Is it normal that my manager is constantly micromanaging me?

[LL2933]

I’ve been working for a new company for around four months. From the get go, I’ve had a complicated relationship with my manager. When I first joined she seemed to be ok with me and showing me the ropes of the job. There was no indication that there were performance issues with my work. In our one to one online meetings early on I noticed she would sometimes say that I’m not where I need to be at this point and she would have a smirk on her face when she said this. I didn’t think much of it at the time but then in my 3 month probation review meeting she dropped a complete bomb on me and told me that I was not where I needed to be and there were issues with my performance at work related to accuracy and not communicating with colleagues appropriately regarding tasks and set deadlines. She told me that if I continued she would extend my probation or dismiss me. I told her when I first started the job that I had a disability but no measures were put in place to help me with my work.

I reached out to a staff member from another team for support. He deals with disability in the workplace and reasonable adjustments. He spoke with my manager and said it was unfair how I was told I was going to be dismissed and no measures had been put in place to support me with my disability. My manager got back to me after and was very salty. She said what I did was wrong asking for support for my disability outside of the team and that she would now have to fill in all this complex paperwork to support me.

Since then, she has been micromanaging me and it has been suffocating. In group discussions she ignores my existence whilst speaking to other colleagues and gives me dirty looks. I’ve noticed she will look me up and down sometimes and give me judgmental looks for no reason. In all our meetings now she’s constantly picking apart my work and giving me corrections. There has never been any praise of my work. I get the feeling she just wants me to quit

What is her issue with me?

[Oliverlogan263]

Dang, sounds like your manager has got it out for you big time! That totally sucks. A few thoughts:

- Micromanaging like that isn't normal or cool. You said yourself you weren't having issues before, so it seems like there's something personal happening here.

- Speaking up about your disability was totally within your rights. Don't feel bad about that - you gotta advocate for yourself, you know? Sounds like the other guy had your back too.

- Some managers just don't know how to handle disabilities or "differences." Doesn't make it right, but maybe she feels threatened or something dumb.

- The only explanations I can think of are either she's personally biased against you/your disability for some reason, OR she's threatened by you for some competition/promotional thing and is trying to get you to quit. Either way, super unprofessional.

- I'd start documenting everything - specific examples of micromanaging, looks, comments, criticism vs praise. If it keeps up you may need to take it higher up the chain.

- In the meantime, keep your head up. Do your work the best you can without stressing about her weird behavior. You belong there just as much as anyone!

Hope it gets better. You don't deserve to be treated like that. If it was me, I'd push back on her directly next time. You got rights!

[laly520]

she has big issue with herself