>Or do you have no interesting in "getting ahead" there even
>if it were required?

Networking is vital to getting ahead here, but it's definitely not with anyone who would have written an anonymous note. Had it been a supervisor the conversation would have gone differently, but this was a typed note left in anonymity with just enough specifics that I have a good guess about the culprit.

Thing is, it’s still a minefield because perception is considered gospel here and it boils down to whether or not you bosses believe what’s been said and this place is teaming with people who complain about every minor infraction.

If I had a dollar for every time I had to sit through staff meeting “others” consisting of a complaint about someone wearing something too tight/short or tattoos showing or cliques- yes, people here complain about “cliques” like it’s fucking high school- I’d have a nice lunch money budget for a few weeks.

In my old office I had a few situations where I had irrefutable evidence that proved the allegations were untrue, but was told “perception is everything, I’m just telling you how you’re being perceived, don’t shoot the messenger”when I went to prove my case.

Once I was told that I wasn’t answering my emails “timely” when the emails in question were less than 5 minutes old at the time of the complaint and were received while I was on break and had a journal timestamped to show the time I left my desk. Another time I was supposedly not paying attention during a training and waited until the end to answer questions on the packet despite having a physical hard copy of my packet that I had completed halfway through the training. I had the copy because I gave it to a coworker who left at the beginning because the trainer gave us a bad attitude when she didn’t have enough packets for us because she didn’t know we were scheduled.

Both times my supe didn’t even want to look at the evidence. I had another situation where I was given a memo about me raising my voice at a coworker that omitted pertinent details regarding the actions of my coworker and began at the point where I raised my voice as though I showed up on some Hulk Smash. I remain good friends with that worker to this day, actually, and we were arguing over the drive to switch unions during a rather heated and stressfull summer for all of us.

To hear my boss tell it though? I was a monster. I had to fight to get the memo corrected and the best she was willing to do was halfassed and still left a lot of information out. I had to take my issues with her all the way up to the director since her boss didn’t want to see or hear evidence to contradict his “perception” and I brought a manilla envelope full of statements from coworkers that echoed my contention of a hostile workplace to the dirctor. Things were fixed the next day and she got on her P’s and Q’s real quick before requesting a transfer.

Her boss wound up swimming in shit a year later because he refused to police the actions of his supervisors, but again…This had to go all the way to the top and I had to get a shit ton of statements, but the fact that I was able to get so many on such short notice was a testament to the quality of my rep among my coworkers.

It’s a tricky balancing act and it just boils down to who you know on the top half. I know enough to get through if I ever get enough college units to move up, but if that happens I’m moving out of this place and into something else anyways.