In my humble opinion, I would continue on with the meeting and make the needed decisions around the missing co-worker. After the meeting, I would write up the meeting - listing the decisions, action items and tasks - include the open items due to your coworker's absence. Then email this to the invitees with a cc to both the permanent and interim supervisor. This will force the unreliable one to own up to her duties and if she does not, this will be the beginning of proof that she is not carrying her weight and will enable your supervisor to deal with it. She has probably never been called on her flakey-ness because there has not been documentation. Also, you are covering yourself because you are documenting what you ARE doing so there can be no fingerpointing to you should the project not be completed in a timely fashion. Susan Mann Management Consultant 212/875-1495 ----- Original Message ----- From: "Gayle" <[log in to unmask]> To: [log in to unmask] Sent: Wednesday, February 18, 2009 3:32:31 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern Subject: [MUSEUM-L] ANONYMOUS REQUEST: How to Deal with a Problematic Coworker I've received a request for assistance and am protecting the identify of the original poster. Please see the dilemma below and post to the list your suggestions how to deal with this conundrum.. Many thanks to those who can offer guidance. It may be something some of you have experienced heretofore and can provide creative solutions. I'm dealing with a coworker who is very unreliable and undependable. The rest of us never know when she will actually be in to work or how long she'll stay that day. When she is actually at work she is not a bad person to work with by any means. My boss is aware of this issue and it's been going on as long as I've worked there and from what I can gather, even longer than that.. Currently my boss is away on leave and our interim supervisor is very clueless about all of this. I am in charge of a project involving her and another coworker. It's hard to find time to meet as there is only 1 day a week when all 3 of us are there together at the same time. This project has been stalled because she repeatedly can't make meetings for one reason or another. I had a meeting scheduled for today to discuss the project and make action plans for the upcoming weeks and months but she can't make it. I realize my most pressing concern is timely and there may not be any instantaneous replies, but I am in the "wrong" for going on with the meeting even though it will just be me and the other coworker? I feel not working on this project makes the institution look bad as it is related to our strategic plan and goals for the year and it's in our best interest to move forward. Any thoughts on collaborating with this particular coworker? ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes). If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes). ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes). If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).