I’ve fucked up at work

[fairynick]

I only joined in March so still feel really new. It was a completely new role, something that I’ve never done before and it’s kind of a trainee position.
I work from home and from the start have found the workload to be inconsistent. Sometimes I’m super busy, then other times I’ll be twiddling my thumbs for two days.
Anyway, today my team leader emailed me with a scheduled meeting for Monday, to discuss the outcomes on the attached spreadsheet.
I had never seen the spreadsheet before and it had 40 tasks on it that I needed to do. I then searched me emails and saw that they had actually sent it to me two weeks ago and I’d missed it!
Around the same time they’d sent me a similar spreadsheet with around ten tasks on, so over the past couple of weeks when they’ve been asking me about it I thought they were talking about the ten tasks and I’ve been saying things like “yes just waiting for this or that” and “coming along well”.
I don’t know what to do because this meeting is going to be so painful. I also can’t get it done over the weekend because it involves contacting people/organisations that are only open on a Monday to Friday 9-5. I’m so stressed out, I can’t lose this job.
Not sure if this is a rant or a wwyd really.

I think the only thing you can do at this point is fess up. Get in touch with your boss now so that you're not stressing about it all weekend.

Oh no!
How important/urgent are the tasks that you haven’t started? Are they needed by a certain date? If there isn’t a strict deadline you will just have to say you will work really hard to get it done ASAP, could you speak to someone now so you don’t spend all weekend stressing about it?

There are plenty of us that mess up. Maybe some of these will make you feel a bit better.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/4233511-Share-with-me-your-big-f-ck-ups-at-work-to-make-me-feel-better?pg=1&messages=100

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/3936889-to-ask-you-about-the-worst-mistake-you-ve-made-at-work?pg=1&messages=100

I would

1. Look through the emails you've received/ been Ccd on the last few weeks to see if you've been provided with any of the information required to get things done
2. Send out emails now, apologise for the late notice, get on Teams/ whatever you use to see if people can verbally confirm information to you so you can get it done
3. Do as much as you can over the weekend
4. Be honest on Monday but also make sure they know that you have been working on other things and this was a communication error.

Just be completely transparent. If you lie, you'll only dig yourself a hole. It's human error, just tell the truth and hopefully it won't be too bad

It’s something that is done on a yearly basis. I’ve began this years process, but this was basically cleaning up the last bits and bobs from last year.
I actually replaced someone incompetent, so really don’t want them to think that they’ve made the same mistake twice hiring me!
I have had problems with my work phone working and part of this task is making calls, my manager knows this so I expect he knows I won’t have completed this yet.
It just makes me sick thinking there’s been days where I’ve had my feet up when really should’ve been doing this!

I think it'd be best to tell your manager and let them know you will now be prioritising the work - if I were your manager I'd appreciate you telling me when the deadline would likely be. I'd also be expecting you to work additional hours if needed to get back on track ASAP.

Can you spend some time this weekend on it? Write as many of the emails as you can bad send them so they're waiting for people Monday morning. Write a to-do list of phone calls and other stuff. Highlight anything with a deadline as priority. Then admit Monday you missed the email but have sent out emails to X, Y, Z since then and today will be calling 1, 2, 3. Apologise and tell them how you will make sure it doesn't happen again (can you mark emails as read and then organise by read and unread for example?)

All you can do really is start the catch up now OP, over the weekend and make the relevant parties aware in advance of the call, to at least avoid that aspect of the experience. I'd send out an SOS email about this now if I didn't think I could make it happen over the weekend, or schedule a call with my line manager.

Mistakes happen. It feels like the worst thing ever now but in a few weeks nobody will care. It's always the way

I also think you need to be honest here. Get everything rolling this weekend. You need to have a one to one with your boss to explain.

Also op, I’m sorry, but you need to face the fact they are going to ask you what you’ve been doing with your time if you were not doing this, snd how you missed it in light of the fact you’d little else going on.

I think you’re all right. I’m going to send out all the emails over the weekend, then try to make as many calls Monday morning before the meeting at 10:30am.
With the type of organisations I’m dealing with, it isn’t out of the ordinary to not receive a reply to an email for a week.

I would fess up but also come up with as much of a plan as possible:

1. I've emailed x y and z now so can sort this as soon as they reply
2. I can do a,b and c over the weekend
3. on Monday I will contact...

Dont beat yourself up, these things happen and it sounds like you've just had your wires crossed.

The best thing is to be honest, I would maybe try and contact them before the proposed meetings and suggest says you are going to ensure it doesn't happen again.

Get the ball rolling and maybe ask to delay meeting for a couple of days, say you have not got as good an update for them as you'd like, sorry it's taken longer but will have better picture on Wednesday or Thursday?

I would also suggest requesting your manager push the meeting out by a day to give you a bit of breathing space.

I would definitely tell manager that you missed the original email or it didn’t download properly or something. Don’t just try to do the work before Monday morning without saying anything to your boss.

If I were boss I'd rather not waste time on meeting with no info

Yes have a list of what you have been able to get done and how much longer you expect it to take. Apart from that apologise and explain how you are going to prevent it happening again eg by sorting email read/unread.

This could also be down to them not providing adequate training, ok so your manager sent you email request, if you are training I would expect to follow that up with a Teams meeting as you are WFH to discuss said email & ensure you understand the requirements. So I would come clean, do what you can over the weekend, but also try not to worry, sounds like you’ve been dumped in the deep end, and I feel sorry for people starting work with lots of workplaces WFH, this is where it doesn’t work.

First, DON'T worry. Tell your manager what you told us, minus the bit about sitting your feet up. Just mention you did think the workload was light, but thought it was reduced because you were onboarding remotely.

Explain what you are planning to do to catch up, check your manager agrees with the prioritisation, promise to provide regular updates and then follow through

If you appear calm and professional and in control now , rather than panicky and apologetic, you'll win trust and look good. 8 promise.

Your manager may be stressed and annoyed but there are lessons to learn on both sides... i simply can't imagine FORTY tasks, which were tying out loose ends from someone else's incompetence, only generating a conversation with a BRAND new employee that consisted of "how are you getting on" with a reply of "fine thanks" being adequate.

Keep an eye on this manager, perhaps the previous job holder was incompetent becarhey had no training or supervision.

Can you go in (very) early on Monday?

Good luck...

I would work out a plan for when you can complete it by.

I would email my boss saying that I had missed the email and detailing my plan to get back on track. Requesting a delay in meeting with your boss until you have something to report is a good idea. Also the meeting may be a more of a "how are you getting on with it" meeting than turning in your results.

But remember what you have said in the first post, you are a trainee in a completely new to you role, trying to learn it at home with no mentor, so hopefilly they will be understanding; eslecially if you have a catch up plan

@fairynick how did the meeting go?