about my colleague implying credit for my work?

[okeooreo]

I’ve just returned to work after five years of having children.

I have spent the past week writing a complex assignment for my boss to send to a client before Christmas. Yesterday it was due and I encountered some formatting problems.

I asked a colleague on my team if he could help me with the formatting. It was things like spacing and paragraphs and the boiler plate info / header of our company which I don’t yet know the company style of, as I am new. It was slightly time consuming, it maybe took him half an hour to do.

After finishing the formatting he said he wanted to read through it and check it a final time. By this point (7pm) i had to go and relieve my nanny who had been with the DC since 7am. I told him so.

He said okay well i’ll check it and send it back to you.

I then leave, and the next thing I know he has sent it to my boss, cc-ing me in with the following email:

Dear boss
Here is the assignment you needed. Let us know if you want anything changed.
Best wishes

Colleague and okeooreo

There was no acknowledgement of the fact that I had written it and he had just done the formatting (it required me hours of research and 3 late nights, which when you have very young DC is more than just going to bed late and sleeping as long as you can.)

He is actually my slight junior in terms of roles in the company, but he has been here five years and knows the ropes.

Should I be pissed off? Or is this what teamwork in the workplace is these days? What should I do?

I'd be pissed off! What a CF

Since you boss asked you (and not colleague) to write assignment, surely he will realise that you wrote it (possibly with help from colleague)?

Reply back "thanks colleague for your assistance with the formatting and headers and sending this for me so it wasnt delayed, much appreciated"

Email the colleague 'thanks for the last minute formatting help, really appreciated it' and CC the boss.

Reply to all.... thanks dear colleagues for formatting this for me. Boss. . If you have any questions on the content, I have the supporting research available should you wish to expand on any particular section.

I had this when I came back from May leave only the person tried to dump me in shit they had created while I was on mat leave. Took a battle to fix that I was ill prepared for.

Well now you know he’s a sake (and not a very clever one). Do as pp suggested him. He won’t cross you again.

And next time op, if you didn't already, at the bottom of the contents page or front page put "report produced by okeoreo" and the date.

I’m going to go against the grain and advise slight caution here. It definitely sounds like he was being a CF, but is it possible he was just trying to be helpful? Maybe he was trying to indicate that if further work was available, he could assist instead of expecting you to do it while also looking after your kids? Does he have kids himself, or was he genuinely more available at that specific time than you?

If the latter, I might be inclined not to react on this occasion, but keep a very close eye on him and if he does it again definitely make it clear that it won’t be tolerated.

Obviously ignore this advice if you think it’s really clear he wasn’t acting in good faith! You were there so will have the best feel for this.

Tad cheeky, but a lot of people are very dismissive of maternity leave and people coming back and needing help settling in, and it's possible this guy was pissed off that you are more senior and can't format a document and thought you were being cheeky yourself? Bit of a passive aggressive dig to email it, but he's trying to make a point (that he's a git).