What kind of protection am I entitled to on the job?

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This is going to be blunt.

I have not been officially diagnosed yet. My wife and I have set the wheels in motion for that to happen. I was diagnosed as a child with a condition that would have been called AS if it had been a known thing in the early 1960s. I would have been content to just let it slide, but I have problems in the workplace: my supervisor and the general manager.

The place where I work now is unlike anywhere I've ever worked, seen, read about or even imagined. It's like an alternate universe. My field attracts creative, technical people who really know their stuff. Other places I've worked at the same job were some of the most fun I've ever had. This place is like a mausoleum. Individuality is strongly discouraged. Proper credit for talent and work performed is minimized. There is no laughter in the hallways. The office politics are vicious and unrelenting. It is staffed and managed by a bunch of the most uptight, judgmental, egotistical, self-righteous creeps I've ever encountered.

I've been there for 8 1/2 years. I told the GM that I have what very well may be AS about four years ago, thinking it would make a difference. It is painfully obvious that she has done no research of any kind into it, or given any thought to making any kind of accommodations for me. It was pretty much OK until a kid half my age got promoted to be my supervisor. He is an uneducated hillbilly whose previous job experience consists of nine months of delivering flowers. Now he is in charge of an intensely technical and demanding field in which he has no experience, grounding or training. Besides which, he is now management, with no concept or training of any kind in how to be a manager.

Well, you folks all know as well as I do what kind of difficulties we AS people have in communicating with people and social interaction. At this company, I have been subjected to some of the most obnoxious people I've ever seen. Some of them have treated me abominably, and when I have the understandable reaction, I get punished. I have been told more than once that I have 30 days to change my behavior or be fired. The people who caused the situation have received no reprimand whatsoever.

Now this kid thinks he's a psychologist. He has decided there is something wrong with my personality. I just had a job evaluation where I got fives in everything but working with people, in which he gave me a 1. And because he thinks I'm an arrogant, hard-to-get-along-with, nasty person, he has sent me to - now get this - customer service training, to learn how to be polite to people. We have no customers, and do not deal with the general public. I had to go, or be fired. Now I am at the point where I need to know what legal protection is available to me, to protect me from these morons. How can it be impressed on them that no amount of degrading, humiliating crap like customer service training is going to change the chemistry of my brain? How can they be made to see that being talked down to and embarrassed in front of clients by twenty-somethings with no other experience in the field, impressed by their own sense of celebrity, is not going to provoke any reaction in me but anger? I was doing this s**t before their parents met. I don't walk around the place being famous. I just do my job, and I do it very well. I do it so well, in fact, that I am the only person on the staff who is on salary. They love my work and my skills, but they don't like me much. Since this kid took the reins, it has turned into a repeat of my childhood. I'm being punished and beaten for being different, except this time there's no hitting.

I have to stay at this company, because there is a state pension at the end, and benefits and all that. If they were to get rid of me, my wife and I would lose our house, which we just bought last year. If I couldn't work at this job, there is nothing like it for hundreds of miles, and we can't move. How can I survive these clueless NT morons? How can I protect myself? Any advice will be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

I told you it was going to be blunt!

Depending on where you live, you'll have to do some digging. As far as announcing your dx without it being official, that was probably a bad idea. Get the dx ASAP, then find something along the lines of what would qualify you for immediate or legal action (if necessary). The BBB could be a good place to start or get directions, but everything rests on you getting officially diagnosed first. Then take steps with organizations outside your company first, then when your higher-ups screw up, you have backing to get something done. Not sure how long a process this will be for you though . . . took me 6 months just to get a job coach after my official dx.

Well, in theory, the Americans With Disabilities Act is supposed to protect you from any kind of harassment or discrimination that arises due to your disability. Your employer is SUPPOSED to make reasonable accommodations to help offset an employee's disability - such as providing ramps and wheelchair access to those who need it, etc. In this case, that should mean learning what your disability is and making arrangements to provide you with whatever you need to do your job with minimal social anxiety, and so forth.

Of course, that's all contingent on your disability carrying a formal diagnosis.

Then there's the issue of getting anyone to actually ENFORCE the ADA, and in my experience, therein lies the rub. Autistic children get all the press. Autistic adults can't possibly need any help - Hell, don't autistics outgrow that s**t when they turn 18? Besides, you're way too articulate to be autistic, autistic means ret*d, right? You're obviously not ret*d, so there's nothing wrong with you - quit yer bellyachin' and get back to work! If you can't get along with everyone else - even if your talent and work is carrying the entire business - then you're NOT A TEAM PLAYER. Hit the road, Jack.

At least that's the attitude I keep running into.

I wasted my time and concern on this tripe only to find that in the end it all distills down to calling NTs names. I could understand calling these people clueless or morons, but why do you have to throw NT in there like it is on par? Just another form of bigoted hatred. Pedal it elsewhere, please.

Well, pardon the hell out of me for having an attitude about it that doesn't meet with your requirements. Next time I want to have an opinion on my life, I'll be sure to get your approval first.

Why would customer service training be of no use? I understand what you are going through as i've been in a similar situation. But I would've preferred to be sent on some training like this where I might learn how interact with "NT's" better, rather than just be told I had a personality problem and was too blunt with no explanation on how to change. That left me with no options.
The person doing the customer service training might be an idiot and it might be useless. There is chance though they might be able to help. Especially if they know what aspergers is. They might do if their job is to help people deal with customers.

There is no way you are going to get the people in work to change. You have to change if you want to be happier in work. Maybe it's an age thing as I'm only 30 and want to change my behaviour. I know I can't change my brain but I can change my behaviour towards others. Maybe your too old to want to do this or be able to

Just an aside you say you have no customers but then later say "How can they be made to see that being talked down to and embarrassed in front of clients". Are the clients not customers? I don't understand.

I perceive that the OP's thought is this....if his problem in this area is the result of AS, the training won't yield much benefit and it is WRONG for the employer to attribute as a negative on his performance evaluation something largely affected by his AS and not a lack of skill or an "attitude problem" when dealing with a typical NT.

Right now, he doesn't want his job security or promotion options injured because an ignorant supervisor attributes as bad behavior on his part something caused by a legitimate disability that hinders his ability for function normally in this area.

That said, it's already been pointed out that you'd need an official Dx to ensure you can be protected, and the ADA is largely a joke. It does the most good if you have a "sensitive" employer who respects disabled people. Otherwise, it's a law with very few teeth in it.

I understand that and I'm not disputing the employers responsibilities. I'm just going on a litle bit of a tangent. Why would anyone reject this type of training?

I'll give you an example, I used to constantly get told that I was blunt and unapproachable and that junior employees where frightened to ask me questions. I used to be really confused by this as I'm quite a placid person and didn't think I'd ever spoken to anyone in an aggressive tone. One day out of the blue a new employee came up to ask me a question, he started by just saying hello and then just stood there, I didn't make eye contact and continued to look at my computer waiting for him to ask his question, he said (possibly sarcastically) "this is the point of the conversation where we exchange some social pleasentaries before business" then he asked his question.

I don't know whether he has experience with aspies and realised I was one and was helping me out or else he thought I was rude and his response was total sarcasim. Either way I learned something that day, when people come up to your desk and say hello your supposed to stop what you are doing and smile and say hello how are you or how can I help etc... I can use this information to make myself more approachable by making myself so something NT's do naturally.

Maybe the training will teach things like this? Maybe not, but why reject it before you do it?

I work in a retail environment but my job has quite a few of the same issues it sounds like your job has. My recommendation is to talk to this kid quietly and politely and not to insult him or demean him no matter how much you feel he may deserve it. If you can't work through him go over his head once again privately and hopefully you can get some of these issues addressed. If that doesn't work and I'll be honest it may not just suck it up and take the class.

You don't feel you need it and your inclined to dig your heels in but don't start a fight over it. I've had to make compromises I couldn't stand, apologize from things that weren't my fault, and back down from confrontations where I was in the right. It happens in the work place no matter what job your in but ultimately you have to think about, keeping your job, working in a drama free office, and most importantly not having a supervisor with as an enemy. You have that and you'll be constantly on the lookout for the metaphorical knife coming at your back.

You are not the only one that gets to be blunt, you know.
WrongPlanet.net has rules against discrimination.



Had you said 'black morons' or 'gay morons' or 'white' morons or 'Christian morons' or 'Muslim morons' etc. we would have objected just as much. We have NTs here and don't consider them the enemy, we consider ignorance the enemy.

Merle
Moderator

To the moderator: I have wandered into your territory up to the tops of my toes. I was using terminology I learned here, before I was aware of the context in which you use it, and I guess I'm not sure of exactly how you use it. I was not aware that an entire class of people, that is to say, the rest of the people in the world who do not have AS, could be discriminated against by calling them what they are called on this website. To equate it with racism is unfathomable. It now becomes a game of semantics, which I have no wish to play. I won't use that term anymore.

to RhettOracle,
thank you. I am sorry if you have read prejudicial things about NTs on this site and that is exactly what we are trying to stop. Almost half of our membership are NTs. We have NT moderators (not me, though) We have received complaints that they are made to feel picked on and maligned. The specific rule is:

*behavior intended to provoke or belittle other members;
*anything else that purposely causes conflict with other members.

thank you for being a good sport about our enforcement of this rule. I am glad you are here and hope you can find some coping strategies with your seemingly thankless job with an immature supervisor that couldn't find his bottom with both hands.

Merle

Thank you the responses so far. I was agitated when I wrote my OP, and I used stronger language than that in which I normally communicate. But I am frustrated and upset at the way I have been treated at this company, by people who think it's appropriate to treat me the way they have. This is why I am seeking information on how I can protect myself.

The facts remain that a high-school educated kid who has no work or life experience is now in a position of power over me. He displays the worst traits of an inexperienced manager: he lies, he twists my words to make them mean something else he can use against me; he wields his power like a weapon. He is trying to make me pay for being different by using the most humiliating methods he can come up with. He will come at me with an accusation, to goad me into a response, which he will then write me up for. One such argument started when he asked me by e-mail to do something. I replied with "OK." He turned that into an accusation that I was being obnoxious and shouting at him by using upper case letters. Should I mention that he has an elementary-school command of the English language? He has been showing this side of his personality since the day he walked in the door. My biggest problem with him is that he has demonstrated that his word isn't worth the paper it's written on. Before he was promoted, during another all-time low at the company, three of us made a pact that we were in this together, and would look out for each other, no matter what. Since he got promoted, all that has gone out the window. He has reneged on his end of the pact, and is rude and obnoxious to the other two of us at every opportunity, and, as I mentioned, he wields his power like a weapon. Any respect I could ever have had for him is gone, and is never coming back.

As far as his skills in the business we do, it used to be a pretty professional operation, which he has turned into a mediocre operation. His total lack of grounding in the field leads him to strive not for the best, but to settle for the absolute minimum. He will not be convinced otherwise. He doesn't know how to achieve the kind of excellence we were used to. The other person in our dead pact has over twenty years in the management, planning and execution of our business. This kid will not listen to any of his recommendations, takes umbrage at them and undoes all the work done by the other fellow to attempt to improve our operation. In short, he is a moron. And he's in charge. What's worse is that he is the golden child of the GM. She loves him, and thinks he can do no wrong.

Although I haven't always worked, I started working 36 years ago. In all that time, I was never called on the carpet before management by any supervisor. Except for this one. Three times now. Can you see why I'm upset and afraid for my future?

About the customer service training situation: I used the word "client" as a generic term for people who come into the company for a specific thing. We don't sell anything or deal with customers. I'm sorry if that was confusing, I was trying to be vague.

Now, it isn't like I can't get along with anybody. I get along just fine with almost everybody else in the building, if and when I see them. They're always busy doing their jobs, and there isn't a lot of fraternization that goes on. I don't know how to do small talk, and I usually keep to myself, or hang out with the other person I mentioned above, who also happens to be my best friend at this stage of my life, and he has been for the last five years or so. I am never purposefully rude to anyone. I don't talk down to people or say things that are unpleasant. I'm not hard to get along with. I am willing to give anyone the benefit of the doubt, up to where they prove that they cannot be trusted. Sometimes I say things that, while they make perfect sense to me and do not strike me as offensive, seem to have offended a couple of people. Not a lot of people, just a couple, and not often, but spaced far, far apart. I have apparently been branded as aloof, and difficult because of this. I am also a perfectionist in my work. The kid is finding ways to use it against me. The only real confrontations I've had there besides the ones with him, have been with people with massive egos, who are the kind to throw tantrums to get what they want, and run to the boss to complain, when what they want is to punish people they don't like. There have only been five or six of them in the eight and a half years I've been there. They have all moved on, except now we have a new person to fit that description. I get reprimanded for having a negative reaction to being treated badly by people like this - nobody else treats me that way. If nobody ever treated me that way, I'd never have a negative reaction. I don't want to be treated as someone special. I want to be treated as an equal. I don't want to be deferred to. I want to be treated as someone twice as old as these people, with more than thirty years' more experience than they have, who knows what he is doing. I ask for no more, but I find it extremely difficult to accept any less.

Thank you for reading this far. I will be back to respond more at a later time; I feel uncomfortable writing to this forum on the workplace IP, as web content passes through the company server. I would appreciate it if anyone has any suggestions on how I may learn to deal with the situations I've outlined. The place didn't used to be a problem for me until this kid got into management. Now it's sucking my will to live.

There is a dreadful trend in American management that a "good" manager can manage any field. Yeah, okay, up to a point, 'Are we playing our best game?' 'Do you feel good about this?' 'What's the next most important thing?' So a new manager can be a good coach (and it sounds like this guy is anything but!) But in pretty short order, the manager needs to dive in there and start learning the business!

Dave Thomas of Wendy's was proud that he was a grill man.

Okay, if the business is more complicated, the manager may never get great at a technical task, but may get enough experience to appreciate and RESPECT those who are really good at the technical task.


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Now, these kind of difficult situations, you need to be very strategic.

First off, add free positives to your life. If there is something you and your wife have been thinking about doing, well can you go ahead and do it now anyway.

Talk to a lawyer, just don't invest too much in it. Not time, or inconvenience, or more money than you can comfortably afford, nor especially too much hope. Lawyers typically want big money cases, and easy cases, but it might be worth checking.

Same for an advocacy group, and the same qualifiers (or similar).

And please, please try not to feel trapped. It sounds like with the pension, you might be. But in poker terms, if you could start moving away from the hand. There's a lot of money out there in IT. It's certainly not a guarantee, but for the sake of your mental health and the possibility of this money, maybe

You can take mental health days, 'family situation,' 'family emergency,' 'no, I'm sorry, I can't be more specific than that.' You could take a mental health three days or a mental health week. It is some risk, but frankly at this point, anything you do has an element of risk.

It's a junior high work place. This people are royally immature. If, in zen-like fashion, you can accept that they're immature (frankly, only occasionally works for me). Or post some of the stories right here, just don't make yourself too identifiable. In Dilbert-like fashion, make fun of them

I knew a guy in his late 50s, long time as a professional sales person, these young kids with their degrees, and he would talk about them dressed up mouthing the words "coordinate, facillate . . . " and they don't know anything past mouthing the words! And he told a story in which this new guy brought in MBO Management By Objectives, and they're sitting in a coffee shop while the guy's going over MBO. And the older guy says, 'Okay, what's our goal here? We want to have a cup of coffee. Now should I order a Danish? Well, if I want to have a bowel movement later, I could order a prune Danish? . . . you know, this is jsut so much crap.'

The job was heuristic, a good salesperson has real relationships and real conversations. It's not just some algorithmic step-by-step that a child could follow. And I think the same is true for technical people, and that's not fully respected even by halfway decent managers.

You could also get there slightly early and then not stay one minute past five o'clock, or whatever the normal quitting time.

I would suggest more conversation by email, but the part where this guy criticizes you for writing "OK" that's just bizarre. He has real issues. He's a lord highness. He's not a team builder. More in writing, more you can document.

This company is not the world.

Maybe go formal with the Asperger's diagnosis. then resign, then sue them, just don't invest too much in the lawsuit, especially not emotionally

Talk with your wife as honestly as you can. She might prefer a smaller house to you being in a job you hate (and having ever reason to hate)

Like in poker, guy comes back heavy when you've flopped mid-trips, when there's only one chance that he'd have a straight and that would be a real garfunkle hand, and how likely is it that he has top trips, really? So, you may not fold immediately, but you may try and keep it cheap.

All the best. Please keep us informed.

Understood. Venom retracted. I also have to confess to coming to this "hot"; it was the third negative NT comment I had come across in as many minutes and it did get me chapped. Especially after reading the post, thinking of solutions and ways to help and then feeling a sort of emotional WHACK at the end.

I should have seen your post count and I should have come across softer. Maybe even in a PM. Forgive the tin-foil hat cat

We are in a severe depression/recession and if you lose your job you may not find work again for a very long long time.

You need to get an official diagnoses if you want legal protection. The employer could tell the court you made everything about AS up and they had no clue whether you have it and therefore are not liable for violations against the ADA. I am not a lawyer so you may want to get legal advice on this but I assume this would be the case without an official diagnosis.

You can try looking for other jobs but be very careful. If the economy was good I would say quit. Seriously, with 8 years of experience you are definitely hirable but there are thousands applying for each position right now. Some employers in the tech field are known to terminate employees who look for work because of a perceived security threat. Use your networking with other professionals in your area or apply with your company's customers?

Being happy you simply have a job might not be what you want to hear. I would love to be in your shoes right now abusive or not because I would at least have a job and could pay off my debt. I was just recovering from the last recession and got my degree only to start over 7 years later at square one with a wife and kids.

I hate abusive bosses as the next guy and I wish you the best of luck networking with other groups to find other jobs. Make sure you have a job first and that the next employer is not likely to lay you off after hiring you. I had this happen to a family member and she lost everything she had.