BLUF: I unintentionally took credit for a major project in an e-mail to one of our bigwigs instead of properly sharing credit with my boss, and now she is furious. What steps can I take to rebuild my image and the trust in our relationship?
Dear all,
Me again. Earlier today, I made a major screw-up. Our of our bigwigs sent a "constructive feedback" on a major project that I ran day-to-day operations while my boss ran interference on political obstacles and helped clear the way for my work. The e-mail raised some constructive criticism points regarding the design and the philosophy of the project overall whilst praising my speedy response to customer support tickets and efficiency in the day-to-day running of the project.
Due to a miscommunication, after coordinating the draft response with my boss, I sent the response message phrased as "I" rather than "we" and not inserting any verbiage to the effect of "and I would like to particularly thank my manager for the support and leadership she has provided throughout the process." I should note that my manager is not involved in my customer support and daily operation work, but she has been extremely supportive in helping me deal with my frustrations caused by the issues I had to face and always kept her door open for me whenever I needed an ear to rant to.
I subsequently received a furious e-mail from my boss - and rightly so - expressing her very strong disappointment with me taking the credit for the work that we jointly did.
My request for a meeting to clarify this was turned down; I e-mailed her back taking responsibility for the miscommunication while citing instances where I felt I went above and beyond the call of duty in ensuring she got her feedback - including interrupting our CEO during a public speech to ensure he mentioned my bosses name as well as mine. I received another response to that effect stating that the topic is closed insofar as she is concerned and that she will "adjust her expectations accordingly".
Bottom line is - I know I screwed up. I absolutely did not intend to be seen as taking the credit, but that's how it came across. We have worked very closely together and enjoyed a great relationship, but I can already see how it has nosedived as a result (the formality of her e-mails is unlikely anything I have seen before).
She is furious and rightly so. My question is - what can I do to start correcting the situation, rebuild the level of trust that she had, and - hopefully - prove by actions (not words - those are cheap) that this was not intentional?
She was pretty clear that she doesn't want to hear about this any further - but I would like to prove my commitment and intentions through actions, not words.
Any advise you can give me would be greatly appreciated.
I've done this...
I feel like I catch myself doing this so oftern that sometimes it must slip through occaisionally.
You screwed up. I've found the only people who don't ever screw up are the people that don't do anything. You seem sufficiently contrite. It seems like you learned a valuable lesson and plan to improve your behavior going forward. Good for you... next time better.
If your boss chooses to hold her anger associated with this there's nothing you can do about that. You don't control her. Breathe in, breathe out, move on. Dust yourself off, put a smile on your face, and deliver results.
--Michael
Apologise and move on
In support of Michael's post, I've got to say that it sounds like you're doing pretty much the right things -- you're sorry for what happened, you've sincerely apologised to the wronged party for the mistake, and now it's time to move on. The only thing I might have done differently is asked specifically if there was anything that I could do to try and repair the problem with the bigwigs -- send a followup e-mail or whatever, but that's best done at the time of the apology.
Now, as Michael said, you've got to move on and deliver results, and just rebuild the relationship brick by brick. And be *really* careful about how you communicate about your boss to bigwigs for the next while... (grin)