On work trip abroad. Colleague gone crazy

[Eastie77]

Just that really. I'm abroad for work, 2 days in a major European city with a client meeting tomorrow morning. I've travelled with a female colleague who, like me, has 2 young DC. When we found out about this trip she messaged me to say she was desperately looking forward to it as she needs a break from the DC and is run ragged juggling everything. I said I totally sympathised and she replied that we should use this trip as an opportunity to get rat arsed on the company's money. I just laughed.

Arrived at the airport this morning for our early flight to find she had already had downed 2 pints but was at least sober. She kicked up a fuss on the plane as there was no alcohol on sale - not massively but enough to embarrass me. Landed and she bought more alcohol and has generally been increasingly drunk, hyper and shrill since saying this is 'her time'. We arrived at the hotel at 3pm and were meant to go over our presentation for tomorrow but I've had zero input from her. I need her to contribute a bunch of slides and practice a demo of the technical solution we are meant to be presenting to the client but she is not playing ball and has just been propping up the bar. I'm stressed. It looks as if I will have to do her slides and I don't have enough knowledge so emailing colleagues back home. I don't want to speak to my manager about this. She is normally quite conscientious

My manager hates having drama brought to his door (his words)

He'd rather just do the easy bits of management then.

Bloody hell that's shit of her

You owe your manager the chance to salvage her own bonus by messaging her about what is going on.

If I were your manager getting a message after the presentation from you tomorrow crying over spilt milk that I might have been able to prevent, I would hold you as responsible as the colleague.

Just wanted to wish you luck for tomorrow x

Good luck - hopefully colleague doesn’t suffer hangovers!

In preparing a draft slideshow you have prepared in advance. It’s only your crap colleague who hasn’t.

I just wanted to say screw your colleague, unbelievably unprofessional. Surely she could have had a bloody bubble bath and spent some time in the hotel spa if she needed time to herself and still been reliable. Hope it goes well tomorrow, and don't feel bad for covering your own arse on this.

Will the colleague who sent you 'back up' slides not grass you (or your colleague) up?

She’s an idiot who deserves the sack.

Agree with @mathanxiety

You need to message before hand not after - after might be seen as crying over spilt milk or trying to get out of the blame - you need a preemptive strike

(I have a large team - I'd want and expect them to tell me before hand to give me a chance to (a) mitigate the potential damage and also to (b) support them given the amount of unreasonable stress this would have caused the innocent/left holding the bag employee)

Never goes on nights out etc? I’m telling you. She’s a functioning alkie

Quick email to manager something along the lines of

"Wanted to give you a heads up that x is in a bit of a mess. I'm not really sure what the story is there but unfortunately she in no fit state to be part of the presentation.

I have spoken to colleagues back home to get the necessary slides to cover for her and feel ready to do a good job presenting alone, so no need to worry on that front assuming you're happy for me to go ahead?

Will carry on as above unless I hear from you otherwise."

I agree you need to make your boss aware before the presentation. Your colleague will wake up tomorrow hungover and regretting her behavior and will try and minimize it and throw you under the bus.

I have to agree you need to give your boss the heads up before the presentation. You’re not taking drama to his door, you have managed the situation, which is doing your job. However you are not her manager, you are not responsible for her, he needs to do his job so the rest of his team don’t get let down.

You also deserve to get credit for managing her, keeping it together, using your initiative. Yes it’s your job, but jointly, otherwise you’d have been sent on your own.

Good luck

So she’s basically been paid to go away by the company and has done sweet f a. except get pissed. She needs a disciplinary. It’s fraud really.

Good luck

You need to tell manager in advance

I too think you should send a "heads up" email now, not wait until after the presentation. It needs to be time stamped before the presentation, so that it doesn't look like "presentation went shit, now looking for excuses and other people to blame"

I hope your presentation does go well and you do retain your contract, but you do absolutely need to cover your own back here just in case.

best of luck . good advice from the poster who said you need to think like a man. Its your job, your income, your family etc that you need to put first if things don't go well because of this. Let us know how you get on.

Good luck, OP. It wasn't unreasonable for you to expect her to pull the presentation together with you at the hotel and you were left in an impossible position by her idiotic behaviour. I hope it all goes well and the client renews. I think it is a good idea to phone your boss immediately after the presentation, as you would normally to let them know how it went, and let them know what happened with your colleague as well as how it went.

Reported Ranch's post as Spam!!

We simply did not have the time to finish the presentation before arriving here. I had actually completed a draft version so it just needed to be put into a coherent order with her slides added in.

She had download a generic deck from our international sales portal but it is not tailored for the client so cannot be used. No client logos, their use cases etc. so I am going to have to use the slides my colleague thankfully sent me for a similar vertical client and present alone and do the demo on my own.

Basically then you were pretty much done before you left and just had to run through / tweak together, which is pretty standard stuff seeing as you got an early flight. Your explanation above is the sort of thing you can email to your boss but in less words and explaining she refused to work with you from the moment you stepped on the plane and provided the slides at x time when you’d already got them from y colleague and completed the presentation. That’s not bringing a shit storm. This is managing the situation.

Either she’s an alcoholic or has mental health issues. You’re not helping her either by covering tbh.

Good luck!!

I hope it all pulls together for you.

Op, please send the email before your presentation.
You are not sending him a problem, you are just giving him a heads up.
Anyway, he’s paid to deal with dramas, and your colleague is his responsibility.

I'm amazed someone in her position isn't aware of how they're coming across and that she doesn't realise she'll be disciplined for being drunk on company business. And that she really believes she can submit a whole stack of alcohol receipts for approval "on the company". Is she really that clueless?