Friday, March 30, 2007

Can you just keep your big fucking mouth shut for once?

Cripes. What the fuck is wrong with me? Two weeks into the job and I'm making waves already.

I've always been pretty good at making waves. Not intentionally, mind you. But make them I do. If I see something wrong, I tend to bring it up. And I bring it up again. And again. And again until usually something is done about it (and I piss off the entire universe in the process).

Two weeks. Two weeks and I'm INADVERTENTLY bringing up problems.

But I see deficits! I see problems! I'm having a hard time getting my work done because of these gaps!! So, I ask questions to fill the gaps. And I get answers that I'm just not so thrilled with, or satisfied, or, most importantly, able to use to get my work done. So I continue to ask, probe, prod, and instigate.

Flashback: one of my worst experiences was with my first job out of UG. I worked in a dean's office for a demoted dean (OK, he had issues to start with) doing analysis. I was 23, fresh of out college, and working a secretarial job with increasing responsibilities (yay). However, this dean kept driving me crazy with his freaking nit-picky insanity. And overall he was just an academic crumudgeon.

Well, I got fed up with it and started to make notice of the things he was doing wrong: unwarranted poor performance reviews, snarky comments, and general peskiness (which I could document). Luckily other deans were behind me in this to validate my points, but I ended up quitting because of the jerk anyway.

Well, a week after I quit I learned that they had completely moved this pesky person OFF OF THE FLOOR and put him in some rather menial position. I guess I was the bottleneck in the way, and once I quit because of his sour disposition, they were able to make a move. But, of course, as far as he was concerned, I was the culprit (they targeted my complaints as the reason they finally got fed up, which is probably true, but mine was only a drip in the total bucket of complaint water).

Anyway, speed up to this week -- our team has doubled in one month, going from a 4-5 person team to a large team with half of the people completely new to the company. We're all senior level, so we know our functional skills. But still, each workplace needs a workflow and method.

Well, it's a little lacking in the current job. What I do is both art and science. The team was previously artists, and now half the folks are more scientific in their approaches. So we're screaming for some order, some methodology, some processes.

But the boss, in today's meeting, seemed a little aggravated. I'm super sensitive about these things, so I may be making more of it than necessary. I just feel bad for calling a meeting to discuss (and resolve) the deficits I see, and instead I heard some defensive push-back and a very faint message to toe-the-line. Maybe the toe-the-line message wasn't really there, but I *FELT* it based on some of the boss's comments.

And I feel bad for making waves.

So, Monday I'm going to go in and produce. OK, no real processes (at least that I'm used to). It's more an "every woman for herself" mentality. I can do that. It's OK. It's just a pain to recreate the wheel (but I've done it enough taht I can do it now).

Still, I'm feeling weird and uncomfortable about it. Not angry at the boss; more just feeling bad for making him angry (or stressed or whatever).

~sigh~

As for knitty news, I'm halfway done with sock #2 of Cake Walk. It's a simple ribbed, toe-up sock, and I'm loving it. I'm starting to think about next projects. I'm loving the socks, but I'm itching to knit something else. Maybe the mitred square blanket, maybe a garment. Not sure. Gotta think on that one.

2 comments:

NeedleTart said...

I quit, too. As an underpaid aide, I kept asking the teacher if she was sure she wanted to teach her class that "Slaves weren't allowed to read because if they could read, the Constitution says that slavery is illegal and there would be trouble." Now she wants me to sub in her room "Because I know so much."

Susan said...

That sounds like my problem too. These days I try really hard to keep my mouth shut but it makes me sulky and bitchy so when I finally inevitably do speak up I just sound like I'm whining and crabby. Do not, repeat, DO NOT devolve to this approach. Yours is better. Remember, people hate to change. Maybe try the "Hey, I have an idea. Let's try this this way just once and see if we like it," approach. Keeping your mouth shut only works so long. Eventually you open it or you become so disgruntled you have to leave.