Frustration with my manager
October 18, 2021 11:01 PM Subscribe
I am having difficulty getting my manager to confirm my annual leave entitlement.
I started a new job role 2 weeks ago. It is an internal transfer. Prior to starting the role, once recruitment had notified the rostering team of my new role and hours, my annual leave entitlement was adjusted. I queried this adjustment with the rostering team, my new manager and my old manager. Firstly, my new manager had sent the wrong form in and my old manager had to then send a different form in. Once that was sorted, I expected my entitlement to be readjusted. It wasn’t. I contacted the rostering team again and they said they are waiting for confirmation from my new manager regarding my entitlement. I contacted my new manager again and she sent me a screenshot which showed my entitlement as it should be from her perspective (when she logs in as a manager). However, it still was not updated when I logged in. I emailed rostering again and they said that the manager still needs to confirm with them that the entitlement is correct. I emailed my manager again and told her what they had said, that she needs to confirm with them. She replied that it has already been updated (referring to the screenshot she had sent) along with a smiley face emoji. The thing is, it has not. Unless she confirms with the rostering team, my entitlement will not be updated. I’m new this year to the whole organisation. All they keep telling me is my manager needs to confirm and when I tell her this, she keeps fobbing me off. Why? It may seem like a minor thing but it is on my mind all of the time because I cannot get it sorted out. I don’t know how many times and in how many ways I need to ask her to send an email just to confirm that that is my entitlement.
Why would she not want to help me? Is she not tired of the emails going back and forth? I have been emailing her about this for one month. She must be able to see the thread of emails. Or is the rostering team being awkward? I feel like one or the other is giving me the run around. It is driving me mad and making me feel I have made the wrong decision moving to this new role if the manager is being awkward with me from the beginning. The manager works from home. She comes into the office on a day that I don’t work.
I started a new job role 2 weeks ago. It is an internal transfer. Prior to starting the role, once recruitment had notified the rostering team of my new role and hours, my annual leave entitlement was adjusted. I queried this adjustment with the rostering team, my new manager and my old manager. Firstly, my new manager had sent the wrong form in and my old manager had to then send a different form in. Once that was sorted, I expected my entitlement to be readjusted. It wasn’t. I contacted the rostering team again and they said they are waiting for confirmation from my new manager regarding my entitlement. I contacted my new manager again and she sent me a screenshot which showed my entitlement as it should be from her perspective (when she logs in as a manager). However, it still was not updated when I logged in. I emailed rostering again and they said that the manager still needs to confirm with them that the entitlement is correct. I emailed my manager again and told her what they had said, that she needs to confirm with them. She replied that it has already been updated (referring to the screenshot she had sent) along with a smiley face emoji. The thing is, it has not. Unless she confirms with the rostering team, my entitlement will not be updated. I’m new this year to the whole organisation. All they keep telling me is my manager needs to confirm and when I tell her this, she keeps fobbing me off. Why? It may seem like a minor thing but it is on my mind all of the time because I cannot get it sorted out. I don’t know how many times and in how many ways I need to ask her to send an email just to confirm that that is my entitlement.
Why would she not want to help me? Is she not tired of the emails going back and forth? I have been emailing her about this for one month. She must be able to see the thread of emails. Or is the rostering team being awkward? I feel like one or the other is giving me the run around. It is driving me mad and making me feel I have made the wrong decision moving to this new role if the manager is being awkward with me from the beginning. The manager works from home. She comes into the office on a day that I don’t work.
Write a new email to the rostering team and make sure that your new manager is CC'ed on the message. In the email assert that your new manager has confirmed via email that the entitlement is correct, and that a copy of the email along with a screenshot from your manager which confirms the entitlement is included at the end of your message for reference. The theory being that if they say they want a confirmation from your new manager in the form of an email then an email forwarded by you should be adequate if the forwarded email is from your new manager to you and contains the confirmation, and the CC to your manager lets both the rostering team and your new manager know that you are saying that she has already confirmed, and that she can object if you are misrepresenting her actual position. Something like:
To: Rostering Teamposted by RichardP at 11:39 PM on October 18, 2021 [3 favorites]
CC: New Manager
Rostering Team,
I am pleased to let you know that New Manager confirmed via email on date DD that the change XYZ to my annual leave entitlement is approved. Please find attached below a copy of the email in which she confirms the annual leave entitlement along with a screenshot she took which shows that my entitlement is confirmed. If her email below is not adequate, please reply with any additional steps you require.
Thanks,
Charlen
--------
[forwarded email confirmation]
Response by poster: Thanks for the suggestions so far. I just wanted to add that I have already CC'd both parties into all of the emails I have sent.
posted by charlen at 11:55 PM on October 18, 2021
posted by charlen at 11:55 PM on October 18, 2021
Best answer: CC'ing both parties is often not adequate by itself, as nobody is going to care as much about your annual leave entitlement as you do. Perhaps your manager is one of those people who just doesn't interact well with email, or your manager may consider herself to be extremely busy, with insufficient time to read the emails she receives, and certainly with little or no time to act on anything in the emails if she were reading them. If it helps your mindset, pretend your manager is very busy with Tasks Upon Which the Fate of the World Rests.
Send something like the email I suggest above, if the rostering team finds it adequate then you're done, but since they've been responsive previously, it seems likely that if they need more they will reply with a message like "Sorry, the forwarded email and screenshot is not enough, we need an email directly to us from your new manager that confirms exactly what changes to the annual leave entitlement have been approved." After you get this message, compose the complete text of the email you think your new manager has to send to the rostering team, and reply to both the rostering team and new manager saying "Would an email from new manager saying the text below be adequate?" If they say "yes", you then call your new manager, tell her you need a favor, and ask if she has five minutes (if she says she is too busy at the moment, ask to schedule a phone call for later at a specific date and time, be insistent if she is reluctant). Once you have your five minutes, ask her to check her email and pull up the message from the rostering team where they confirm that your composed text is exactly what they need. Ask her to "reply all" to that message with either a copy of the composed text or maybe just a simple note confirming your text. After she does this apologize for interrupting her with such a trivial task (and maybe joke about the rostering team being impossible sticklers).
posted by RichardP at 1:05 AM on October 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
Send something like the email I suggest above, if the rostering team finds it adequate then you're done, but since they've been responsive previously, it seems likely that if they need more they will reply with a message like "Sorry, the forwarded email and screenshot is not enough, we need an email directly to us from your new manager that confirms exactly what changes to the annual leave entitlement have been approved." After you get this message, compose the complete text of the email you think your new manager has to send to the rostering team, and reply to both the rostering team and new manager saying "Would an email from new manager saying the text below be adequate?" If they say "yes", you then call your new manager, tell her you need a favor, and ask if she has five minutes (if she says she is too busy at the moment, ask to schedule a phone call for later at a specific date and time, be insistent if she is reluctant). Once you have your five minutes, ask her to check her email and pull up the message from the rostering team where they confirm that your composed text is exactly what they need. Ask her to "reply all" to that message with either a copy of the composed text or maybe just a simple note confirming your text. After she does this apologize for interrupting her with such a trivial task (and maybe joke about the rostering team being impossible sticklers).
posted by RichardP at 1:05 AM on October 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
Do you know what confirming looks like? Does she have to submit a form or send an email or check a box in the system? Find out from rostering EXACTLY what they need so you can ask your manager for THAT, not for a general "finish the process." She thinks the process is finished, and might be concerned or annoyed if you keep emailing her the same request and you keep saying it's not done when she believes it is. Add new information to the request.
posted by gideonfrog at 4:34 AM on October 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by gideonfrog at 4:34 AM on October 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
Best answer: Neither party has any interest in troubleshooting this for you because the obvious things have been done. So you need to take the time to make them, nicely of course.
2nding the suggestion to call rostering to finding out exactly what needs to happen for rostering to think something is confirmed. Explain you have the email from your boss showing her view of the system which is different from what you and they seem to see. Ask why that may be. Troubleshoot with them.
Ideally, you need somebody experienced within rostering because it may well be that they are both right and there is a system problem/somebody hasn't ticked a box somewhere when they transferred you from one cost centre to another or whatever. To figure out that kind of thing takes time and entails going through all the obvious stuff and figuring out what else it could be.
posted by koahiatamadl at 5:54 AM on October 19, 2021
2nding the suggestion to call rostering to finding out exactly what needs to happen for rostering to think something is confirmed. Explain you have the email from your boss showing her view of the system which is different from what you and they seem to see. Ask why that may be. Troubleshoot with them.
Ideally, you need somebody experienced within rostering because it may well be that they are both right and there is a system problem/somebody hasn't ticked a box somewhere when they transferred you from one cost centre to another or whatever. To figure out that kind of thing takes time and entails going through all the obvious stuff and figuring out what else it could be.
posted by koahiatamadl at 5:54 AM on October 19, 2021
As others have said, you are the one who cares the most about getting this fixed. Can you schedule a meeting with your new manager and rostering so you can meet face-to-face and work this out? Yes, it means you have to come in on a day off. If you want to fix this, that may be what you need to do. It is probably a 5 minute fix, but it is obvious that emails aren't cutting it.
posted by agatha_magatha at 8:44 AM on October 19, 2021
posted by agatha_magatha at 8:44 AM on October 19, 2021
Response by poster: Thanks everyone for helping me with this problem. I value all of the suggestions for now and in the future. I have finally got it sorted.
posted by charlen at 7:32 AM on October 20, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by charlen at 7:32 AM on October 20, 2021 [1 favorite]
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"Hi Martha, Hi Rostering,
Hope you're both having a great week!
I'm just writing to connect you about the change to my entitlement.
Rostering, you had mentioned that it was close to completion but not 100% there yet - but it looked like it was complete based on the screenshot Martha shared with me, so I just wanted to check in and see what, if anything, is still needed ensure it's all square.
Please let me know if I can help!
Thanks so much,
- Charlen."
posted by nouvelle-personne at 11:26 PM on October 18, 2021 [13 favorites]