Polite Paradise

I'd definitely say something to your secretary.  Something along the lines of 'Could you please check and correct the spelling of my name.  It's M.E.L.I.S.S.A.  Thanks."  And I do wonder whether that misspelling is contributing to the others.  So if they are writing "Melassa want to confirm your 9.00 am conference call" or the sig block is 'Secretary to Melassa Brown' then that may not help. 

For the others, trickier.  A name tag?  Ask them to call you a derivative of your name 'It's Mel, actually.' ?

Or a very blunt "My name is actually spelt M.E.L.I.S.S.A.  Just making sure you get it right because other wise paperwork has been muddled up."

Or go for the "I prefer Ms/ Mrs/ Miss/ Empress/ Dr/ Prof.  Fork Knife."

'Listen, can you have a look at your spellchecker? I know you know my name is Melissa, but for some reason everything you send me comes up wrong, like the system's overwriting you. You know how much that sort of thing bugs after a while...'

And believe me, I hear you. For surname, I use my maiden name and my married name, double barrelled. The chance of me getting both spelled correctly in an official document? Slim to None.

This is dumb, I know. But I need help!

I have a common, phonetically spelled name. People frequently misspell my name in a way that makes no sense to me. Think - my name is Melissa, and people spell it Melassa. I know it’s a little thing, but it’s a big pet peeve for me.

The most common offenders are my secretary, a vendor I work with (I’m technically their client), and one of my clients.

Is there anything I can say to correct them that won’t seem petty?

I once said “It’s “Melissa,” actually” to a coworker who kept misspelling it and that didn’t go over great.

What happened? It's hard to imagine how that innocuous correction could be taken poorly!

My name is often misspelled a lot as well. If it's a one-time communication, I just let it slide.

If it's someone I'm going to be corresponding with a lot, I generally just say something like, "FYI, my name is spelled CatsNCorgis, not CatsAndCorgis." Whoever it is usually apologizes and I tell them it happens a lot, no worries. Someone who reacts poorly to a gentle FYI is probably just a jerk.

Thanks all.

The past experience that went poorly:
I was exchanging emails with a woman who works at my company, but who I didn’t know prior to the email exchange/have never met. She spelled my name wrong in each email. So after maybe the 6th or 7th time that day, I included “(it’s Melissa actually)” in my response.  And then I got back an email that just said “Ok.” It’s hard to read tone over email but it felt pretty dismissive/annoyed in context (like, all her other emails were long and had greetings and sign offs; this was pretty curt).

No big deal - I don’t know her and we didn’t end up interacting again, and it’s not like she had a fit or something.  But I always want to avoid awkward interactions if I can.

To be honest, part of the issue is that I’m in a fairly senior role in an industry where women in my role are often assumed to be ****. So I work really hard to not give off that vibe, and I overthink situations like this. (Whereas in my personal life, I don’t really care if someone misinterprets an innocuous email/comment from me).

Anyway, following the advice here, I gave it a shot with my secretary. She sent me an email this afternoon that started with “Melassa.” I thanked her effusively for the thing she sent me and then said - btw, it’s spelled “Melissa.” No response from her for the last hour, which is super unusual. But trying not to overthink this one.

I think some people tend to respond defensively when they are called on something where they KNOW they are wrong. Like.... I sometimes have that urge too, and try to tamp it down. I also saw it all the time in customer service. If someone does something and is corrected they feel embarrassed and dumb, so in their mind they think of it as "you made me feel stupid." But I feel like most people, even if they are curt/silent right afterwards, will get over it. They'll realize "My coworker corrected the spelling of her name" is absolutely NOT something where they have any ground to feel hurt or offended.

I guess what I'm saying is, yeah, I think some of the time there's going to be an initial "eh" reaction, but even most people who react that way are going to get over it pretty quickly and not like, hold a grudge forever.

Agreed. And besides, nice people feel bad when they make a mistake like that. (As they should - a little. Not forever, but a little).

Sometimes they're just quiet for a bit because they want to go off and bang their head on the desk. It's okay to let them do that, and just move forward with the next encounter.

Gently, you aren’t being a **** by politely but firmly telling people what your name is. You’re being professional. If people call you a **** because of that, the problem is theirs. And my experience is that as a woman in any type of authority role, you’ll be called a **** by someone regardless of what you do.