I eventually decided on taking a white collar job in technology. I was hired into a subsidiary of a well known CPG company as an Information Systems Specialist. When I was brought on board, I was told that I would be assisting the head of the IS department in documenting ERP customizations, developing/optimizing SQL, and working closely with other departments in order to build customizations and automations. It sounded great.However, my boss wasn't located in the same office as me and only spent 6 days on location "training" me. My "training" was consistently interrupted as my boss had to go put out fires multiple times per day.
Four weeks later I was brought in to HR and told that my boss resigned without notice and that I was to fly to the HQs the next week to do a knowledge transfer.
The parent company, of course, stepped in and said they would "allocate resources". So far I have had little assistance from them. What little assistance I have from them, ironically, ends up being more work.
Now I'm drowning in work, with no one to give me priority or direction. I have politely let my new boss in the parent company know that there is too much work and that I don't have priorities to work within and I am told that I should just say no whenever someone asks me to do something. The work I am asked to do is important and I don't feel comfortable telling individuals high up in the subsidiary no.
I was given a decent raise in light of my situation. But I'm finding it increasingly difficult to deal with the stress of managing all of this. I am very seriously considering finding a new job, but am concerned that my short tenure in this position will look bad. Thoughts?
Your boss told you to say no. You tell people “no”, and refer them to your boss, and keep your boss informed of what your current workload is.
You are drowning in work because even after being directed to do so you refuse to stop accepting new requests when you are overloaded.
Saying “no” is an important skill.
I am only partially joking. These types of situations are not uncommon and can actually work out to your benefit if you can take advantage of it. Your new boss told you to say no more often, he/she is giving you a lifeline and you are saying you're scared to take it? Instead of a direct no try saying it as, "I really would like to work on your issue and you have expressed its importance but I am limited in how much I can accomplish and right now my schedule is full. I may be able to get to it in X time period, but I can't make any promises today. However, if you'd like to have this prioritized then you can feel free to speak with Mr X who is my boss." And then you document the details either just to yourself, or you can send a heads up email to your boss.
This happens a lot in companies of all sizes, people make requests of engineers (generally young/new ones) and see just how much they can sneak around the system. One of the most important skills as you mature in your career is to say no. Saying "no" but getting your work done will not get your fired, saying "yes" and failing to keep up on your work will. Think of it this way, if these are higher level people then you that are making requests and their compliant about you is you said no because your schedule is full, it really won't go too far. If instead their compliant is you told them yes and then you never did it, their complaint will be valid.
Remember, the people considering your application are well aware of the realities of the workplace, and one of those realities is that every so often a job is just a bad fit. In those cases, leaving it sooner rather than later is a good thing for everybody concerned. When I'm looking over resumes, if I see someone who has generally worked for years at each position, but has a couple that only lasted a few months, I see that as perfectly normal.
Often, in our ticketing system, some random person assigns me a ticket. In these situations, I just assign the ticket back. In general, my rule is that: I only take assignments from my direct manager or someone I'm working closely with. All tickets (tasks) that come from outside my small working group must be triaged with my direct manager's involvement.
(I created an email rule for Jira just so I can see these situations.)
There's many reasons why random people try to rope me into their tickets. Sometimes it's laziness. Other times it's entitlement. (You're such-and-such a role so obviously you'll solve my problem for me.) Sometimes it's just passing the buck. Rarely, it's a genuine ask for help; but in those cases I hold firm that whoever is asking for help must retain ownership of the ticket. (Basically, I'll look at someone else's ticket as a favor, but not as my deliverable.)
In the worst case, there are managers who try to rope people into their work as a means of playing power or political games. I don't understand why people do this, but that's when I rope my manager in if some bozo tries to get me to do their work for them.
What's important is that you leave for a better job. Focus on where you're going, not where you're leaving. (I once took a job with a few too many warning signs, and in hindsight I should have stayed put.)
Honestly, every person filtering resumes has different things they look for. For every person who filters you out because you had a short stint, there will be someone who filters you in because your new job looks so much better.
Oh, and good jobs have ups and downs. If you generally like the work, believe in the company, and like the people you're working with, you can figure it out.
Every company is full of self serving idiots that will throw you under the bus for their own personal gain. The trick is to avoid these useless idiots, and to defend yourself when you have to deal with them.
Also, the only way to climb the ladder and make more money is to jump ship. You will never earn a decent amount of money by sticking around, and accepting the company’s pathetic 2% COLA raise, if you even get that. Meanwhile, they just paid their executives $100+ millions in performance bonuses. And they claim there isn’t any money left over for you.
Once you have an Interview (or a phone screen) they may ask about it, but then you can explain and it's unlikely to be held against you.
That said, you need to consider your long term goals. If you are job hopping for experience, you might want to consider contract work, or independent work first. As an employer though, I don't consider a 6 month stint to be a bad thing. You need to be prepared to tell me why you're jumping ship, and what you are looking to achieve at my place of business.
Nobody can tell you a "right" answer though. It is entirely dependent on your own goals and ethics. You don't owe anybody anything in your journey to the top, so do what feels right and keep moving forward.
When you feel that "drowning", probably you are not enjoying the work load, which is quite important for the happy-you. I understand you are in the early days, did you try to make your decisions on the priority? Sometimes, you may be better, who knows. Give it a try.
> The work I am asked to do is important and I don't feel comfortable telling individuals high up in the subsidiary no.
This is the situation you've to face in your life, every day. Saying "no" is perfectly "yes", be bold enough to say "no". But just give a thought on the after-effects, if those do not put you in trouble, it is perfectly alright.
Good luck.
This sounds like a process problem that your current manager has inherited from your previous manager. This problem also probably caused your previous manager to get so burnt out they quit.
It sounds like there is no process to intake new work and prioritize it. Talk to your manager about this. If you want brownie points propose how you can implement this process.
Most decent companies and interviewers will give you a chance to explain your reasons for leaving after only six months. It’s quite normal for devs, especially for recent graduates, to move around before finding their niche.
Move out if you can, granted, a lot of places on these kind of things tend to be easier on the task load, but it's not true in your case. Have you tried to automate? Are you drawning in powerpoint presentation and word documents? All of these are important to know.
My suggestion, try to find opportunity here. Successful technology implementations are much more about building relationships and understanding people’s roles, responsibilities and workloads and a lot less about SQL, code, gear, etc.
As other commenters have said, this situation is common. That's not to say it's okay - it isn't. The question I'd ask you is, "before you bail, what can you learn from this experience?"
One of the primary duties of a manager is to act as a diffuser of potential stressors. Given your experience level, all the inputs you are receiving should be landing on your managers desk first. Those inputs should then be filtered, grouped, prioritized, contextualized (to whatever extent is necessary for you to understand what you're being asked to do) and then handed to you at a rate that enables you to complete work and learn the systems you're interacting with.
It's okay to push back on requests. It's also a good idea to develop a system for doing so.
One of the things I repeat often with my direct reports is, "everything has a place." Every request, every escalation, every task we're asked to work on - it all goes into a ticket system. Everyone on my team knows to accept the input and inform the source of the input (often another engineering manager) that their requests will go into our work queue and will be prioritized against our other objectives at the appropriate time.
You seem to be operating without those systems in place. What I'd suggest is that you develop a queuing and prioritization system for yourself. The next time someone asks you to do something, maybe try saying:
"I'll be happy to dig in. Let me get a few pieces of information from you and I'll put this in my queue. Mind if I follow up with you next week?"
A couple things could happen in response. They could escalate and use their coercive power (they outrank you) to force you to do the work immediately. This is when you can invoke your manager. You could respond with,
"Understood. I will inform my manager and we will prioritize accordingly."
Usually these situations won't escalate. If you appear to have your act together, others will recognize that. If you have a system of note cards or an issue tracker you're using to capture their requests, they may be more inclined to leave you to manage your own work queue. If you're also equipped with a prioritization rubric (it can be arbitrary, just start with org chart hierarchy of the requestor if you don't have anything else to go on), even better.
As the saying goes, "manage your time or others will do it for you." No matter how stressful this may seem now, this may be an opportunity to learn some time and work queue management skills. The earlier in your career you begin cultivating these skills, the better.
I'm happy to elaborate on any of the above.
What's the REAL challenge here for you?
Any Bozo can quit and find a new job. It takes BRAINS to learn how to Manage Yourself.
On this subject, Drucker is brilliant. > https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2477223.Managing_Oneself
OT, but what is the whole "post-grad thing"? You earned a PhD?