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Last week all of these happened to me so yes, this is a vent. I hope you’ll join me in the comments.
So here goes, in no particular order…
1. Canceling a meeting 10 minutes before the scheduled time. In my case, by email, which I was lucky to check before getting out of my car to go to the meeting. And I was all proud of myself because I’d planned my day to get there early. I mean, OK, I’ve canceled meetings plenty of times, but even when it was an emergency, I called the person at least 1/2 hour before to let them know. But 10 minutes before the meeting?! I held back most of my rage but did write back an email explaining that I was already on my way there. No explanation followed, just a call to reschedule for next week. I haven’t called back yet.
2. People who are always asking for something without ever giving something back. About a year ago I met this person who was fairly prominent in the digital media industry, the space I was new to with the launch of Workitmom.com. We really hit it off and got in to the habit of calling and emailing each other regularly. This person would ask me for a favor from time to time, and to be honest, I was giddy with excitement that someone with more experience and connections than me would do that. Then came my turn and I asked for what I thought was a VERY small favor. Nothing happened. After a few months, I’d asked for something else, again, not huge. Ignored, but followed up with an email to ask for my advice on something. UGH! (Yes, I know I am being boringly vague here but I am fairly certain this person reads my blog. Sorry.)
3. Dead-fish handshake. This is going to sound like an exaggeration, but it’s not: I’ve NEVER gotten over this and actually had a good working relationship with a person who shakes my hand with complete lack of enthusiasm. I don’t care how digital the world has become, a great, firm, enthusiastic handshake is a must during a work-related meeting. Period. (No wonder it’s one of the most frequent good interview tips we hear.)
4. Unnecessary unfriendliness. I understand that not everyone has a bright sunny personality, but c’mon, you can’t handle a tiny tiniest bit of friendly rapport during a conversation? I had a call with this woman recently — and this time, I don’t care at all if she reads this blog — who spent the entire 20 minutes giving me terse short answers. I wasn’t asking anything of her, and quite the opposite, if we ended up working together she and her firm would benefit. Yes, maybe she had a really bad day. But really, not even a nice hello? (I’ve had plenty of horrible conversations with guys too, believe me, but I have written about my thoughts on women being bitchy at work before.)
5. CC’ng too many people on an email and abusing the Reply All feature. I am sure as you’re reading this you can think of an email you got that included (a) way too many recipients, including people who had no business being copied on it and (2) too many recipients replying to the email using Reply All, even though what they were writing was useful for a few people. I HATE this. It wastes time — reading through emails — it causes confusion almost always, and it can lead to some unpleasant situations when people forget that so many people are part of this conversation.
OK, your turn, what workplace habits/behaviors drive you nuts?
This entry was posted on Sunday, September 7th, 2008 at 9:26 pm and is filed under Career Talk.
Tags: job, workplace behaviors, workplace issues
September 7th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
When you are in the middle of talking to a co-worker about something important another co-worker pops into the room/cubicle and starts talking without any thought. It should be common courtesy to either wait for us to finish our conversation or ask if we are in the middle of something. We are not allowed to shut doors to offices in my workplace, so this happens ALL the time.
September 7th, 2008 at 10:13 pm
Oooh, great stuff. Let it all out, Nataly! Here’s one email-related peeve of my own: abuse of the forwarded email. It is lazy for the sender to just forward a conversation on to someone else when the intent is for that person to then take some kind of action. You’re forcing them to read the whole thing and figure out what is required. It’s fine to forward the whole conversation, but I think it’s always important - as a courtesy to the reader - to summarize very briefly at the top of the message what you need of them.
September 8th, 2008 at 1:14 am
Open door policies. Why CAN’t we shut our doors? I love to chat with people and almost need horse like blinders to keep focused. I would much prefer a everyone do what ever they want with their doors, and we will assume you are always available unless you have other wise specified in an email.
September 8th, 2008 at 10:03 am
I’ll add one, if I may, that relates to Diane’s post: People who answer their phone (without apology) when I’m physically sitting or standing in their office talking about work-related matters.
I understand if we’re gabbing. Or, if it’s the president of the company or even more importantly, a client, but at least be polite enough to tell me that you’re going to answer the phone instead of wrapping up our conversation!
September 8th, 2008 at 11:07 am
LACK OF COMMUNITCATION. Need I say more? I could site many examples here but I’ll leave it with this: you must inform the person doing the job of ALL of the parameters. And that means before the job begins, not after it’s over. And, as a freelancer, I’m just going to say if you don’t inform the person you will get charged twice. I don’t care if you weren’t done putting it together. You submitted it, it got done and now you need more. Cha ching.
Oh, I feel better now ;).
September 8th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
What a great vent! I get frustraited when people refuse to accept or decline a meeting until JUST before it starts (or at all!). How hard is it to click the ‘accept’ button? or even reply with ‘not sure i will be able to make it, but i will try!’?
If the meeting invite is accepted people RARELY show up on time. I have waited as long as 20 minutes to start a meeting. This is why all the meetings are generally an hour if it’s more than 2 or 3 people. Not because the meeting will really last that long, but because we have to start over everytime another late person walks into the room.
i may have to start brining candy.
September 8th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
Mine is currently people who say they don’t want to micromanage their employees, but who take every opportunity to demand a level of detail that appears ridiculous for no other reason than playing a martyr.
Believe me, I understand being so busy you have to answer email at midnight, but that should really not be the rule (particularly when one is away from her desk gabbing most of the day.)
Oh, here’s another - same person says she does not have time to read all the emails that come across her desk each day. But when you don’t copy her on emails requesting information, she gets angry and snippy.
September 8th, 2008 at 8:13 pm
Cancelling a meeting 10 minutes before is ridiculous, but I have a manager who regularly waits until 15 minutes before the meeting is supposed to start to let us know about it. It’s kind of a standing-but-only-maybe meeting, which I guess makes it a LITTLE better … annoying.
I’m frustrated by people who refuse to sign up for (let alone use) the instant-messaging program our company has made available to us. I understand wanting to have periods where you’re not plugged in, but never? Really? You can NEVER be available for a quick question from someone remote? (Ditto for people who go entire days without checking email.)
And I’m doing some regular communicating with now with a woman who NEVER EVER EVER uses the Reply-All button, even though there are 3 or more of us trying to coordinate this project. I wind up having to try to figure out who doesn’t have the information and pass it along.
And for the love of God, PLEASE do not invite me to meetings that last an hour and a half, but have ten seconds of useful-for-me information. Send me an email when it’s over.
September 9th, 2008 at 8:49 am
I find it annoying to have a leader that will not lead. We are in a small office of 9 people and there is one person in particular that everyone in the office has a problem. It has been brought to the attention of the Executive Director on more than one occassion and NO action has been taken. The usual response to the problem is you need to talk it through with the other person. Like that hasn’t already been tried. I find it even more disappointing when that leader is a woman because I such high enthusium and expectations for them in that role.
September 9th, 2008 at 10:27 am
I find my biggest frustration is that when I am assigned a project to help publicize someone’s work, and often times requested by that someone, that they take several emails and phone calls to get the information to me. Then, when they finally send me what I need, I am supposed to drop my other projects to work on their’s. I also really hate when I request information and someone cannot get to me by my deadline, that they just ignore me emails, phone calls, IM’s… how hard is it to reply: I am busy this week, check back next week?