The Student Room Group

Are teachers/managers like Mr. Gilbert from the Inbetweeners commonplace these days?

Are there managers/teachers out there who are only interested in their own interests and will only do the bare minimum to help you, and would rather not even do that? In fact, they would rather **** you up! :mad:

My manager bullied me today, and I said to him not to speak me like that as it lowers my self respect. He basically said "Why would I give a flying **** about YOUR self-respect?".

In a way he has a point, does he? :confused:

I guess some people are just nasty.
Original post by BCMFM16
cba reading


right with ya. This isn't anything to do with Inbetweeners, dammit.
That rather demeans the legend that is Mr Gilbert.

There is a clear response you should have given:

Feeling valued motivates employees, and in skilled industries motivated employees yield better results.

In unskilled industries, demotivated employees are likely to sabotage processes. If the boss wants to prevent that, he will have to invest a huge amount money in micro-management and employee monitoring systems.

His need to bully you could cost the company in spades, and you think his own superior would be very interested to learn about his attitude.
Mr Gilbert used to live with Labour leadership contender Liz Kendall.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/liz-kendall-greg-davies-split-5705437
Reply 4
I'd rather a teacher who shouted at me than a teacher who fingered my bumhole. Mean teachers are fine as long as you can learn from them.
Original post by scrotgrot
That rather demeans the legend that is Mr Gilbert.

There is a clear response you should have given:

Feeling valued motivates employees, and in skilled industries motivated employees yield better results.
Lame. The only workable response is, "**** you I quit.".

If you are not willing or able to say that then he is right that he has no reason to care about your self-respect, since clearly you don't either.
Original post by Observatory
Lame. The only workable response is, "**** you I quit.".

If you are not willing or able to say that then he is right that he has no reason to care about your self-respect, since clearly you don't either.


An unskilled worker has no power to leverage by quitting. He can be replaced and the manager's attitude will not change. Thus, unskilled workers ought to be unionised; part of a union's remit is to provide help in industrial grievances which can include bullying.

Quitting in a fit of "self-respect" is all very well but if it doesn't solve the problem it's nothing but grandstanding.
Original post by cambio wechsel
Mr Gilbert used to live with Labour leadership contender Liz Kendall.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/liz-kendall-greg-davies-split-5705437


Mr Gilbert is a Labour leader I could get behind
Original post by scrotgrot
An unskilled worker has no power to leverage by quitting. He can be replaced and the manager's attitude will not change.

You can't change anyone's attitude. You can tolerate their attitude or not. If you do, then in this instance the manager's attitude wasn't wrong.

Quitting in a fit of "self-respect" is all very well but if it doesn't solve the problem it's nothing but grandstanding.

It's not, it's a perfectly practical response. The manager is no good, so don't try to change him, just choose another. It's what he would do to you. The fact that he hasn't indicates that quitting probably will damage him, but that's just a bonus.
I'm not certain.

The only time I've had rude teachers was when I lived in Trinidad.
Original post by Observatory
You can't change anyone's attitude. You can tolerate their attitude or not. If you do, then in this instance the manager's attitude wasn't wrong.


But then another worker gets saddled with that manager, so the problem remains unsolved. It's not good enough to simply act in your own interests and screw the rest. Given that there are only as many jobs as workers, the manager will always have a worker, and a worker will always have to suffer the manager.

You called my response lame; I think yours is. It's self-interested only and does not tackle the problem in toto, just your own interaction with it.

It's not, it's a perfectly practical response. The manager is no good, so don't try to change him, just choose another. It's what he would do to you. The fact that he hasn't indicates that quitting probably will damage him, but that's just a bonus.


Well there we are, we see that employers have more power than employees in the negotiation. It's in fact worse than the situation I just described, where power (supply and demand) is equal.
(edited 8 years ago)
Original post by scrotgrot
But then another worker gets saddled with that manager, so the problem remains unsolved.

You called my response lame; I think yours is. It's self-interested only and does not tackle the problem in toto, just your own interaction with it.

So your idea is to tolerate bad treatment as some kind of charitable donation to the next sucker who would otherwise come along? I think that's ridiculous but even if I accepted it I don't think it's true that managers whose employees keep leaving would last. The boss in the OP clearly acts like that not because he doesn't care if people react, but because people don't react. And indeed, OP didn't react, and even seems to agree with what the boss said.

Well there we are, we see that employers have more power than employees in the negotiation. It's in fact worse than the situation I just described, where power (supply and demand) is equal.

I don't see how you are getting that from what I said. Employment is a trade. If people are rude to me, I won't trade with them. There are tens of thousands of other employers I can trade with, and at least one of them is not going to be rude to me.

It's no different to refusing to return to a restaurant that offered bad service. I am not going to lecture the staff about the business wisdom of being polite to customers and wait patiently for them to improve, I am just not going to tip and not going to come back. If they change, great; if they don't, not my problem.

In fact so far none of my employers have treated me with anything but the greatest courtesy - probably because I didn't accept offers from people I suspected would act like the boss in the OP. Lame or not, my approach seems to get results.
(edited 8 years ago)
Original post by Observatory



It's not, it's a perfectly practical response. The manager is no good, so don't try to change him, just choose another. It's what he would do to you. The fact that he hasn't indicates that quitting probably will damage him, but that's just a bonus.


:laugh:

You're either incredibly naive or delusional of what the real world is like. Stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Funniest Mr. Gilbert moment, anyone?

I personally love when he said, episode 6, series 1:

"Ah. Another fairly innocuous jamboree that didn't result in someone *shouts hatefully at passing teenager* tagging people's property up!! Yes. I say I should go home tonight relatively hate free."

:congrats: Sooo hilarious.
(edited 8 years ago)
Original post by Observatory
So your idea is to tolerate bad treatment as some kind of charitable donation to the next sucker who would otherwise come along? I think that's ridiculous but even if I accepted it I don't think it's true that managers whose employees keep leaving would last. The boss in the OP clearly acts like that not because he doesn't care if people react, but because people don't react. And indeed, OP didn't react, and even seems to agree with what the boss said.


I'm not advocating not reacting. I'm advocating a system where workers are protected and recompensed from such treatment through union support. In the absence of that, quitting may be the only practical solution (for him), but it will not solve the problem, and the labour market may not allow him to quit without personal consequences that are even worse.

What I propose is a far stronger reaction, and one which will teach the manager much more of a lesson, than quitting, at least for unskilled jobs.

I don't see how you are getting that from what I said. Employment is a trade. If people are rude to me, I won't trade with them. There are tens of thousands of other employers I can trade with, and at least one of them is not going to be rude to me.

...

In fact so far none of my employers have treated me with anything but the greatest courtesy - probably because I didn't accept offers from people I suspected would act like the boss in the OP. Lame or not, my approach seems to get results.


That's all well and good, but you surely accept that there are fewer jobs than job seekers, so you must surely accept that managers will get workers no matter how badly they behave: not everyone has the bargaining power you do in the job market. Sure, they may have to suffer high turnover and associated time costs, but there will be no lack of suckers willing, due to the supply and demand, to do the job.

Employment is far from being like trade. Trade generally consists in an uncoercive market where you are not going to starve to death if you refuse to accept trades. Of course the welfare state is a bulwark against the worst coercion but not against it all.

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