Gratitude Monday: Email is my friend

Have I mentioned before that I’m pretty sure my manager has ADD? It’s a huge challenge trying to keep him on track in any particular conversation, because he’s like a pug chasing a housefly most of the time. I frequently find myself having to wait until he’s exhausted his diversion and then waving him back to the topic at hand.

(The one single comment I allowed myself on the 360-degree review I was compelled to give him was, “I’m never quite sure when he’s heard what I’m telling him.”)

This has, on more than one occasion, led to near disaster, as when I’d got down to words of one syllable explaining why, given everything that was going on organization-wide, we had to run a planned course every week for six weeks, he nodded agreement…and then sent a memo to senior management announcing that classes would meet every other week.

(Actually, it’s worse: I’d drafted the email and sent it to him, stipulating the weekly schedule, and he changed it to what he’d lodged in his mind.)

Last Monday, he sent round a meeting request for a “[department Name] Team Holiday Celebration”, for the early evening of Wednesday the 14^th. It occurred to me that, had he only looked at my Outlook schedule, he could have seen that this particular block of time was not free, but he doesn’t typically bother with such niceties.

(As an aside: he was in the habit of not actually sending meeting request acceptances until one time when I queried whether he was, in fact, attending some meeting. He said he’d accepted; I said I hadn’t seen the response, and he replied, “I don’t send a response unless I’m declining.” I looked at him for some time before pointing out the blazingly obvious, “So, it’s up to me to root around and see if you’re coming or not? Oooookay.” Only since then has he expended the great energy suck of clicking, “Send response now.”)

I declined the “celebration” invitation and told him that I would be unable to attend that time on that day because I’m having hand surgery that afternoon and don’t know whether I’ll be fit for anything. His reply?

“We can help you numb the pain?”

No, I am not making that up.

Tuesday morning, he appeared at my office doorway in floppy puppy mode, full of enthusiasm about the opening session of that weekly course I mentioned above. When I did not display all the excitement he reckoned the occasion warranted, he eventually asked if something was wrong. I believe I exercised admirable restraint when I said, “You know, a better response to me telling you why I couldn’t join the party would have been something like, ‘Oh, right—I’ll reschedule, then.’”

He bounced right back—yes, yes indeed; I was 1059% (his figure) right. He’d been distracted by board issues, but, yes, he dropped the ball. He did not actually use the words “my” and “bad”.

However, the days of the week passed, and there was no rescheduling of the “team celebration”. Like I said—you just never know when he’s actually heard you, or he’s too busy googling dogs that are half poodle and half Saint Bernard. (Yes, that happened. In the course of one conversation, I referred to something as “a dog”, which prompted his announcement that over the weekend he and his family had seen a dog that of that half-and-half configuration. I couldn’t get him back to our topic until he’d found photos to show me.)

Fast-forward to Friday, when we were meant to have met for our weekly catch-up. (He ordinarily spends about 70%-75% of his time on the activities of the other, non-[Name] staff, which is fair enough, as there are seven of them and only one of me. I get 30 minutes, aside from whatever specific project meetings he needs to be a part of.) As it turned out, I was massively late getting back to the office from an external appointment, so we did not get the chance to meet before the company holiday lunch and his kid’s swim meet.

I got back to my office after the lunch to find an email from him suggesting we reschedule the catch-up for Monday. I replied with a single word, “Sure.” And this, I swear I am not making up, was his response:

“10a Monday? Also, buy you lunch the week of the 19^th to make up for messing up the holiday outing?”

Ah. Well.

I actually said a very, very bad word when I read that, directly into the sound-amplifying atrium outside my office, but fortunately no one else was back from the lunch, so I don’t believe anyone heard me. Because, look—the guy has degrees from Amherst and Harvard, and I do not have enough sock puppets to explain what I’d have thought shouldn’t have need dramatizing to begin with. I already pointed out what the issue was, and he professed to understand. But obviously not well enough, or obviously I did not give him the necessary quiz afterward to check that he really did understand the whole “team” issue.

(Or, well—perhaps I’m the one who doesn’t understand the definition of “team”? Could be, I suppose. Perhaps I should ask Mr. Harvard about that.)

I have to say that a lunch à deux with him under these circumstances would not be a pleasant experience for me. That being the case, and given the fact that I do not have what is known as a poker face, it’s not really anything I want to have to live through. Because: Career Limiting Move.

So I waited some time before I clicked reply and wrote, “With respect, that would not be equivalent to a ‘team celebration’, so no, thanks.” And I hit send.

Now, you might well be wondering what this story has to do with Gratitude Monday. So here’s the hook: I am truly grateful that the latest exchange in this comedy of errors did take place via email. Because I would not have been able to keep the disgust, disbelief and disappointment off my face if he’d popped by my office in floppy puppy mode and asked that.

(Also, tbh, I'm grateful that no one heard me bark that very, very bad word.)

Some days, you just put what you can in the wins column.