You would think that I would have learned last week when my client was mean to me and all that other stuff happened after I posted that I was having a good Monday on FB (updated on my private blog btw), that I shouldn't post that, but I didn't. So, today I posted that I was having a productive day (and I did) but right after that, the shit hit the fan. I am giving a webinar (which is like a seminar but online, hence the nifty name) on Friday and Monday to pretty much our whole country on how to do a certain reconciliation...remember, we learned about those here, that has caused a lot of problems. Well, today at 3 I get an email from a lady who is involved with the financing part that I spoke so highly about (sarcasm) and wanted to change a bunch of stuff. GREAT. The best part was that she said the locations were doing it wrong and made it seem like it was my fault when she was actually the one who had the wrong account numbers. Lucky me, she had forwarded it to high up people. I replied with the info she had given me and tried to confirm which one was right (she sent me two conflicting items). ANYWAY, it sort of caused a huge problem with a spreadsheet that we are about to roll out to our 80 locations so they can track information and that in turn messed with the webinar and cause me a headache to fix (not done). To top it all off, I am a little frustrated with my senior right now (she reports to me). I had her work on the powerpoint presentation for the webinar because she requested to. I also let her work from home in St. Louis (not her home she lives in now) last week because she requested to and I also had told her of my expectation to have all of her recs reviewed by this Friday. So, it took her 5 days to put together an 18 slide presentation and complete 3 reviews. When I told her of all the changes above, she said that she would do them and it would take her a half a day. I said I would do it since she still had 12 rec reviews to complete. Fine. It took me 45 mins. At the end of last week when I saw that her recs were getting behind, I told her I was going to pull her from the webinar project and that I would finish it because the recs were the most important part since the CFO wants to see those this time. She asked me not to pull her because the project meant so much to her, so I didn't. Then, today she tells me that she worked from home (I approved it) in NE and only got one and a half recs done. Just to give you an idea, I did 2.5 rec reviews today and fixed the spreadsheet that she said would take her a half a day, plus was able to do other things. My question is, am I being too hard? It seems to me that she just works REALLY slow. I have already had the conversation with her a couple of times about how she needs to let every little detail go because she is missing the big picture and I give her deadlines that are reasonable. I just don't know how to gauge it. The problem is that I know her personality and she is a talker, plus she goes out to lunch every day and doesn't work late as far as I know. She also is not here so it is hard to confirm all of this. I just get frustrated because she can be really good at what she does, but it just seems to take her a really long time to do it all. Any advice on how to handle this?
Still counting down to Greece!! I really need a vacation!
7 months ago
3 comments:
I don't think you are being unreasonable. Could you talk to her again and tell her (again) that unless she can get her recs done quicker, you're going to take her off the webinar project. Just explain to her that you were able to do 2.5 in one day plus other stuff. I'd somehow approach it like that and kind of let her know that the expectation is not for her to do one a day & take 5 days to make 18 slides. I don't know what all is involved with the rec things, but 5 days to make 18 slides seems like a bit much. Good luck!
I had the same thing happen in my old job - the person did everything right, they just did it slower than molasses. I'd ask her to conference you in and do sort of a live thing to see what exactly is on her plate and how quickly she can really get things done. It could be that she's not using the resources she already has and doing everything from scratch or it could be that she's not gathering the right stuff to do it efficiently. Sit down with her (even if it's remotely) and have her walk you through how she does one. When she's done, show her how quickly you do one and how you do things different. I don't think it's sugar-coating it (I know you don't do that) to tell her that while you'd really love to have her abilities working on the project, you need things faster. Ask her to show you everything she's also juggling and come up with a plan that splits the difference (12 slides instead of 18? I dunno) and make it clear that you need exactly this at this time, even if it means a working lunch or staying late. If she's struggling with time management, it'll just get worse if you take the work away from her because she'll think she doesn't have to work that hard, but if you nip it in the bud now, she can take more and more on.
Good suggestions guys!
Molly, I never thought that it might get worse if I gave her less.
I think that her issue is that she is TOO detail oriented and has to have everything too perfectly organized before she starts, if that makes sense.
One thing that I did do is set up a project matrix...cheesy and very Corporate, I know, but in it I put projects, assigned people and put estimated time to complete. I just did this yesterday but I told them that if anything was going to take longer than they should let me know. I also put a 'completed' column and all the projects that I am working on and the deadlines I up against so she can see what I get done. I think that it just drives me nuts because of things like today..when I told her about the changes, she wanted to make excuses for why the Controllers couldn't figure it out and stuff whereas, I know they have to do it so I just figured out how we could make that possible.
Also, I completely redid one slide and completed another in an hour ....granted, she had some of the formatting there already but 18 slides in 5 days is ridiculous...oh and I asked for it last Tuesday by 5 so I actually had it then with the exception of my changes (which I told her exactly what to do) and 1 additional slide...I don't think that takes 3 days!
The other issue is that she always wants to work from home and I am not sure whether she is really more productive there like she says she is or not....it is tough.....
Think that I will definitely have to have another talk with her...after I get all this stuff done that I need to do.....
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