Being strategic and positive about unacceptable behaviour at work

[Coffeetree]

I'm looking for another job but could use some strategies in the meantime.

I'm a lawyer. I supervise a small team but I'm not management. I feed any issues to management.

One team member has been underperforming for a while. She's had literally months of chats and weekly supervisions and paid-for training and extra admin support. It doesn't help that she gets very defensive and litigious.

At first when I raised concerns with management her response was "omg coffetree is lying and is also mean" but management had a look at her files and responded "well no your files are a mess" and she's on a performance improvement plan.

In the past couple of weeks she's 1. Literally screamed at me when I asked her to complete a certain report (and it was literally just me putting the files on a shelf near her desk and saying, "Could you fill out the xyz"), and 2. Writing long weird texts and emails to me anytime I give her some anodyne routine file reviews (everyone on my team gets periodic file reviews and they're literally like checklists and a comment along the lines of "Please do x")

Of course I'm not taking the bait and I never respond to emails etc. She cc'd management in the latest and got told off for being unprofessional.

At point point do I really put my foot down to management and tell them I cant be expected to work under these circumstances? I'm not exactly upset but it's bizarre. I mean there was just a big jolly lunch and I made (plausible) excuses because I don't feel like sharing a lovely meal with someone who has screamed at me.

I don't really have any personal feelings towards her, I think for a while I was confused as to why she kept underperforming

Surely it’s gross misconduct? Someone with line management responsibilities needs to go down the disciplinary route: verbal warning, written warning etc etc

It’s completely unacceptable and you shouldn’t have to tolerate it

How much longer has the Improvement Plan got to run? If she hasn't made any progress, what are the next steps that the partners will take? Is joint supervision - including another manager alongside you - an option at all, what reasons has she given for her performance so far (apart from the one about you lying, obviously!).

Yes she has been given a written warning for the file mess.

They are clearly not interested in the other unprofessional behaviour. I mean, I can't force them and it's the reason I'm looking for a job.

I want to bring it up in terms of, "I'm not carrying out any more file reviews or supervisions with her until I understand how this is being addressed". And then they can get someone else to supervise her or fire me, who knows.

I think that getting someone else to do the supervision/reviews is fair, as for her behaviour towards you I doubt your employer will tackle this unless it affects them in some way. So you could report it when she screams for example, or record how much extra time supervising/reviewing/correcting her work is taking away from your fee earning capacity, for instance. Sadly, a financial issue might get a little more attention and that should not be the case at all.

Thank you ChicChaos I can tell that you've worked in a law firm.

A similar client-charging-timesheet type of environment yes! Hope you get it sorted