NWR - annoyed by work 'interns'! HUGE-O RANT
I am a lawyer, so we actually call them 'summer associates.'
I am heading up a large project and I supervise 5 summer associates. One summer associate was doing all of this great work at the start of the summer, but for the past week has been one giant problem. I received a phone call from a sheriff from upstate last Friday, so I emailed this summer associate and asked him to return the call since he was most familiar with that county because he did that county research. Four business days later, I got another call from the sheriff because the summer associate never bothered to call him! I had to apologize profusely, and sent the summer associate a nasty-ish email, and cc-ing the partner, because this is a major problem.
Then I realized that the summer associate had taken some CDs on Monday and was supposed to review them, and I never heard back from him about it. So I emailed him this morning to check up on the status. And he writes back 'because we didn't talk too much about it on Monday I assumed it wasn't urgent so I haven't done it yet.' ***! All you had to do was pop a CD into your computer and spend 30 minutes looking at it! And you KNEW it needed to be done this week because we have a time deadline -- YOU KNEW we had a time deadline because you were the one that did the research and told me and the partner ABOUT the time deadline!
So each of these things, taken on it's own, would be annoying but I could deal. But wait there is more!
We were supposed to visit the client today, so I let the summer associates know on Monday that they were all invited to come too. This summer associate writes back how much work he has and how he doesn't think he can make the meeting. Ok, whatever. Then today, the partner had a conflict so we had to cancel the meeting so I emailed all of the summer associates to let them know. This summer associate writes back, 'you didn't respond to my email when I told you I couldn't make the meeting,' -- uhhhhh, there wasn't anything to respond TO! -- 'so I stayed late last night to finish the rest of my work so I could come but now you have canceled the meeting.' Well, I didn't cancel the meeting, the partner did, and BTW, you didn't stay late to finish your work because you OWE ME work right now and hey, it isn't done yet!
OK, I feel so much better now![]()
Edited for spelling
I am heading up a large project and I supervise 5 summer associates. One summer associate was doing all of this great work at the start of the summer, but for the past week has been one giant problem. I received a phone call from a sheriff from upstate last Friday, so I emailed this summer associate and asked him to return the call since he was most familiar with that county because he did that county research. Four business days later, I got another call from the sheriff because the summer associate never bothered to call him! I had to apologize profusely, and sent the summer associate a nasty-ish email, and cc-ing the partner, because this is a major problem.
Then I realized that the summer associate had taken some CDs on Monday and was supposed to review them, and I never heard back from him about it. So I emailed him this morning to check up on the status. And he writes back 'because we didn't talk too much about it on Monday I assumed it wasn't urgent so I haven't done it yet.' ***! All you had to do was pop a CD into your computer and spend 30 minutes looking at it! And you KNEW it needed to be done this week because we have a time deadline -- YOU KNEW we had a time deadline because you were the one that did the research and told me and the partner ABOUT the time deadline!
So each of these things, taken on it's own, would be annoying but I could deal. But wait there is more!
We were supposed to visit the client today, so I let the summer associates know on Monday that they were all invited to come too. This summer associate writes back how much work he has and how he doesn't think he can make the meeting. Ok, whatever. Then today, the partner had a conflict so we had to cancel the meeting so I emailed all of the summer associates to let them know. This summer associate writes back, 'you didn't respond to my email when I told you I couldn't make the meeting,' -- uhhhhh, there wasn't anything to respond TO! -- 'so I stayed late last night to finish the rest of my work so I could come but now you have canceled the meeting.' Well, I didn't cancel the meeting, the partner did, and BTW, you didn't stay late to finish your work because you OWE ME work right now and hey, it isn't done yet!
OK, I feel so much better now
Edited for spelling
