Quite a few things have been hapening at my office lately, and I feel the urge to write about it. Maybe writing about it all will help me gain some perspective, rather than have it sit inside and bother me... My manager has been coming to me for the past few months discussing plans and changes that affect my position in particular. Some are good, some aren't as good. But either way, there's open discussion of a positive affect to my salary. (Long overdue, says I...)
One of the things that has recently happened is that I had to train someone to do what I do in our eastern office. The training was not as organised as I would have liked it to have been, but I felt confident in my trainee's ability to function on her own when she left here. She is still technically working under me, and I am supervising from afar. Fun...
I have also been in discussions regarding expanding my responsibilities here, overseeing more projects in a supervisory role, and having less to do with the actual design process. I'd be responsible for every single project that rolls through our office. I pretty much have that capacity now, but I would have more input on the final outcome, and more responsibility for others working beneath me. In other words, they want to expand my role as a supervisor and put more people under me...
Also, for the past several months I have been dealing with our office's database issues. Part of my job description entails overseeing IT as a first line of defense before going to our contracted tech-support company. Unfortunately, they deal mainly with our network and our server hardware and software. They don't deal with our business software to the level that I do, so I have been stuck babysitting a rather temperamental database on a platform that isn't up to running it. I think I have rebuilt the database no less than ten times in the past two months...
And then there was today's announcement. We just had a meeting to tell us the lead salesman in our eastern office has turned in his resignation notice. This is the person that trained me to do what I am doing, as he was moving east to start a whole new office. He was to be the proctor and manager of the office, but things have not turned out well in the two and a half years he has been there. Sales have been seriously lacking, and existing projects have been suffering from neglect and poor managing. Last week the powers-that-be decided to take the office managment responsibilities away from him so he could focus on sales and existing projects. Apparently, this did not sit well with him.
So after the announcement, my manager and the company president pulled me aside for a talk. Today's discussion was on how I could better interact with my trainee and whether or not I would need to go to the eastern office to oversee her work. It is a well known fact to the managment that I do not like sales and do not wish to fill that role in either office, so it was not even asked (at least they are listening to me in that regard). A few ideas were bounced around, including possibly bringing my trainee back here until we have a full sales staff available in the eastern office again. I am personally against this idea, but we shall see what happens. For now, I am just going to have to interact a little more with her so I can keep track of her projects and her progress...
So here I am, waiting for even more responsibilities to fall upon my shoulders. I know that as the business grows, things will get more and more hectic. I've already begun taking on so many different things, and I am feeling a good deal of stress already. I'm just hoping that I don't burn out from all of it. <sigh>
But next week is my annual review. I wonder what that will entail, and what changes await me then...
