Colleague not on the rota for meeting

[Welchchu]

I work in a team of four and we are all expected to take minutes (adult safeguarding). One colleague never seems to be on the rota, leaving three of us minuting. I find this so unfair. How would you browch to the Office Manager?

It’s possible that there’s a reason that you are not entitled to know about.

I doubt that. Also her name is on the rota with nothing against it.

Could they be dyslexic?

Ask the manager if they can review the rota, as it looks as though a colleague has been left off by mistake.

It is possible as pp said that this is an adjustment for the colleague - e.g. if they have dyslexia and would find it hard to minute. If the manager says the rota is correct, you'll have to accept that, as they wouldn't be able to divulge details of any disability/condition.

This is an issue for your manager to sort out. Focus on that rather than blaming your colleague for now. There might be a reason why they can't do it.

Why are you taking minutes and not using AI to document and log actions?

Interesting thought but I'm dyslexic and managed to minute meetings when it was my turn. It was one of my colleagues who made a fuss about doing it because she was lazy!!

It may be more some sort of social anxiety and they are excused from some work activities. Ask the manager, but you may not get much of an answer if it's a private medical exemption.

Id never, ever use AI for very confidential meetings.

Plus by the time youve gone through and corrected the often wildly inaccurate notes ("I like cheese" instead of "like these" etc.) you might as well have taken them yourself anyway.

So you'll understand not all dyslexic people are the same.

Just because you can do it doesn’t mean that everyone with dyslexia can

my son is severely dyslexic, ehcp dyslexic, and couldn’t take minutes

i am not dyslexic but I don’t absorb aural information so would be poor at minuting.

I have noticed that sometimes people can have adjustments agreed for something that is reasonable at the time (so not for something permanent like a disability but a temporary situation), but then time passes and the employee’s circumstances change but the adjustments remain the same. This can then end up becoming unfair to others.

Good managers should keep their team organisation under review so that a healthy balance prevails.

Exactly. Reasonable adjustments are all very well but IME, sometimes they are used to get out of a task they could do but don't like doing it. @BadSkiingMum

Not everyone is a slave to AI

I wear hearing aids and even though my hearing is supposed to be very good when I’m wearing them I still miss/or mishear parts of conversations so I wouldn’t be good at minute taking.

So as a person within a disability/ condition you'll understand the importance of treating people with disabilities as individuals who are affected in different ways, right?

I did a mainly remote course once and as part of the course there were a few (optional) in person tutorials for discussion. The guy taking the course asked one of the participants what she thought of something and she said you can't ask me anything I have a statement and went on about how he should have read her statement and shouldn't ask her to speak and she was going to complain, etc. He apologised and asked someone else, she popped up again and said you can't ask anyone else a question because that will be excluding me because of my disability. Stunned silence in the room and pretty much end of tutorial. Why did she attend... And so annoying travelled an hour each way to not have a discussion, well a few of us reconvened in the pub and had a chat but without the tutor. Reasonable accommodation it wasn't.

Just raise it gently and say are all of four of us minuting these meetings as I have noticed one of us doesn’t - or are we doing a rota around 3.

Last AI transcript I read of a meeting I was at included the words “penguin” and “trousers”. Neither was said in the meeting.

Dyslexia isn't a one size fits all diagnosis. I have multiple close relatives with dyslexia and they each have very different challenges. Some wouldn't struggle with minute taking as long as they have time to tidy it up and correct spelling mistakes later. Some of the others would really struggle to keep up with minutes, distracting them and taking their head out of the discussion. Dyslexia simply describes a series of processing differences and (as you should know from your own assessment) the profile for each person's strengths and weaknesses is very tailored to the individual.

Is it not just recorded? Then used transcription software and check it over. I guess if she's dodging doing that part just ask her if she can do it. She may just say yes. I wouldn't go to office manager as it's true she may have some special arrangement where she doesn't have to.

Ask your manager instead of of us

There are specialist AI minute takers for social care used and endorsed by professional organisations all over the country with suitable confidentiality agreements in place.
Life changing really!

Because that would be wildly inappropriate for a meeting about something as sensitive as safeguarding.

The current fad for suggesting AI as a solution for everything is somewhat worrying.

In ten years' time people will be saying "Oh fuck, what have we done?".