Thanks Pjlu, you are right, it is his issue and I should let it remain that way. I am absolutely not insisting on trying to be friends with him, as I said, it is up to him and I understand that he doesn't want that, and I am certainly not trying to force that in any way. My only concern was his inappropriate behaviour at work and that he was going to get himself into trouble over it, and I know how mortified he would be if the supervisor got involved. I wanted to try to resolve the situation for his own sake, not just mine. No, dispatcher is not the subject of this- for some reason he has taken this opportunity to be extremely unpleasant and judgemental towards me for reasons unknown to myself. In my experience only a very bitter and unhappy person with some sort of issues feels the need to behave in this manner towards others, so I will not continue my debate with him. I would never dream of attacking a person on this forum who was in a difficult situation and just posted to ask for some advice on how to resolve it in the best way for the other person- I have more respect for people than that. Thanks for your advice, KB

@KB: This is a really tough situation, and you have my sympathies.

You haven't done anything wrong. On the contrary you have tried to extend every method to try to resolve the situation in a professional and kind manner. The fact that the other man is behaving in an unprofessional and childish manner while unpleasant for you, is not just your problem anymore -it is actually in danger of becoming a HR issue of potential harrassment/ bullying.

I had to deal with something like this when I was a postdoc and interim manager of my team. My advice is to

- log all your contacts with this team member (notes preferably with dates time and comments).
- Let someone higher up know (supervisor, but also HR/Admin). This is vital if this guy is gunning for you and accuses you of something, and you havent declared this prior incident.
- Do not get drawn into any arguments, politics or tit for tat retaliation, especially if this guy tries to poison other team members against you. Remain calm, professional and polite at all times.

This is based on my own experience, but I really feel you need to let your line manager know and keep them updated. I was kept out of the loop until WAY too late, and then had to untangle everything. After I went through all the "he said-she said" stuff, it was clearer, but it would have been easier to contain the situation and provide advice earlier. The victim in my situation actually made things worse for themselves by not raising this earlier, trying to sort things out alone and saying things they later regretted and were taken out of context.

KB did you get the message I sent you a bit earlier today, it doesn't seem to be in my sent box?

Hey Eska, no I haven't had one from you today! Got the ones from yesterday though! Thanks! KB

Thanks Badhaircut- sorry, I somehow missed your post earlier! I will do just that. To be honest, everyone on the team is aware of his nasty behaviour towards me anyway, and I don't think he will be able to poison them against me because he has at times been quite unpleasant to other members of the team as well, and they are also aware of the earlier complaints against him. They have been very supportive even though they don't know exactly what is behind it all, so I know that they would support me if the need arose. I would actually be surprised if they hadn't worked out what is behind it anyway- two of the people on the team know because they are my best buddies, and the others have probably worked it out by themselves, including our sup....you know what it's like in the office, word gets around pretty quickly even if you try to keep it quiet. I reckon they know what's gone on. Thanks for your advice, KB