To report my lazy colleague to the manager

[Fedupoflazyones]

To give a bit of background, team of 9, one person been there years, ‘old school’ so of a time when there was no urgency to tasks, no thought about customer service etc.

Things move on over the years, I joined the team 5 years ago from another part of the company, myself and others have slowly turned the team ethic around to get ‘tasks’ done in a good timeframe. This ‘old school’ person rose to the challenge but as they’d been there the longest liked to hand out tasks for others to do whilst looking busy themselves.

This was reported to manager at the time and the role of giving out tasks was taken from her - she was told she, like the rest of us needed to contribute equally.

She didnt like this and has continued to quietly do as little as possible, it’s been brought up to manager on occasions, usually by me as I appear to be the unofficial spokesperson for the team. Manager tries give said person a gentle kick up the bum but they improve for a couple of days and it’s back to square one.

This week has been particularly busy - the ‘tasks’ we have to do, we are all goaled on getting about 25-30 of these done a day. It can vary as some tasks are more complex than others. The tasks build quickly if we have people off so it’s important to keep at them.

I clocked on the system that one day this week the person in question had done just one task all day and it was something that would have taken two minutes to do. We were already two staff down so the tasks were building quickly. The person has attended one meeting (same as us all) and the rest of the time, although tapping away on their keyboard must have simply taken an easy day with headphones listening to music whilst the rest of us battled to keep the mounting tasks under control.

Manager does not look at these numbers daily but we have to enter our numbers into a spreadsheet - it’s become apparent that this person always adds a few extra to their number. I’m waiting to see what number gets added for the day they did one.

I suspect Manager is already a bit sick of me / the team complaining about this person and would rather us all just get on with it (they aren’t around much) but it bugs me to the point I feel I need to leave. Then I think why should I leave? I love my job but it’s a bad egg that annoys the rest of us.

WWYD? Continue to bring it up each time it happens? I have evidence of a screenshot of the task completed, or just say nothing and worry about my own work.

If it’s not reported the manager won’t even know as they don’t delve into the system to check that the spreadsheet figure matches the system figure.

Odd your focus on this colleague rather than your manager

Your manager strikes me as the most obvious poor link in this scenario

and from what you’ve said - this manager won’t take it seriously in any event

I suspect Manager is already a bit sick of me / the team complaining about this person

so you have reported this person before. Numerous times. 😐

Mind your own. This is your managers job.

Normally I would say just concentrate on yourself and not other colleagues, but, as her inactivity means everyone has to pick up her slack then YANBU. If I was the manager I would very much want to know as this is impacting the whole team and someone isn't pulling their weight. Is it being made clear that you all have an issue? If it appears to be you acting alone constantly, it may seem to be vindictive.

Are you sure you are getting a fair perception here, because I cannot believe anybody would do one two minute job in a whole working day. Most people would be bored to tears with a day like that.

Otherwise I think you need to focus on your own work, this is for your manager to deal with. You and your colleagues repeatedly talking about her and making group complaints doesn’t sit well with me.

Sounds toxic.
Lazy colleague
Shit manager
Busybody unofficial watchdogs.
Yuck.

If your manager can't see it, then they are the problem.
Go above your manager and report them for not knowing what is going on 🫣

I'm the manager of a medical secretarial team and this sounds very familiar. Your manager needs to do an audit of each persons 'tasks' for the month, using the official system rather than the spreadsheet so they have evidence to approach the member of staff and question why their performance is below that of everyone else's.

It’s clear all of us have an issue but only myself and maybe two other members speak up to the manager about it.

Difficulty is that the manager and said person used to be equal colleagues themselves so have history of being friends to an extent. I think that colours the managers views somewhat. Manager is way too busy with bigger fish to fry so as long as these tasks get done, they appear to not really care who does them which creates a lot of resentment then when you’ve got one person leaving the others to do the bulk of the work

What does the rest of the structure look like? I manage a team of managers and we have an open door policy where employees are free to come to me if they want to. Or my boss.
It doesn't happen often but this could be one scenario I'd rather they came to me rather than being so unhappy that they leave.
If your manager is completely ignoring this, they shouldn't be surprised if you are forced to go over his head.

Are these shared tasks the only tasks for all of you ie nothing that she could have been off doing?

We work from a shared task list but each of us will need to do other things from time to time but will let the others know if it is likely to be a while. This isn't visible from the shared list and it can sometimes look like one of us has given up for the day just looking at that but it doesn't mean we're not working.

Managers boss is lovely and very approachable. This may be the solution

I don’t want to be too outing but another member of the team asked said person outright why they’d only done one task and they replied ‘same you’re thought of whether you do 1 or 31’.

That’s what makes me rage.

I had a colleague like this too in the end I just moved teams. You will always get one weak link and sounds like your manager not interested at all so all your efforts are wasted. Focus on you and if the jobs not too bad just stick it out if the tasks build up that’s the managers problem not yours.

Yes, it’s this kind of work. I don’t think the manager has time to delve this deep.

90% of the department is keeping on top things. 10% have an easy day when they feel like it and it flies under the radar.

I see, that would annoy me to be fair. I agree then with the idea of going to manager's boss.

I would have been tempted at the time to push back with a comment about being happy to watch the team struggle

I had this once, very childishly the team slowed down to match colleagues pace. Manager soon took action .

@Fedupoflazyones I'm with you. I get pd off if someone in the team is allowed to under perform because tge rest of the team is carrying them which is unfair. In fact that person isn't a team player at all.

Sounds to me you need a team building session - being old stool is a crap way of saying they're a dinosaur and need to change jobs.

Your manager is poor.

I'd get advice from HR if it really is causing the team challenges but this must be the team seeking advice, not you on your own. Ergo, you're not your teams spokesperson. They are allowing you to fire their bullets whilst need to speak for themselves, so pls stop doing that. You will be seen as a trouble causer even if your grievance is well founded.

I think you need to decide what you want the outcome to be, which includes how you want to be perceived within the structure. The person is unlikely to change, the manager is unlikely to stop being ineffectual. If it is all addressed it will likely be a long and uncomfortable time . I would look for another job or just behave like this person isn't part of the team in terms of output and let them hang themselves or throw in the odd comment to managers when you can to let it be known the lack of productivity is noticed but step back from the situation. Not fair at all but there are always those who coast along.

What would happen if the work was divided up , clearly, on a spreadsheet each day/week and NO one did lazy persons work?

I’ve had coworkers like this in the past. And you know what? Later in life they’ve ended up a hell of a lot less burnt out than me.

You and the rest of the team should not be pushing yourselves to pick up the slack. It won’t do you any good. You’ll end up with burnout.

Go a bit easier on yourselves and if all of the tasks don’t get done on time and your manager wants to know why, you can say we did this much and said colleague only did this much. We can’t keep up with doing his/her share for him/her.

If all the tasks are getting done on time regardless of this one colleague slacking off this manager doesn’t seem to care and has no incentive to do anything. Maybe if the tasks aren’t all completed on time that will give them the incentive to do something about it.

Your lazy colleague is counting on you all to pick up his/her slack. Just don’t do it anymore.

You said what I was trying to say a lot better than me. @Fedupoflazyones Do you think your colleagues would join you in matching pace with lazy coworker?

The only option if the manager won't deal with it is to go to the next person above.

I would be looking for a new job. You could end up being the one to suffer a bullying claim, given that you're the 'spokesperson' against this colleague.

YABVU for writing 'we are all goaled...'