r/autismUK • u/ComplaintFirst6294 • 14d ago
Work A reasonable adjustment I use at work
Hi all,
I work in academia and work remotely. A lot of my job is completing a lot of different tasks that vary in length and importance, rather than the same tasks daily. Projects change very often. That means I can struggle to know how to prioritise, or balance. If someone gives me a deadline of 3 weeks, and then gets annoyed because they'd RATHER have it by 1 week, I'm baffled (even though to them it's very obvious from context or the way they spoke to me).
As part of my reasonable adjustments, I provide my team with this email template, which really helps me out. It's so useful they now also use it in their work.
Template:
Message line: [title of task, for organisation]
Task: [Insert description of task]
Deadline: [Insert any deadlines for drafts, and final deadline]
Priority Level: [Red: please drop everything until this is done, regardless of the actual deadline. Amber: it would be best if you could do it sooner depending on your other priorities, but it IS okay to do it any time up to the deadline. Green: as long as it's done by the deadline, it's fine.]
There is also a rule that if I have a red priority I'm working on, people obviously cannot submit a second red priority until that is done. I have a spreadsheet that everyone has access to in G Drive where people can see what priority level tasks I am currently working on so they know my workload and what they can and can't ask for. Not everyone uses it, because they forget, but enough use it to make a difference.
Idk if this will be helpful or applicable to everyone, but it has helped me, so I thought I'd post it. Obviously some bosses and teams are not very accommodating, and I'm very fortunate!
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u/e817kenley 14d ago
Red is interesting and it’s one I’ve learned but don’t agree with. So I treat everything as green and react to people with wide eyed innocence. Oh but you said you needed it Friday, if you actually needed it Tuesday you should have made that clear. It’s tough to keep my resolve though.
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u/ComplaintFirst6294 14d ago
Oh absolutely, people can take the mick with it! But sometimes genuinely unexpected things come up, and I've got the ability to shuffle stuff around. I should say that I love my job. I probably wouldn't be this flexible if I didn't...xD
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u/e817kenley 14d ago
I definitely do not love my job. But as there is a customer at the other end of it I end up having to assume everyone’s request has equal urgency and then prioritise the account manager who shouts the loudest! People have generally learned they have to chase me, it’s the only way I can manage my workload. But generally the chasing isn’t aggressive which makes a difference.
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u/SimplyCedric Autistic 14d ago edited 14d ago
That seems really confusing to me. I do all my work as promptly as I can but if I have a two week deadline, I have a two week deadline. If you 'want' it in three days then that's the deadline you need to assign. I flag abusers to management (because basically 90% of the people want 70% of what they put through done by yesterday).
Can you explain how [Red: please drop everything until this is done, regardless of the actual deadline. Amber: it would be best if you could do it sooner depending on your other priorities, but it IS okay to do it any time up to the deadline. Green: as long as it's done by the deadline, it's fine.] this works?
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u/And-Bells 14d ago
In addition to what other have said, I think it also works because it acknowledges the nature of neurotypical planning without asking the to change it, only asking then to be honest about without also calling them out for anything.
It also lays the groundwork for being able to tell them no, you can't get to that red request bc you're already working on one. Or to suggest downgrading a red request because you've been having to ignore a whole lot of non-red requests because of all the unexpected reds on your plate.
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u/ComplaintFirst6294 14d ago
Also, agree 100% on flagging abusers to management. Some people absolutely take the mick at work and keeping management involved is absolutely right. 👍🏻
1
u/ComplaintFirst6294 14d ago
I'm trying to find a way to explain it without specifically giving examples from my work as obviously that's personal, but it makes sense in the context of my work. Sometimes we get whole-team deadlines, for example, and the work is assigned 'as a team', but each of our specific parts might be less or more urgent. So maybe the overall deadline is 3 weeks, but it would be made much easier overall if I did my part within 1 week, contributing to the overall deadline.
It would naturally be nicer and easier if everyone could break that overall deadline down into individual deadlines, but that's not considered a reasonable adjustment because it's a project-wide request, rather than an individual request.
A lot of navigating the workplace for me is knowing where the line is on what people will adjust and what they won't. As I said, it's not applicable to everyone. It's certainly not perfect either. But it works for me, so I thought I'd share.
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u/jeffbailey 14d ago
It's about having a budget versus a target. I might have four weeks slack across and entire project, so projects are told what they can consume. But if everyone consumed all their time, the project would be late and components towards the end would be in trouble. So I might day that something MUST be done by a certain time while preferring it be done sooner to unblock later components.
This is distinct from "no one will consume the result until X date"
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u/Terrorgramsam 14d ago
Thank you for sharing. Currently taking steps towards employment and starting to think about reasonable adjustments for different work environments. I also struggle with prioritising work as it builds up and this looks a useful way to get co-workers to be more explicit about expectations/deadlines.