I've upset a colleague

[Amoneyone]

And I feel dreadful about it. I need some advice on how to deal with it.

There isn't much of a backstory really - me and the person I have upset have been working under the same line manager for the past 18 months on a project with a couple of other teams. I felt we have got along.

Our line manager left a couple of weeks ago and they haven't been replaced. We are a bit rudderless as the line manager divvied up tasks, led meetings and did the general project management etc. and now we are winging it. Sod's Law also means the project is it a critical point and we have a massive deadline at the end of the month.

I am older than colleague but we are the same grade. Not sure if that means I am seen as more senior but the other teams have been coming to me/ asking me questions / pushing work onto me and tbh I am under a lot of pressure. I suspect it is also because I am a "doer" but colleague generally sits back. I suck at saying no.

I work part time (I finish at 3pm) and I have a funeral on Monday (leaving tonight for the weekend to stay with family pre funeral) so not back until Tuesday. At 2.30 I was asked to deal with something urgent. Colleague had taken a late lunch so I started working on it, sent them a teams message saying I was doing what I could on it but could they please pick it up. I worked until I had to leave to get my DC from school then emailed the other team with what I had done and said I had asked X to deal with it because I am away until Tuesday.

I got back from the school run and quickly checked my messages because I wanted to make sure colleague was ok with what I had done so far.

There was just an email saying that I should never delegate work to them on an email with other teams and that we are peers (their emphasis). That I should have waited for them to agree to pick it up first.

My initial reaction is that this is a massive overreaction but now I am questioning everything, scoured our teams chat in case I have had a habit of doing it (unintentionally, I thought we were a team). I don't think I do.
I am so upset that they clearly think I am trying to usurp them or undermine them.
i started typing a response but decided to leave it for now.

I think I will call them on Tuesday instead (we work in different offices) do you think that is the right way to go?

I think your colleague is quite right.

You should've told the person you couldn't do it because you were leaving at 3pm.

It was then up to them to find someone who could.

But yes, I'd probably leave it till Tuesday and speak to her.

You didn’t just delegate it. You worked on it as far as you could before being unavailable and then handed over to a colleague to meet the deadline. Perfectly normal behaviour for a peer.

But the lack of role clarity perhaps caused it to touch a nerve.

Yeah I should just say no, shouldn't I.

Aargh. There was honestly no malice intended.

Is your colleague a man? This just gives me vibes of previous situations in my career of men having an inflated sense of their own importance.

I think you were perfectly reasonable, except you shouldn't have checked your messages until Tuesday, because now this person has got you upset when it's actually them who is at fault for failing to be a team player.

Yes it is a man.

I honestly feel sick, in my 10yrs + here I have never had a problem with anyone and never had any negative feedback and now I am just doubting everything I have ever said.

I keep thinking if the reverse happened I would not have given it a second thought.

If a colleague sent me something like that, I would just shrug, see if I could do it, then either do it, or reply to everyone that I had issues with x y z. There are people who complain about everything, and people who get on with things...

My reading if this is you dumped the ending of the task on your colleague without any understanding of what their work load was like and told the other team they would get it so you have told your colleague to finish that task.

It would appear that you and the colleague are not working as a team or co-ordinating the tasks?

Not being in the same workspace is a problem too.

So an apology and suggesting it may help if you both had a 5 min meeting in the am and pm and/or a common task list with delivery times would be helpful.

Why has the management decided not to replace your manager when the project is at a critical point? Ditto why did the manager leave at a critical point?

This would be a non-issue where I work, but we are always passing things over to each other. Nothing to do with seniority.

It's the civil service.... there has been a new line manager appointed but they can't start for another couple of weeks and the old one got a temporary promotion so wanted to start asap.

Yes, I agree we need to project manage better but we have been muddling along - as stuff comes in we have a quick teams chat and decide who is picking it up. We both work on everything so it isn't like he will have to do a lot of work to get up to speed - it is feeding into a document 3 teams are working on - he just needs to do our team's bit. I wasn't pushing something onto him that isn't his job more just flagging I wasn't going to be there.

I will be VERY careful in future.

However - how do I broach on Tuesday? I don't feel I can now suggest a daily catch up/ shared to do list as he will just think I am trying to lead it again (I am really not, I have stuck at this grade for a reason!).

I was actually trying to be helpful by starting it. Should not have bothered.

Yes I agree with this ^

But honestly....all you have to do is apologise for not passing the "not done" work UP instead of ACROSS

Simply say you were rushing and distracted. "My bad, so sorry. Won't happen again"

All sorted

Why would you doubt all your working life because of one tiny error?

The only thing I might have done differently is "emailed the other team with what I had done and said contact X for updates because I am away until Tuesday."

Because that's factually correct. X can decide if the deadline can or can't be met. In reality, I may well have done what you did. Honestly, your colleague is being difficult unless they think you do this a lot.

I wouldn't see this as delegating and assuming seniority either. I'd do this with colleagues as a 'I've got so far with this but I have to leave now so can you pick it up?' While technically that's asking, it is also expecting them to just get on with it.

Unless your colleague has been copping for this regularly and feels put upon, I think he's been overly touchy here. Does he ever ask you to pick up a task? Or do you habitually do these things yourself because he conveniently doesn't offer to?

Wouldn’t be an issue where I work either OP. But more importantly it’s past 6 on a Friday and (assuming you don’t work weekends) you shouldn’t be worrying about any of this! As my nan says ‘you don’t get this time back!’

This.

From what you've said it sounds like your colleague would have been equally upset if you'd NOT started it. Or if you'd tried to contact him to discuss it. How could you have handled him that was acceptable, given that he had opted (I assume) to take his lunch so late you'd be gone before he got back?

Goodness you are away on Monday because you are going to a family funeral. Surely in circumstances like that we pick up each others work without stressing about whether the delegating person is treating us as a peer or not 🤔 Unless this has happened often before it seems to me a bit of an over reaction on your colleagues part. If you are of equal status and you are picking up more work than her. You need to stop doing that and refer back to your manager. Difficult I know. I must be ancient and old fashioned by in my working life time the right response to anyone potentially 'oveestepping' who was going to a family funeral would be ...goodness @Amoneyone seems a bit stressed. Never mind ...can do. Hopefully she'll be back to normal when she gets back. 💐

IMO it’s not great etiquette to copy other colleagues into your requests to colleagues to do work, but it’s done loads when deadlines are tight!

Ideally I would have sent him a quick, private one to one message, put out of office message on with his name as the contact.

His response to you seemed a big over reaction though.

In my work his attitude would have got him the sack! If there’s a deadline and there’s only the 2 of you that could do the work and you were going to be away from the office ahead of the deadline then what other option is there?!! You were kind in starting the work if you ask me. Sounds like a man in a cushy civil service job who probably needs a job working for a FTSE / S&P to give him a kick up the arse!

I agree with the above, OP I think you should be annoyed with HIM for being unpleasant and unhelpful when you are off for a funeral. He just didn’t like having to do extra work on a Friday pm imo! And is obviously sensitive about the dynamic. Your initial reaction was correct in my view. Total overreaction. Don’t over apologise.

OP, please don't spend your weekend thinking about this. You were diligent in getting as much done on an urgent task as you possibly could in your last 30 mins. It sounds like you worded it politely. Presumably if you had stated you could not assist in that time he would have been approached anyway, given it was urgent? I work in a team in the civil service too and this would not even register as an issue. I would make myself less available and accomodating to this colleague beyond what you are required to do for your role, advise people to contact him directly if you do not have the time or capacity to take on tasks at short notice. A short polite email response to him on Tuesday would be best I think, I would be putting any correspondence to him in writing if he takes offense over such innocuous things. Sorry for your loss 💐

@Amoneyone So I work in the Civil Service also and also in project management and also with colleagues in different offices!

I think ideally perhaps you should have just added a line or two about why the task was important/timebound and if it was okay for your colleague to continue what you’d started and if so, to update the relevant. teams accordingly so that he retains autonomy himself rather than being dictated to.

But that said, I do think it was an over reaction from your colleague. However, going forward, I think your suggestion is best to just ring him when your next in as it just doesn’t work trying to resolve this over email. So just apologise (albeit through gritted teeth!) and just explain that you weren’t trying to impose or dictate anything to him but just trying to collaborate together with him which is why you started piece of work off but due to your time off and it being time bound asked him to continue with it and you’re sorry as on reflection it was quite clumsily asked and absolutely you both need to have calls going forward so no such issues occur again. Good luck!

You're massively overreacting. Just say of course we're peers, apologies for misunderstanding blah blah and move on with your life.

You did nothing wrong. If you're that worried just play on the funeral element.

Colleague has slightly over-reacted, due to the two of you having no manager currently. However, your wording of "I've asked X to deal with it" does come across as bit delegatory. It might have got my back up too - I have a peer who likes to throw her weight around and this is how she would word things.

You should perhaps have said that you would do what you can, and then messaged the other team to say that you'd not been able to finish and that they could ask your peer, but that you were unaware of your peer's other commitments /workload this afternoon. , and that you would happily complete it on your return to the office on Tuesday.

As for how to handle your peer on Tuesday, just say you didn't mean it to come across as delegatory, more that it was precisely because he is your peer that you felt you could ask, in a team member kind of a way.

I would have done the same as you. I think your colleague is being a bit precious tbh