Well, it’s been more than 24 hours and I’m more calm but I’m still angry. Now it’s cold instead of hot.
Again, this is not a work situation.
The question is not whether anyone misunderstands the data, the question is whether we really have the data (documents, etc.) to back up some claims in the report. The report format is too short to include huge spreadsheets, let alone all the physical documents. In other words, he should have asked for a cite but instead chose to assume we were lying and then went to great lengths to attempt to prove it through his own data searches.
Anyway, I have decided I am going to address this in the meeting of the large group. I am going to start by saying that there has been a question circulating through back channels about whether we have data to support these claims in the report. While I’m talking I will be forwarding the email to the entire group, along with a link to one of the main supports for those claims (some of the backup is physical documents, which will also be produced at the appropriate moment). Then I will present our documentation and rest my case. If the opportunity arises, I will commiserate with the shit-stirrer about all the time he wasted and ask why he didn’t just contact us for our sources. But if I’m lucky I won’t have to do that, someone else will get there first. It depends on how fast people will be able to read and absorb the email during the meeting.
Thanks again for all the advice. I agree emotionality should be kept out of it if possible. But if the subject comes up I’m not going to shy away from talking about how angry (at this person’s malfeasance of their role in the large group) and hurt (at the accusation) I am, and at that point some real emotion might break through. I may not be able to prevent it.
I have been wondering if either of the other two recipients of the email have replied to him (carefully leaving me out of it) to either point out his bonehead mistake of including me and/or to berate him for his actions (or to agree with him, which I hope not, because I respect both of them). I truly believe that his email was an attempt to persuade two more no votes on our report, which might have been enough to kill it. If his work was convincing enough for him to share it with those two, why not with everyone? If we were really guilty of what he was saying, he had a duty to inform the entire large group.
The drama is over. The report was approved, and he semi-apologized to two of us (out of the five in the smaller group) in front of the whole larger group. The apology seemed to be saying that he expressed himself clumsily in a way that upset us, and he is sorry for that.
The circumstances of the apology didn’t give me any chance to ask questions or clarifications, and in any case I don’t think that would have been received well by the group. But I have a lot of unanswered questions.
Fortunately, the business of this larger group is finished and we disbanded after today’s meeting. So I don’t have to worry about any of this again.
The advice of many in this thread was what kept me from getting into trouble and turning the blame from him to me, and for that I’m grateful. I didn’t have to say anything in the meeting, fortunately, because I’m not sure I could have carried it off.
Years from now after his retirement you see him strolling down the Champs-Élysées with his wife to their favorite café for their usual light breakfast of croissants and Café au lait…
He doesn’t even notice the new waiter as you set down the coffee and pastries…
And as he takes his first bite and washes it down you step in front of him getting his attention…
You slowly remove your wig and moustache and say “Remember me Bill? It’s Brian form Group “C” Mother Fucker!”
You have never worked for a volunteer organization! People will kill the best of plans if they aren’t going to get the glory, or it’s their turf, or it makes someone else look good.
It’s nothing like that. It might have been a personal animosity towards one or two members of the group (I don’t think it was me, I was only collateral damage) or else it’s some other deep dark motive that he can’t admit even to himself. Everyone in the larger group shares equally to the public about all output from the group, and this certainly wasn’t his turf.
Glad it worked out. My way too late advice is that one way to deal with this kind of emotion is to open Word or Notepad or something and write the angry, emotional response you really want to write, full of venom and name-calling and everything else. Then, once that’s out of your system, delete it, and get to work on the professional reply. What ever you do, though, don’t skip the step of moving to Word or another program not connected to e-mail; you don’t want to accidentally send the rage-filled reply.
Ah, yes. Healing visualizations can work wonders. Isn’t yoga marvelous?
There is a great sitcom about this on HBO called “Sent.” Watch it if you can. Wimpy guy accidentally unleashes years of bitter, mouth-frothing, vitriol on his unsuspecting family and coworkers.
It’s especially refreshing because it’s set in Singapore, so there are all these cultural pressures to learn and consider. Really fun and tough to categorize. Maybe feminist Bollywood meets a noir Gilligan’s Island?
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too.
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
. . .
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
