To have thrown colleague under the bus

[trainboundfornowhere]

I am still on probation at work at the moment and need to work on consistently keeping my pace up. There are four of us a day who work in my section two are morning shift and two are back shift (counters close at 6pm then we clean till 7.30pm). There are two food counters that need set up every morning and then two different food items that need made up for the shop shelves the idea being that each person sets up one counter and then makes up one of the two food items for the shelves. Back shift gap fills the shelves again as we sell food during the day. We also serve customers at the counters. I commented at a probation meeting today that because of who I’m on with tomorrow morning it could be interesting as a few weeks ago I was finishing my shift as they were starting and they didn’t realise this and so asked if I could gap fill both counters so he didn’t have to and he could just serve the odd counter customer. I told him no as I wanted to go home. I wanted to make the manager aware so I could just focus on my own areas tomorrow and showing I can complete them at the correct speed rather than trying to do it all as I know he will try and palm it all off on me and avoid making any food tomorrow.It means if something isn’t done I only get the blame for my own section and not the whole department.

That was fair enough, I think!

YANBU to raise this issue with your boss, YABU to have waited for your probation talk when this situation occurred a few weeks back, why didn’t you mention it then?

it could be interesting as a few weeks ago I was finishing my shift as they were starting and they didn’t realise this and so asked if I could gap fill both counters so he didn’t have to and he could just serve the odd counter customer. I told him no as I wanted to go home are those your exact words? If so then I get what you're saying and I know why you said it but I wouldn't be impressed by "it could be interesting" I'd have addressed it head on. "When I am on after this person they ask me to gap fill both counters - to clarify my role is to do xyz and then I finish my shift, is that correct?"

It's not throwing someone under the bus to tell management the truth about how colleagues behave on the job, especially when their behaviour is detrimental to the business or your own ability to work.

Yanbu. The colleague sounds like they are trying to palm off work onto someone else because they can't be arsed to do it themselves

My manager has been else where for a few weeks and was on holiday last week. This is the first time I’ve seen her in a month.

Was there was no one else in charge while she was away?

I tried speaking to another manager and got told as it’s not their department it’s not their responsibility.

I suppose whether your response was right depends on the manager. Some would prefer to be kept abreast of any concerns. Others consider it "telling tales" and would prefer that you assert yourself with your colleagues instead of dragging them into it.

Glad you tried, sorry to hear that they’re not good at sorting out delegated responsibilities. But as I said, YANBU to have mentioned it.

It was not unreasonable to raise the issue, but if you really said it as "it should be interesting..." that could come across as unprofessional depending on how casual the chat was.
To me that phrase comes across as "I'm trying to drop them in it with plausible deniability if they say I've told tales" and would make me wonder what the other side of the story was.

"it should be interesting" is PA twaddle that i, as a manager, have no truck with

there are several issues, not least holiday stand-ins. Tell your manager what happened and ask if it is always like that?
Then be clear when you start your shift what you are going to do, and what the other person is going to do, and do that. Of course, if you need to do extras to keep things going, then you need to step up. and you need to tell your manager that too. Without being PA and snitch-like, but in a factual way.