BAD BOSS OR BAD EMPLOYEE? THESE VIRAL CLIPS NEED A VERDICT

Welcome And The Professionalism Theme

SPEAKER_01 0:00

She's seen it all from the bench. He's helped couples through it all. Now they're making the call on the internet's biggest relationship debates. Real relationships, real reactions, real talk. This is Judgment Call.

SPEAKER_08 0:19

Welcome back to Judgment Call with me, Judge Lynn Toller, and my compatriot, Dr. Ish Major. So the two of us are sitting here today watching what's going on on the internet, what's happening, what's what people are talking about, what people are doing, what people are discussing. And today, Dr. Ish, we are going to discuss the topic of professionalism.

SPEAKER_06 0:42

Oh, lovely, lovely, lovely.

SPEAKER_08 0:45

We're gonna look at some people on the internet, talk, watch them talk about their bosses, their workers, and decide and make a judgment call about who's right.

SPEAKER_06 0:56

You know, on the surface, it sounds like one of those things that should be a layup. It should be pretty easy, but from what we see, it's really, really not.

SPEAKER_08 1:05

It never is. It never is.

SPEAKER_06 1:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 1:07

Madison, could you tee up our first uh video so we can see what we can see?

The Interview Meltdown At Reception

SPEAKER_00 1:14

Judgment call.

SPEAKER_02 1:21

You think it is okay that when somebody walks in a job interview, you can just start staring upside their head and looking at a person all crazy. She can even open up her mouth and say, Hi, can I help you? Then finally I said, The cat got your tongue. You've been eating on peanut butter, you're eating what's tea? Like, why you ain't saying nothing? She's gonna say, Um, can I help you? I said, You can crook up your face. I don't care. I hope it gets stuck like that. Because you should stop being so rude and evil early in the morning. I woke up on the right side of the bed, okay? You're not gonna put it down for my day. Yeah, you can help me. I got an interview today. She said, Who's your interview with? I said, how in the world am I supposed to know who I'm interviewing with? Well, how did how did who contacted you? How did they contact you? I said, in my email. She said, Well, you need to check your email. And look, I said, My email ain't coded into my phone. My email is at home on my old-fashioned Dell laptop computer from years and years. Not the updated Dale, the nice ones. This is the old one from way back in the day. It's about this thick, that one. And she said, My aunt, well, ma'am, we're gonna need to know who your interview was at. I said, No, ma'am, you're gonna need to look it up. She had to talk about, ma'am, I can't look it up. And we need to know that you're the right person. I went in my purse. She thought I was pulling out a, but I don't do stuff like that no more. I went in my purse and I slapped my ID on the counter. I said, This is who I am, and you need to direct me to whoever's supposed to be interviewing me to give me this job. I got bills to pay. I ain't got time to play with you today, little girl. She had talking about little girl, uh, you can't little girl, me and all this. I said, I ain't finna go back and forth with you. I proceeds to walk in the back and start hollering out. Um, excuse me, who is interviewing me today? Because the little girl up at the front camera, she got some kind of problems going on, and I ain't finna let all that jump off of her and on to me. Y'all know how stuff like that works. The man comes running out of his office and uh, ma'am, ma'am, uh, you're not supposed to be back here. I said, Well, the only reason I am back here is because she don't know who I'm supposed to be seeing, and she acts like I'm supposed to be the one in charge of the front desk, so here I am. Who's supposed to be interviewing me? He'll tell me I asked, What's your name? And I told him my name. He said, Well, I'm your interviewer, but unfortunately, because you're back here and you're being obnoxious, I said, Here we go. Now you're being discrimination. You talking about I'm being obnoxious. Do you understand why I'm being obnoxious if you think I'm being obnoxious? He said, Well, it really doesn't matter, ma'am. We can't have you in the office jeopardizing our business. Now I'm jeopardizing your business. I ain't even got the job yet. How much is the job paying, sir? I proceeded on with the interview on my own. You don't want to interview me? I'm gonna interview myself. He has to talk about, um, ma'am, we're not gonna be able to hire you and I'm gonna have to ask you to leave. I said, You can ask me whatever you want to ask, but we're finna get these questions out the way. He said, ma'am, you have to leave the building or something after call security. I said, I ain't signing up to be no security guard. I don't even want to be around no security guard. I deal with enough of that at my church. I need you to tell me where I'm gonna be working at, which one of these desks is mine, and if I'm getting one of them apple, orange, banana, whatever them computers call, them expensive ones. They got them all sitting up on the desk. Give me one of them. I'm proceeding to tell this man I have bills to pay. I took out of my time, fixing my hair up in the car, came in in this interview because y'all called me at the last minute. And you're gonna tell me that I got to leave the building. If I leave the building, everybody in here finna clear the building.

SPEAKER_08 4:05

Before we say anything else, let me say thank you to this woman. I was having a bad day. Nothing was going right, the dogs weren't doing the right things, the sons weren't doing the right things, everything was wrong. I turned this woman on. She got dressed for me, and she told me the best interview story. Now I know she's unemployed because she couldn't have gotten any job with that kind of attitude, but I appreciate the fact that she took the time to pink herself up like that. Get on the internet and make my day for me.

SPEAKER_06 4:44

I mean, uh, let me let me echo those sentiments, you know what I mean? And let's let's address the magenta elephant in the room. Let me just say, I love me some Elsbeth. It's one of my favorite TV shows. I love that style of dress, and so continue to do it. Fly that flag and wear it well. I love her. I want to be her friend in real life. I really do.

SPEAKER_08 5:06

I mean, she got a lot of drive-by comments, you know. Little girl, go ahead. What you mean? I don't do that anymore. You know, it was it was it was just perfect. It was beautiful, it was well put together, it's an A. It you you she knocked it out of the park.

SPEAKER_06 5:23

She knocked it out of the park. However, if you're in a room and everybody in the room is telling you the same thing, that at some point you might want to listen.

SPEAKER_08 5:33

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_06 5:34

You're in a room, you've got two people telling you, hey, this is not a good fit, this isn't working, yet you still persist, right? So listen, if the Elspeth thing is working, being quirky and colorful, then great. But if it's not, you got to be able to kind of pull that lens back and take a look and adjust your approach at some point. I think she's applying for the wrong job. I think she should be on stage entertaining people because that is who she is. She's big, she's bold, she comes on in a rush. Maybe office is wasting her talent.

SPEAKER_08 6:03

Office work is clearly not her, not her strong approach. But let me say this: the thing about telescoping back that you said is so important because most people say this is me, this is who I am, no matter what room, no matter what door they go into, this is me, this is who I am. And if you can't accept me for me as me without any assessment of reading the room and determining what you need from the room and who who's in the room and what you need to do, it's not you can be true to yourself without being glued to yourself. You can be. Absolutely. And and and she can be true to her her magenta self, as you most accurately put it, but still read the room.

SPEAKER_06 6:45

Right. Right. You know, uh conformity is one of those nasty little things that we have to deal with on earth, right? At some point, we're gonna have to shave a bit off the edges to fit ourselves into a in a into a place that lets us live the lifestyle we want, right? It doesn't, it doesn't mean we have to remain there permanently, but for maybe six to eight hours a day, you might. And then you can go do the rest of the thing. So she's got to work on that part. But I don't, you know, it's like that over African proverb never hide your light under a basket. I don't want her to dim her light at all because it is spectacular.

SPEAKER_08 7:19

She just needs to light up the right room.

SPEAKER_06 7:21

She needs to light up the right room. And once she it's all about goodness of fit, and once she finds that good fit, oh my god, we won't be able to get enough.

SPEAKER_08 7:29

She'll take off.

SPEAKER_06 7:30

Oh, what's the judgment?

SPEAKER_08 7:31

Judgment for judgment is for Madam Magenta.

SPEAKER_06 7:36

Yes, indeed.

SPEAKER_08 7:38

Right woman, wrong job.

SPEAKER_00 7:41

Right woman, wrong job. Absolutely. Judgment call.

Fired For TikTok And The Exit Email

SPEAKER_04 7:46

I

Being Yourself Without Burning Bridges

SPEAKER_04 7:47

just found the email that I wrote my boss when I got fired at my last job. It's really dramatic. It's really dramatic. Honestly, rightfully so. This woman made me so miserable. I had naively gone to HR asking them to help her become a better manager because I was trying to figure out how to work with her and how to make her happy with my work. And she just really wouldn't give me any feedback. And so HR, you know, obviously, was like, uh, we like her, we don't like you. Her and her little mean girl posse were watching my social media, and I ended up getting fired for one of my TikToks. And I wrote a very mean email to these people. And this is what I said. And what you can say to your boss when you leave your job if you want. Rereading this is so funny. I spent the weekend trying to figure out what to say to you after being so unceremoniously fired on Thursday without you there, which I found cowardly. Ultimately, I want you to know that you failed me as a manager and as a person. You should have been fired long before I was. The entire time I worked for you, I felt ostracized and made fun of by you and the people you deemed worthy of respect. You are a micromanager to the highest degree. People don't stay on the team long because you are impossible to work with. And I've heard from several ex-employees that this is the worst team they've ever worked on. You are not fit to manage people, and I pray you shift into a role in which you cannot have this effect on anyone else. It is the greatest gift that I'll never have to deal with any of you again.

SPEAKER_07 9:26

Ish. Okay.

SPEAKER_06 9:29

It's on you. Listen, um, the phrase work from home comes to mind when I see her. Because I don't think being amongst the humans is a good fit for her. Let me reframe this for everybody. Okay. You were fired for TikTok. TikTok. And then you got back on TikTok to tell people about how you got fired for the TikTok and then broadcast to every pertinent future possible employer what will happen in the event they should employ you next. I don't know if that's working.

SPEAKER_08 10:03

Yeah, I don't know if she had the best strategy for getting what she wanted done, done. First of all, you don't pull in HR just cuz. HR is always trouble. When HR comes around, everybody starts shaking in their boots. You try to resolve the matter yourself and in terms of your communications with the people that you're having difficulty with. But to take it on to TikTok, I mean, there's no value there other than the views. And I know views are what drives a lot of us these days. But to interrupt your dollar for a TikTok, I don't know.

SPEAKER_06 10:43

Well, we gotta so what's so what's her priority, right? This strikes me as a person, the way she clutched her pearls as she was telling us the story tells me that this is a person who validation is high on her list of things she needs on a day-to-day basis, right? Yes, we need money, it's reasonably close to oxygen. We gotta have it. So, like you said, but what's what is that algorithm in your head that makes you risk your dollar for that validation, which is what she's trying to get, and that support. What I really hear her saying underneath that, Judge, is she feels singled out and feels like she didn't have a whole lot of support there.

SPEAKER_08 11:19

Right. And I think that's how she felt. Now we have absolutely no idea how true that was because we only got one side of the story. Right.

SPEAKER_06 11:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 11:28

Our commentary, or at least my commentary, is based upon her response to how she to her not getting what she wanted and how she hurt herself and still doesn't seem to see how, although maybe she had gotten a better job. I don't know. She said she's rereading this after a year. So she really must enjoy that letter. And you don't know how hurt she was in that job. So I just want to give her a little room for that.

SPEAKER_06 11:57

A little room for that. Listen, I'm gonna introduce her to a key phrase that has saved many a fighter pilot in the good old US of A, which is pull up. You got to know when to pull up. Okay. If you're in a nosedive and you're you're you're looking at ground coming, you got to pull up. And just like you, like you would always say on boot camp, right? Find the pause button. Yeah, find the pause button.

SPEAKER_08 12:22

And just figure, and and again, like you said, step back, step back, look at it from a longer lens, not just about that immediate need to feel better, because that's what happened in that TikTok in that letter. But uh to determine what emotion you need to get the thing that you need done, which was to keep the job. But apparently she's happy without it.

SPEAKER_06 12:44

So like she's happy without it. I don't know. I wish her the best.

SPEAKER_08 12:49

Yeah, I wish her the best. Uh judgment call-ish. What do you say?

SPEAKER_06 12:55

Uh well, listen, uh, there's there's something about this that strike me, that strikes me that there's a much more to this story. So I'm gonna side with the ghosts in the room. I'm gonna feel like she's a pull up here, right? She needs what she needs. I'm gonna prescribe her a pull-up person. That's gonna be somebody saying, Hey, you know what, baby girl? No, no, you actually don't send that email. You know what? Let's just go, let's go to lunch and talk about it. And let's just see what happens.

SPEAKER_08 13:22

I'm right with you. I think pull up is exactly the word that the praise that she needs. And she seems like a delightful person. She does. A delightful person, but she's in the moment, right, managing her emotions without stepping back and allowing them to breathe a little bit.

SPEAKER_06 13:42

Never works.

SPEAKER_08 13:43

There you go. Another video where we got a story.

Boss Comfort Goes Too Far

SPEAKER_08 13:46

What we got? We got a story here. It's called Keep Your Foes On, literally. We're in a meeting to discuss budgets. While getting settled, one of the bosses comes in with a lap blanket. Not that cold in here, but okay. Halfway through the meeting, she kicks her shoes off under the table. Bear dogs just there. I'm sitting there with these bright red toenails in my peripherals thinking about the stupid rule of business casual keeping me from wearing shorts. An old girl here looks like she's getting ready for a nap. She's got her blanket on, her shoes off, and she's just maxing and relaxing.

SPEAKER_07 14:21

Your comments.

SPEAKER_06 14:23

No, no, no, no, we're at work. We are at work, correct? We are at work. I'm gonna assume she does not have a uh podiatry problem that requires her to remove her shoes every so often. We would air the Tipsies out. Yeah, we don't know. So, so I so help me understand. What is it about you that makes you feel so comfortable in your workplace that you're gonna blanket? I get it. But to take the shoes off and just settle in for a nice long winter's nap during the budget meeting, I don't get that. I just I don't and and again, Judge, you're talking to a bona fide germaphobe here, okay? I've double, I got I keep a hand of sand, I keep a bottle of sanitizer in each pocket. So what I don't want to see in my workplace is toes.

SPEAKER_08 15:17

Oh, oh I gotta say she felt entitled to do it because she was the boss, and being the boss is the biggest reason not to do it. You set standards, you set you you set the the rules, you set how things go, the atmosphere, the corporate feeling. And if that corporate feeling got feet in, it's not where you want to send, it's not the message that you want to send.

SPEAKER_06 15:47

Yeah, yeah. Leadership's gotta come from the top down. So what's the message you want to send? And and folks are, you know, folks are looking to you to know what they can do next. And so you've always, as the boss, as a as a as a business owner myself, you're never not setting the example.

unknown 16:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 16:03

You're never not. And the feet and the and the is it's it's just a little gross. I'm not a German cold, but it's just a little gross. So I'm gonna say you are not the asshole for not wanting to see your boss's feet in the meeting.

SPEAKER_06 16:19

Not at all, not at all. Feet and hands are a deeply, deeply personal thing, and those should be kept to yourself in a workplace environment. Please and thank you.

SPEAKER_08 16:27

I mean to tell you. Madison, what do we have next?

SPEAKER_00 16:32

Judgment call.

Graduation Antics And Respecting The Moment

SPEAKER_05 16:35

Hello everyone. My name is Type On Campbell slash CK Sue, and I'm recording here to talk about my discrimination.

SPEAKER_04 16:44

Wait.

SPEAKER_05 16:45

I've come here to talk about how I've been wrongfully done at Chicago Tech Academy and how I didn't receive my diploma because I did a split on stage. Now, a quick backstory. I've been telling these people for weeks that I was gonna do a split on stage. It was not a surprise, they just thought I was joking. And that's the problem now. Don't think I'm joking because I'm not. So yeah, I did my split on stage and I walked across, and it was an area where you're supposed to take pictures with your diploma. And the person who was handing out my diploma, she was just looking slow. Well, excuse me, not slow. But she was standing there looking crazy. So I'm like, babe, what are you doing? Give me my diploma. And she's like, um, she I honestly thought that they mixed up my name and didn't have my name in the right order. I didn't even think that she was purposely not trying to give me my diploma at first. And then everyone's telling me, oh, just go, just go, go, go back and get it, go back and get it. And I'm like, wait, you're telling me to go back and get the diploma? And she's telling me to keep walking. So what do y'all want me to do? So I was just confused. I ended up keep walking across the stage, and I was standing there for a minute. I was standing there like, I'm not moving until I get my diploma. I'm not moving until I get my diploma. Why didn't you get my diploma? So I ended up standing down. Long story short, everybody was like, sit down, sit down. So I had a seat. I went to sat down, whatever. After I sat down, I was escorted out of the graduation ceremony, and I was taken outside by a dean. And I was met with my principal Shacklefort, Mr. Shacklefort, Zatea Shacklefort to be exact. And I was met up there and she was beyond angry, like livid. It was genuine tears in her eyes, and her mouth was shaking. She was really, really, really, really upset. And she's like, You need to figure out a way how you're gonna make up for this. Um, you're not giving your diploma until you figure out a way how you're gonna um make up for what you just did. And I'm like, wait, I have to figure that out. Or do you have to figure that out? So, yeah, this was honestly just a confusing experience. Long story short, I ended up leaving. I didn't even get to do the uh left to right or right to left with the graduation cap because I was really upset. Like I was really upset. And then to end this off, the next line of students who went, the next line of students who went, a girl went up that stage. And yeah. So let me tell y'all something. Let me tell y'all something. That girl still received her diploma and everything. But my act, the whole world shook. So yeah, it's been countless of times where I've been punished more than another student just because of me. I think this school has something personal against me. Why? I have no idea. I think it's because I'm happy, I'm glowing, I'm always outgoing, and most of all, I have money.

SPEAKER_08 19:41

And most of all, I have money.

SPEAKER_06 19:46

Oh, is this the is this the split?

SPEAKER_07 19:48

Yeah, I'm in love with this lady, but I just can't take a look at the biggest.

SPEAKER_01 19:52

Whoa! And I know the saying, more money, more problems, no.

SPEAKER_07 19:58

More money, more people with their money problems looking for you to solve.

SPEAKER_08 20:03

I feel bad because she's a young lady. I do. Uh maybe what 20, 21. She's obviously uh upbeat, outgoing, loquacious.

SPEAKER_06 20:15

She's one of these and attractive, extroverted people.

SPEAKER_08 20:20

Yeah. But you gotta know where the line is when you're going out in public. And to set this was a graduation for everyone, not just her. And if you don't honor it with the respect that it deserves, I think it tarnishes other people's experiences. I'm not, you know, I don't know if the no diploma response was appropriate, but you gotta, you gotta uh respect other people's uh appreciation and and and appearances in a place like that. You know what I mean? Because they all paid a lot of money to go to that school.

SPEAKER_06 21:02

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I got a problem with her terminology. She misled us. She said she did a split. That, in fact, what she did was not a split, Judge. In the popular vernacular, what she did was bust it down. Okay, that is not a split, right? But what she did is what I saw last week at the trip. I'm sorry, what some people make. I heard that is. I heard you got that past me. I heard you down in Miami there. And that and that is so, like you said, right? This is an experience for everyone, not just for you. And there are kids in that audience, man. There are folks who are not used to seeing that kind of thing. Because, again, from a young, outgoing, loquacious, attractive lady, that can be sexually provocative and that crosses the line, right? People have done a whole many things. I walked up cross stage five times and I do something weird and wacky every single time, but nothing that's going to Embarrass somebody in the audience who was invested in me getting there. Do you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_08 22:04

Yeah. I know I've seen, and I know this has nothing to do with her, but I've seen a lot of graduations where they just have to kind of almost push the kids across because everybody wants to do a dance. If everybody does a dance, graduation lasts 10 hours. We can't do it. You know what I mean? Just push them along, push. And I understand they're exciting. I'm non-sperbatory. I told those people at law school when I got my diploma, my last exam. I went into the registrar's office. I said, send that sucker to my parents. I am out. Did not walk. Didn't gather.

SPEAKER_06 22:39

You didn't need the validation, right? You didn't need the external validation from a room full of strangers because you had parents at home who loved you and cared about you and who you knew were investing in you.

SPEAKER_08 22:51

Invest in me. They were mad. They wanted to see you walk.

SPEAKER_06 22:55

For sure. Now here's listen, can I make a can I make a a leak of a leap of psychiatry here? Please. I'm gonna make a huge leap, and I'm gonna say that that is a young woman who did not have a father in the audience. Wow. How do you do this? Because if she did, she's not busting it down on stage because she's not gonna embarrass her daddy like that. There's gonna be something cute she does. There's gonna some, there's gonna be something, uh, it could be something even flirty and super cute she does, but it's not gonna be explicitly sexual like what she did there, right? Because now you're looking for validation in the thing people offer up what they think they have that's most of value. She offered up her sexuality to a room full of strangers.

SPEAKER_07 23:39

Wow. But it's all about a diploma.

SPEAKER_08 23:42

I didn't even put it that way. I I don't see what you're saying.

SPEAKER_06 23:46

If there's a dad in the audience who invested in you and who validated you as a daughter from birth until now, you don't need to do that in a room full of people to get some external validation that means nothing because you already got it from the most important person in your life as a daughter, and that is you know, male in your life, and that's as your dad. So I'm gonna make I could be totally wrong.

SPEAKER_08 24:07

However, in these kind of situations, that's what you look for.

SPEAKER_06 24:12

That's what you look for, yeah.

SPEAKER_08 24:14

Yeah, she was wrong. The judgment call is she was wrong, no doubt about it. She busted down, she was dead wrong. I don't know why I feel bad for her. I don't know why I feel like she's taking everybody.

SPEAKER_06 24:34

I don't know. I don't know. I think I must have gone to the wrong college because we didn't have that nearly that much for the graduation.

SPEAKER_08 24:42

Yeah, I've seen some of those graduations. People get buckwild. I just buck wild. I don't see it at all. But anyway.

SPEAKER_06 24:49

Now listen, and I I agree. Now, but now unless uh unless no splits and no busting it down was on the syllabus of the curriculum, you can't hold that girl's diploma. Give her her give her her sheepskin, right? Absolutely. And let her go on with her life for sure.

SPEAKER_08 25:04

Yeah, I think I would have been fine if she not bounced it.

SPEAKER_06 25:08

Again, hence the bust down. That's what it was. Right.

SPEAKER_08 25:14

I don't know why. I don't, I that she's she she worked for that sheepskin. She should have gotten it. You know why you feel bad for her? Why do I feel bad?

SPEAKER_06 25:24

Because she's obviously bright, super smart, eloquent. She's got grace, she's got the whole package, and she cheapened it by doing that stud on stage.

SPEAKER_08 25:34

Boom. That's why you feel bad for it. That's why I feel bad. That is that's exactly it.

SPEAKER_06 25:41

Right? She devalued herself and the whole experience just with that one act. That's what happened.

SPEAKER_08 25:47

Judgment call, a light tap on the no. You know what I mean? Right, just a light tap a light tap on the no, you Jenna. But with some love in our voices.

SPEAKER_06 25:57

With some love, with some love and a hug in our voice, for sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 26:01

Now I'm going to find out who is the asshole. And don't say me again, Madison.

SPEAKER_06 26:06

I like these. I like these. Okay.

Surviving Gossip Culture At Work

SPEAKER_08 26:08

Trying to stay professional, but gossip culture is turning on me. I'm dealing with a weird shift at work and I'm not sure how to handle it. Two co-workers invited me out and spent most of the night criticizing other staff. I stayed neutral and didn't engage. Later, they tried to involve me in a situation I wasn't comfortable being a part of. So I set a boundary and removed myself. Since then, things feel tense. There's subtle exclusion, awkward energy, and now multiple co-workers are requesting me on social media, which make me uneasy given how gossip-heavy this environment seems. I'm not trying to escalate anything, but just want to do my job without drama. Don't we all? For those who's experienced this, how do you stay professional when you feel iced out? How do you avoid being pulled into gossip without being feeling isolated? How do you protect your peace in an environment like this? Appreciate any advice.

SPEAKER_06 27:08

That's tough. That's tough. We're living in a time where you've got to pick a side now, right? Uh and people are not allowing you to be Switzerland and be neutral, right? They want to know either you're either you're with me or you're against me. And you're in the car or you're not in the car. We're rolling in the boat or we're not. And when you don't pick a side, it makes them uncertain. And uncertainty right now is making people turn it all the way off and it's making people afraid. So I don't know how she does that.

SPEAKER_08 27:36

Yeah, I I I agree with you wholeheartedly. I it's hard when corporate culture is such that everyone engages in a behavior that is so uninviting to you and excludes you from the thing. I personally would use humor. If I'm in a situation, I don't want to gossip, I don't want to play, oh, I didn't know that, or I don't know anything about that, or ooh, change the subject. I try to to engage, but change the subject and use humor, but it is a difficult thing to do. And you're right, in this day and age, you're either for me or again me. And if you're against me, I have to hate you. I you know, we got to go no contact, or either you love me completely or we go in no contact. And that really distresses me about how we are these days, that we are so we can't dislike a little bit about somebody and accept the rest of it and do it like that. That we are so everything's a dichotomy, everything's a duality. There's everything's a duality.

SPEAKER_06 28:40

We can't equivocate, we can't we can't self-soothe and we can't equivocate, and we can't find the cushy middle ground. Right. You know what I mean? Here's what I would offer her. I'll offer her a tactic that my sister, Sheba, used to use. So Sheba is uh 30 years retired FBI, and she uh had a sign to give you an idea of her personality, she had a sign on her door, the entirety of our childhood that said, Stop, do not enter. And and she meant it. If the door was shut, you didn't go in. So here was here was her trick in the office in DC. Sheba would sit at her desk and she would pop in her headphones. And whenever somebody came with some extraneous information, with some gossip she wasn't interested in, she would purposely pause three to five seconds before she even recognized them, and then pull out one headphone, tilt, and then pop it right back in. Body language speaks volumes. If you don't want to be involved, there's a way to not be involved. You're talking about wait, what happened? Oh, that's wild. I have to get that story next. Pop your headphones back in and go back to work. Let your bot, let your behavior speak volumes if you can't set the boundary.

SPEAKER_08 29:50

I'd love to meet your sister. I need to set those kind of boundaries with my with my people. But she's in a she's in a tough, tough situation. I mean, the corporate culture being what it is, but there are subtle ways to do it. And the last thing I would do was accept all of those uh invites on social media. Don't bring your work home with you, especially when it's a bad part of the work. It's not even the work part, it's the bad part of the culture that you're gonna bring home. Don't do that.

SPEAKER_06 30:22

Don't do it. Don't do it. I don't I recommend when people start dating, unfollow each other on social media and for your work group, unless it's tied to your work, don't follow your coworkers, right? Church and state, keep it totally separate, and you want to have a respite, a place to go where you can just be you and let all the rest go so that you can go back in and tackle your day and have the energy to set those boundaries. It takes energy, it takes emotional labor to set those boundaries. And if that's a struggle for you, then you're gonna have to rest up for that.

SPEAKER_08 30:51

Yeah, other otherwise, if you're doing social media about work, you're at work all day and you don't want to be there all day.

SPEAKER_06 30:59

Exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_08 31:02

So uh the judgment call on this one is she's right. She we wish the whole corporate culture was a little more like her. Right. Uh, but she has to use subtle, small strategies to make sure people know I'm not a gossiper, I don't engage, but I don't judge the fact that you do.

SPEAKER_06 31:23

I'm just involved. And stop accepting invites online and invites to lunch. Oh, I got that thing I gotta go do. I can't make it, I'm sorry. Right. Right? Let your behavior speak volumes. I got one word for her iPods. Pop them in. Forget it.

SPEAKER_08 31:44

That was a great idea. What do we have next, Madison?

SPEAKER_00 31:48

Judgment call.

Voicemail Shade And A Parent’s Calm Reply

SPEAKER_03 31:51

On Friday, I caught the guidance counselor at my son's school talking about me on voicemail because she thought she hung up the phone, but she didn't. I missed the call from the school, but a few minutes later I was able to go check the voicemail that they left, and I saw that it was about two minutes long, so I thought, oh boy, what happened? This is a long message. And I listened. And after about 10 seconds, the guidance counselor said, you know, okay, well thanks, give me a call back. And I thought that's weird because this message was long. So I listened and she started to talk about me. The school psychologist was in the room with her, and she told him that I probably didn't answer because I needed to get my cronies together first. And once I got my cronies together, I would call back. She then told the school psychologist that he should probably just sit there for a couple minutes because I'd probably call back shortly, since she has a feeling that my day revolves around my kids and what happens at school. After I hung up and picked my job off the floor, I sent this email. I just missed your call, but I had a chance to listen to the voicemail you left. In the future, you should make sure you hang up the phone before you talk about the parents of your students. I didn't ignore your call because I needed to get my cronies together. And my day doesn't revolve around my children and what happens at school. I have a job. I'll call you back shortly. My son has pretty severe anxiety. He has a 5-0 plan, and up until about February, I had good communication with his school team. Um, but then we hit some bumps in the road in February, and things changed a little bit. We had a meeting at the end of February, and even though I am an advocate, I knew it was gonna be an emotional meeting for me, so I brought an advocate friend with me because I wanted to just be mom in this meeting. So apparently that's my crony. And my life doesn't revolve around my kids. I run a business. But let's just talk about that, shall we? Because as parents, we're damned if we do and we're damned if we don't. There's so much conversation on this app on a daily basis about how parents are the problem in education because they're not involved, they don't pay attention, they have no idea what's going on, they don't care about their kids' school. But when we do care and we are involved, that's a problem too. You can't have it both ways. You can't shame parents for not being involved, and they complain when they are. And make sure your phone is hung up before you talk about someone.

SPEAKER_08 33:41

Ish, I gotta say, I loved her response.

SPEAKER_07 33:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 33:45

Her response was letting them know I heard everything you said, letting them know that everything they said was wrong in a very classy way. It was what my girlfriend used to call a classy F U letter. Dignified. Uh, it was like, I heard what you said, it's not true. Have a delightful day. I love that kind of understated response. Like, you did you got in my ear, but you didn't get under my skin. I think that was something she demonstrated.

SPEAKER_06 34:18

Let me ask you this. As a mom, what did that what did you feel hearing that?

SPEAKER_08 34:24

As a mom, I felt like, you know, you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't. I think that a lot of educators do have, and there are a lot of uh parents out here who aren't taking care of the educational business as they should have. Uh and then there, you know, over involved parents. I might have been over involved a little bit. I mean, I was there a lot. I was showing up, and every day after class I was talking to the teacher when there was difficulties and all that kind of stuff. But I don't see how that's a beautiful thing. It's my job to teach my children. It's the teacher's job to facilitate that that effort. And uh I think this this woman did exactly the right thing.

SPEAKER_06 35:06

I do too. I think there's a huge difference between difference between being over-involved and enmeshed. There's a huge difference uh between vigilant about your what your child needs in a different setting and being hyper-vigilant to the point where you're working against yourself. So for folks who aren't familiar with the terminology, uh, let me do a little educating here. So 504 plan and the IEP plan are the two things you can do for your kids in school if they're struggling. The IEP or the individual education plan is something we sign off on, I sign off on all day long. Because if you're struggling academically, the kid is gonna need, let's say they got a math problem, they got a reading problem that gets them extra help, extra time, extra tutoring, and turning those assignments, and we can help with that. The 504 plan, Judge, is for strictly for behavior, right? This is we're gonna need to make some provisions and some allowances in this class because physically they're struggling to be in the room. So a 504 plan will let an anxious child give the teacher the sign, say, hey, it's that it's that time of the day for me. Great. You go, you know what to do. You go take a 30-minute walk, you get a 40-minute break, you can go outside and call your mom, whatever that is, whatever we've kind of figured out on our end that this child needs to do to get through that school day in terms of self-care so they can complete the day and they get home. Now, what I will tell you about her, moms like this and kids like that, is by the time they get to the point where they've got a 504 plan in place, Judge, that kid's gotten written up 20 times. They've got 20 referrals, they've got over 30 in-school suspensions and maybe an out-of-school suspension simply because they're having trouble being in the room because they're overstimulated. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_08 36:43

And so Yeah, and I I think that teachers are people too. And if you've had all of this trouble with this young man, you have some negative emotion around it. And then that negative emotion is going to involve the mother as well, because the kids being troubling class, and then the mother's coming and all that kind of stuff. Got it. And the teacher's got a lot of kids in the class, probably more than she needs to handle, you know, more than she can adequately handle because the schools are overcrowded, and she's got kids with four or five or fours and IEPs and this kind of stuff. You got it. She's asked to do a lot, and then it's it's difficult to do. That's why I liked the demeanor of the letter. It was I kept it. She had to do the wrong thing. She kept it cool though. She didn't get how dare you blah blah blah blah. Because that's not what it's called for. Everybody was in emotional, in an emotionally vulnerable place, and everybody had to act like they had some sense.

SPEAKER_06 37:42

I like the fact that she modeled distress tolerance for her child in her response to what was happening with her child. This is how we move through it, and this is how we keep it cool. Two of the most overworked and underpaid folks I know in life are social workers and school teachers. School teachers. Yep. Social workers are supposed to have a caseload of 30 people, 30 kids, and then most of them are carrying a caseload of 90. School teachers, like you said, they got schools are overcrowded. There's more work than teachers to go around. And so any child that requires extra attention is taking my time and my attention and my effectiveness away from everybody else. And so it's only natural. We're allowed a moment of humanity to resent that. And so I totally get where the teachers are coming from, but I love the mom's response even more.

SPEAKER_08 38:29

Absolutely. And everybody can go from a point of irritation to a point of calm if they choose to do so. And it's not about having to win. The only thing that only person that needs to win in the circumstance is that child. So it it's a it's a matter of not taking not keeping your side angry. You have to do it. I'm sorry, did you pass through it?

SPEAKER_06 38:52

Did you just did you just intimate that people have a choice in how they feel? Is that what you're saying?

SPEAKER_08 38:59

Can you imagine that? I know it was outrageous. I know it was an it's an objective. Objection, Your Honor. Objection. The feeling of the moment is not the one that you have to go with. You have i you have the ability, you have the right, you have the capacity to pick a new emotion.

SPEAKER_06 39:16

You just can, and it's just that simple. It's a choice.

SPEAKER_08 39:20

Yeah, just can. So I give her a thumbs up on her response.

SPEAKER_06 39:25

Thumbs up, I do. Full thumbs up for that response. Love that, love that. Need more mom, like it. That is the perfect balance of vigilance and involvement, and it's not too much. Absolutely.

What Professionalism Really Means

SPEAKER_08 39:35

So, Ish, we were in on professionalism today. Uh, how do you think we did?

SPEAKER_06 39:40

I think we did good. You know, I heard a lot of people who were feeling treated like they were treated unfairly, unfairly judged, didn't have a lot of folks on their side, um, which makes it even harder to be professional. But I think, I think we walked the line. Uh, as my mom was saying, I think we told the line pretty good today.

SPEAKER_08 39:56

Yeah. And I think professionalism is all about the cool that we need to have when we deal with other people. Yes, there are going to necessarily be problems and difficulties and struggles and and hard times, but if you know how to talk to people, if you don't, if you don't maintain the negative emotions, if you don't ask other people to join in your negative emotionality with you, instead of train your brain to get where you're going as opposed to just soaking in where you are. And that way we can get along a little better and we can be professionally human.

unknown 40:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 40:31

We can do a better job of that.

SPEAKER_06 40:34

Yep, yep. Humaning is hard. That I love that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 40:37

Yeah. So as we tried to be professional humans uh-ish, I'm gonna say goodbye and say I'll see you next week.

SPEAKER_01 40:44

We'll see you next week. She's seen it all from the bench. He's helped couples through it all. Now they're making the call on the internet's biggest relationship debates real relationships, real reactions, real talk. This is Judgment Call.