Intensely lazy colleague

[Drinkclearwater]

I work in a very busy private school, teaching in Year 3.

There are 3 year 3 classes and 3 teachers in our team. Technically, this should lighten the load but it doesn’t because of one person’s laziness.

One of the Y3 teachers does not lift a finger and it’s making my life a misery.

He leaves school straight after the children leave and always has. This means that everyone who needs anything from our department comes to me because I’m always the only one there after school and he doesn’t answer emails very reliably.

The other Y3 teacher leaves early too because of childcare commitments but to be fair, she does contribute a lot in the way of planning and ideas to our team.

I feel like I’ve become the default organiser and muggins who stays late every night trying to get all of our administrative work done.

The worst of it is that I am paid no extra for this and the lazy teacher is a bit immature and his main hobby is befriending everyone (especially TAs) and moaning about me to them.

I think he does this because he knows inside that he isn’t contributing and feels guilty so deflect his guilt he complains about the things I’ve organised.

I am losing respect for him rapidly. It’s the easiest job in the world to sit back and criticise what others organise. He is never there and is not a team player so I’m contemplating speaking to the Head about it to make sure it doesn’t keep happening from September.

Three years ago, another teacher left because of this colleague’s lazy behaviour and the impact that it has on the team.

I’m the same level as him so I can’t make him do any work, but I’m a bit sad that he’s managing to sway the opinions of others against me despite being so unreasonably lazy.

What can I do?

I understand your frustration but I wonder how you've all let it go on this long! Surely at some point there's a team meeting where you talk about what needs doing over the next week/month/term and divi up the jobs between you?

I don’t think his laziness is on me!
Whose job is it to divide the jobs up? I’m not his boss, we are all equals.
When he says he’s going to do x,y,z he simply doesn’t do it, which I’m not in a position to call him out on. It’s very frustrating.

You’ve got to stop covering for him.

You’re a classroom teacher with no additional payment to be responsible for your year group. So stop acting as if you do. You’re getting no thanks for it.

Minute your team meetings or send an email after each one saying ‘thanks everyone for sitting down just now to sort this week out, just so we’ve got a record, as agreed Lazy Colleague you’re going to do X,Y,Z, Nice Colleague you’re going to do A,B,C and I’m going to do E,F,G.’ Cc in the Head or whatever relevant SLT member it is who oversees your work.

From now on do your allocated tasks and your allocated tasks only. Leave on time every day - stop staying late. Why should you work additional hours to do work you’re not responsible for? Stop doing this to yourself!

Now when work isn’t done and people come asking for things you can say ‘sorry, that’s Lazy Colleague’s responsibility not mine as agreed in our team meeting, you’ll have to ask him.’ And if he doesn’t change you will have a whole load of evidence to go to the Head with in terms of what was agreed and what hasn’t been done.

Rather than being a martyr and seething with resentment, you’ve got to protect yourself by refusing to work beyond the scope of your job and pay grade and make SLT aware of the issues - they’re the ones paid to deal with poorly performing staff, not you. By continuing to cover for this colleague you’re just making the situation worse for yourself.

I’m sorry to be sexist but I’ve worked with a few male teachers who are like this. They think that because they have a penis, they are so valuable in primary education that they can just be carried along by the women.

I agree: stop doing it. The email with minutes/copied in head seems like a good idea.

As @EnidSpyton says minute everything. He'll hate that but he is making your life a misery at the moment as he is not doing his share. It'll be the only way to hold him accountable.

If you only did the administrative work for your class, what would happen? Can you also leave early, and just do what you need to do at home, in peace, where you're not disturbed by anyone? I know you shouldn't have to, but it's a way of making sure you don't get given any extra jobs.

Can you give examples of what you are doing which he is benefiting from? Can you keep the plans etc in your own personal files rather than sharing?

Long term, could you move to a different year group, away from him? Request a new challenge, or similar?