OK, so I have a work situation. A group in our office with no authority to make changes to our company's website asked me the other day if I had an objection to a very minor change. I indicated that I did not.

So, across my desk comes specs of MAJOR redesigns with all of that group's input on how these changes should be made. If I approved this without talking to my boss and ultimately, his boss who is our director of Marketing, I would have been reamed. So, I passed it on and not surprisingly the changes were rejected.

Now, the people in this group came & told me that their feelings were hurt because they thought their opinions were disregarded. I don't know a nice way of saying, "your opinions, really are valued, but its not your job to make major changes to our website". I actually care about a couple of these people, so I feel bad, but don't think I did anything wrong.

What do you think?

That seems like an extremely nice (and appropriate) way of saying it.

Let me understand you here... some people approached you, asked if you could make one minor change, you (I guess you're a webmaster, right?) said "no problem, send it on," and then you get not just a minor change but a huge change. Is that right?

If so, I don't think you did anything wrong. It's one thing to agree to a minor change, but when it's more than that, you do need to get signoff from someone above or in marketing. I'm not sure why your co-workers are getting their feelings hurt about this. You just need to tell them, "Hey, I encourage your feedback and suggestions, but what you asked me to do was not what you sent me. I needed to get buyoff on this before I could make any changes."

I think this is nice enough. Something like "There were some really good ideas in your proposal, but its above your paygrade. Keep up the good work and eventually it'll all work itself out"

Either that or "You think we give a fuck what S grade graphics hustlers like you all think? Go ply your wares elsewhere, jagoffs."

I would say pretty much what you said, and maybe try to explain how much work it woud take to implement thier ideas.

Say it's beyond your control to make changes so significant, and explain how significant these changes were.

are your co-workers in third grade? their feelings were hurt because some design proposal was shot down?

i agree with everyone else. all you have to do is tell them what you want to since that seems to be the nice way.

When people act like children you need to gently chastise them. If you apologize, they'll treat you like a bitch.

If you slightly condescend, you get your point across, and maintain respect.

They need to understand that what they did:

1. was misrepresented to you
2. put you in danger with your superiors
3. wrong

Then you tell them that other stuff about their opinions being valued, blah blah blah, and you hope that in the future they follow the proper channels to implement changes instead of jeopardizing your job.

Tough, concerned, AND caring. You're a man Jimmy. A man with feelings, but a man nonetheless.

-Phil

babies. they better get over that shit.
there's no crying in design.

Sheeeeeiiiit. No crying. Not if you're good, anyway.

I stopped in my old job to pass by the babies I used to work with and throw around a few shiteater comments like, "Hell, if I wanted to work for a living I wouldn't be this damn good".

ha ha ha.
by the way,kfr, a bit of your luck has certainly rubbed off on me over the past week. i landed a big account today. it's my third new client since last wednesday. much better than this time last year. wheee!

It's really strange, considering my November and December were deserted. No complaints here though. My first ad for the Chevy dealer runs Thursday. We will take over the East Coast and worship at the altar [or maybe ashtray?] of Westerberg.

Ignore them.

Then one day ask how are your feelings.

Then walk away as they decide whether to awkwardly chuckle or frown uncomfortably.

Then invite them out for drinks via email.

Then don't show.

Then ask where they were the next time you see them.

Tell them that you had made a minor/drastic change to the location of the get together but only told their underlings — Figuring it would be ok with them.

Remind me never to piss you off.

Totally agree with Phil here. They're being unprofessional and what you did was right... and I don't think what you said was mean at all.

What he said...
that took some thought.