The meeting

I was pretty upset with the tone of the first email below and realised that it was doing exactly what it’s author intended – intimidate me into giving my colleague what they wanted.

What I can’t seem to get through to this person is that I am on their side!

Anyway I fretted about it all night and ended up at a position of not allowing myself to be intimidated.  I carefully structured the meeting and spoke to my boss beforehand to let her know that I wanted to run the meeting and not hide behind her – although I was pleased to have her there.  I also discussed the format of the meeting.

The structure was that I outlined why I’d called the meeting, what I wanted the outcome to be – a consensus – and I even complimented my colleague on inviting my boss (whom I’d already asked to come along) so we were all on the same page.

I opened the discussion by inviting my colleague to tell us what they wanted… and then asked if anything had changed from initial meetings where something else had been decided but was not being followed up on.

I kept the meeting on task and summed up in the end with action points which I summarised in an email following the meeting.

To be honest I was quite proud of myself that a) we managed to reach a consensus and b) I didn’t cry.

After that meeting my boss took my colleague to task about the emails. 

My colleague didn’t recognise that the words and tone used could be considered threatening or intimidating (let alone rude).  She says my colleague has no idea of the impact of those emails.  She told my colleague that if it happened again, to anyone, my colleague would be put on a first warning.

Personally I thought THAT should have been the first warning, after all, this person has also verbally abused my predecessor and my counterpart.  However, I’m happy that she has taken my colleague to task at all.

I confess to being a bit naughty though.  During her chat with my colleague an issue was raised that I wasn’t doing enough on a certain project.  A project, I might point out, that I knew only vaguely about.  So I sent off an email requesting a quick catch-up to see where they are up to on it.  After all, I need to know where to start from…

Yes, I know I’m fanning the flames but lets just see if the temper can be controlled… and fuck it.  I’m NOT going to be controlled by the whinging and undermining of a very nasty individual, no matter what talent they brings to the organisation.

The worm has turned.