Posted by noa on April 11, 2003, at 22:56:21
In reply to Re: The other shoe (long) » noa, posted by Dinah on April 11, 2003, at 20:29:42
Dinah, thanks for asking. Yes, I had my meeting--thanks for remembering.
I am fine. Just confused and angry. I was offered a full time job (I have been askinf for full time hours for years), but it will have me straddling two different departments, meaning I'd have to manage two sets of crazy managers!]
On paper the job description is pretty good. They definitly wrote it with my strengths in mind (and weaknesses because they got real specific about deadlines!!hehe!!)
But there are a lot of issues for me that I still have to sort out.
First of all, I am so fucking mad I don't know if I can stay there. I cannot believe how badly they treated my colleague/friend for no good reason. they are wrong on so many levels about their criticism of her and morally wrong to have kicked while she was down. Not only that but in my meeting today it was revealed that there is actually an opening happening in one of the departments I will straddle--a full time opening that my friend is fully qualified for and would have done a great job at. I just cannot understand how they can let her go! I just don't understand it. Why, out of the blue is there this sudden poorly defined criticism of her that is baseless and undocumented and they say they let her go because of financial cut backs, not for cause, and if that is the case, they should be offering her this other position or at least allowing her to apply for it. I just don't understand.
How can I work there without speaking my mind? I don't trust their judgment or their morals or ethics.
There will be 2 managers to deal with (plus more, but first layer next to me is these 2). One is in the deparment I am already in. But the other half of my job would be in the other department. The people there are so miserable with their manager, and he would be directly supervising me. This is the one I mentioned before who is passive agressive and an idiot (that's a technical term, btw) and hasn't the first clue about supervising. And is underhanded and mean and vindictive and stupid!
If I had more money in my account than just barely next month's morgtgage, I would resign. But the chances of me securing another job before I have to respond to them about this one are pretty small.
At best, I would accept it and think of it as one year (contracts are year by year begining July 1), during which I would be looking elsewhere. But I am just having the hardest time imagining working in a professional and pleasant manner with them because I cannot beleive they did what they did. Like I said I don't trust their judgment if they can be so cruel and so stupid to let her go. Stupid! because they don't know what they are losing! And just so bad because of their treating her like discardable trash! It would be different, somewhat, if there really was no other position to place her in, but they have apparently already started interviewing from the outside for the position that is opening up (because they fired someone else who was ready to leave anyway).
I am so disappointed. I am so angry. I am so confused.
I am fine. I am functioning normally, but so angry and sad.
Today in my meeting I was pretty glum, and couldn't really react the way a person might when being offered full time position. I tried to ask a few questions about the job description, and their answers were just wacko because they weren't understanding what I was asking. They answered in a way that clearly tells me they were hearing my questions through this expectation that I (and my colleagues) think unprofessionally and not in team spirit and like we don't want to really work and put in the effort that is needed to do the job right. I'll give an example. Because of the cutbacks, they are combining roles and tasks so that there are more items on my job description than there would have been before--kind of like 1.5 jobs. So I asked if they had envisioned in their minds how execution of the roles and tasks would work given the increase in workload for everyone. I was not asking a rhetorical question! I even said that after their first responses because they answered as though my question was rhetorical and argumentative about the decision to load up job descriptions. So I then also said that I am fine with the idea that the increase in load was happening, I understood why, etc. etc. and my question was not meant to challenge that at all. I said I just was asking that as they had done their strategic planning had they had the opportunity to envision how this all would be succesfully implemented given that it was a significant change? Ie, coudl they share with me any thougths they had about implementation?
They did not get what I was asking and responded again with answers that implied that I would need to think professionally and make it work. One of them even gave as an example that the day before she had to sacrifice her personal plans for the evening to get some work accomplished. Well, that was simply insulting to me. So I calmly said that I wasn't asking about what I would have to sacrifice, but more about how the programs and projects would change. I didn't wait for an answer at that point, and simply said, "you know what? I'm afraid that I am not succeeding in articulating my question in a way that leads to your undersanding what I'm intending, so I'm goign to hold my questions for now and think more about how to articulate them.
Then I said, "I'm sorry I'm not being more cheerful but you understand that the past couple of days have been extremely rough." and they both nodded and said they understood.
I was downright distant and glum in this meeting. I did not smile, I don't think. I was matter of fact as I could be. I asked a couple of logistical questions about the job and about the process and timeline, etc. But I was so cold.
I didn't know any other way to be, really. I'm not a good poker player.
I don't know what to do. I am not in a financial position to leave. And I would miss a lot about working there, really, despite all the problems. I am mad at them for that, too. They changed the place in my mind. There were always problems with suprvisors that enraged me but now it is at a whole new level.
I am taking some vacation leave this week and will have some time to think about it all.
At least I'm not very impulsive, I guess.
poster:noa
thread:218303
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20030407/msgs/218684.html