I know everyone has a moment like this with their bosses, but it doesn't make it feel any better when it happens...

I was asked to put together a report for one of our employees, a summary report for his 401K account. Cool. I like doing the HR part of my job better than any other, and I don't get to do it as often as I'd like.

So I put the report together, using numbers from a previously approved report that I had created, and gave it to the employee and walked him through where the numbers came from and what they meant. I was feeling pretty good.

My boss called me into his office..."Can I get a copy of what you gave him?" Sure, no problem (I'm thinking to put in the records). I bring in another copy of the report and a copy of the report I pulled the numbers from. He reviews my numbers, walks through them with me, determines I was completely right in what I'd done...then asks that in future I make sure to run anything like this by him before giving it to the employees.

IT WAS JUST A SIMPLE SUMMARY REPORT, WHY DOES THAT NEED HIS APPROVAL???

My vindication? I caught some mistakes on a report of his this morning. Maybe he doesn't think I'm incompetent, maybe he's just thinking "It's very easy to make a mistake, even on something simple." At least I hope that's what the thought process was....