to just step back and 'give up' in my job

[coffeelover3]

I cant take it any more - my "team leader" constantly takes work from me, or re-sends emails I've sent. Like if something comes in, I'll respond and copy her in (as she would have been copied in originally so to let her know I've responded), and nearly every single time, even if it's a fairly straightforward thing, she ALSO responds, usually wording it in a more elaborate way (unnecessary IMO), over explaining it, or expanding on what I've said. Its really undermining and I'm sick of trying to pre-empt what she might say and get my answer "right enough" that she wont feel the need to also reply. It's like a competitive 'game' or something - not one that I want to play. These are mostly colleagues I'm talking about, who just want a simple answer to usually simple questions. So I reply, and they say thanks, and then SHE replies with a long wordy elaborate answer. I think it's to show how much she knows or something, or that she is the team leader or something??? I'm so sick of it. I feel like just doing the minimum and letting her take control of my job as well as her own as I'm sick of trying to 'protect' my own tasks. I don't think she has enough to do, so she is constantly looking at what I'm doing, and re-doing it. Or often if she can, she will reply within 60 seconds before I've even had a chance to read something. I feel like just walking away and saying to myself 'fine you do it then'. Feeling so stressed. And I'm "homeschooling ds age 11 for 6 hours a day starting yesterday, so I'm distracted too trying to supervise him.

Even today I was having a conversation with a colleague, and was copying her in as she was copied on the original message, and he said could we have a meeting at 2.30 and she immediately replies and says she cant do that time as she has another (very important..) meeting and she sends him lots of documents and says she will meet him later in the week if he still wants to. Meantime, I could have met him - I'm free!!!!!!! Don't know whether to say I can meet him, or just leave it as it looks like we're not speaking to each other....

Ask her to verify your duties in writing so that she isn't duplicating.

yeah she's very tricky though so I don't want to 'rock the boat'. One person resigned because she couldn't work with her, and another team member has been on 'stress leave' since September as she was so stressed trying to work wit her

I would have replied to your colleague ignoring her and saying sure re the meeting, and then pretended to not have seen her email on the chain

When she replies with long wordy elaboration just reply again saying "Yes thanks for that Sarah, as I said Colleague, (repeat your very simple answer)".

This is awful. Can you speak to HR? The issue is you want to protect yourself as you don’t want her claiming you’re incompetent. I’d suggest writing to her (including the head of HR) and whoever her boss is. This is constructive dismissal. In the email write

Dear xxx

This is a formal request for an outline of my duties and tasks per day from you please as required by my job description. I’ve noticed lately a lot of “replication” and “doubling up” which seems to me to be unnecessary and confusing. To avoid future confusion please outline in clear bullet points what you expect my daily tasks to be. Once those are clarified, I would then expect autonomy to complete those without you “doing them for me”.

Hope that’s clear.

I look forward to your urgent reply

ok good idea

She sounds a total pain. I'd try to get moved to another team. I agree. Speak to HR.

I know it’s easier said than done, but can you just pretend her emails don’t exist unless relevant? So, in that case, I’d just email him back and say yes, it’s fine to meet. If she emails after you, just ignore her emails and don’t acknowledge them. She’s only making herself look stupid.

She’s obviously got big issues with self esteem and a bully. I recognise this because I live with somebody like this. It’s domineering behaviour and bad communication and lack of empathy. She wants to run everything herself because it’s about control. The only way to solve this is to go over her head so somebody “bigger” can stamp her down

I had a boss like this once.
The most stressful period I've ever been through at work.
If you are ready to walk and it's already affecting other people, you might as well tackle it head on and speak to HR or just tell her that her behaviour is upsetting.
What's the worst that could happen? She never speaks to you again? She says you're wrong and is horrible to you? She was awful before so you've not really lost anything.

Let her do your work and then you can concentrate on home schooling your child.

When she replies repeating your response, can one of the other colleagues reply in (mock) confusion stating you have already replied with the same information?

Maybe I'm not understanding the situation, but I think I'd just leave her to it. If you've given an adequate reply to an email, she's just making herself look like a self-promoting waste of space, unnecessarily taking up everyone's time, by following up in her own words.

I imagine her emails are having precisely the opposite effect to what she intends, they are annoying everyone and damaging her reputation.

If she gets in first with replies, I'd let her do my work for me. Particularly if I was fairly busy anyway. Unless I disagreed with any nuance of what she said, in that case I'd correct her.

Oh yes I've had colleagues like this. Tries to claim all their work is far more important than mine, makes everything a drama when it isn't, and then when I've got something they want in on, they are constantly trying to nosey in on it, yet if I had previously asked them for help on something else they were far too busy to help. Completely fine with work if it's something more interesting.

I just ignored it to be honest and left them to look a bit stupid. Was more funny.

TBH you have enough stress with two kids - let her do it - and stop copying her into everything.

Yep I agree. Maybe before approaching HR, stop copying her in. Just do your work. See if that makes a difference. You shouldn’t need to copy her in on everything. A once a week catch up on a Monday morning should be enough for her to know what you’re doing. Just stop and see what happens

I'd save examples of the behaviour you have outlined. Have evidence of how she is undermining you etc. I'd then suggest a formal meeting to discuss your working relationship and your role (with the examples saved). Make sure you document everything including discussion points. If there is no change following this, you can escalate to her manager or HR.
You say you don't want to rock the boat but come on, you can't work like this. Say something.

thanks for the advice. I do some of what you all suggest, some of the time, but it gets me down day after day, especially this week, as work is not particularly busy so I think she's looking round for things to do and to "show" how busy she is. I replied to that colleague and said I could meet at 2.30 so he said great. No big drama. I'll just do the meeting. I copy her in because if I don't (when people copy her in) then she replies automatically, even though she's only on cc, so that if I've replied already she's duplicating, and if I haven't replied, she 'gets in first', so that's why I copy her to let her know I dealt with it/am dealing with it. Just had tears from homeschooling, so have let ds off for a break. Bloody stressful isn't it.

Just don't cc her in. Cut herself out of the loop. She's obviously worried about her job.

Maybe she's trying to be supportive

Stop copying her in.

She sounds like she either has issues with control/delegation or she’s worried that her job is at risk so is trying to do it as much work as possible to show how valuable she is (even though she’s actually just duplicating).

I had similar issue recently with my manager micromanaging my work and redoing spreadsheets, emails etc. It was terribly frustrating. Turns out she has autism and wants everything done they way she would do it. We had a big chat about it and I told her how it made me feel useless, and she has since backed off.

It sounds to me like she has some kind of anxiety / control issue going on.
Is she nervous about her own position? Does she have a particularly difficult boss?

Gosh, she must be very insecure person - either in her job or in life generally. I could kind of feel for her, but working in that must be exhausting for you.

I also think that this: "I copy her to let her know I dealt with it/am dealing with it" does not work. It rather invites her to step in. Try not copying and you'll see what happens.