Advice for being the only guy in the office?

Don’t be the only guy in the office. Be one of 14 employees.

Work and gender don’t mix. Neither do relationships and work.

I’m not asking about relationships. I’m more asking about getting along without always or necessarily going along.

Sorry… I do understand what you’re saying, but I’m sure the dynamic will surface.

Don’t leave the seat up?

Seriously, what kind of advice are you hoping for? To advise you, we’d need to know what it is that you’re concerned about. Are you worried that you won’t be taken seriously? If so, this kind of question is not a good start.

I’m leaving this open ended, but if you want a specific question, then how should I regard being regularly asked to lift things? I say this because it has happened in the past, and I find it tiresome but don’t know a very graceful way to say so.

Just say you have a bad back and can’t do much lifting.

Watch out for the cat fights, gossip, and bitchiness. I work with mostly women and that’s one thing the guys usually manage to stay out of. It may not happen in your office, but it does happen in many places with a bunch of women working closely together. I’m not saying you have to keep to yourself, because you definitely don’t have to, but keep an eye out for trouble and try to stay out of it.

Similar question

@Seaofclouds

“What out for the cat fights, gossip, and bitchiness.”

Did you mean, ”Watch out for….”?

I worked with all female nursing teams for 23 years. My advice? Keep your head down, don’t take offense at any of their jokes, and don’t ever date any of them ever. Ever. I don’t expect you to be able to follow the last piece of advice as few men can. But if you don’t, you will end up in a world of shit and your job will become unbearable so incomprehensibly fast you will not know what hit you.

@Brian1946 Shoot, I did. Luckily it was still in the edit window. Fixed. Thanks!

Wear sunglasses.

Shower and dress well.

You will ask your manager for feedback and be told that your work is excellent but the consensus is you should be wearing a different cologne and that you should be more sensitive to people’s feelings.

If it were me I would have another job. You simply cannot get along with 10+ women. It cannot be done. That is the honest and unpopular answer. You will learn this if you take the job. If you do take @Espiritus_Corvus advice and do not shit where you eat. He is quite correct.

Ugh, sounds awful. I’d never work in an office with nothing but women, and I’m a woman. Prepare to be surrounded by drama, backstabbing, cat fights, and bitchiness, regardless of their ages.

If you weren’t asking about relationships, why did you mention you’re single?

I’ve been there, and only survived it because we were allowed to wear headphones and I love loud music. Even my wife prefers male coworkers because of how nasty women can be, and being outnumbered like that is a bad position to be in.

Well, I had just finished a stint (a temporary job) working for a stuffed animal factory where it was mostly all women around me. From my experience the women were much nicer to me than they were with other women. My female boss was nicer to me than she was with the other women too. If your situation isn’t temporary I’m not sure what to say here, but listen to others if you have to, but don’t gossip.

Don’t give ‘em no lies and keep your hands to yourself.

in more ways than one, keep it zipped

@Imadethisupwithnoforethought Christ, I forgot about that. What a pain in the ass. And it always began with, “We have to talk…” in lilting falsetto. And rarely did the “talk” have anything to do with the actual job at hand.

I just finished working in an environment where there there were only two men.

The women were generally very detail oriented. And some of the women liked the men and gave them “passes” on workload or on quality. The other women either or hated men or hated them because of it.. some managed to pull off both.

Just be courteous, funny and slightly flirtatious but never engage in anything beyond… Everyone will know instantly. And they will never forget it.

Thanks all. Good advice all around.

Regarding finding another job, I kind of suck at looking for work and writing and editing jobs in my area are not super plentiful. Plus, I’ve been (more or less voluntarily) underemployed as a grunt in the organic produce biz for a few years now, so I’m just trying to get a foothold again in career work. Plus plus, this is a really cherry gig. My health and dental are top-tier and fully-paid among many other bennies, and I go home at 4:30 with little or no overtime. I also have a bona fide office with a door, so that will help I’m sure.

I mention being single, because the dynamic would be different, I’m sure, if I were married or gay (and single). Hence, FWIW.

Also, back to the top of the page, the director made a point of telling me this as part of an e-mail earlier today. This would be after I accepted the offer, not that I would have decided otherwise regardless.

Oh, here’s another one literally, should I shit where I work? :-) Actually, I have a funny story about this. An ex-gf worked in an office that included a fat lawyer who would clog the toilet every day. He took to shitting in the women’s bathroom, because it was a mostly male office and he didn’t want to clog up the men’s room. True story.

^^^yuck don’t do that ever!

Don’t make assumptions about what the environment will be like, but there is a likelihood that women tend to be more talkative. Some of it depends on what industry you work in. My advice is smile, do some of the niceties like saying hello when you pass someone in the hall or their desk, be efficient, and sit back and be an observer to see how they tend to interact with each other.

For me, it never mattered if a man was single or married when I was at work. I was the same with them either way, because I never was scoping out men at work. However, obviously, people do meet people who they date at work, it just was never in my mind, I am not saying it never would happen. I guess maybe men are always scoping out women though? Not all men of course, I am just generalizing from what you have said here.

Wait until you’ve started before getting worried. Why should all those woman be volatile and annoying? For all you know, you’ll wind up with 13 new friends!

Welcome to veterinary medicine support staff. We have 40 female techs for every 1 male. Mostly, the guys just have to let go of being shocked by, err, “earthy” female conversations.

I just remembered this. My step father’s uncle used to work for a light fixture company and he worked with all women. He loved it, and so did they. I think it really depends on your personality. He has a way of making people laugh with minimal effort, he’s not a creeper (either intentionally or unintentionally; the latter being the case for many men), and my guess is that he served as a buffer for any tension that certainly occurred between the women. You just can’t be mad when he’s around. It was probably really fun working with him.

As for always being asked to do stuff, I say man up and do it unless you’ve got some type of health issue that makes that difficult. You scratch their back, they’ll scratch yours – metaphorically speaking, of course. Trying to get out of it will just make them talk.

Don’t talk about any co-worker to another co-worker. Don’t even listen to them talk about one another. It will all end up your fault somehow.

@GloPro Good advice. In fact, the OP should not trust anyone with gossip about another, it will get back.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAKsCy26xbw

It sucks dude. The hypocrisy is astonishing to say the least. All day they talk about dick, pussy, tits, periods, wanting to fuck, getting fucked, dick size and drama. Im the only guy on the customer service team where i work and ive only been there two weeks and its a daily nightmare that i already dread every single morning. I have to watch litterally everything i say otherwise its used against me out of context at any given time. Its like working with your girlfriend that has multiple personalities and all of them think youre a piece of shit. Oh and also, if you arent some abercrombie photogenic douche expect to be ignored 99.9% of the time regardless of what you say or have to contribute. Ive never had an experience turn me off and make me want to stay single quite as much or as fast. I feel like i could get fired for saying one wrong word yet they spend the entire day talking about shit i couldnt even type without being ostracized. It fucking sucks lol