I have just been sent an email by mistake,

[iwantitalltobenormal]

AIBU to be massivley hurt and pissed off from the email I have just read which was sent to me by mistake?

at the begining of this year, I offered to do a monthly blog for our small team, so other departments are more aware of what we do internally - (manager thought it was a great idea ) baring in mind this was my first attempt at this , and by no means a mandatory task , I did it all on a power point presentation , I also do not claim to be a professional blog writer and I really enjoyed doing it, and putting it together, I sent it to my manager back in March, It took a little while due to also carrying out my day to day job.

fast forward to today ( baring in mind I had no response or feedback on my blog, whether it be positive criticism or any type of feedback) someone has unfortunately sent me a long email trail between my line manager to his line manager slating my work on the blog I had done and slating how unprofessional it the content is - but in a really distasteful way , and nasty.

I feel hurt, upset and belittled.

Just to let you know OP, no matter how senior these people are, they don't have any right to maliciously or underhandedly discuss other members of staff via company email. Especially as it appears that other people in the company have also been privy to those emails.
This.

Woah, so your line manager slagged you off to his boss over email and then accidentally sent the whole email trail to your colleague?

That’s dreadful. I would maybe have a quiet word with HR. Focus on the fact that your line manager sent the whole thread to your colleague and now you feel super awkward and undermined.
And this.

The levels of unprofessional behaviour of these two managers is off the scale - providing the comments are rude and personal, not just blunt criticism.
But sharing those comments to a colleague is unforgivable.
It's ridiculously undermining.
I would wait and seek advice when you're not so emotional but definitely do some research on ACAS / employment law.
It depends how much you love the job / the company and if you're prepared to overlook it, but if you think you would find it difficult to work for a manager knowing they feel this way about you, it puts you in a very difficult situation.
If you think you can forgive and forget fine, if not you have a case.

I think take a deep breath.

The person in the wrong here is the third party who sent it to you. What was their motive in doing that? If they are a friend of yours you will get them in trouble if they have passed it on to you.

The managers are entitled to have a discussion about the standard of work between themselves. One of them made a stupid mistake when forwarding it to the third party to takeover the role.

Finally, ask yourself as to whether you may be oversensitive to what they have actually said? If it is saying it needs to be in X format rather than Y etc they may have intended the new blogger to have it as a guide to what needs to be done.

So starting point what have they actually said?
What does third party get out of showing you?

As someone else said up thread do not go in all guns blazing. You may end up making a show of yourself when you really don't need to.

Also the fact that it wasn't used does suggest that it wasn't quite what they wanted.

I'd go for the cool, calm and professional.

I like the phrase used above: "I note the content of this email. As such I am more than happy to pass this task over to XXX."

Short and sharp and not emotional and def don't ask for feedback. Yes take a copy and forward yourself a copy too. If they are being nasty and this is a culture of the company it may be useful in the future.

I suspect they wanted to use the content of the blog for future use, perhaps promotional material or something? As you weren't given a remit how were you to know? Totally unfair. Shitty management tbh.

They, any of them, may approach you face-to-face or by email to worm out of this, and do some sort of (fake) apology or blame the others. A cool non emotional response, or no response at all would be best here too perhaps.

It's a horrible feeling when this happens. It's happened to me before, a boss slagging me off sent it to me instead of his mate, my equal in terms of management.

As a PP said, at least it's feedback you would have never received. I think if you're writing blogs you probably need to improve your spelling and grammar too. Sorry, just a bit of constructive criticism.

Thanks for answering the questions OP, that makes things a lot clearer.

How about this?

1. You say to manager “John got in touch to let me know that he has been asked to do the blog. In doing so he also inadvertently copied me in on the below exchange between you and x. I can see that the quality of my work didn’t meet your expectations and I would be grateful for the opportunity to discuss.”

Are people just not reading the thread? How is it a good idea for her to ask how to improve it etc when they have taken it off her and asked someone else to do it. That’s like begging to be kicked.

Because her line manager has never given her any feedback on the blog she wrote, or told her that they were going to ask her colleague to do the next one. She only knows this because of the email chain forwarded to her in error. 'Officially', as far as OP is concerned the blog is still with her manager for feedback. She is owed some proper, constructive feedback, as well as an opportunity to address that feedback before it's just pulled from her with no explanation and given to someone else.

“John got in touch to let me know that he has been asked to do the blog. In doing so he also inadvertently copied me in on the below exchange between you and x. I can see that the quality of my work didn’t meet your expectations and I would be grateful for the opportunity to discuss.”
I like that too

But sharing those comments to a colleague is unforgivable

It's literally in the thread title that the sharing was accidental.

@iwantitalltobenormal thanks for clarifying.
In that case I would reply to the email stating that you would like a formal discussion.
How unprofessional.

It's literally in the thread title that the sharing was accidental.

The sharing between the two managers wasn’t.

In that case I would reply to the email stating that you would like a formal discussion.
How unprofessional.

I agree, if they knowingly sent that email chain about you to your peer, then that's bullying behaviour and you need to speak to HR about tackling it.

I would be tempted to email the managers and just say "thanks for the feedback, I will keep your comments in mind in the future".

I might have missed it, but have they bothered to tell you the task has been given to someone else yet?

Sorry this happened to you. It's not nice. Hopefully they will learn that you shouldn't say stuff in emails about peiple/their work, that you're not willing to say to those people in person.

@MrsNoah2020

But sharing those comments to a colleague is unforgivable

It's literally in the thread title that the sharing was accidental.

@MrsNoah2020 OP has confirmed that the email chain between her two managers, criticising her work in an unprofessional way, was forwarded by her manager deliberately to the peer who was asked to take over her work. The peer sent it to OP by mistake, not having realised that the email he had received contained info that OP was not intended to see.

( Because the peer probably would not in a million years have expected his managers to be so unprofessional. )

So what are you going to do OP?

I'd be tempted to send something to your manager along the lines of:

"I understand that another member of the team has been asked to continue with the departmental blog. Given that this suggests my initial draft wasn't what you were looking for, I'd be grateful for some constructive feedback in case similar opportunities arise in the future."

Doesn't embarrass them, doesn't play daft, but tackles it in a far more professional way than they have themselves.

@Shimy

It's literally in the thread title that the sharing was accidental.

The sharing between the two managers wasn’t.

I get that a manager sent it on to the person asked to take on the blog, but there is nothing inherently wrong with that, unless the comments were abusive or personal. No one intentionally upset the OP by sharing it with her.

There are some incredibly naive views on here about the standards for constructive dismissal or 'a claim'. What has happened is the equivalent of the OP overhearing her manager tell an employee that the OP's work on a project has been unsatisfactory. If that constituted constructive dismissal, half the employers in the UK would be in front of an employment tribunal every week. In lots of sales-based companies, e.g. estate agents, public naming and shaming of employees' performance is the core of how they manage staff. I'm not saying it's good - it certainly isn't how I manage my team and I think it's crap for staff retention - but it isn't illegal, unless there is some additional element, e.g. discrimination.

I remember sharing a classroom with a member of management while I was having a big fall out with the management. Went in one day switched computer on and went to email. Realised as they loaded up they weren't my emails and the top one was a big chain between her and the bullying deputy all about me. I forwarded it to myself, deleted the forwarding from her account. I really regret not using it with the union but it was such a personal attack it still upsets me when I think about it

It does very much depend on what was said but if it is discussion of your performance then it is a possible confidentiality and data protection breach.

With Managers this unprofessional however you raise it will probably blow up in your face. I would only raise it if it is actually going to benefit you in some way eg if you want their support to move roles away from them.

It’s never professional to send feedback about someone to another colleague unless it’s their manager so they shouldn’t have done this.
However for me it would depend on what was actually said in the email. A manager is perfectly entitled to discuss the performance of a direct report with their manager. I’m not saying it wasn’t appropriate but i know many people (including friends) that take offence at any negative or constructive feedback.

Panic ye not

Thou soundest like a twat, sire.

Please make sure you know your rules on forwarding to an external email address before you follow that advice.

If it's against the rules then just print two copies off.

Don't give them something to get you for if they get jittery about their messages being seen.

I'd definitely send a copy to HR so they have it on record and keep the higher ground when replying but word it in a way that shows you aren't hurt if you can and that you aren't amused. These people just like to bully and push other people around.

There are three issues here.

The complete lack of feedback and opportunity to improve, whilst also passing it on to someone else without your knowledge.

What language was used , taking the piss and being derogatory,while keeping you in the dark is different to just discussing what's wrong with it ,how to fix it etc.

Sharing their email thread with someone else.

It's sounds like a shower of shite and really bad management, even if the emails were completely professional and just constructive criticism. Given the first and last point I doubt that is the case anyways.