Restraining my Mama Bear instinct ... the public just stinks.

[dirty ethel rackham]

DD23 is a civil engineer working on traffic studies.  She was at a public meeting representing her firm when this lady corners her, asking her questions about a traffic study her firm did for the area in question.  Dd worked on this only a couple of months after graduation and was the most junior person on the project. Apparently, this woman is an attorney who decided that the best tactic was to find the most junior person there to grill, badger, and berate about how the recommendations were not going to prevent accidents (it is a pretty busy arterial road near a residential area and a park) and how people have died, will continue to die, and how dd will have all these future deaths on her head.  It was brutal.  (Dd agrees with the problems that she brought up and had sent that up to the powers that be, but it was the city that decided not to make the changes. ) This woman did not let dd get a word in edgewise and cornered her for nearly 30 minutes while dd was trying to deflect her off to the people who had decision making power.  It was so bad that dd had to go for a walk and she called me sobbing.  It took 30 minutes for her to calm down enough to go back in.  

Why are people like this?  What did this deranged woman hope to accomplish?  Dh talked me out of driving 4 hours to chase this woman down.  

[Rosie_0801]

To vent without getting punished by people with power, I should think.

Your daughter shouldn't have to be her whipping boy. 😠

[TexasProud]

 

Yeah, be momma bear. She needs to report this woman to her superiors.  Bullying shouldn't be tolerated. 

 

[Arcadia]

27 minutes ago, dirty ethel rackham said:

Why are people like this?  What did this deranged woman hope to accomplish? 

Some people have ego trip issues. Was she trying to use what your daughter said to pit her words against the city e.g. “your traffic consultant agrees with me …”. When I did my civil engineering internship, my employer would send the senior engineers to these kind of meetings. They know the engineers would get barraged by the other parties so having at least one senior engineer to front it is important. I got to tag along to some of these meetings as an observer. 

[dirty ethel rackham]

39 minutes ago, Arcadia said:

Some people have ego trip issues. Was she trying to use what your daughter said to pit her words against the city e.g. “your traffic consultant agrees with me …”. When I did my civil engineering internship, my employer would send the senior engineers to these kind of meetings. They know the engineers would get barraged by the other parties so having at least one senior engineer to front it is important. I got to tag along to some of these meetings as an observer. 

There were more senior engineers there, but they were talking with other attendees.  DD did have knowledge of the project and the study so she was there as a resource. And she has been working as an engineer for 2 years.  The plan was that she was supposed to be able to direct people to the more senior people and the city representative for those types of questions.  I think this woman saw an opportunity to get this off her chest and chose the easiest target.  After dd left, she did move on to other people before storming out.  

I do think she was trying to get dd to say something that could be used against either their firm or the city.  DD was inwardly agreeing with this woman's concerns but was trying to deflect everything on to senior people.  What got her was the personal accusation that she didn't care about the accidents that have already happened and that she was personally responsible for future DEATHS.  

[Heartstrings]

I do NOT mean this in a victim shaming kind of way, at all.  Your daughter needs to learn the skills for extricating herself from that kind of situation, which I’m sure she has realized now.  She shouldn’t be brown beat for 30 minutes but the only one who can really save her from that is herself, because you can fix the public.  One time of a polite “I’m not really who you should be talking to, I’ll connect you with the senior engineer” then it’s ok to be “rude” or to not be “nice”.   It’s ok to say “Excuse me, I need to be elsewhere” and push past someone, shoulder checking them if necessary.  It’s ok to say “Don’t touch me” very loudly if that person  grabs her.    It’s the same basic skill set that you’d use when dealing with an overly forward or aggressive date or guy who wants to be a date.   
 

 I don’t know if self defense classes might help work on that sort of thing.,    

[Arcadia]

22 minutes ago, dirty ethel rackham said:

What got her was the personal accusation that she didn't care about the accidents that have already happened and that she was personally responsible for future DEATHS.

It is emotional blackmail tactic that unscrupulous people use as a means to an end. They want to unsettle you so that you might blurt out something that they can used against you. 
I do think your daughter is a capable engineer. It is just that legal ramifications/liabilities are sometimes so high that people are willing to attack the weakest link. 

[dirty ethel rackham]

7 minutes ago, Heartstrings said:

I do NOT mean this in a victim shaming kind of way, at all.  Your daughter needs to learn the skills for extricating herself from that kind of situation, which I’m sure she has realized now.  She shouldn’t be brown beat for 30 minutes but the only one who can really save her from that is herself, because you can fix the public.  One time of a polite “I’m not really who you should be talking to, I’ll connect you with the senior engineer” then it’s ok to be “rude” or to not be “nice”.   It’s ok to say “Excuse me, I need to be elsewhere” and push past someone, shoulder checking them if necessary.  It’s ok to say “Don’t touch me” very loudly if that person  grabs her.    It’s the same basic skill set that you’d use when dealing with an overly forward or aggressive date or guy who wants to be a date.   
 

 I don’t know if self defense classes might help work on that sort of thing.,    

This is pretty much what my husband told her.  Dd is normally someone with good instincts and boundaries, but this is the first meeting where she was there as a resource and she was wearing her "customer service" persona.  The badgering and the personal guilt trip got out of hand right away and took her off guard.    

[City Mouse]

19 minutes ago, dirty ethel rackham said:

This is pretty much what my husband told her.  Dd is normally someone with good instincts and boundaries, but this is the first meeting where she was there as a resource and she was wearing her "customer service" persona.  The badgering and the personal guilt trip got out of hand right away and took her off guard.    

Unfortunately, it will get easier for her to handle such situations.
 As a teacher, I still remember the very first “crazy” irate parent that I had to deal with very early on in my career. That single event caused me to set up boundaries with parents that I have kept up for nearly 30 years, and teachers who have not had the same experience do not understand. 

[Arcadia]

37 minutes ago, dirty ethel rackham said:

Dd is normally someone with good instincts and boundaries, but this is the first meeting where she was there as a resource and she was wearing her "customer service" persona

Unfortunately for town hall style meetings, it is better to bring a courtroom persona than a customer service persona. 

[JennyD]

I am so sorry that your daughter had to deal with this!  What an unpleasant situation.

53 minutes ago, Heartstrings said:

I do NOT mean this in a victim shaming kind of way, at all.  Your daughter needs to learn the skills for extricating herself from that kind of situation, which I’m sure she has realized now.

I completely agree.  I have been to a LOT of community meetings involving traffic engineers who work for firms that have contracted with the city, and being able to gracefully deal with agitated members of the public is unfortunately an unavoidable part of the job.  People are stone-cold crazy when it comes to traffic issues, man.  

It's definitely a learned skill, and I'm sure that the senior members of her firm can help her work on this.  I remember 7 or 8 years ago going to a community meeting run by two young female traffic engineers.  They were pretty obviously taken aback by the force of public outrage and the meeting quickly went off the rails.  More recently, though, I went to another meeting and there was one of those same engineers, now much more experienced, and she ran the meeting like a pro.  There was one person (there's always one!) who kept trying to drag things off track and she just dealt with him perfectly -- very politely but firmly keeping control of the discussion.

I would encourage her to talk with one of her senior colleagues to ask for advice on how to smoothly handle this sort of situation.  

Edited May 16 by JennyD

[dirty ethel rackham]

Dh related a story where an experienced co-worker was invited to talk with a small group of people to discuss the impact of a project on a neighborhood.  He was told it would be a half-dozen people.  When he pulled up to the address, instead of a small group, it was 50 people in a garage.  He quipped that after watching the Sopranos, as an Italian, he knows that being invited to a garage filled with people is never a good thing.  😄