Wasting Valuable Human Resources
Sep. 12th, 2007 12:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thessalianYesterday didn't go particularly well towards the end...
I'll begin with about a fortnight ago, when I got called into my line manager's office and told that I really ought to email the people I do my PA work for to let them know that I have done the things they've asked me to do. Now, as someone who's pretty used to working on her own initiative, that's somewhat counter-intuitive - surely my employers, who laud my technical skills and proactivity, should trust that I am going to do what they ask of me, and that I will pass along any details of that as are appropriate but otherwise will just get on with the work. However, as I was asked to start confirming that I was doing my job regularly, I did as requested, sending emails confirming that a task was done when a task was done. What else was there to do?
Cue two weeks later - yesterday. The day started off pretty normally. There were tasks. I did them. I emailed people to let them know that the tasks were done when the tasks were done. I pried some information out of my just-back-from-holiday line manager, who seemed happy to see me and content that things were well and under control. Matters progressed throughout the day until I had nothing much left to do.
Then my line manager walks in, looking really subdued, and informing me that I have to report to Personnel. It's never a good thing when one has to report to Personnel. Honestly, though, I thought it was something to do with my apparently missing Occupational Health form that was posted to the Royal Free but may, I suspect, have been lost owing to the postal strikes that were happening at the time I sent it. So I wasn't particularly worried, but there was a little bit of trepidation about how my formerly smiley and personable line manager wouldn't even look at me on the way down to Personnel, much less talk to me. It wasn't that 'I am very disappointed in you; you have done a bad bad thing' silence, though, so I didn't think much of it.
Basically, it was a 'walking the last mile' thing, as I discovered when I sat down in the Personnel Director's office and said Personnel Director told me that, while my technical skills were brilliant, I wasn't communicating to the senior managers enough in terms of what I was getting done, so they weren't renewing my probation period and I might as well leave the building and the job right then.
Long story short: despite the fact that I get my job done and do so quite well, because I work on my own initiative and have only recently started flooding my senior managers' email in-boxes with pithy emails telling them that yes, I have done my job, I got sacked.
My line manager was horrified and apparently very surprised. No one else knew a damn thing about it, to judge by the reaction of the one person I got to say good-bye to. I seriously doubt whether my senior managers know a damn thing about this, to judge from their emails to me yesterday (boy, are they in for a shock). And frankly, it makes no sense. Ask me to do a thing right towards the end of my probation period, and then don't extend the probation period to make absolutely sure it's going according to plan, with an employee that they've admitted is a fantastic PA? Of course, it's possible that they just want to revisit the payband on that role and can't do that as effectively when someone's in the role on a permanent basis, but on the whole, I'm just not going to bother doing the conspiracy theory thing.
There's also, of course, the little matter of now being unemployed. Again. I've got my last paycheque coming in (including payment in lieu for the annual leave I never took and I wonder if I'm supposed to be getting notice - that never became clear but generally speaking one gets at least some notice period before the sacking, though admittedly that might be different in a probation period) so that's a month's worth of leeway, and with everyone going back to uni and stuff, there should be some temp roles kicking about the place. Today, however, is a mental health day. I just can't face the idea of bouncing right back up and ringing agencies today. Too much stress and confusion and argh.
Instead, I'm going to find something that vaguely resembles lunch, sit down in front of Buffy or something for a couple of hours and pull out Transmetropolitan. Spider Jerusalem really helps at times like these.
I'll begin with about a fortnight ago, when I got called into my line manager's office and told that I really ought to email the people I do my PA work for to let them know that I have done the things they've asked me to do. Now, as someone who's pretty used to working on her own initiative, that's somewhat counter-intuitive - surely my employers, who laud my technical skills and proactivity, should trust that I am going to do what they ask of me, and that I will pass along any details of that as are appropriate but otherwise will just get on with the work. However, as I was asked to start confirming that I was doing my job regularly, I did as requested, sending emails confirming that a task was done when a task was done. What else was there to do?
Cue two weeks later - yesterday. The day started off pretty normally. There were tasks. I did them. I emailed people to let them know that the tasks were done when the tasks were done. I pried some information out of my just-back-from-holiday line manager, who seemed happy to see me and content that things were well and under control. Matters progressed throughout the day until I had nothing much left to do.
Then my line manager walks in, looking really subdued, and informing me that I have to report to Personnel. It's never a good thing when one has to report to Personnel. Honestly, though, I thought it was something to do with my apparently missing Occupational Health form that was posted to the Royal Free but may, I suspect, have been lost owing to the postal strikes that were happening at the time I sent it. So I wasn't particularly worried, but there was a little bit of trepidation about how my formerly smiley and personable line manager wouldn't even look at me on the way down to Personnel, much less talk to me. It wasn't that 'I am very disappointed in you; you have done a bad bad thing' silence, though, so I didn't think much of it.
Basically, it was a 'walking the last mile' thing, as I discovered when I sat down in the Personnel Director's office and said Personnel Director told me that, while my technical skills were brilliant, I wasn't communicating to the senior managers enough in terms of what I was getting done, so they weren't renewing my probation period and I might as well leave the building and the job right then.
Long story short: despite the fact that I get my job done and do so quite well, because I work on my own initiative and have only recently started flooding my senior managers' email in-boxes with pithy emails telling them that yes, I have done my job, I got sacked.
My line manager was horrified and apparently very surprised. No one else knew a damn thing about it, to judge by the reaction of the one person I got to say good-bye to. I seriously doubt whether my senior managers know a damn thing about this, to judge from their emails to me yesterday (boy, are they in for a shock). And frankly, it makes no sense. Ask me to do a thing right towards the end of my probation period, and then don't extend the probation period to make absolutely sure it's going according to plan, with an employee that they've admitted is a fantastic PA? Of course, it's possible that they just want to revisit the payband on that role and can't do that as effectively when someone's in the role on a permanent basis, but on the whole, I'm just not going to bother doing the conspiracy theory thing.
There's also, of course, the little matter of now being unemployed. Again. I've got my last paycheque coming in (including payment in lieu for the annual leave I never took and I wonder if I'm supposed to be getting notice - that never became clear but generally speaking one gets at least some notice period before the sacking, though admittedly that might be different in a probation period) so that's a month's worth of leeway, and with everyone going back to uni and stuff, there should be some temp roles kicking about the place. Today, however, is a mental health day. I just can't face the idea of bouncing right back up and ringing agencies today. Too much stress and confusion and argh.
Instead, I'm going to find something that vaguely resembles lunch, sit down in front of Buffy or something for a couple of hours and pull out Transmetropolitan. Spider Jerusalem really helps at times like these.
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no subject
Date: 2007-09-12 02:38 pm (UTC)Talk about very much sucking!
..now way to appeal it, huh, cause you were on probabtion?
Suck, suck, suck.
*wonders if they were just looking for an excuse so they didn't have to keep you on board* /cynic
no subject
Date: 2007-09-12 02:41 pm (UTC)Aha
Date: 2007-09-12 03:17 pm (UTC)Huge hugs.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-12 03:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-12 10:05 pm (UTC)I hope it doesn't take long for you to find something else.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-12 11:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-13 04:37 am (UTC)So basically, they told you to start communicating better, you do, but instead of them saying "Be a bit more detailed..." they just throw you the fuck out?
*mega-hugs*
J