Miss Manners: Approaching colleagues about recurring mistakes

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I work with a management team of four people. One member of the team is constantly making mistakes that the others have to scramble to correct after the fact.

She brushes it off and says things like, “Oh, I’m such a bad typist” after sending embarrassingly erroneous emails to employees, with no second thought to proofread before sending. She will completely forget the main tasks that she was hired to do, and when she does remember to do them, she does them half-correctly, forcing others to finish/correct the tasks.

These, in my professional opinion, are fireable offenses, especially if they’re recurring. I’m sure you’re thinking, “Why don’t you go to her manager?” To put it frankly, our president and VP could not care any less about operational minutiae. They’re very hands-off.

So how do we mention her constant mistakes, in the hopes that she will improve, without hurting her feelings? GENTLE READER: You must be candid with her: “You may not think it’s important, but when we send emails to employees that have typos in them, or leave them with unfinished projects, it makes the company look bad and forces the team to pick up the slack. Is there something we could do to help you make sure you proofread and finish these tasks? Perhaps there is a more efficient platform we could ask leadership to provide.”

Miss Manners suggests this collaborative approach, as it is kind and clear. But it is not without a whiff of warning that upper management may have to get involved. Even if everyone knows that the threat may be ultimately empty.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

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