to not feel much sympathy for 'stressed' work colleague

[BloodshotEyeballs]

Briefly I line manage someone who mans a booking line. The line is open between 9 and 4 with an hour at the end of the day free for associated admin and she works 2.5 days per week. She has just been signed off for a month, following being signed off for two weeks. This is due to stress at work.

Don't get me wrong. It can be hard. When it's busy people on the phone get very pissed off and tend to rant a bit. But it's not a massively busy period now. And that job is the only thing she has to do, no other responsbilities at all, not even a tea kitty. I have left the office in tears many a time, I was in tears last week because I just couldn't keep up with the work.

The jobs are such that I now have to cover her job as well as doing my own (and I'm snowed under) as well as picking up the slack from my job share who is hardly ever here (I work three days). I have had to come in for the last two Saturdays to try to catch up and I will probably be in this Saturday as well. I am due to take 2 weeks leave from next week which now looks under threat.

So I can't summon up much sympathy. I feel bad that I should be a better, more concerned manager but really I#m actually quite pissed off. I know I'm probably BU but I need to rant

So tell me what a bad person I am, please.

BloodshotEyeballs, it does seem unlikely to change from what you say; the job is what it is.

Is there, however, a way for you to change your workload somehow.

In situations like this, I have a tendancy to look at the whole team's workload, work out what their priorities are, and work out who can back up other people in cases of high demand etc. At the same time, look at the aptitudes of the people involved to see if you can give people the oportunity to be diverse in what they're doing a little bit.

For example, one of my team is the best proof-reader I have ever worked with. Because of this she gets given loads of stuff to proofread before it goes out of the door. It's not her favourite aspect of her work. If I know she's been given a hideous dry report of 60 pages to go through, I'll tend to flag down the next person approaching her with a report and suggest they go shove themselves offer to do it myself, or ask what level of input they need. I'm then looking out for the next 'fun' job to send this person's way.

I've been under stress because I've needed to take time off with school starting and there's no-one who understands my job (finance and what-not) so if I'm away and something needs costing I'm likely to get a call at home. This isn't good enough. Both of my team are number-phobic and simply don't want to do it and it's not fair to put them under that sort of pressure. Instead I've asked them to pick up some other aspects of what I do to give me back up, and I've asked someone else higher up the ladder to be my cover when I need it. In return, I've learned much more about what they do, been able to make suggestions to make it more manageable for them or cover them when they're off.

So the phone needs to be manned, but it's clearly not something this person can do 100% of the time. What on your desk or someone else's desk can you give her to do for a phone-break? Who can then give her an extra hour 'off' phone time? If you know the booking line is going to be overrun because something is coming up, can you reschedule other tasks so that the line can be picked up by other people as well as her?

Bad Luck with this situation, it is so frustrating on occasions! I would have thought that if this continues further than a month on then your company should consider insurance for long term sick pay if this can all be proved etc. If you can get an external factor involved sometimes it can help put those problems into perspective iyswim. Also then the company would have the insurance and the ability to employ another person as the insurance company would be paying the sick pay.

It really is a pita, I know and have been there, and there are some unscrupulous people who are ineffective at their jobs who take the piss. Unfortunately you are in a situation at the moment that you don't know. I have sympathy for you as it sounds like you are mega stressed too.

Re people on the phone, I must admit that i get very riled when people phone me, then ask me all sorts of personal questions to prove its me, i may be ur here but if your phoning me then why do I have to answer all those bloody questions when I actually don't want to speak to them in the first place! Sorry - if I get one more phonecall from Kitchens Direct asking me if I want a new kitchen again (they did the last one 2 years ago ffs) then i will scream and shout down the phone.

Thanks everyone for your replies. I know IABU and I would never in a million years say any of this to her face. Maybe that makes me two faced, but that's not my intention. This situation, for me, has been going on for years. The person she replaced had similar issues and I've always had to do this. It's just got worse as my job has got busier. I just needed to get it off my chest as I can't complain too much in RL.

Despite what I'm saying, I love the people I work with, we work in a really interesting place and my work, whe I can do it, is high pressured but enjoyable, hence why I'm still here.