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Bad Manners and Brimstone
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#Post#: 39746--------------------------------------------------
Is this normal?
By: Victoria Date: October 3, 2019, 9:39 am
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I’ve worked at the same company and/or with the same people for
pretty much my entire “professional” life so my conception of
what’s normal may be a bit warped.
One of the people I work for is Jim. He regularly asks me to do
things without deadlines, but then follows up to say “Where is
this?” or “Why haven’t I seen anything on this?” If I try to ask
for a deadline or suggest one he acts as if that’s too much of a
chore for him and says that I need to be “flexible” and “Do it
as quickly as possible.”
However, even when I email work to Jim without his following up
first, he will come back days or weeks later and ask why I
haven’t “made him” take action on it. The latest item is an
archive of some matters that he and another department handled.
I sorted and filed all the documents that I had, then sent the
list of the missing items to him for him to collect, which is
exactly what he asked me to do. A couple of weeks have gone by
and he just walked into my office asking why I haven’t “made
him” collect those documents. I also emailed him something that
he said was urgent before I went on vacation, then three weeks
later he told me to print it out and bring it to him. It’s a
crapshoot when I walk into his office to follow up whether he’ll
say “Yeah let’s take a look at that” or “I haven’t gotten to it
yet, I’m not going to look at it today.”
I’m starting to resent the fact that he expects me to do so much
“managing upward,” but I’m also curious to know if this is just
something that is normal to do in a corporate environment and I
do in fact need to be flexible.
#Post#: 39747--------------------------------------------------
Re: Is this normal?
By: Jem Date: October 3, 2019, 9:47 am
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I think we need to know what your job is and what the structure
of the company is, but this is not appropriate in my opinion.
I don't think your question is really whether this is "normal."
I am confident it happens in various workplaces all the time, so
on some level it is "normal." But it isn't appropriate. So the
question is, what do you do about it?
That depends on the structure of the company and your particular
job description. If you are a personal assistant type of role,
probably the answer is that if you want to work for Jim you are
going to have to put up with his antics. You are not likely to
change Jim, so if you don't like it your better option would be
to find other employment.
If you are in a structured company and you are not in a solely
administrative role you would likely have more leeway to push
back. From your description it kinda sounds like you are just
letting Jim treat you this way. If that is true, I imagine he
has no idea it bothers you (even though he should be self aware
enough to know he is out of line for expecting anyone, let alone
someone he manages, "make" him do HIS job).
My advice would be speak up, first to Jim, and then to the
company if it is structured in a way that makes that possible.
It sounds like you work for other people in the company also,
and they don't treat you like Jim does, so I am wondering why
you have been putting up with Jim for so long! Does anyone else
work for or with him? Does he treat them like this?
#Post#: 39748--------------------------------------------------
Re: Is this normal?
By: Carol1412 Date: October 3, 2019, 9:49 am
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Not normal. Sadly, too common. He's pushing all his
disorganization and disfunction onto you and trying to push the
blame for it to you as well. I'd advise keeping a good paper
trail, electronic if that's the way you communicate work stuff
within your office.
Remind yourself often that this is NOT about your work ethic,
but his. If you have a direct supervisor, I'd also make sure
he/she knows this is happening and has suggestions on how to
either deal with it or push back.
Jem posted while I was typing - what Jem said, too! :-)
#Post#: 39749--------------------------------------------------
Re: Is this normal?
By: Victoria Date: October 3, 2019, 9:59 am
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Thank you both. I’m an attorney inside of a company. Jim is one
of the three top attorneys in the department. We have a small
group and I’m the most junior person by two empty positions
(meaning everyone else is closer to Jim than me in rank), so the
only people doing admin work are me and an admin assistant.
#Post#: 39750--------------------------------------------------
Re: Is this normal?
By: Hanna Date: October 3, 2019, 10:10 am
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Honestly if someone Senior to me asked me why I had not "made"
them do something I would probably smile really big and say "How
can I do that?" Then say "Do you want me to give you reminders
about these things?"
I think it's completely unreasonable to be expected to manage
someone above me, but if he's your boss and that's what he
wants, I would do it. If I didn't like it, I would start
looking for a new job.
#Post#: 39753--------------------------------------------------
Re: Is this normal?
By: bopper Date: October 3, 2019, 10:30 am
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Ideas:
1) Send the info you college to the admin assistant after you
send it to Jim and say "Please remind Jim to follow upon this"
2) Do you have a boss? Ask them for advice on how to handle
this.
3) Be specific when you respond to Jim..."Jim, here are the
archived information you requested. As you have no further
requests/questions about this, I consider my involvement in this
matter finished."
4) Talk to Jim: "Jim, I noticed that often you ask for something
from me, I send it, and then you ask why I haven't made you
follow up on it even though I have no idea that I am supposed
to. If you need someone to project manage this for you, I can
do that, but that means we have to talk about deadlines/dates.
If you don't want to be held to a schedule, then I am afraid I
don't know how to help you follow up on tasks that are not
assigned to me."
#Post#: 39754--------------------------------------------------
Re: Is this normal?
By: ncgal Date: October 3, 2019, 10:53 am
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Do you have a docket system? if so, place it on the docket for 1
week out, 2 weeks out etc for follow up. If you do not have an
existing docket system, then make up your own.
Set up an email to go to him to be placed on his task list for 1
week out reminder, 2 weeks, etc (what ever time frame works for
what is being done). this way it shows up on either the docket
or his task list for regular reminders on what he is suppose to
be following up on. Yes, senior level attorneys want and need
reminders one way or another on what is going on and what they
need to do. If need to, printout the task and place in his in
box on a regular basis for follow up.
#Post#: 39755--------------------------------------------------
Re: Is this normal?
By: Jem Date: October 3, 2019, 10:58 am
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[quote author=Victoria link=topic=1355.msg39749#msg39749
date=1570114749]
Thank you both. I’m an attorney inside of a company. Jim is one
of the three top attorneys in the department. We have a small
group and I’m the most junior person by two empty positions
(meaning everyone else is closer to Jim than me in rank), so the
only people doing admin work are me and an admin assistant.
[/quote]
Wait - what? Why is the company paying an attorney to do admin
work? I have significant legal malpractice concerns for Jim now
that we know he is a lawyer...….
#Post#: 39760--------------------------------------------------
Re: Is this normal?
By: Chez Miriam Date: October 3, 2019, 11:50 am
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If he's a reasonable/friendly sort of chap, I'd be tempted
[probably wouldn't say it out loud] to say: "when they make me
the boss of you, then I'll feel comfortable making you do your
work, but till then, let's talk about how we can help you become
more efficient at managing your workload?".
But if you're not an admin asistant as well as a lawyer, I'd be
tempted to speak to someone in billing to find out how your time
should be charged when you are doing his admin chasing rather
than your own lawyering.
#Post#: 39767--------------------------------------------------
Re: Is this normal?
By: TootsNYC Date: October 3, 2019, 2:34 pm
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[quote author=Victoria link=topic=1355.msg39749#msg39749
date=1570114749]
Thank you both. I’m an attorney inside of a company. Jim is one
of the three top attorneys in the department. We have a small
group and I’m the most junior person by two empty positions
(meaning everyone else is closer to Jim than me in rank), so the
only people doing admin work are me and an admin assistant.
[/quote]
Isn't that a major waste of your law degree and your salary?
Jem is right that this isn't appropriate. And that if you work
for Jim, you might have to realize that this IS your job, and
make sure it gets into a job description, and that you start
coaching him to explicitly alert you when he needs you to be his
time manager.
It's not completely uncommon for a busy executive to have an
assistant, or a junior person, to whom they essentially say,
"I'm busy, I know I'll forget this, please remind me."
But that's only appropriate when the exec is that person's boss.
And the exec needs to say it.
In your case, I don't know what you do. Do you say, "I wasn't
aware you needed me to do that."
It's also appropriate for you to say, "I'm an attorney; I'm not
sure that's the best use of my time or my skills, and it
certainly cuts into billable hours. Could we hire you a
secretary, maybe? Who can be your task manager?"
Whether that's dangerous or not, I don't know.
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