My accidental Zoom chat comment upset my colleague — what can I do?

During a Zoom call, you make a comment to one of your team members in the chat box about another member of the meeting, but the message is accidentally sent to everyone on the call. The person became very upset and abruptly ended the call, ending the meeting for everyone. How should I deal with this?

Isn’t your comment “this person is doing a great job”? I’ve seen this mistake happen many times, and it always ends up being awkward unless the comment is a compliment.

Having sidebar conversations like this about colleagues online is extremely risky, and certainly not within a meeting platform. That’s the best way to avoid this mistake.

All you can do now is contact the employee directly and apologize.

Depending on what comments you made, it could take a long time to rebuild trust, even if you don’t want to. But own it and keep your comments offline next time.

I’m a resident manager at a co-op apartment complex in New York City, and one resident always asks my staff for a little favor. But she never tips. Should my staff continue to do things for her outside of her job description? Should she say something to her?

what would you say? “Hey, do you appreciate a tip?” I think everyone understands that you tip construction staff at the end of the year, at the end of the year, and sometimes both.

But it’s not your place to remind residents of that.

Such reminders and suggestions should only come from the co-op board. Your only options are to continue providing great service even without tipping (just because) or politely decline “favors” that go beyond the job description.

If a resident asks why a staff member is no longer responding, it is outside their scope of responsibility, and continually asking for additional work without additional compensation is difficult to accommodate and juggles with schedules. You can say something to the effect that it is difficult.

Gregory Giangrande has over 25 years of experience as a Chief Human Resources Officer. Listen to Greg Wedo.at 9:35am iHeartRadio 710 WOR by Len Berman and Michael Riedel. Email: [email protected]. to follow: GoToGreg.com and Twitter: @GregGiangrande