yourself - move on and let it go.
posted by pianissimo at 6:21 PM on May 18, 2023 [1 favorite]

You lost control of some emotions, perhaps because underlying feelings of being excluded (rightly or wrongly) came over you. It happens to most of us who are human, in all facets of life. You apologized and tried to explain yourself. At this point, please just try to let it go. Try to take this as a learning experience for the future. Maybe try to get to know your team members more, or figure out what some of the root causes that drove you to react that way were.

I've had managers who have lost their tempers with me or in meetings that I was present for, and the ones I maintained respect for were the ones who apologized or acknowledged that they weren't at their best, and then moved on. You've apologized, which frankly, took courage on your part. Give yourself some credit there! Being a manager isn't an easy job, and the combined stress got to you.

I hope things get better with J but I think you've done what you can at this point. You can't force her to feel a certain way, you can only keep moving forward and privately cringe (we all have private cringe moments don't we?). If you trust your own manager or have some sort of mentor at work maybe talk to them about this as well to get their thoughts (your call).

Side note, imo, most folks want a manager who is in the trenches with them or at least giving them guidance and empowering them to shine at their jobs. That's the important thing to focus on here: don't let a momentary mistake cause more fallout than it has to, focus on the broader task at hand, of supporting J and your other team members do as well as they can in their roles.
posted by watrlily at 6:34 PM on May 18, 2023 [3 favorites]

One time during the pandemic while we were all remote, I was on a call where the team was discussing a candidate we’d just interviewed, and there was some disagreement on the candidate between my manager and the person leading the interview process (at my company they’re the same level, and the interview lead is an external team member who is meant to provide an objective perspective on candidates based on some specific criteria). The disagreement wasn’t particularly heated, and there were two others in the call who sided with my manager, including me, out of 7, so my manager was in a minority. The meeting was about to end and we hadn’t reached a consensus which is necessary to make the hiring decision. The discussion was becoming circular and suddenly my manager burst into tears. She excused herself and dropped from the call. We wrapped up without a decision.

My manager apologized to me in a subsequent 1-1, and the matter was never raised again. I would have forgotten all about it if your question hadn’t jogged my memory.

I assumed my manager had something going on in her personal life that left her particularly vulnerable that day.

It was truly a non-issue.

I say this to tell you that the less you dwell on this with your directs the sooner it will be forgotten. But even if it isn’t, they must assume, like I did with my manager, that your disproportionate reaction was tied to something else distressing that’s going on in your life.

Don’t burden them further by offering that they choose the manner in which to resolve this, particularly J. As far as she is concerned, and all the rest of them, it’s over. Let her get on with her work without requiring any more uncomfortable unpacking of what happened.

When you next see them, focus on your common goal, the project you’re all working on.

Let the embarrassing moment be forgotten. Nobody really cares, it’s just something that happened and everyone has moved on.
posted by Dragonness at 6:51 PM on May 18, 2023 [13 favorites]

Wow, your panic is leaping off the page and I truly feel for you! I’ve felt this way, like the world is crashing down, and guess what? Even if the world were crashing down (it’s not) you can’t do a thing about it in this state of panic. So calming down is job one.

Great suggestions about getting sleep, treating yourself right, waiting until your body and mind are back to normal. You will feel normal again.

You can overcome this. And even if you can’t, you can certainly fake it. As a manager I fake it all the time! That’s like 80% of my job.

Stop apologizing, stop bringing it up, stop even thinking about it. Let everyone else move on because no human alive wants to dwell in an awkward moment.

Just be super professional from now on. That’s all, that’s the solution. You can’t undo what happened but you can be the professional you want to be every day going forward, and you’ll have this lesson to guide you.

Going forward on your new mission to be a pro, remember that your reports are not your friends. Of course you’re left out—you’re management and they’re not and that means you’re not one of them. It’s one of the things that sucks about going from peer to manager—which I suspect is a transition you’ve made recently.

J will get over it. Or she’ll decide she doesn’t want to work for you and quit. Both of those are perfectly acceptable outcomes. The third option, where she begins to give you attitude or underperforms is trickier, but that’s actually just another way of quitting, ultimately.

Also, excuse me, but you do NOT tell one of your reports that you’re working on emotional regulation—you made a professional faux pas, not a personal failing. You didn’t slap her or call her the c word or scream or threaten to fire her for god’s sake. None of her business what you’re working on emotionally.

People cry at work all the time, and way worse (my examples re: hitting screaming and the c word are all real life examples.)

This will blow over.
posted by kapers at 8:37 PM on May 18, 2023 [8 favorites]

Oh, I feel terrible terrible for you. Honestly, if I were in your shoes, I would ask my doctor for 3 days worth of Xanax/benzos to get me through to Monday and reset the intense anxiety spiral you’re in.

You made a mistake, but it’s not a big one. You’ll be ok. It’ll be ok.
posted by samthemander at 9:24 PM on May 18, 2023 [2 favorites]

First of all, as a person with intense social anxiety, I get it. I have been there! I hope the rest doesn't sound too harsh, because I really have been there.

I told her I understood, reiterated my apology and explained that I only wanted to talk about it further so that I could get a better understanding of her comment, just between us

I think failing to let go is the mistake. Of your behavior, of her comment, of the whole thing. This was probably kind of weird and intense for J, so the thing to do is to back way the way off, and be purely professional with her going forward. In time the weirdness will fade and be replaced with the many professional, non-intense interactions she's had with you and she'll be able to think "ah, my manager was just having an off day" and forget about it.

That probably makes you cringe and want to apologize even more, right? But again, the thing to do is to back off. And keep backing off. And back off some more. It's okay and normal to have outsized emotions about some things, but what you do with them is take them home and let them out when you're alone or with friends or with a therapist. Not with someone who has to report to you. Of course since you're human it might well happen again sometime, and that's life, and when it does you just say "sorry, having some health issues this week" with no details or anything and let everyone drop it and move on. It can feel weird dropping it, because you feel like surely no one will believe it's nothing and you have to address this terrible thing they've seen, but in reality everyone wants it to be nothing and most of them don't even know what's going on and don't want to care about it. Everyone has blips - everyone; you learn how to brush them off and let people walk on by.

Are you in therapy or anything like that? Have you considered anxiety meds? Sometimes something like medication that lets you not be so controlled by anxiety makes it possible to finally practice those things other people have already learned how to do when they make their own mistakes - brush things off, laugh things off, treat a molehill like the molehill it is. Again, everyone makes these mistakes going through life, and you're going to make more of them as you go through life just by virtue of being human, so learning how to brush them off instead of turning them into A Thing is an important skill to learn.

For right now, when you're feeling terrible... Just trust time to do its thing. This will stop feeling so intense for you over time, and the sooner you start taking a step back the sooner that can happen. Go watch something distracting, listen to distracting music, do a distracting workout - anything that can get your mind off this and start telling your brain it's okay to move on to other things. It might take a while, and that's okay too.
posted by trig at 10:50 PM on May 18, 2023 [7 favorites]

I have worked for and with people who have done FAR worse things than this, and they either never apologized or only apologized because they were required to by someone else. It frequently amazes me how brazen so many people can be when they screw up. So the fact that you tried to make things right puts you way ahead. I agree with what others have said above that the thing to do now is to let this incident go, and focus on the future; what can you do to separate your sense of self worth from your job and start treating it in a more dispassionate way?
posted by mydonkeybenjamin at 11:01 PM on May 18, 2023 [2 favorites]

Please be kind to yourself. This is not a grievous error. This is not something worth feeling like you want to die over. You are a human being who will make mistakes sometimes.

When I started my current role a couple of years ago it took me a little while to find my feet. Very early on I had a meeting with several stakeholders where I got flustered, defensive, emotional because I felt like I wasn't getting any input on how I approached my own work. It was awful. But what can you do? You apologise where needed and then move on. Work on it, so that it hopefully doesn't happen again.

It sounds like maybe what your colleague is asking for is that the meeting with the CEO be a skip meeting. Maybe after you have both recovered from this week, you could ask her about that and then help to pass her feedback on. That should be appreciated.
posted by kinddieserzeit at 2:20 AM on May 19, 2023 [1 favorite]

As gently as possible, you are reporting not one but two excessive responses in this question and your post history indicates this is something of a pattern. Are you working with a mental health or other professional? My anti-anxiety meds changed my life. You don't have to live this way, I promise it can all be so much more manageable.
posted by DarlingBri at 3:17 AM on May 19, 2023 [17 favorites]

All we can do at this point is wait, until J is feeling better. But I can't handle the anxiety and shame in the meantime. I hate myself and wish I had better controlled my emotions in that moment. I had been feeling shitty all day yesterday and J's comment took me over the boiling point but I didn't even take the time to consider the full context of what she was saying before reacting. I want to die. What is wrong with me?! What kind of manager am I?!

Respectfully - you need to see a mental health professional asap. All the precursor and your response and subsequent anxiety spiral is your own work to do and right now you are are putting a lot of emotional baggage on J with your many apologies in a way that is really uncomfortable (bordering on inappropriate) for an employee to handle with their manager. There is a power dynamic here that matters.

J heard your initial apology. They don't owe you an answer so you will feel better. They may put up new boundaries with you going forward and it is your job to respect them - that might include not attending events where you are the only manager.

You need to process your shame, identify what you will do differently in the future, and move on. Get help with that because it is difficult work.
posted by openhearted at 5:02 AM on May 19, 2023 [6 favorites]

I think you've gotten some very solid advice. I'm going to assume you've gotten some sleep now and maybe danced around or gone for a walk to spend some of that adrenaline. If not, maybe do those things first.

So first, even if you were a really lousy manager, that wouldn't make you a bad person. It's good to try to tease those two apart. It's really okay. I just had to intervene in a situation that would make your hair curl..this involved a physical scuffle over a set of keys. Trust me when I say this is going to be fine, especially as you learn from it.

Second, most managers don't get any training on emotional regulation in the workplace, or even how to manage - usually it's like "how to fill in these forms." I recommend Managing to Change the World (even if you're not in a non-profit) as a guide.

For this situation - yeah, there's a lot here. Here's how I think a more experienced manager would have handled it.

1. The first reaction - let's just take that as a given. It wasn't the ultimate best, but over your whole career sometimes things are going to hit wrong.

2. The apologizing phase. Look, none of this is unrecoverable. I'll take you through it so that next time it goes better.

Here's where you needed to think more like a manager. A manager is not like "how can I apologize to make this better between J and I?" necessarily...a managerial mindset is about figuring out how best to position everyone for success going forward from an incident.

From your description, it sounds to me like you were frantically trying to make your bad feelings go away by pushing J to understand your shame and also you were trying to gain respect from your team through an apology. Apologies in the workplace are fine, but they should be understated. As a manager, you want your team to have some perspective for all these little bumps in the road.

- I wouldn't have sent a late-night Slack message. I feel like you were trying to get ahead of things, which isn't always bad, but it might have been good to allow yourself time to calm down.

- I would have met with J privately and delivered a brief apology. Some of us have been trained to think that a "profuse" apology is better. 95% of the time, it is not. At that meeting I'd've asked if she'd like one with the team, and followed her wishes. Then I would have reassured her "J, I really value your work here and I'm sorry that my bad day gave you a different impression."

- you really don't need to share so much information about you. Remember that your job as a manager is to support and organize your team to get work done, and support their careers. J didn't need any of that information. She just needs you to start the work to reestablish a professional relationship.

- the team thing - I wouldn't have apologized unless J wanted me to. I might have said 'hey team, sorry for my emotional reaction last night, there's a lot going on and I misheard. As a team I hope we can always correct the record together."

- from there, it's important that you work with J collegially and with J's best interests at heart (as well as those of the organization.) It does not matter if J likes you, or even trusts you (although it's good to work to regain the trust). What matters is holding J's work in high regard where warranted and refocusing on the work.

So I'd encourage you to refocus on whatever the work is at hand. Everything else at this point is water under the bridge.

The same is true for yourself, which is also why I went through that. You had a bad day. Then you kept having one. That's okay. You wouldn't be hoping a team member died over something like that!!! Just learn and grow from it. One day you'll be mentoring a manager and you can tell them this story.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:27 AM on May 19, 2023 [13 favorites]

All day yesterday, I had been feeling bad because I'm not outgoing enough, not interesting enough, not really fitting in with the group, etc.

If people dislike you, this is probably why. People are incredibly self centred. If someone is interacting with them and seems uncomfortable, they will blame themselves and get uncomfortable too. They won’t think “this person probably has social anxiety”, they’ll think “I must be making this person uncomfortable somehow”.

This is also why psychopaths are so popular and persuasive. Their absolute comfort with themselves no matter what puts others at ease. It’s MUCH easier said than done, but you need to stop thinking this way and caring. Psychedelics helped me a lot.
posted by wheatlets at 5:43 AM on May 19, 2023 [2 favorites]

Throughout this question, your desire to be a good manager and treat your reports fairly and with respect is evident. You're not a bad manager - but you do need help with your anxiety. It is not a failing that you can't handle it alone and you are not choosing to feel this way, but it's something you badly need to address. You owe it to those around you but more importantly to yourself. I hope you've gotten some sleep and are feeling a bit steadier!
posted by superfluousm at 6:05 AM on May 19, 2023 [1 favorite]

Let it go. You've already apologized to everyone who needs to be apologized to and at this point bringing it up again would make things weird.

You worry about what other people are thinking about you but chances are they aren't. How much time do you spend thinking about every single time someone else at work got emotional? Can you list all those incidents off right now, or have you already forgotten them?

People really don't care about or even remember most things.
posted by Jacqueline at 6:13 AM on May 19, 2023 [1 favorite]

A recommendation for now that you have hopefully gotten some sleep: one way to close the anxiety loop now without harassing anyone else is to figure out and practice a response to use in the future when you perceive you're being attacked but need to be super ultra careful about reacting until you are certain.

For me, I count myself lucky that I am a Freeze + Flight. A coworker could stand up in a completely silent room with a microphone and go "Lyn fucking sucks, the worst person I've ever known" and I would still be like did i hear that right? and go hide in the bathroom and cry and THEN get mad. This is honestly kind of a useful reaction, because by the time I come back someone else will have figured the situation out and will either say "hey, it turned out they said Lane, as in the CEO? they're super embarrassed" or "we put Jerkface in a cab home, he probably won't remember that in the morning". Or maybe everyone will be acting like it didn't happen, in which case I can assume I misunderstood until I have time to figure it out later.

In any case, for me, I generally treat any kind of defensiveness as something better dealt with cold, and you can just decide that IF you think someone's coming for you like that in the future, you should back-pocket it to deal with later if it doesn't self-resolve. Because even if this person did directly say you suck, that's a thing to deal with in private and quiet. Or silently arrange your revenge, whatever. If you've practiced making a "hm okay" face to any kind of alarming statement, it's easy to call that up first and deal with the details later.
posted by Lyn Never at 7:10 AM on May 19, 2023 [8 favorites]

You are not alone. I am in a managerial role and I experience this level of overreaction to perceived mistakes, slights and disagreements. I lose sleep, cry in front of others, apologize too much and make people uncomfortable, and more! My sense is it’s a delightful combination of childhood trauma, natural sensitivity and hormones. I also have never taken any medication (prescribed or otherwise), for better or worse. Here’s what works for me.

Short term: sleep. Shower. Walk. Fill up ALL your time, or as much as possible, with people outside of work who love you. Partner, old friends, parents, siblings, whoever. You don’t need to process the specific scenario with them - though I have done this - but just tell them, I am having a really hard time. I need to spend some time with people who love me. If you don’t have anyone like that, watch your favorite comfort show, one where people disagree and then forgive and make up.

Long term: THERAPY. You need to process things from your past that led to this habit of overreacting. Therapy can also help with self compassion. Meditation. Loving kindness & mindfulness will both help so much - cultivating different habits to replace this panic response. Start reading Ask a Manager! And lastly, as others have said above, your self worth does not, and when you’re a manager, CANNOT, live at work. It can’t actually live in other people! It’s not reasonable to make it other people’s job to shore up your identity. So… can you develop your own sense of morality, your own code of ethics, and/or find a context to practice in? Read Brene Brown’s Braving the Wilderness for more on this. If you’re already in a specific spiritual tradition or group, look there for clarity instead. Read philosophy. Whatever it takes to find a way to look inside yourself for your guiding light.

I am sending you love. I promise if you let go a little, your sensitivity can become a superpower. Good luck!
posted by Isingthebodyelectric at 7:06 PM on May 19, 2023 [3 favorites]

I am so sorry this happened. I relate to it heavily.

I'm sure you've heard of this before, but just in case, it might be helpful to think of your reaction to her through an Internal Family Systems lens. A *part* of you got activated. Likely a very young part that jumped to a conclusion based on feelings of inadequacy. IFS would tell you to give that part a name, an age. Dialogue with it, even if it feels funny. Ask it what it's trying to protect you from and why it's there.

Ultimately, IFS says there are no bad parts inside us. They all serve a protective purpose. Asking yourself these questions can help you "unblend" from the part that feels shame, the part that got emotional. YOU aren't bad. Your PARTS aren't bad. Here's an article that can maybe help:: https://www.pesi.com/blog/details/1511/6-step-ifs-process-to-jumpstart-healing

You are a good person with lots of parts, and some of them are reactive when they've been hurt. They are not you and are not your true capital-S Self. Please have compassion on the part that acted out of hurt. Real or perceived, sometimes our "parts", the youngest parts of us, have their hackles up and perceive slights when they are not there. Because at one point, it was true, and that part lodged in your amygdala, and when you're activated in a similar way, you can act childish--as childish as the age you were when you first got hurt in that particular way.

You are not bad. One day, probably sooner than you think, you'll be able to turn the page on this. And you have information now--this situation shined a light on a part of you that needs a little (kind) attention.
posted by ygmiaa at 11:48 PM on May 28, 2023 [1 favorite]