Coworker Who Always Corrects You? (5 effective Tips)

This article will focus on how to deal with a coworker who always corrects you. It will point out 5 effective ways to do so in an unrude and professional manner. Furthermore, the article will also point out reasons as to why your fellow co worker can’t help himself but to point out your mistakes!

Ways To Deal With A Coworker Who Always Corrects You.

There are a number of ways to deals with a fellow coworker who always corrects you such as:

• Keep Your Cool
• Take Good Advice, Leave The Rest
• Confront Them – Ask Them To Let You Finish The Job
• Inform Upper Management
• Do Quality Work – Don’t Give Others A Chance

Before we look at how to deal with a coworker who just can’t help himself but poke his nose into your work, let us look at reasons why they are so nosy and critical!

A Critical Coworker – 5 Reasons Why

Here are 5 reasons why your coworker is so critical of you:

• They Don’t Like You
• Too Controlling
• Genuine Advice
• Habit
• Too Smart

In this section we will explain why your fellow worker has that irritating habit of always poking their nose into your work and pointing out something they don’t like!

They Don’t Like You

You are mistaken. It is not the work they don’t like but actually you. Your coworker may not like you and that is the reason why they like pointing out the mistakes in your work – obviously because they can’t point out mistakes in you at first because it might cause an outrage amongst others!

People have their ways of bothering others whom they don’t like. One of those ways is to be critical of their work. They may generally point out things they don’t like or things they are actually jealous of. For example, your coworker may be jealous of how you present your work! Hence, whenever they get the chance, they will try and point out something related to your presentation, clothes or how you stand or how you present your work output. They just can’t stand it and want to make you feel bad about yourself.

Sometimes they just don’t like you as a person and they will use anything against you. Hence, they might call you repeatedly to fix not so important things in an article you wrote or the analysis you carried out with regards to a software. Your work may be perfectly fine but they still want you to change it – all for the sake of irritating you!

Too Controlling

Some people are controlling. They actually suffer from this habit and may even be aware of it. They are scared of others doing work for them because they might mess things up. Furthermore, they believe that if they do not interfere at each stage to give constant reminders or instructions then the work will turn out bad.

Hence, they may actually like you and care for you and your work but because they have the habit of supervising each and every detail, they will point out everything that is a concern to them in your work because of the habit they have developed!

Genuine Advice

Some people can’t help but give genuine advice. They will want to make sure work turns out perfectly and will hence find every chance to jump in and guide you! They will monitor you not with the intention of suspicion but to make sure they figure out when you may need help or are going in the wrong direction.

Although this is great in terms of providing guidance and ensuring the job is well done, it does not allow the team members to grow or learn themselves. Coworkers will not learn how to deal with situations where they have produced the wrong output or deal with mistakes or issues in their work because they are always spoon fed the instructions.

In this case, you are not dealing with someone who despises you or is out to get you but someone who genuinely cares about your work and you as well and hence try and give you as much guidance as you need!

Habit

Some people have the habit of correcting others regardless of intentions. They have this innate urge to pick out mistakes even if they are small and ensure work is done perfectly. They don’t take into consideration how this affects the morale of others or if it prevents self learning or not.

Furthermore, these individuals get restless if they cannot comment on your work or point out exactly what bothers them.

Too Smart

In this case, people like being smart – just too smart. They will want others to see how good they are at perfecting the tiny details even if they actually don’t matter or bring in more perspective. They are obsessed with looking the best at the office in terms of their performance and want to stand out – because they believe they are too smart even if they are not in reality.

5 Effective Ways To Deal With A Coworker Who Always Corrects You

Here we will discuss how to deal with coworkers that we described in the previous section!

Keep Your Cool

If the coworker is out to get you then the worst thing you could do is show them you are angry at what they keep on doing. That is what they want! They want you to get annoyed every time they point out a mistake in your work.

The best thing you can do is keep your cool. Don’t let them see how frustrated you are inside or even the fact that you are on to them. Make them feel that you consider this normal and actually appreciate their advice. However, a fun thing to do would be to start ignoring them after sometime. Allow them to come over to your cubicle and talk to you about your work. Once there are with you and have begun their lecturing then start ignoring them. They will probably feel embarrassed.

Take Good Advice, Leave The Rest

There is no harm in taking good advice. If your coworker genuinely cares about you and wants you to do well then listen to what they have to say. You don’t have to implement everything they ask you to do!

This tactic works with coworkers who want you to do well and want the work or task to be done perfectly. They have good intentions but do not realize they can become a little irritating – a lot actually. Hence, take their advice and let them speak. This may actually give you some good tips and improve relations between you and them. In the end, you can discard any suggestions you do not want to implement!

A caring coworker is better than one who doesn’t bother about you at all right?

Confront Them – Ask Them To Let You Finish The Job

If you think enough is enough then confront your coworker. Some coworkers need to be questioned, only then will they back off and leave you alone. Next time they come up to you openly ask them about their habit of constantly giving you advice. Tell them how you feel and that you will not tolerate this anymore. Tell them how you can do your work perfectly fine and that not everyone has to follow their way of work.

Inform Upper Management

Issues between coworkers can go from bad to worse and even become toxic! If you feel your coworkers habits of correcting your work are somewhat resembling any form of harassment, immediately inform upper management. They will tackle the situation without compromising your request.

Do Quality Work – Don’t Give Others A Chance

One of the best ways to avoid the above situations is to do the best work you can so no one has the chance to even comment on it or take out mistakes in it. This way you won’t have to deal with the toxic culture your coworker has created and you will have your peace of mind!

Conclusion

This article explained why a coworker may point out mistakes or concerns in your work by describing various types of coworkers and their intentions. It also highlighted how an individual can deal with such coworkers in an effective manner by outlining 5 methods.

References

https://www.careercontessa.com/advice/toxic-work-environment/