When you know your boss is lying (employers, companies, business)
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My boss was supposed to be flying back today and was expected to show up in the office this morning. I got a very brief email from her (at the same time the flight was supposed to be arriving) saying her flight was cancelled and she's trying to get on another one. That was four hours ago and I've heard nothing else from her.
Something about this didn't sit quite right with me, so I went to the Flight Tracker site and put in the departure and arrival cities. Guess what...not a single cancelled flight between those two cities today. (And I checked every airport within a 50 mile radius of where she's supposed to be.)
I don't know why she would lie -- maybe she's out of vacation days? -- but it bugs me a lot because it's something I personally wouldn't feel comfortable with. Plus, it means I probably can't trust her word on other things either.
If the reporting situation was reversed (i.e., she reported to me), I would confront her with HR in the room and have it recorded in her personnel file. But since I report to her, I'm not quite sure what to do.
What would you do? Ask her about it when she returns? Tell her supervisor? Let it go?
You seem to go to alot of trouble over somethig that bascially isn't your business;afterall your not her supervisor.Like to stir the pot?
My boss was supposed to be flying back today and was expected to show up in the office this morning. I got a very brief email from her (at the same time the flight was supposed to be arriving) saying her flight was cancelled and she's trying to get on another one. That was four hours ago and I've heard nothing else from her.
Something about this didn't sit quite right with me, so I went to the Flight Tracker site and put in the departure and arrival cities. Guess what...not a single cancelled flight between those two cities today. (And I checked every airport within a 50 mile radius of where she's supposed to be.)
I don't know why she would lie -- maybe she's out of vacation days? -- but it bugs me a lot because it's something I personally wouldn't feel comfortable with. Plus, it means I probably can't trust her word on other things either.
If the reporting situation was reversed (i.e., she reported to me), I would confront her with HR in the room and have it recorded in her personnel file. But since I report to her, I'm not quite sure what to do.
What would you do? Ask her about it when she returns? Tell her supervisor? Let it go?
What??? Are you serious???
I never would have checked up on her in the first place.
See? You're what will be classified as a "problem" employee. You're unnecessarily nosy. So what if your boss is lying about her flight being cancelled??
I guess I should have prefaced the story by saying that this wasn't the first time I've had reason to doubt her stories. It's not like me to assume the worst in people. This has been developing over time. I've tried to give her the benefit of the doubt and cover for her repeated absences, but after a while, it's starting to wear me down.
Perhaps you're right and she had a reason to lie about the cancellation. I'll go with that.
The boss is always right, and just do what the boss says without thinking about it.... *sticks fingers in ears like an idiot*......
Working for other people sucks, especially if you have a mind of your own and a pair of balls. Having no control over anything and just blindly grinning and doing what the boss says all the time is hell.
While this is true, OP mentions that his boss "lied" but not that he had to work the weekend to get her work done, or even that he had to work late that night...so it really did not impact him in the least, other than thinking that she lied.
In this case, the only thing that changed was his boss was not in the office.
One thing I learned early on in my career . . . it was my job to make my boss look GOOD. In return, my boss would promote me and help me up the career ladder.
If you are feeling that adversarial about your boss that you have to check up on her and then feel you are justified in "doing something" about what may be a misunderstanding on your part . . . you really should find another job.
As others have said, it was not important that your boss gave you detailed reasons for why she was delayed. Perhaps the easiest thing to explain was - the flight was cancelled - meaning - SHE cancelled her flight. I have certainly been in the position when I was out of town at a corporate meeting and had to cancel a flight due to a meeting that was called or an opportunity to meet with someone that I had been trying to schedule face time with.
You need to get a new attitude about working with this person or find another spot. It sounds to me as though you are looking for reasons to stab her in the back. That is quite troubling.
These days, the easiest thing to do to buoy a business' bottom line is to throw employees over board, which saves all those terrible employee expenses and, at least on paper, increases productivity. Hence the business model for surviving in the Great Recession.
I think the above quote is about employee loyalty. Very retro.
Maybe it is retro...but when the company looks to lay people off, the OP who spends his whole day spying in his boss, is not going to rank high on the "employees to keep" list.
Something could be going on that she cannot tell you, either personal or work related, and maybe her boss knows. She could have also cancelled her flight herself (as I think someone else mentioned) for reasons that she should not have to share, and maybe she wasn't technically telling a lie.
In any case, I don't think bosses can or should always be truthful with their employees and it doesn't necessarily mean they are dishonest in general. Kind of like when I didn't tell my kids that the reason their aunt was not at a family event was because she and their uncle were discussing a possible divorce.
Well, now you know your boss lies. It wasn't the first time and it won't be the last. Keep collecting evidence. Keep a file -- but not at work. Next time you get called up on the carpet for being seen at the strip club when you'd called in sick, casually mention one or two of your boss's incidents. It's a get out of jail free card if you play it right.
If your boss's boss is anything like my boss's boss then he/she will make it YOUR problem. Because my boss's boss thinks she walks on water and can do no wrong, regardless of anything he may know about her. If you want to keep your job, or maintain some peace, just suck it up and move on. I know it's hard.
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