Background:

The large window a.c. in a common area of the office where I work broke a couple of weeks ago. The associate director ("S") asked the building maintenance/super to replace it. So far the a.c. has not been replaced. I have emailed the super numerous times (on my own and also when S. has asked me to) -- the building has roughly 14 floors and he is the super for the entire building. The super told me that the a.c. was ordered, but is lost in transit, or is taking longer than anticipated to arrive, I have relayed that info to S. I have also asked twice for a smaller unit to be installed in the interim. (The super offered this option as a solution.) That has also not been done. The Executive Director has also asked the super when this a.c. will be installed. There is a window a.c. unit in S.'s office (actually every office has it's own window a.c.) -- but this is in a common supply/break room area -- no one works in that space.

This afternoon in a staff meeting S. asked me what was the status of the a.c. I was literally in a meeting all morning (from 9am) until the meeting started (at 1pm). I said, "I have been in a meeting all morning, but I can email [super] again after this. Maybe you could send him an email because he's not responding to me."

At that time I was told by S. that "when I am told to do something S. expects me to do it" and after the meeting I was pulled aside (by S.) and told not to talk back to S. at which time I tried to explain that I thought that since my emails were basically being ignored by the super, that it may be more effective to have someone higher up (the associate director) send an email about it. In response I was told to cc S. on the next email I send to the super.

So what say you of the Org - do you think me asking S. to email the super was talking back or not?

Disclaimer: My main responsibility is to manage the company's financials and prepare for their audit; which is what I was doing all morning in my meeting.

that sounds petty, isn't this about getting the job done not "power play"

sucks

Yeah, it sucks. I'd forward a copy of every single e-mail I'd originally sent to the super to this S. person, I usually hang on to e-mails a long time. Hopefully, they'd get the point.

cc s every time you communicate outside of your job description, if you aren't giving your boss shyt, that way you know you got back-up.

I don't think you were talking back at all.

But I probably would have phrased it differently. I'd have said "There has been no response as of _____ this morning." Rather than vollunteering to find out after the meeting and asking S to also email. He might've taken the way you said it, which was fine, as you having not keeping on top of it.

I dunno. People can be dicks at work for no reason. S. is probably just sweaty and irritated.