It’s a really tough spot to be in when things aren’t going well at work for reasons that are out of your control, or just for reasons you don’t know how to fix. Maybe it’s another employee or maybe it’s just burnout? A lot of times, employees are worried about brining up these problems to their manager because they think they may put their job at risk for any number of reasons. To the contrary, managers really do want to know what’s going on so they can help.
Given that, it’s tough to write a good email about bad things, so I’ve put together a template for how to write a complaint email that will help you achieve the results you want while maintaining your professionalism through the struggles you’re facing.
The simple template is the following
- State the problem.
- Explain how you feel about the problem.
- Explain how you’ve tried to solve the problem
- Ask for help, and provide ideas you have for solving the problem.
- State what you hope to have happen / what success looks like.
Here’s a quick example. Let’s say that you manage accounts for a company, and suddenly there’s a change and you have 3x the number of accounts. A job that was once very manageable suddenly becomes unbearable and you are barely sleeping and on the verge of burnout.
State the problem.
Dear Manager,
In the latest restructure, I’ve ended up being given 3x the number of accounts to manage, and I’m finding myself working ten and twelve hour days and losing sleep. I’m extremely stressed and feeling frustrated, and I’m starting to get behind to a point where tasks aren’t getting done, and I’m letting down my co-workers.
How you feel about the problem:
Being unable to keep up with my work is making me feel awful and defeated, and I’m worried it will damage my relationships with my co-workers.
How you’ve tried to solve the problem:
I’ve tried to fix this by posting my daily to-do list in the standup channel in slack, but it hasn’t seemed to make any difference.
Ask for their help, and provide ideas you have to solve the problem.
Could you help me find a solution to this problem? I have a few ideas on how we could fix it including, (1) moving some accounts off my desk, (2) figuring out an interface to help stakeholders track statuses without emailing/slacking for updates, and (3) getting an assistant to help me with processing certain items.
What you want to have happen / what success looks like.
My goal is to find a way to make my job manageable so I don’t burnout, and to make sure that I continue to be seen as reliable by my co-workers.
This template can be applied to many different levels of complaint severity, and there are a few key things to point out about the construction of this format. The biggest thing is that you are coming to the table with solutions to the problem, not just problems. Managers have a lot of people to manage, and the job of a manager is to solve problems and help make their team successful. Employees who do not participate in solving their own problems generally won’t be considered for a management track, and on the extreme end, can sometimes be considered a nuisance if too many problems are surfaced (even when warranted).
So, what do you do if you don’t know how to solve the problem? Do your best to ask for advice from mentors or peers, and if that’s not available and you truly don’t know what to do, be candid and explain that you’ve tried to come up with solutions and you’re unsure. It’s important to tell your manager what you have already tried, and that vulnerability and authenticity will be seen as a strength by good managers. Being authentic and vulnerable also builds trust and rapport with people, so it’s a great way to build a genuine relationship with the people who can impact your career.
What will generally happen is your manager will have a meeting with you to discuss the complaint. It’s best to avoid blaming statements, such as “you and they” when explaining the situation, because it creates an “us vs them” paradigm, and what you’re trying to achieve is a collaborative space where it’s “us vs the problem.” I suggest explaining things in terms of how you experienced them because it naturally makes people more sympathetic to your feedback because they see you’re not assigning blame. Simply, you attract more flies with honey instead of vinegar.
Last thing to point out is the closing section – what you want to have happen – it isn’t a demands list. It’s helping your manager see what you think success looks like once you solve the problem, and it’s a measure by which you can evaluate the solutions you’ve put in place.
Hopefully this helps you find a path forward and gives you a clear idea on how to write a good complaint email. I hope it will help you get through a tough situation and turn it into a positive one.