I have been a very good Employee today. I deserve some kind of SuperEmployee sticker and a bad picture of me in a cheap frame hung on the wall in our temporary lobby that says, “Kevin’s One Super Employee”. I may go do that myself tonight with Max. We’ll make a “Kevin’s One Super Employee” plaque. Then, I’ll bring to work really early tomorrow morning and hang it up before anyone gets here. Maybe I should start with someone else so no one suspects me. Although, I think I’m the only person here who would do such a thing, and everyone knows it. I have a pirate flag up on my wall, ferpetessack.
And to answer your next question, I have a pirate flag on my wall for a very good reason. I’ve been feeling extremely subversive lately. There’s usually a subversive undercurrent running through whatever I do. Recently, though, the undercurrent has become an undertorrent, and I just can’t help it. Maybe I’m feeling extra-subversive because my boss, and boss’s boss have both left in the past six weeks, and I’m feeling a little… grieved? Yeah, that’s as close as I can come to describing it. I lost the guy who hired me, protected our group from a lot of garbage, was in our corner the whole time, and made us better. I’ve also lost the best manager I’ve ever had. It’s kind of thrown me for a loop.
I’m not quite sure what to do next. I still have my projects, the things that “make me go”, but I don’t have the support system I had last week. I don’t have a manager I can tell anything to, give her any problem, and compliant and she’ll go fight the battle, or filter the message appropriately. I have a crappy filter. I usually just come out and say it, which isn’t the most productive trait to possess at the moment.
I’ve come to realize that I work best with a manager I can trust completely. I don’t want to have to play political games, and watch what I say with my direct manager. It’s too stressful, and makes work no fun at all. I have to be able to tell my manager what’s really going on, and have them do the same. If there’s no honesty in that relationship, there’s no trust. When there’s no trust, nothing productive happens. I’ve done pretty well so far in my career finding people I can trust, and good working relationships. The times I haven’t had that support system have been an absolute nightmare.
I don’t know… this post started out really light and sunny, didn’t it? I was faking it. There’s nothing sunny or light going on here. I’m worried that I won’t find that working chemistry again, and I’ll just be working instead of having fun. I’m afraid I’ll spend my days playing politics instead of building cool stuff and challenging myself. I’ve done that already. I’d rather not go back to it. You know, maybe everything will be alright. Maybe it won’t. It’s the not knowing that’s killing me at the moment.