Troll Dilemma #2 – Solution

Thanks for your suggestions on how to handle the Troll after Sunday’s post:

E, you’re just too darn sweet. Portraying a professional, approachable image is everything we’re about – even if we are volunteers, and I just couldn’t let it continue. Imelda is starting to affect other colleagues, and I can’t have that. She needs to change for her own good, never mind everyone else.

Frog, you win the prize for thinking along the same thought processes as me. And succinctly put, too!

So, as you’ll have guessed, this was no hypothetical scenario – this really happened to me; this was my situation. What should I do?

Well, I thought. Once I walk down this road, so to speak, there’s no going back – so better make the journey as useful and eventful as possible…..

If I spoke to Imelda, and she got upset, and stormed off, never to be seen again (so called voting with one’s feet – something volunteers can do soooo easily), would we cope without her?

Answer – Yes we would.

Right then. Let’s get this over with. So, with Imelda choosing her primary medium of communication to be email, and her sporadic attendance making it nigh-on impossible for me to catch her out of earshot of others, I opted for a well-thought out email, explaining things honestly and simply.

I re-read it about 5 times before I sent it, but send it I did. I used kinder words that I wrote in my post, but I pointed out how disappointed I was in her standard of uniform, how other people perceived her, and how concerned I was. I finished on how valuable she is and how much I want to help her, if she’d only let me. I gave her three months to get sorted. If she’s not sorted by 1st August, I will restrict her duties. She won’t want that.

And I waited, and waited with a knot in my stomach, wondering what her reaction would be. She might pretend she’d never received it (denial), she might be angry, she might be terribly upset and feel I’ve victimised her, she might take out a grievance against me…..

I only had to wait a week.

A week later, I received a well-considered, fairly adult response. It neither whinged, nor became agressive, but the dialogue continues. At least we’ve opened the channels of communication, I now need to see whether it will make any difference.

I’ll let you know.