If you accidentally sent a text to a person you were talking about in the text that was meant for another person, how would you handle the situation?

This could happen to anybody and recently happened to someone very close to me. The embarrassment factor is ginormous and IMO a temporary moment that mature people should be able to get past. BUT…if the wordage (or picture) in the text is damaging enough to the offended party…one may not be able to chalk it up to a mere texting mistake and have to step up to accept the consequences of this stupid move. If you are truly insulting someone in a text like that, saying I didn’t really mean it just won’t cut it.

I would probably not say anything and just see what happens.

When I fuck up, and I do it a lot, I’ve found 100 percent honesty and 100 percent contrition is the only way to go. It hurts sometimes, but the sooner we can start to get over the damage the better. But that one was bad. She’s going to be pissed for a while.

I agree with @Adirondackwannabe. A direct apology will be humiliating for him, but then they can both get over it. Otherwise, the person who is humiliated is the boss – which neither fair nor a safe position for him to be in. He needs to suck it up and apologize to her personally.

If he pretends that nothing happened, he shows dishonour in running away from the situation, and does nothing to improve the situation. She is certainly not going to just forget about it.

As to how to discuss it with her, I wouldn’t try to pretend it’s a typo – this is neither true nor believable. I would probably try to explain the context – I assume he was upset about something and using very, very poor judgment.

I border on paranoid about sending emails and pm’s to the wrong people, or having things hacked or seen by IT. I work for an organization that (in part) defends employees who are the subject of disciplinary action by our employer, so I have seen what happens when emails fall into the wrong hands. Also, it’s on the news all the time – just today I was sent an article about Steve Croft from CBS who had an affair and sent all kinds of embarrassing texts to his mistress. I have not yet had the personal pleasure of sending the wrong email to the wrong person, partly, I think, because I’m so paranoid about it. If I do send an insulting email to someone about someone else, it’s usually something that I wouldn’t be afraid of saying to the person’s face if I had to – not that I’d want to hurt their feelings, but that I would be brave enough to discuss this with them directly if need be.

@jca Yes, and don’t forget the other common source of email-related strife: sending a trusted co-worker a complaint about a third party, and having the trusted co-worker forward it to the third party. People can be jerks. @chyna, even if your friend had sent the email to the correct person, that email could have ended up in the boss’ Inbox eventually. This should be a wake-up call for him.

@dappled_leaves It was. He is in absolute panic mode over it.

@chyna He needs to walk in to her office and apologize and accept the consequences. She might respect him for that. She’s going to think him a coward if he doesn’t. I suspect she knows she’s tubby.

@chyna That’s understandable, but the panic is going to do him no good. He’ll need to make a decision about a course of action, and just accept the consequences. Perhaps they will be bad for him – but he can only control what actions he takes next; he can’t take back what has already been done.

There is a lesson to be learned here which is, pay attention to who you are sending a text to and stay away from saying derogatory things about others because those comments may directly or indirectly get to the person that is being talked about.

This is what I call “learning the hard way.”

^^ Yep!

Oh my goodness. How horrible. It can happen to anyone but that’s why we should be careful what we email. Not that I’m any less guilty than anyone else.

I think he has to speak to her. Otherwise, there will always be an ‘elephant in the room’ :-)

She may never quite forget what he said, but if he’s sincere with his apology, she might forgive him.

It will be interesting to see (hear) how this employee’s relationship with his boss changes over the next few weeks or months and how he addresses this issue. Please let us know.

^I will.

I would probably make a list of my superficial faults in an email to the boss.
Maybe something in the subject line like, “Showed you yours, now here are mine.”

Make an appointment with the boss.

1 minute before the appointment, hit “Send”, then walk into the office and say, “You have mail.”

Really, it depends on your workplace and the employee’s relationship with the boss. “Tubby” is not “fat cow”. Not even ‘chubby’. I find ‘tubby’ mildly endearing. Truth with respect for feelings. I can see where it could be from a chuckle to a tear, depending on the boss’s confidence.
Rage? Better off with a new job.

The person might need to quit. How will it ever be nornal again between the two of them? The person can apologize or not. Either way, something like that is almost impossible to explain, it showed very poor judgement, and as someone said above—that’s learning the hard way.

I probably would say something. I would apologyze. I hate when things are left unsaid and there is an elephant in the room. However, I honestly don’t know if it is the best thing to do in this situation. Sometimes I regret saying something.

If the person is fat, she knows it most likely, she has been the target of mean comments before, and for all you know she has already turned it inward. She might be more focused on feeling badly about herself, more than being angry with the person who said it.

I don’t think of the word “tubby” as endearing in any way. It’s not as bad as “fat” but it’s in no way a charming description. Maybe a not-so-bad description could have been “she’s a large woman” or “she’s on the stocky side” but “tubby” is hard to describe as nice in any way.

Depending on how long the email was, the boss could take the route of if you have so much time to send these non-work emails back and forth, you have too much free time, or you are spending too much company time on non-work things.

Karma, suck it up & whatever happens, happens.

@jca I agree. Tubby is not endearing in any way to me. It sounds sloppy fat to me.

Teletubbies are cute, although I used to want to massacre them with big knives, i’ve moved on since.

It’s hard to imagine how this guy is going to salvage his reputation in the eyes of the boss. It seems like sending an email such as this one would portray his true colors, and makes him seem petty. Also, it shows him as spreading his negative opinions among other workers, which is not good, either. When we’re at work, we’re supposed to be concentrating on work, not people’s body sizes.

I want to add some additional thoughts to this event. I am a “boss” of my company and I know without any direct knowledge of this that my employees all talk about me behind my back. I accept that as part of the territory of being their boss and I know a lot of that talk is probably not flattering either. Having thought about how I would react over seeing an errant email of an employee making fun of my weight or in my case my eyesight….I would feel hurt for a brief moment and then brush it off and for the moment not say or do a thing. I then know I have the upper hand over said employee and might even relish in making them sweat for a few days and give that employee time to do or say something to me about their mistake.

The bigger black mark that employee has on his record is he made a really stupid error on the job that brings scrutiny to his on the job e-mail acumen. If he sent an email to the boss by mistake….what if this was sent by error to a customer? Has this happened before?

That would be my biggest concern and the main topic of my talk with this employee because of this mistake of his.

@Cruiser That’s what I meant by the lack of judgment. Almost everyone has sent an email or text accidently that they wish they hadn’t. I try not to risk mean content getting to the wrong person by accident, especially in a work environment. Even if the text had gone to the right person it is now in writing and can be forwarded.

It’s a tough pill to take (I know, I’ve had to learn it the hard way), but a simple, direct and face-to-face—I emphasize face to face—apology is the only way to handle it. Hurt feelings may well ensure, but as the saying goes, “This too shall pass.”

I definitely think the person should apologize, I have been there and I didn’t, and it still haunts me to this day whether the person overheard me.

I was at work talking to a friend and I said. “X Woman would sell her own grandmother to get ahead here.” only to find that X Woman was sitting in my boss’ office with the door open, which my desk was right outside the door of. I never knew whether she heard it or not. She never let on.

Today went well without any discomfort. Boss even bought lunch for the whole office. So she must be overlooking the text.

She bought lunch so as to fatten you all up, then she’ll blend in :)

@chyna I would take that as a clear signal that she know fully what happened and is sending a message that even bosses and hopefully their employees can rise above uncomfortable moments.

If I were the boss, I would tell the guy when he gets his new job, he should use his work time working. Tubby, fat, or beautiful aside, he wasn’t working. That would leave me miffed. If he followed with apology and promise, I would give him the chance to prove his worth.

My guess is that she hasn’t decided what to do with him yet.

Maybe the lunch was a “farewell” lunch for the guy who made the text, it’s just that no one knows it was the final lunch for the guy who is going to get fired.

Been 3 days.

Anything new? @chyna?

Boss is overly nice to the guy. Keep in mind these are doctors. They can’t be fired unless they kill someone and then it usually has to be at least 2 people.~

Wow.
It’s down to 2? ~