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The ethics of juggling lockdown with children

Thursday 19 August, 2021
by BFSO 2021 Young Ambassador

You’re currently working with a colleague who you have a strong relationship with on a fast-paced project. They’ve confided in you that they’ve been struggling recently managing their workload and their increased caring duties at home during lock-down.

In the past week you’ve identified that the colleague has been cutting corners in their components of the project. When you suggest they flag their time pressures with their leader, they respond that ‘I really believe it’s going to be good enough to get through in these challenging times’.

Your manager has called you in to get a weekly update on the project that you feel is coming in at sub- par. You feel near enough isn’t good enough and you’re not sure what you’ll say in the update to your manager.

Do you let your leader know that your colleague is struggling and betray their confidence, correct their work and sacrifice your own wellbeing, or allow the sub-par outputs to be delivered?

What would you do?

  • What considerations would you give to this dilemma? 

We challenge you to create a healthy discussion with your colleagues and post a comment below. You could even encourage them to consider taking The Banking and Financial Services Oath! If you would like to submit an ethical dilemma to feature in an upcoming weekly challenge please email: dilemma@bfso.org.

 Photo by Jessica Lewis on Unsplash

Comments

There are 2 comments for The ethics of juggling lockdown with children.

Re: The ethics of juggling lockdown with children

Friday 20 August, 2021
by Greg
For me the root cause needs to be addressed, the colleague is struggling so we need to get some scaffolding around them to enable them to juggle both work and home.
And I’d tell the boss that there are some folks in the team (non-identified) struggling right now. They may also wish to address this situation because it’s unlikely to only be one person across the organisation who feels like this.

Re: The ethics of juggling lockdown with children

Saturday 21 August, 2021
by David
If it’s well-being that is my concern, then I can’t assume the subpar work being produced by my colleague and the juggling of homeschooling isn’t also effecting their well-being. I would go back to my colleague and talk with them about lightening the load through lockdown and informing their leader. Best to be transparent here then hide the stresses and produce subpar work which could have negative consequences down the road.

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