Promotions and the unspoken rules of who gets ahead at the workplace are conversations most employees have quietly, among themselves, never out loud. But sometimes something happens in an office that’s so plainly wrong that staying quiet starts to feel like being part of the problem. Our reader Nina recently decided she was done staying quiet — and what followed surprised even her.
Hi Bright Side,
I need to talk about Beth (to be honest, I have changed her name to be on the safe side).
Beth has worked at our company for 11 years. She trained almost everyone on our floor, including me when I joined two years ago. She’s the person you go to when you don’t understand something and you’re too embarrassed to ask your manager.
She remembers birthdays. She stays late when someone else is overwhelmed, without being asked and without mentioning it afterward. Everyone knows Beth. Everyone likes Beth.
6 weeks ago, a team lead position opened up. Our entire department assumed it was going to her. It felt like something that had been owed to her for years.
Our boss gave the role to Marcus. Marcus has been with the company for 14 months. Beth trained him.
The announcement was made in a team meeting on a Tuesday morning. Beth smiled and started clapping before anyone else did. That was the moment that broke something in me.
Afterward, I heard through a colleague that Beth had gone to our boss privately to ask for feedback. His answer was that she “lacked the assertiveness the role required.”
Beth came back to her desk and got back to work. No complaint. No cold shoulder toward Marcus. She even helped him prepare for his first team lead meeting that same afternoon.
What's done is done and can't be undone. However, your co-worker deserves better leadership and better opportunities for advancement. She seems content with the way her employer has not only overlooked her, but then later disrespected her and belittled her work effort with a baseless statement. If she's ok with the situation, then you shouldn't comment any further. Personally I believe she has taken the higher road. I also believe that she should look for another job elsewhere.
Time for a walkout, or speak to someone higher
I went home that evening and wrote my boss an email. I kept it professional, but I said what I thought.
I told him that Beth had been with the company longer than most of us combined, that she had personally trained the person now leading her, and that calling her “not assertive enough” for a role she had essentially been doing informally for years was worth examining more carefully. I copied HR.
By the next morning, my boss had called me “disruptive” in a group message and asked HR to speak with me about “appropriate channels for workplace feedback.”
HR met with me yesterday. She was polite but clearly uncomfortable. They said my concerns had been “noted.”
The only good thing that came out of all this: Beth stopped me in the hallway and quietly said “thank you.” She said no one had ever done that for her before. That meant everything.
But now I’m sitting here wondering if I’ve made my own position here impossible. Did I do the right thing? And what do I do next?
— Nina
You did the right thing. I've seen this happen to many times. You Boss is a POS. They never give it to someone who deserves it. Girl you did the right thing.
Do you think “not assertive enough” is ever a fair reason to pass someone over? Or is it just code for something else? Tell us what you think below.
Oh, it could well be, but ii doubt it in this case; 11 years and largely training a department which likes and respects her (she wouldn't need assertiveness) could well justify accendancy. I have a substantial career in management and, had I been at a higher management level, I would suspect that the choice of a just trained 14 month person for promotion was probably because he would be the least likely to threaten his bosses career prospects.
If you were Nina, would you stay at this company after all of this — or would you start looking?
START LOOKING
