The Only Secret You Need to Manage Impatient Employees (and Bosses)

<p>Several years ago, I had an employee with a communication style I found extremely frustrating. This isn&rsquo;t the only person I&rsquo;ve encountered who uses a similar approach, so I wouldn&rsquo;t be surprised if you&rsquo;ve experienced this too.</p> <p>This employee would send out an email or comment in a Google Doc with a request for feedback from me. If I hadn&rsquo;t responded to their request within about 10 minutes, the employee would message me with something like, &ldquo;have you had a chance to review my email yet?&rdquo; Before I even had a chance to reply to the message, this same employee would appear at my desk and ask again about the email.</p> <p>During the in person exchange, I would ask if there was something urgent I needed to address in the email. The answer was always, &ldquo;no, I just wanted to make sure you saw it.&rdquo; I would ask a few more questions about when a response was required and prioritize my own time accordingly. Sometimes, I would get a second and third message asking if I&rsquo;d had a chance to review the email yet later in the same day, even when the employee told me they didn&rsquo;t need a response until the following day or later in the week.</p> <p>This sequence of events happened several more times before I decided I needed a change in strategy. The interruptions were distracting for me and the employee clearly wasn&rsquo;t feeling like their needs were being met.</p> <p><a href="https://medium.com/@jakeludington/the-only-secret-you-need-to-manage-impatient-employees-and-bosses-121dab272122"><strong>Learn More</strong></a></p>