No more laughs for the office jokester
Question: “What can be done about a co-worker who likes to play practical jokes? He thinks it’s funny to create fictitious emails with rude comments, and then send them out under someone else’s name. He has even faxed unprofessional messages to customers as though they came from another employee. When we confronted this guy, he denied everything, but we know he’s the guilty party. He seems to delight in creating chaos and conflict. How do we put a stop to this?” Not Smiling
Answer: Your juvenile associate is undoubtedly the only person who finds this reckless behavior amusing. Misinformed customers and wrongly accused co-workers certainly won’t be laughing.
Since your group intervention failed to produce results, it’s time to make this a management problem. You and your colleagues should give the jokester’s boss some examples of his fabricated documents and explain how you know that he’s the author. Unless his manager is equally childish, that should put an immediate end to these obnoxious pranks.
Answer: Your juvenile associate is undoubtedly the only person who finds this reckless behavior amusing. Misinformed customers and wrongly accused co-workers certainly won’t be laughing.
Since your group intervention failed to produce results, it’s time to make this a management problem. You and your colleagues should give the jokester’s boss some examples of his fabricated documents and explain how you know that he’s the author. Unless his manager is equally childish, that should put an immediate end to these obnoxious pranks.
