Who do you trust? How far?
Jan. 11th, 2006 09:35 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bjarvisIt's a really annoying Wednesday so far... I have a large number of work-related projects this week, many of which I cannot delegate to colleagues as we're short-handed right now because of an unfortunate confluence of outside events.
Nevertheless, despite a lack of hands on my immediate team, there is no excuse for other people around the company for not doing their jobs correctly and in a timely fashion. Nearly all of my activities for today now have to be rescheduled because of incompetence. Because the remainder of the week is already loaded with activity, I may have to do extra shifts to meet our deadlines. I am seriously pissed that this is necessary, but I will not allow the failure of other people to translate into failure for me or my team.
I expect people to routinely drop the ball when working in volunteer organizations or even socially (esp. family). It's frustrating to watch, but since I routinely anticipate & make allowances for other peoples' failures, it rarely causes material harm. But I draw the line when people aren't doing the work they are paid to do.
I would like to be a more trusting person, professionally and socially. Really, I would. But my experience has been that trust is inevitably followed by profound disappointment accompanied by a legion of related costs & losses. It's a little odd to have to confess that my mental health is contingent on trusting others very little if at all, but there it is. I have little enough left of a cheerful disposition that I can't afford to lose too much more.
Since I now have little else to do today, I have allocated two hours this afternoon for a series of telephone calls to each person who screwed up, with subsequent calls to their managers if required. I don't intend to be rude or angry, but I definitely want each person to understand clearly the consequences & costs they've induced. A limited degree of trust may be restored somewhat if they offer either means of making up for the lapse or for preventing future ones.
Nevertheless, despite a lack of hands on my immediate team, there is no excuse for other people around the company for not doing their jobs correctly and in a timely fashion. Nearly all of my activities for today now have to be rescheduled because of incompetence. Because the remainder of the week is already loaded with activity, I may have to do extra shifts to meet our deadlines. I am seriously pissed that this is necessary, but I will not allow the failure of other people to translate into failure for me or my team.
I expect people to routinely drop the ball when working in volunteer organizations or even socially (esp. family). It's frustrating to watch, but since I routinely anticipate & make allowances for other peoples' failures, it rarely causes material harm. But I draw the line when people aren't doing the work they are paid to do.
I would like to be a more trusting person, professionally and socially. Really, I would. But my experience has been that trust is inevitably followed by profound disappointment accompanied by a legion of related costs & losses. It's a little odd to have to confess that my mental health is contingent on trusting others very little if at all, but there it is. I have little enough left of a cheerful disposition that I can't afford to lose too much more.
Since I now have little else to do today, I have allocated two hours this afternoon for a series of telephone calls to each person who screwed up, with subsequent calls to their managers if required. I don't intend to be rude or angry, but I definitely want each person to understand clearly the consequences & costs they've induced. A limited degree of trust may be restored somewhat if they offer either means of making up for the lapse or for preventing future ones.
