This is why God made the delegate function in Outlook.

Hm, set the "Reply To:" field to Professor T?

Ah, so you work in the social sciences, then?

(Hint: The easier way to do it was that the professor could have sent the damn email himself, since it was going to his own colleagues!)

I had a manager whose idea of managing was:

Me: we need X done.

Manager: could you take care of it?

And anything that went wrong was my fault, of course.

You should submit your story to Dilbert; it might show up in a cartoon some day. :)

People used to do this all the time when I was in grad school. Things like:

"Dear Secretary: Can you please forward this to the list? thanks"

and once a quarter she would send out an email saying something like "you know, it's one step less if you just email the list yourself. Yeah, you Dr. distinguished prof."

But still none of them would get it.

This morning I got to watch a professor at the local college spend 10 minutes trying to make a single copy. I told her, "This is why god invented grad students." I had to wait another 5 minutes waiting for her to stop laughing.

Now you should circulate a memo regarding e-mail etiquette, and schedule a meeting to update the standards and practices manual to reflect the changes.

Then you should email everyone the updated manual and solicit their comments.

Via email.

Next time try: Email Prof X directly at Prof X @ xxx.edu.

If you're lucky, 4 out 10 will do it right and you'd only have to forward the other 6.

People don't read.

No, see, it's even easier than that. There's an email address that's basically allfaculty@univ.edu. All Professor T. had to do was send his request to that address, and they could have responded directly to him.

And it's not like they're more likely to respond to *me* -- most of them have no idea who I am.

Ah, but as you well know this has to do with status.

Need I say more?

(You have my sympathies as I have managed email lists before.)

^^ Bunnyfire is 100% correct.

I've had a million things like this happen in years of working administrative jobs.

It doesn't matter one whit if it takes three times as long that way.

I am both happy and sad that my boss is kinda computer illiterate. Happy because it makes me look very competent when I can manage to do something semi-basic. Sad, because it means I do almost everything computer related, even if I don't know the exact answer (see: all my previous job-related Ask MeCha posts from April 2008 to now).

One thing I do hate is when she asks me to re-send her something I'd sent previously because she doesn't have it in the Outlook list that's visible. Sometimes, it's stuff I sent her just two hours ago. Thankfully, I'm able to spend time cleaning my Inbox so I know where everything is and where it should go.

Wow... I guess I needed to vent a little. I've been working on a Photoshop project for her since I got in at 9:30 am, I'm nowhere near done, and I only took a half an hour for lunch at 5:30 pm. I think I'll be at this for another two hours at least.

*sigh*

(I guess I'm not done with this topic)

One thing about being an admin or exec assistant that I'm just now getting to realize is that because I get every phone call and have access to every email (I know her login password), I am literally in charge of knowing what she's supposed to be doing every day and when things need to be done. Phrases and metaphors that keep running through my head is that I am half of her brain and she can't function without me. Or if she did decide to let me go one day, it would take her a HELL of a long time to get back up to speed with another assistant.

It's a small comforting thing to think about when I look at the real estate market reports that keep coming out and read about the state of our economy.

Don't worry. Soon we will have shuffled the pre-email generation off into comfortable "Emeritus" positions, whereupon we will send them important amendments to their medical & retirement plans... by email. In small type.

One thing I do hate is when she asks me to re-send her something I'd sent previously because she doesn't have it in the Outlook list that's visible.

Haha, I used to get phone calls like this when I worked at a law firm. I wish they had a one semester basic computing course in every professional field.

Please tell that person that I am not talking to that I am not talking to her.

Put him in the To: field and Bcc: ALLFACULTY. This is possible from virtually any e-mail client, which things like changing "Reply To:" may not be.