I Found Out My Best Friend Has Been Spreading Rumors About Me To Get Promoted At Work
My best friend and I worked at the same company.
We’ve known each other for eight years.
So when I was passed over for a promotion, I was disappointed.
But I assumed the other candidate was simply more qualified.
Then a coworker told me something.
She said:
“Your manager thinks you aren’t reliable.”
I was shocked.
I’d never missed a deadline.
I asked my manager about it.
He said:
“There have been concerns.”
He wouldn’t explain.
Then another coworker told me she’d heard I was planning to leave the company.
I wasn’t.
Then someone else said I’d been complaining about management.
I hadn’t.
I started investigating.
Eventually, I discovered the source.
My best friend.
She had been telling our boss that I was lazy.
That I didn’t want responsibility.
That I was looking for another job.
She had also been spreading personal rumors.
Apparently, she’d been doing it for almost a year.
Why?
Because she wanted my position.
She believed that if I looked unreliable, she would be the obvious replacement.
I confronted her.
She cried.
Then she admitted it.
She said she thought I was “too comfortable” and that she deserved the promotion more.
I showed management the messages I’d received from coworkers.
Then IT reviewed internal communications.
There were dozens of messages.
She had even told my manager that I’d complained about him personally.
I had never said any of it.
She was fired.
But the strangest part came afterward.
My manager apologized.
He said:
“I should have verified what I was hearing.”
Then he offered me the promotion.
I accepted.
But I stopped being friends with her.
A year later, I learned she’d done the same thing at her new job.
Apparently, she had been promoted there too.
Then her coworkers discovered the pattern.
She wasn’t trying to beat me.
She was trying to make sure nobody else could stand next to her.
