How to deal with suspension from job

Looks like they are really out to get me at work. My boss came in at about 1pm and told me I was being suspended for 30 days while they investigate further misconduct charged against me. I'm still facing discipline for allegedly threatening my no-good assistant with a bowl of pasta. This is some additional charge.

I hate that job so much. My lawyer says I can't quit whike under investigation. Especially with no other job lined up. The job market is terrible too. I guess I should use the 30 days to look for other work. I'm so depressed now though. it's hard to look under normal circumstances. Now it would be nearly impossible. I would be like a zombie in an interview.

I don't see how I could go back to that job when the suspension is over though. I hate it so much. My office-mate was cheating by HOURS every day on her time. I was told for years to work overtime without pay. I worked 15 minutes over almost every day for two years. That's as much overtime without pay as I was going to work. All that time my office-mate was doing almost nothing.

I'm going to have way too much free time on my hands now. That's not going to be good for me. My mental health is really going downhill here.

I don't feel that I can talk to any mental health people either. They've treated me so badly in the past. They tried to say I had shcizophrenia once. They locked me up in a psych hospital and tried to get a court order to jam me with haldol.

maybe you should go see a prostitute or even two at a time if you're into that.

You should do something you like in order to take your mind off that, but I got nothing...

I'm way to bent out of shape for the hookers now. I really shouldn't be spending the money if I could get fired. It could take some time to find another job in this economy.

parador, this suspension makes no sense to me, based on what you've written over the last few weeks about your job. No sense at all. Something isn't jivving here. Something is missing.
I can see the boss playing some kind of favorites with your asst. That happens in poorly run organizations. I can see them looking the other ways with minor infractions of time, especially if your boss has a boss who doesn't model strict timekeeping or focus on productivity, etc.

But what doesn't make any sense to me is your suspension. I have legal training and I direct large organizations. Suspending someone is serious business and even a lousy organiztion won't do that without some merit. They just won't. Even if the boss and the boss's boss and the boss's boss's boss are lousy, the human services team or legal team won't allow them to take this drastic step without merit. There must be specific charges or allegations of misconduct or other things that they are legitimately investigating. And to suspend while investigating, as I"m sure your lawyer has told you, is very serious and is just a hair's breath away from your being terminated.

What else has happened besides what you've said here? Do you know what the allegations are? They must have told you as a part of the progressive discipline steps.

Are you suspended with pay? Can you take sick leave for this time (some companies allow that)?

This isn't a suspension for punishment. It's a suspension with pay while they investigate allegations against me. I gave the letter to my lawyer. They are accusing me of misusing the computer at work. My boss told me we are allowed to use the computer on our breaks as long as we weren't in chat rooms or looking at indecent materials. I haven't been doing that. I did spend about an hour looking at ways to waterproof my basement. I did that after work though. I did some amazon shopping the day before that. I do send out some personal e-mails on break or after work sometimes. I really can't recall what. Sometimes I e-mail from the library computer too. I just can't remember what I e-mail from where. Almost everyone uses their work computer for some personal stuff. My cheating office-mate was on facebook all the time.

I know another guy who was suspended while they investigated him. It was really obvious to everyone that he had not done anything wrong. They found he had not done anything wrong after a month or so. He was not punished. Later he quit because he didn't like they way they treated him over that and other incidents.

I knew another guy from another department who was suspended with pay while they investigated a sexual harrasment charge against him. That dragged on for over a YEAR. He finally just quit. Nobody who knew him believed it. He is a really nice guy. Some woman probably just got ticked off over a raunchy joke he told. I never found out any details though.

It seems very odd that you work for a company that will suspend somebody for misuse of internet while at work but, from what you make out, will do nothing to if it's employees are persistently late and do little work while at work.

Surely you're boss must realise you are unhappy, and have problems with people not having adequate time keeping skills etc while you have been doing what was expected of you. I'm amazed action hasn't been taken against these people from what you've told us. To suspend you for what really is something so insignificant in comparison is a total joke.
IMO either you're not telling the whole story or you're boss is a complete @@@@@@@.

bright eyes said what I was thinking: either there is more to this story or your company is rather nuts.

I wonder, parador, if you have gained a bit of a reputation of being a somewhat obsessive 'complainer'? I'm not trying to hurt you here but trying to help you.
It may be that your bosses feel like your subordinate's actions aren't as significant as you make them out to be. They pretty much told you in the past that they aren't interested in your complaints about her. You've even said that a boss's boss was there and watched your subordinate walk off the job early and leave you working, and the boss did nothing about it. Rightly or wrongly, your boss and her boss have told you that they don't see things the way that you do. Frankly, I cannot understand that, but that's what you've told us is true, so I believe you.

Or your company may be upset re your complaint (and making a formal complaint on it), alleging many hours of backpay due because you've been taking 15 min breaks offclock when you've now heard that this could have been paid time, and that has put you in the "let's watch this guy" category.

My difficulty is all this is reconciling their laissez faire attitude about your subordinate and office-mate's in-your-face attitude, and your good work and reputation, but then YOU get suspended. That's so nonsensical that either we're not getting the full story, or you're being targeted by management for elimination (and if they suspend you, and pressure you long enough, they know that you will eventually quit and they won't have to affirm their charges - which your quittting might be their goal all along), or your company is just insane.

If you want to stay with this company.... once you return from suspension, I would advise you to stop monitoring the behavior of others, do your own job the best you can, concern yourself only with your own work, and be very pleasant and happy (even if you have to fake it). Rrealise that this is just a silly job and you need the money and you'll do what you need to do to just let things cruise along. In other words, just become a good, dumb and happy worker. It seems like that's what your organiation wants.

Somehow, YOU are the one attracting the negative attention. Figure out why that is, and stop that. Or quit.

Free 'legal' advice....

LifeSong wrote:
Or your company may be upset re your complaint (and making a formal complaint on it), alleging many hours of backpay due because you've been taking 15 min breaks offclock when you've now heard that this could have been paid time, and that has put you in the "let's watch this guy" category.

...

I never did that. I thoght about doing it when I was told everyone was getting 30 whole minutes of paid break. My boss got corrected on that by her boss. She set it at just the one 15 minure paid break. I still hadly ever take it. For a couple of years I was working 15 mintes OVER without pay at the order of my boss. I never even went over her head on that. I only complained when it became totally intolerable about the unfair pricing that was causing massive loss of money. They didn't care that my assistant and I were working to near collopse. I've never even filed a formal grievence.

I really think I'm being targetted for elimination. They know I could complain to higher ups about the corruption. This is there way of discrediting me or getting rid of me. Believe me, I put up with stuff for a LONG time. My good asistant was griping to me almost every day about my office-mate. I gave the office-mate plenty of hints that I knew she was cheating, but she never straightened up. It was not until I got another assistant who liked to cheat on her time that I finally spoke up.

For all I know it's my office-mate who has retaliated against me with this latest complaint. I'm not allowed to know who complained (at this point anyway.)

There's a lot of office politics that goes on. I have avpd so I'm not a real social person. That may have put me at a major disadvantage.

LifeSong wrote:.

Somehow, YOU are the one attracting the negative attention. Figure out why that is, and stop that. Or quit.

Free 'legal' advice....

I would love to quit at this point. I actually think I won't be able to go back. The anxiety and depression I have been feeling going to work has been crushing. Now it will be 10 times as bad. I would never be able to cope. I feel like I've gone past the point of no return now. I could have recovered from the first complaint. Maybe. But now the second one. And the presence of a no good assistant who gets away with things because my boss must like her. Lots of people know she comes in late and skipps work a lot. They have told me. That made me feel like I would be able to make some headway. But it didn't work out like that. There are people over in another department who do the same thing and administration won't let their suoervisor do anything either. She pretty much gave up getting people to work on time. She just says "At least he showed up." Her workload is never going to get as high as mine though. And the boss never yelled at her in meetings we had. I doubt the boss told her to work over without pay either.

I'm so sorry you are going through this. It sounds like this is a horrible organization, so poorly run. It is demoralizing for good supervisors to be given responsibility for good work production, but no authority to do what's needed to build a culture of good work ethics. Without authority, bad workers will run all over good supervisors if the culture shows that that is tolerated, and it seems that this organization tolerates that. Too bad for them...