Episode 77 | Is It Me or Is My Manager Forgetful?

Question

Hey, Work Wives. This is Samantha from Boise, Idaho. Have you dealt with having a boss who is very forgetful?

For background, I work in an office in an administrative role. I manage the administrative assistant and other admin staff, as well as I'm the office manager for our office. My boss will often ask me where I am with doing things like X, Y, and Z and ask why our administrative assistant hasn't done something for him when he has not asked either one of us to do that task. And when I tell him that I don't recall him assigning that to me, he insists that he has, and he'll even start reminding me of who was present for the conversation, or what he said, or a joke he made, et cetera. And I know that I personally have a very good memory and I did not just forget that he and I had this conversation, but he insists that we did.

Today, this exact thing happened, and I told him that I was totally sure that he did not already ask me to do what he was asking, but I was happy to do it. And I asked if he could give me instructions on what he needed me to do.

I have started taking notes during all of our meetings so when this happens, I can refer back to them, but I, I don't know what else to do.

Is this some sort of condition? Because I wanna be sympathetic to that, but it makes me feel crazy when this happens, even though I know that it's him forgetting and not me. Truthfully, I don't know if he's actually forgetful or if it's something else going on there.

I haven't addressed this with him directly, and I'm, I'm not even sure if it's the best thing to do.

Thank you so much.

Summary

There are two things you need to know about Corporate America: first, there’s no such thing as a good memory. Second: if it’s not written down, it doesn’t count. So the answer to “Is it me or is my manager forgetful?” is yes. 

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