it's not always rainbows and butterflies

I wrote a big long thing and then I erased it. Basically I hate it when I back up people who don't deserve to be backed up, then end up taking crap from said people over the way I backed them up.

If it was someone who was less experienced I'd have jumped in right away. But this particular person is someone who's twice my senior. I thought this person would have enough confidence in their own abilities to stand up to the "angry guest" and do the right thing with grace and firmness, even in an intimidating situation. But this person decided that the best way to proceed was to ignore the situation and throw the person in charge at it, overlooking any responsibility they may have had in contributing to it.

Rather than jump right into the fray and risk getting my head bitten off, I stood by and jumped in at the precise moment this person proved themself incapable of handling the situation (by ignoring it). This person angrily said they were was disappointed with me for not dealing with it when they asked me to. Right now I'm only disappointed in my overestimation of this person, since clearly they proved themselves incapable of handling the slightest challenge on their own.

I'm in charge, but that doesn't make me the piece of meat you can throw to the lion whenever it starts roaring. If you work in the service industry, your customers are bound to get upset sometimes. Deal with it. Otherwise I can certainly start treating you like the new cross-trainee whom you've just put yourself on the level of.