I was assertive at work, maybe too much

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I work at a new costco store, packing trollies. my job is just to put the huge amount items (it is a bulk cash and carry store) from the trolly onto the conveyer, then after they are scanned put them back in the trolly as fast as possible, while making polite conversation with them.

Anyway today i was in the middle of a huge lot and was halfway through putting them back in the trolly, very fast and busy. My scanner guy did not have the barcode so he was waiting a few seconds for it to come up on the computer. Anyway while i stood waiting for more items, still for a few seconds, this nasty female supervizor said "tom why are you standing there doing nothing, if your doing nothing go and clean". I just said in a slow, measured and calm voice, "i am halfway through all this stuff" and gestured to it. She said "well your not doing it your doing nothing so clean" i said in a voice calm but loud enough to be heard "i am halfway through this customers things" and she snapped "your not working" and ran away to do something else.

i was full of rage, and wanted to throw it all away and storm out in a tantrum. i nearly did shout at her and say "im f*****g doing this" and throw it down. i was really annoyed as i had been so busy and worked so hard. however i feel nervous even now that my calm talk back will be bad for me. they already told me i am not social enough and too crap cause of AS, even though all the customers and fellow workers like me and i laugh with the customers all the time and make good social chat with them while packing their stuff.

If they were aware of your AS diagnosis when you were hired, they can't hold anything against you that can be attributed to your disability. If its not already in your personnel file, take a copy to your HR person and have them put it in. The bigger the company, the more wary they are about doing anything that might get them sued for discrimination against the disabled. Its not even the potential financial loss that worries them, its the black eye to their image when the public perceives them as beating up on the crippled and feeble. A bit demeaning, I know, but if the handicapped card will shield you, by all means use it.

It might keep them from promoting you, but AS will pretty much insure that whether its diagnosed or not, and besides, how high ya gonna go in a Costco?

You did the right thing by being assertive. It is your supervisor's problem if she thinks that you are not working because she doesn't understand how you work. It is very frustrating when someone calls you lazy or thinks that you are not working when you are really working very hard.

If a supervisor like her tried that with me, there would be a good chance that I'd blow up at him/her due to my temper, especially if he/she distracted me from my work.

I was proud of myself as i wanted to rage at her, but the right thing to do to make my job easy would have been to just say "yes sorry i will try harder" and give in. but f**k it i will say when i think it unjust.

Good for you, fro being assertive.

I'm happy you stood up for yourself too! Now maybe next time when she becomes drunk on all her power, she will b!tch at someone else who's just doing their job.

I have worked in a place where supervisors acted like that, and I found it best just to say something like "Okay" and then go back to moving another box around a little bit or doing whatever else might at leasts *look* like "work" so the supervisor can then think he or she has done his or her own job and can now run off a little more quickly. Those supervisors almost always have "higher ups" breathing down on their own necks, and they do not even have the time to accurately assess a situation before saying something. In one case, however, I went to the personnel department and asked for help in knowing what to say or do the next time a certain supervisor who was actually more of a bully spoke to me as he had. Nothing really changed very much after that, but at least that particular supervisor ended up knowing he did not need to waste any of his bullying efforts on me.

i can totally relate to how hard it is to be working with a bullying boss. you did a good job being assertive.

i had a job where i was both waitressing and cooking (yeah, stressful. lasted two weeks there). i worked with the owner (she did waitressing only, and i was mostly the cook but i did waitressing as a relief). one day we were shorthanded because a third employee had walked off the job (she was brain-injured and had trouble with the job too). so it was just me and the boss at the lunch rush - with about 12 customers wanting to eat.

she started off having me cook, but then when more customers came in she pulled me up front to take orders. i did this for a bit, then i went back to the kitchen because people were waiting so long to eat already. i was panicking. she came back and yelled at me to get back out to the front. i followed her back out of the kitchen and said that it didn't make sense to have us both out front - someone needed to get cooking. she got more angry and snapped that i needed to do whatever she told me to do.

i walked out. not the best solution. assertiveness is better.