My last job was at what was basically a half call center, half secure warehouse for car titles being stored for banks and loan providers. Roughly 200 employees on site, and myself and a supervisor in another department are the only men I've ever seen there. Otherwise it's gotta be the number one employer of non-college educated women in my small community.
I worked in the warehouse portion, walking back and forth, filing financial documents in boxes on 20 foot tall shelves all day. Mind-numbing stuff.
One day, shortly before I left the company, we were short staffed and falling behind in the warehouse portion, so management co-opted a few ladies from the call floor to come in and help out, and had me give them a quick run-down on the procedure. I came back to where they were working half an hour later and saw a couple of them were doing things a little bit wrong, so I told them how it was supposed to be done.
Keep in mind that though I am a heterosexual man with a deep-ish voice and a Southern drawl, I am 5'6″ and very skinny with what I've been told is a calming and amiable presence, and at 22 was a good 15 years younger than most of these ladies. The opposite of intimidating.
I went about my business and an hour later I was called into the office building portion of the company for a meeting with my manager, and she sat me down and told me that she'd had reports of me bullying the floor ladies who were sent in to help. My manager knew me pretty well and we were able to establish in like 30 seconds that something just got lost in translation, but I think about that day every once in a while and I still can't wrap my head around it.
Is that like a gender dynamics thing, or did I just happen to work with some very thin-skinned individuals that day?