employee is an emotional rollercoaster and her coworker can’t take it

A reader writes:

I’m a manager of a four-person team, on which I was previously an individual contributor. The four team members work in cubes in an open office area and my office is down a nearby hall. We’re a casual office, and the team generally gets along well. While each person has their own accounts and tasks, they interact with each other throughout the day, chatting and discussing work.

The issue is two members of the team, Peach and Daisy. Peach is very open with her mental health struggles and is an open book on most anything but can be emotionally volatile. Daisy, who sits next to Peach, tells me that Peach is constantly on an emotional rollercoaster. She says Peach complains often — about her life and about work. Peach is a single mom and often complains about being overwhelmed at home. She comments out loud if she’s having a bad day, doesn’t feel good, or if someone on another team annoys her. One minute she’s up and enthusiastic, and the next she is upset and complaining. In our one-on-ones, Daisy has said that she’s exhausted by the ups and downs and feels that she has to be Peach’s emotional support all day.

I have given Peach feedback in the past about keeping a positive attitude and leaving her problems at the door and as far as what I personally witness, she has improved. So the complaints from Daisy, while not completely surprising, are out of proportion to what I have observed since I don’t sit in the office with them all day.

I have encouraged Daisy to speak to Peach directly and tell her how the complaining is affecting her. I’ve suggested all three of us sitting down together so I can facilitate a conversation. Daisy has not been receptive to this but continues to complain to me.

I don’t want Daisy to be miserable but I’m unsure of the best way to tackle this. Do I sit down with Peach and discipline her in some way? Do I force Daisy to confront Peach, either with or without me? These two genuinely like each other and I’m sure we all would like to preserve the working friendship they have, but I don’t feel that I can let this go unaddressed.

I have a bunch of questions:

* Can you sit in their area for a couple of days so that you’re observing things firsthand? It sounds like you don’t think it’s as bad as Daisy is reporting, and this would give you more data to know for sure. You’d need to be open to the possibility that Peach might clean it up while you’re there — but it sounds like she might do this so reflexively that she couldn’t sustain that for a full day or two, and you could ask Daisy if her perception was different during that period.

* Can you rearrange how people are seated so that Peach is less disruptive? I’m guessing not, but you should absolutely try that if you can.

* Where are the other two team members in this? Do they disagree that Peach’s complaining is excessive? Are they not bothered because they don’t sit as close to Peach as Daisy does? Do they wear headphones so they don’t hear it? What’s their take on the situation?

* Can Daisy wear headphones at least some of the time to give herself a break?

* What exactly is Daisy hoping you’ll do? It’s worth asking her that directly. I don’t blame her for not taking you up on the facilitated conversation with you, her, and Peach — I probably wouldn’t in her shoes either — but if she’s refusing to address it with Peach herself but still complaining to you regularly, that’s not reasonable either. I’m interested in knowing exactly what she’d like you to do, and it’s worth asking her. (That doesn’t mean you should necessarily do whatever she says she wants. But you might get interesting insight from posing the question directly.)

If Peach’s complaining and emotional volatility is still excessive (which hopefully you can find out for sure with some sustained observation), you have a responsibility to the rest of the team to address it, because that’s exhausting to work around. But that’s not about disciplining her! It’s about having a discussion with her (maybe discussions, plural) where you establish better norms for working in close proximity to other people, including not dumping complaints on them or vocalizing more than occasional minor irritations. It’s appropriate for you to coach her on that as her manager, and for the sake of the rest of your team, you may have to.

One other thing: Daisy says she feels she needs to be Peach’s emotional support. That’s something you need to coach Daisy on, because the fact that she feels that way is making the problem worse. The problem is starting with Peach so you don’t want to put it all on Daisy, but Daisy needs to develop better coping strategies, which include getting comfortable with actively not being Peach’s emotional support. You probably need to coach her on specifically what that looks like, including things like not feeling obligated to respond at all when Peach is complaining.

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