To think that if you are ill (self certified) & main decision maker for a department you should respond to emails wherever possible?

[strivingtosucceed]

Genuinely have no idea where the opinion of this will sway but i'll give a bit of context.

We have a project about to go live in 3 weeks, I own this project. A particular sub-department is in charge of one part of the project and is headed by a woman who also happens to be the only person in that sub-department. Unfortunately, she fell ill and seems to have not told anyone that she had remained ill past the original day she called in sick. It's now been a week since the original day of illness and neither me nor my boss (who she reports to) has an idea of whether it's something long term(eg broken bone/mental health) or something more short term like the flu.

Unfortunately the part of the project her sub-department is on the critical path, this means there are strict timelines that need to be adhered to and quality sign offs that need to happen before we can move to the next step. I want to email her to ask 1) when she'll be back & 2) who I can delegate her work to in the meantime so we stay on track. However, I've been told by some other colleagues that i'd be badgering them if I did so.

So AIBU to expect an answer from my colleague if she feels better for 5/10 minutes during the day or should I expect radio silence until they're fully back and well.

I’m appalled that anyone would expect her to read her emails. Absolutely not. But there should be a proper policy on reporting sickness.

Her boss should call her. He's not asking her to work, only to clarify cover.

As others have said your issue is with this ladies Line manager who unfortunately is also your LM.

I would say to your boss that you don't feel
Comfortable emailing a colleague who is off sick. Keep redirecting it to your project and what suggestions she has for alternative resource.

Not your job to decide if colleague
Is ill or not and should be responding to emails- that's her bosses job.

Agree with PP - You are being unreasonable, and your boss is a total cheeky fucker asking you to call her and ask questions.

Just keep batting everything back to him. It's his job to support the project in the absence of his staff member. I can't understand why you think she would be responsible for deciding who her work should be delegated to - it all sounds horribly unprofessional.

The person who took the original call from her should have asked how long she would be off, and set parameters for when/how she would communicate regarding her absence. Not much point in calling in every day to say "Yeah, both my arms are still broken."

Oh gosh, I promptly forgot about this as soon as I finished work. Thanks for your opinions. Just some things to note.

1. My boss asked me to confirm who the woman's work was supposed to be delegated to, not to ask them to continue work. But I take on board that's his role, not mine.

2. I'm new to the organisation & project so had no part in resourcing and/or planning. Plus, I'm sure most of you know that highlighting a resourcing risk doesn't mean that it gets solved immediately.

3. Unless I was ill to the extent of needing hospitalisation or I was completely out of it, I don't think i'd mind forwarding work/documentation to a colleague with a short description of what was happening and next steps. Not even for the company's sake, but to make my own work easier when I come back.

4. I'm not 100% on the company's sick policy but I would have thought that even self certifying, you'd have to call in and give a rough date of return and then call in again if that date passes or is likely to pass.

Ultimately i've passed this over to my boss for him to raise with his own boss. If the person doesn't return, there's really nothing I can do and the deadline will be missed. It could cost me my own job even though it's not my fault but I appreciate the concern from posters implying i'm some sort of massively unreasonable person for being concerned.

On the public v private sector thing, as a teacher I’m expected to phone in by 7:30am on every day of absence if I’m going to be off sick. I’m expected to email in a full set of cover lessons and resources for the day by 8am (this is why many teachers struggle in when sick as it’s easier to go in than set cover work in a rush first thing in the morning when you feel ill).

We’re then expected to phone in again around 1pm to say if we expect to be in the next day so they know whether to book a supply teacher.

I’d probably also check emails, particularly if I’ve set work for sixth form as they might have queries.

Was the insinuation that it’s easier to be off sick in the public sector?

It's not the best company culture if they're expecting people to monitor emails while they're sick (unless, of course, the sick person has indicated that they would like to do that). In general, it's best practice to leave people alone if they're off sick.

If there are elements of the project that can't be moved on until one person and one person only has signed them off, that's a flaw in the process. There should always be an agreed contingency plan or delegation/escalation plan in place for this kind of thing, and I think your boss should have thought of that. What would happen if your sick colleague was in a coma or something?!

My company policy is to call in every day for the first 5 days (so someone at least knows why I'm off) and then the doctors note covers anything after that.

That said, when my mum died I called on the first day and told them I wouldn't be calling back for the rest of the week, and that was understood.

I would not expect to read or respond to any emails iff I was off sick. I WOULD respond to colleagues' WhatsApp messages if they were checking in on me but I wouldn't expect them to be asking about work.

@noblegiraffe

I agree that public vs private sector is irrelevant. There are public sector roles which require high levels of organisation and delegation and private sector roles which are very relaxed about sickness etc.

I think it’s a factor of the seniority of the role, the level of workload and the urgency of the project.

But I do think the idea that contacting someone during a period of sickness is an absolute no no is quite a public sector culture thing.

There’s a massive spectrum between badgering a sick employee to do work and sending a very short considerate message asking who to delegate the work to.

Maybe I am being naive but I don’t think that’s so awful.

This sounds very OTT for someone who is presumably too sick to work although I understand the implications to the kids.

@Thepeopleversuswork ive only briefly worked in public sector but found that for most companies people don’t mind responding to the odd email or two while sick or answering a quick text on holiday.

I don’t think it should be an expectation but I guess everyone has their own ideas of how these things go.