To tell them to redo work?

[workisbad]

I manage a lady, let’s call her Sue. Sue line manages comms staff, who recently prepared a PowerPoint .

I had a quick look through it and advised of adjustments and the direction to go ie high level vs low level. Sue and team said they will spend a week tweaking it, and sent the final product to my manager who said it really doesn’t fit the brief.

I checked the final product and my adjustments were not added. But in comparison to the rest of the slides from other teams, ours were poorer in quality in general. Hence why I think im being unreasonable as I should have pushed harder to take all the low level stuff out instead of being too diplomatic about it.

I’ve been reliant on Sue to steer her comms staff, but I need to step in now and be more assertive. so how do I go into damage recovery mode and get them to redo the work whilst not wrecking their confidence? I’m conscious it will feel
like they’re getting a bollocking if a more senior manager like me approaches them directly, but that’s not my intention. I don’t think Sue has been clear enough with them but I also don’t want to undermine her.

Could it have been as simple as Sue or team misunderstanding what high level means? Have you used that term, Sue's passed it on and they've gone into it thinking high level = high detail? Or is it more of an error, like you specifically advised only 3 slides were needed and they've done 10 - so blatantly not meeting the brief?

I think either way you should direct your email to Sue only. She may have messed up but you presumably need a good relationship with Sue long term and emailing her team directly at this stage would smart a LOT.

Personally I'm a fan of the classics for difficult feedback. I like a build break build approach.

I'd email Sue along the lines of Hi Sue, just reviewing the PowerPoint, the X is great (anything at all they did well, hopefully there was something!). I've had a chat with x and it's not quite what they were looking for. There are a few areas that need improvement (give very specific list and stress the audience and level of detail needed). I know how hard the team have worked on this so I know they'll have no problem with the amendments and it will be great to see the revised product.

Then give a deadline and ask Sue to send you the completed PP for final checking before sending off to your manager.

I agree with the suggestion above, but I think you also need to add something along the lines of "and here are the comments that I previously asked you to include, but which aren't in the version that you emailed to Y".

Who is even using PowerPoint any more? Canva and sway, for example, produce a much higher end, modern presentation and anything that's in the brief and hasn't been added content wise, they need corrected by sue, who has been approached by you, and it to be explained how to do it properly with a hard fast line around it coming to you for approval and you will forward it to the final approver.

Thanks all! They were asked to produce a beginner’s presentation but instead went wayyyy too technical and bombarded with irrelevant figures and long paragraphs vs salient points. It’s about a project they’re proud of, so I think they found it hard to cut detail. They’re passionate but in an unideal way

The slides are also difficult to read and badly formatted. There’s no engagement, like nothing to capture an audience such as breaks for questions or ways the audience can get involved or get support. It’s just a brain dump of text essentially