RE: What makes a good supervisor?
Im guessing this person is a fairly new supervisor, is probably threatened by the magnitude of their new position, or have even been doing it for some time but cant get comfortable with it.
If you never tried it you should, being a direct supervisor for staff is what some people call the 'meat sandwich', you (the meat) get wedged between those below and those above (bread), you then get chewed by all concerned. When your team screw up as supervisor, you carry the accountability for that, when your team do well, they did their jobs, so what. You get people coming to you with all kinds of crap 'my cat died, I need time off' or the manager telling you 'headcount reduced, so who would you choose to lose?'.
A good supervisor knows they are there to protect the company by improving the performance of everyone on the team, and doing that by making the people want to perform to their own highest capability is the best way. As a supervisor you cant control people though, and if someone decides not to tell you whats going on, then you dont know whats happening and cant do what needs to be done.
@scalextrix
Nah, that's no excuse for being this kind of nasty.
My guess is she is someone who was constantly filing frivolous complaints about her superiors and coworkers, ended up getting fired. Then she ended up suing for some weird thing like sexual harassment or racial discrimination, then got her job back as a condition of not furthering her suit.
Another possibility is she is a nepotism hire. Being a support program for people with disabilities the most likely reason the company exists is some politician is diverting money from a govt program to their own pocket and using the place as their own personal piggy bank. When that happens usually there is someone who no matter how nasty they are, are just "unfirable". You come to find out it's because they are well connected socially.
Possibly both.
She's been a suoervisor for a while, then her program was shut down (I don't know why.) Then she demanded to be in this day program, where for some reason the company let her be... but would not hire her as the actual coordinator. I get the sense she's got a lot of emotiomal problems, I just wish she could find a position that doesn't require interactons with other humans.
Interestingly, she was also nasty to the person I replaced, but she all but ignores a couple if other staff who have been with the company for a few years. So she is very keen on seniority. She is also respectful to the actual coordinator, who has been with the company for a few months.
Oh, so she is a victim. Her other role was removed and now she lost status by being placed under another supervisor. Ill bet she resents the situation and her new boss, but she knows fighting her boss wont work so she takes it out on you instead.
She is weak, remember that the next time she is hortible, it comes from her weakness.