To be assertive about lazy work colleagues

[RareDoll]

If anyone has been in this position I would very much appreciate your view. I work with two colleagues who are incredibly lazy. I am not their line manager but my line manager has asked me to pass work to them. They are lazy, inept and uninterested. They spend most of the day chatting to one another.

I have managed against the odds to be nice to them and try to encourage them with little success. I gave one of them a task to do recently and was let down in a big way. I managed to salvage it at the last minute by the skin of my teeth. I told her how disappointed I was and she freaked and shouted and me. I just completely ignored her and walked out of the office.

I tried to explain something to the other colleague and she took umbrage because I was being very direct and went and told my line manager that she did not like the way I spoke to her.

My line manager's suggestion is that we meet to agree a way further. I have already told her that they are not capable . Should I take this to HR? I have been told by others that they are dangerous and worth watching? Alteratively I can pretend it didn't happen and just not pass them any work at all?

I need this job so badly. The Unit I work in is pretty dysfunctional and you have to keep in with the bosses by licking their arses.

Apologies for the length of this post. Thanks for reading.

I have every sympathy for you RareDoll Many of your posts echo a similar situation I was in previously before my maternity leave. The person in question was re employed whilst I was off (!!!!!!!!!!!!) despite a 6 month disciplinary process they only got away with because they could name at least one other person who had committed a similar offence to them on their long list of offences (well that as may be but no single person had done them all like they had!)

Other posters have already given advice about paper trails. My advice would be stay calm, stay polite, don't rise to any unfair accusations and actually talk as little as possible when you are around them so they can't use it against you. Get your line manager and HR to fight this battle not you. Refer up whenever you're being challenged. And keep your temper or they'll see they're getting to you.

Ted you know precisely what I am dealing with.

Free, Bat brilliant advice. If I do nothing else at that meeting I am determined to be calm, polite, measured, not rise to false accusations, talk as little as possible without being emotional.

I am going to work out exactly what I want to happen after the meeting so that I am ready for that question.

Due to the Line Manager not being available(???) for another whole week the meeting will not take place until week beginning Monday 26 January. I will let you know how it goes.

Thanks again to everyone. I have got great support from posters and feel more confident about holding my own at the meeting.

Start writing down facts and dates of their incompetence so you have info.

It can be a bit unfriendly to start doing everything by email rather than talking to co-workers, but when I've been in (slightly) similar situations I've found that confirmation emails work well (at least as far as avoiding "that's not what we were told" accusations goes).

Just to confirm what we discussed - you are going to do x and y and it needs to be finished and given to me by Friday morning.

cced to the line manager.

It's a good thing that you have the same line manager - it's a bit awkward when your line manager isn't theirs because it sounds like tale-telling.

If they have been there less than two years, and are already getting to the stage where the managers are afraid of managing them, and they are accusing you of all sorts just to get them to DO THEIR JOBS - I would suggest to the managers that they just let them go.

Which they are perfectly entitled to do at any point in the first two years.

Personally I would tell the managers to sort themselves out, and deal with their own staff without dragging me into it unless they want me to be their line manager, in which case I would be letting them go in the first ten minutes of the role.

Deadline dodgers are notorious where I work so I contact known offenders in sufficient time of the deadline that if they aren't going to do it I'll either a) have time to do it myself or b) escalate it so it still gets done on time. If you have the same manager and do everything by email (even if it's a follow up after a verbal briefing) then you can cc the manager in on the chasing email so they know you did everything you could to meet the deadline. It's hard when you want to take responsibility for doing a good job but think about what's in your control and what's not and handle the different tasks accordingly. I find if people are kept informed (communication is within your control) but someone else doesn't deliver (not in your control) it is unlikely to reflect on you. Recently I asked project managers to send me something by a certain date. I followed up with a chasing email & then when the deadline was missed I emailed the papers I did have round, cc'd in the non deliverers and said they would forward their papers when they were available. I therefore wasn't held responsible for late papers and it was clear who had missed the deadline. Transparency in paper trails is your friend!

I have a problem at work, I ask people to get things to me by a deadline, give them plenty of time and they still don't do it. I complain to my manager and nothing seems to get done. I then get annoyed and find it difficult to hide the fact that I'm pissed off and I get it in the neck for my attitude!!!!!!!!! Grrrrr, I hate work bullshit, if it wasn't for the fact that otherwise I like my job I'd have left by now.

Have only skimmed so sorry if this has been mentioned - your colleagues remind me of two people I used to work with who thought they were a bit above the menial clerical stuff and kept complaining that other team members got more interesting, important jobs. They were new to both the team and our organisation (and had been hired as clerical assistants btw) but had a lot of trouble understanding that they didn't "deserve" the meaty jobs just by virtue of the fact that they were capable of breathing in and out - other team members had proven their competence and reliability time and time again, and that was what they had to do with the day to day stuff before being trusted with the higher-profile "extra credit assignments".

Bit rambling but does this ring any bells at all for you?!

I agree that emails may seem a bit unfriendly but there is literally no other option and as you recommend they will mainly be confirmation emails with deadlines.

It isn't up to me to recommend that they are let go but my Line Manager has suggested to one of them who wanted to make a formal complaint about me that capability procedures could be invoked which could ultimately end up in dismissal. She was the one that had the massive fail which kicked this whole thing off.

I practically babysat her through the task. I emailed the instructions about ten days in advance, talked her through the email face to face, emailed every few days to check all ok and popped in for a chat about it why I passed her office. I was told that it was all done and then with about half an hour to spare I was told about 2 things that had been overlooked. I nearly had a heart attack. Only that I have so many connections in the organisation I wouldn't have got it sorted and it would have reflected very badly on our Department. All the explaining in the world wouldn't have mattered. I would have looked crap in front of external people.

A capable person would have done the job she failed on in about 3 hours at the very most. She had 2 weeks to do it, told me it was done and still screwed it up. She told me she didn't have any other work and that she was able to focus on the task.

Spade That is precisely what has happened. If I hadn't been pissed off getting that news half an hour before the event there would have been something seriously wrong with me. The thing is I didn't even raise my voice. I got on the blower and frantically tried to sort it out myself.

Punt, every single bell is ringing - they think that clerical is beneath them. They are living in their dreams. I would love nothing more than to give them more interesting work but they are struggling with the basics. It is a combination of utter laziness, arrogance and incompetence.

Thank God I have examples in writing to take to the meeting.

Good luck op, sounds as if you're in a good position in terms of having solid evidence that you can quote in support of your experiences.

Our similar situation ended broadly positively - we were able to arrange a sideways move for the more vocal of our pair, to a department where she could do work that was at the same level but very different in nature, and which suited her interests better. She did, I believe, later prove to be a much happier and more productive employee than she'd been in our team. The other of the pair remained in our team and continued doing the same kind of work under a stronger line manager. She, too, flourished once released from the influence of her former peer, and when helped and motivated by a more, er, directive boot up the bum management approach than she'd previously had

Playing devils advocate, I imagine if you are all the same grade, your colleagues may not appreciate you being playing the boss.

If your line manager wishes for you to step up, I would suggest that you ask your boss to have a team meeting where they announce that they have asked you to manage your colleagues. This would make it appear more official.

Punt, I would love that outcome to happen. Loopylala7 I am 3 grades higher and the position I hold delegates work to clerical staff. My Line Manager has overall responsibility for everyone in our Unit and reports to the boss. It was made clear to them when they started that I would pass work onto them.

Hope everyone has a good week and I will update after the meeting.