To think when I am on annual leave my colleague should be doing my work

[Jenasaurus]

Just that really. I have returned from annual leave to find all the work has been waiting for me, emails unanswered despite an out of office on requesting the email my colleague or Manager. We share our role and when he is away I always respond to emails and cover his work as well as my own. This isnt work that should be left or can have penalties and implications.

I have been up until now resolving all the issues just so I can have a more normal day tomorrow, when I log on again at 8am.

I think I need to raise this with my Manager but I noted some of the emails are from her, and really she should know as I am away that my colleague should be dealing with them.

This happens all the time, and I am starting to dread taking leave as it just means double the work when I return.

How do others cope, is this the same for everyone or am I just unlucky

I agree and sending an email request to someone you know is away is also a pretty dumb idea when you know they are likely to return to an inbox full of crap. People sending email requests need to take some more responsibility.

I really dislike it when people do the "I'm away and I'm going to delete your email, if it's important send it to me when I'm back". No way am I having to try to remember to email again when I've already sent it. In that situation I'd put a meeting in your calendar for when you're back, so I'm not adding to my admin.

Absolutely fine to give an alternative email address though and that's how it works in our office.

Think you need to speak to your boss. Be really specific about what needs to be picked up in your absence, and allow yourself some personal boundaries. Working until 4am is ridiculous unless you're Elon Musk and I can see why your boss is concerned.

Could you perhaps just ask him if people emailed him after getting your out of office and if they did enquire as you why things weren't dealt with. You never know they may not have bothered.

I'd go down that route first. Seems a bit more conciliatory and grown up than going straight to your manager.

God if I ever got an email saying someone was deleting my email and I was to to email them when they were back I'd think they were a complete incompetent arsehole who had no idea how to conduct themselves professionally.

@bloomburger
Depends on context - if you are directing them to alternative people to resolve issues in your absence it’s actually efficient. Having received such messages and sent them myself I’ve found it works well and is increasingly used in our organisation to ensure a break is a proper break. Most stuff is sorted in the interim faster than waiting for me to come back and then the important stuff comes back in the week or two after I get back. Certainly doesn’t all arrive on the day I get back. People don’t work like that. But I’ve found people are relieved it’s acceptable where I work and it’s making them contemplate taking longer breaks when they used to limit the time away because they were factoring in the nightmare wall of emails when returning. Maybe some people don’t get much email traffic so don’t understand. But those who do will recognise the issue.

MMN I get lots of email traffic but in my industry it is not acceptable to delete emails. I think it is different view of professional behaviour and not weight of work or emails.

I've been in this situation myself. It really is down to your manager to make sure this problem doesn't happen. Either your manager should deal with and delegate your work to your colleague, or your manager should tell your colleague to do it. Of course it's quite possible that your manager HAS told your colleague to do the work, and it still hasn't been done. So your next step is to talk to your manager, and give a list of work that hasn't been done, and put it in writing and say that you had to work X hours of overtime to clear the backlog.

If on the other hand your manager says you have to clear the backlog, then I would take the issue further, to HR and your manager's manager.

@hernamewaseliza
I doubt anyone actually sets them up to auto delete - I certainly don’t. But the message cuts down volume and means I’m not pressured to check them when back - I work through them over several weeks to check nothing was overlooked or didn’t return. Maybe others do delete them but I doubt it. Definitely it’s an approach that is either embraced collectively or not within an organisation and I set a different message for external emails.

Next time the colleague is off, don’t pick up any of his work and leave his build up and have the stress upon his return!

Sort out your job's 'terms of reference' with your boss, explaining the current situation, this will ensure it does not happen again or the other person will be held responsible!

One simple email / chat to your manager. Please indicate to everyone what their responsibilities are when a colleague is on leave. I'm guessing that you'd be happy either way as long as its equal.
Course chances are the manager will ask why then you can legitimately tell them warts and all and if confronted (don't think it would happen) say truthfully you were asked for the details.

Failing that tell colleague they're a mega CF and next time you'll repay the favour (with a big smile on your face - V important - big smile = banter)

You are not being unreasonable at all. If you are coming back to all of your work, in effect you are not getting any paid leave. You need to have serious words with your boss now. They are supposed to be a manager, time they actually managed workloads.

This happens to me too, my colleague goes on holiday and I cover her yet I go on holiday and she hasn’t covered me. Ita so annoying as like you say, it puts me off taking leave

There doesn’t sound like a lot of common sense is being used here. At my work we would try to solve urgent issues for the person who is away and leave non urgent ones for when they get back. Surely that is the only approach that makes sense?! I must admit, I do skim read emails a bit when I am on holiday in a down moment and I have been known to forward on the odd one to someone and ask/tell them to deal with it. But it probably is better to switch off so am not recommending this. I think you just need to chat to your Manager about it in a one to one and they can then talk to your colleague and lay out what is accepted.

Get with your manager and ask for clarification on cover while on holiday.

You shouldn't be even attempting to clear 2 weeks work in a day... If you do... They will let you... Despite the effect on your health... And nothing will change...

I would suggest putting a handback meeting in the diary for your return before you go on holiday. Invite your manager. Use the meeting to go through your handover and ask for a list of enquiries handled while you were away (under the guise of you needing to know so you can pick them back up). This is your moment to hold your colleague to account and let him put in his own words how little he has done.

If you keep doing all this work, your own and other people's, no one else will ever step in. Work your time and then stop, and ask your manager who they want to do the rest of it.

It really depends on the set up in your team. I have my own work that comes to my own inbox. If I want a colleague to look after something or do something in my absence then I ask them to do that and leave a note. Otherwise my emails are not monitored. I have an out of office message directing urgent queries to another colleague.

If you share work then why would your colleague he not help? Does he know that you cover for him? PPs have picked up on the shared inbox so that could be it but if someone contacted you firstly, got your OOO, and then contacted them then they should have dealt with it unless there was a reason it had to wait for you.

I LIKE having a wall of emails on my return.

I give myself two hours on my morning back to identify the priority of all the emails and include them in the list of tasks I had prepared for the week ahead already.

Much, much easier than dealing with a list of colleagues who all think their own query is most important wanting to speak to me.

YABU dealing with this in your own time. You need to arrange your diary to deal with emails on your return during the work hours of your first days back.

When I return from AL, I do a quick sift through for emails from my manager, my director and direct reports and then go through them methodically starting from the most recent. Most of the time the ones from the first week have been sorted.

One thing I do when a colleague is away (that other colleagues have also adopted) is I keep a draft summary email open which I add info onto as I go along when they are off for more than a week. I attach the last email in any strings if they need to respond. This way they see what’s been done while they’re away and the things they need to deal with. I send it as I finish work on the last day of their holiday so it’s at the top if their Inbox. Saves them time and helps me get responses to outstanding stuff only they can deal with.

The first time my manager did this after a holiday was brilliant.

PS - I also work on the principle that really urgent matters will be forwarded to others if they didn’t read my OOO and nothing happened because I was away.

Send your manager an email outlining your concerns, what you have done and why and that going forward you will require full cover during any annual leave going forward.

Be polite, keep it factual, ask for what you want.

It's your managers job to ensure things like don't happen and remedy them when they do but 1st they have to know about it.