Shoeless co-worker grosses me out

mrsconn23

Dear Jane,

I have been working at a small business for the past year and a half. We are an office of all women and we all work well together. We recently moved to a new building and my office is now next door to a coworker who is... very interesting. She can be rude and she has many quirks that get on my nerves, but overall, I deal. I just accepted it’s part of her personality. However, one thing I’ve discovered working much closer to her this past month is that she rarely wears shoes. She will walk around the entire office, including going to the bathroom (which is located outside our actual office down a hallway), completely barefoot. It grosses me out, but I dread having to report this to our boss, mainly because I am one of the newer people in the office and my coworker has worked with our boss for 8+ years. I don’t want to put my boss in the awkward position of having to tell her to wear shoes, but at the same time, I don’t think I have it in me to confront her myself. I feel like I can’t be the only one who notices that she walks around the kitchen barefoot! Should I just grin and bear it like my other coworkers seem to be doing?

Signed,

Podophobic

*Barbie*

Wait, why does the LW need to report this to the boss? 
I mean, if the woman came into my office and put her nasty-ass feet on my desk, we'd have issues and I'd say something. If it's not impacting the business operations (e.g. contamination in a cleanroom or food safety environment), then I'm sure boss and HR are already aware and will deal as they see fit. 

MissKittyDanger

In my office, we often walk around the office without shoes {mostly in the summer typically} but if someone had an issue I would definitely want them to say something.

Why is LW needing to report it? Can't they tell coworker it bothers them? If they can't, I'm guessing because LW feels awkward about it .... it's not fun to bring up "hey btw feet gross me out, so can you wear shoes?"

nicolegs17

I'd report it.  It is a liability and would have it documented.  You can't just go barefoot in a normal professional/working office.  There are parts of me that  want to go there and put shoes on that damn lady myself.

banana468

Are there OSHA requirements for the office?  Any office manual about footwear? 

IMO she can look into the legality and possibly report it as a "concern for the company" but I think she also needs to consider where the affect lies.   If she's not in the same office as this person,  and there isn't a smell issue, be quiet.  

southernbelle0915

Write anonymously to HR pretending to be a patron of another suite in the building: "I've seen one of your employees in the bathroom without shoes on. It's disgusting and our office's perception of your company is that it's unprofessional." 

That would get things to change without it being some internal/political drama. 

short+sassy

Overall, I'm not sure how I feel about this.  I personally would probably just let it go.  At best, I might say something to her directly.  But I just don't think I'd want to cause a potential office kerfluffle by saying something to the boss.  @southernbelle0915's is an interesting tactic also!

I actually had an issue similar to this at a previous job where I was one of the offender's supervisors.  I was the asst. manager at a gas station/convenience store and our overnight manager would sometimes come to work wearing fuzzy slippers.  And no.  Not fuzzy slippers that had a harder sole and could technically be worn outside.  Literally the kind that you slip on after a shower, with a fabric-like soft sole.

WTF!?!?  To this day, I don't know what this woman's problem was.  Her excuse was she had a medical condition that sometimes causes her feet to swell and then she can't wear her tennis shoes because they are too tight.  Ummm...so all the more reason to protect your feet?  Apparently not.  Instead, she wears slippers that have no support at all for a 10+ hour shift where she is standing the whole time.  And also a job where a person is going to occasionally be moving boxes/products around.  Even a fairly light object can break a toe, if it falls and there isn't even normal shoe protection.  Plus, slippers are slippery.   

I spoke to her about it numerous times, trying to persuade her with the ridiculous danger of it.  And the utter unprofessionalism.  Especially in our retail environment.  But she didn't care and, unfortunately, I didn't have the authority to write people up.  Only the store manager could and he wasn't concerned about it.  How can two people actually think this is remotely okay?  It made me start to question my sanity, lol.