New Job Saga

I'll just keep on updating because it will be fun to read the journey someday.

Week started off with me feeling like I was again drowning in work and in over my head. I put in a lot of time preparing and had to lead multiple calls, getting butterflies each time. But once they were underway things went really smooth.

Got a lot of great feedback so far, my boss is very happy with my work realizing I jumped into a massive project right away. Also had feedback from a coworker that people outside our department have been impressed so far and I even got complimented on seeming "very polished" which is something I've never heard before!

Today I had to lead our team in a presentation to a senior director to the first time and honestly felt like we nailed it. Got again very positive feedback from everyone.

So basically I'm bumbling my way through project management and it seems to be going well and I'm getting more comfortable. That makes me feel more confident about going into more unknowns.
 
Glad to hear it's going well for you Jarick.

With project management, all the hard work is upfront (like development and design) and "herding cats". Then it's just status, financial tracking and validation.

I've turned down several jobs thus far, but good overall interview practice. But I'm getting a little stir crazy.

I've been getting projects done around the house - but it's a little meh from the excitement of what I'm used to.

Honestly, if this house was 100% paid for I'd just call it and retire because my wife has a really good gig. But I'd like to stay ahead of schedule on the payoff of the mortgage, so I need to get back at it for another couple of years then decide if I want to wrap it up or what I'm willing to tolerate....LOL

Maybe when I retire I'll do something completely different and go work for a buddy operating a bull dozer or a backhoe and tear stuff up for money for a bit - seems like good therapy :rofl
 
mavrick102000 said:
Glad to hear it's going well for you Jarick.

With project management, all the hard work is upfront (like development and design) and "herding cats". Then it's just status, financial tracking and validation.

I've turned down several jobs thus far, but good overall interview practice. But I'm getting a little stir crazy.

I've been getting projects done around the house - but it's a little meh from the excitement of what I'm used to.

Honestly, if this house was 100% paid for I'd just call it and retire because my wife has a really good gig. But I'd like to stay ahead of schedule on the payoff of the mortgage, so I need to get back at it for another couple of years then decide if I want to wrap it up or what I'm willing to tolerate....LOL

Maybe when I retire I'll do something completely different and go work for a buddy operating a bull dozer or a backhoe and tear stuff up for money for a bit - seems like good therapy :rofl
Click to expand...

Yeah I totally get what you're saying!

The first two weeks I'm trying to meet with like 20 different people for stakeholder interviews, which is a fancy way of me just getting to know them and listening to all of their concerns and goals and what not. Then they all kind of buy into me a little, and now I've got a small army of people who trust me at least a little bit. Then setting up what seemed like 50 meetings, which sucks with calendars always being blocked.

We're getting into technical discussions to understand requirements which isn't bad because I sit back and listen to the experts talk while I take a ton of notes and figure out the action items/next steps. I'm starting to get comfortable enough to make suggestions which are being received well. And once we get into a cadence of work, then it'll be a lot easier to just kind of manage them week to week. I think, anyways.

I'm building a lot of skills too. I kind of have some soft skills already just having worked for decades, and I seem to have a half decent ability to fake it until I know what's going on apparently. But I have never been a big Powerpoint guy and I'm learning how to really effectively make presentations and thoughtfully plan out each meeting. Those should all transfer to whatever I do next.

Plus now that I'm not spinning my mental wheels all day long, I have a lot more free time through the day and I'm building a bunch of reports in Power BI which is something I'm more interested at doing. I could see pivoting back into that type of reporting and analytics work in the future. That was never something that was part of the job but because there are so few Power BI resources in the company and I had that on my resume, they got really excited for me to help with that work.



All that said, there's definitely a part of me that wants to chill out on the brain work and just do something easy. But I have 25 years until retirement, so it's a long ways off lol.
 
Long update, I'm about 90% sure this isn't working out.

I've been struggling with this project since day 1 and now we're at the point the client wants to go live in a month. Meanwhile none of our leadership wants to commit to a decision, so I'm stuck in the middle trying to constantly buy time and figure out alternative plans. I've got little to no resources to work with and basically have no idea what I'm doing.

Talking to my boss in an hour to try and figure out what to do for next steps, but also updating my resume and starting to look at openings. I hate to job hop but I'm definitely not a project manager and the 24/7 stress is killing me right now.
 
Jarick said:
Long update, I'm about 90% sure this isn't working out.

I've been struggling with this project since day 1 and now we're at the point the client wants to go live in a month. Meanwhile none of our leadership wants to commit to a decision, so I'm stuck in the middle trying to constantly buy time and figure out alternative plans. I've got little to no resources to work with and basically have no idea what I'm doing.

Talking to my boss in an hour to try and figure out what to do for next steps, but also updating my resume and starting to look at openings. I hate to job hop but I'm definitely not a project manager and the 24/7 stress is killing me right now.
Click to expand...
Is it possible you just landed in a bad org? It happens. Don’t ask me how I know.
 
EOengineer said:
Is it possible you just landed in a bad org? It happens. Don’t ask me how I know.
Click to expand...

I don't think so, it's one of the top employers in the state that has a great reputation. I think the job itself is just not a fit.

My manager, coworkers, and people in other departments are all really nice. I get a lot of good feedback on the work I'm doing, but I just perpetually struggle. I feel like I'd be a lot happier doing something else within the org.

Going to meet up with my old boss who I'm friendly with and get some advice. He went through a really bad job situation after he left our company and is now doing some freelancing work. So want to get some feedback in terms of when to keep trying to push through vs when its a bad fit. He's been a good mentor for me.

Absolute worst case scenario, my old company continues to not find anyone to fill my old role and reposted the job again this week lol. But I hate admitting defeat, and there's a reason I left that place.

Really it's just, I kinda want to take a step back and doing something more operational and straightforward. The pressure and continuous energy required to be more in management is really draining. Even though I get great feedback from my leadership team and they want me to pursue a management path, I get energized doing smaller scale work with lower stakes.
 
Pulling for you, Jarick. Managing a group of people and their tasks can be brutal.

Hope you find a better fit. Life's too short to murder yourself slowly in a bad situation. :beer
 
Nearly every major project I’ve worked on this millennium has run into decision-making issues. With Y2K (yes, it really was an issue many of us worked hard to ensure didn’t cause a catastrophe – we weren’t the grifters putting Y2K stickers on toasters) and the Sydney Olympics we simply had to get the job done.

Doing so upset our management so badly they Outsourced us as fast as possible, after they accepted all the awards for the world’s first electronic visa system etc.

Management used to rise through the ranks instead of MBA’s with little experience being given fast-track promotions.

Sorry, just my rant. So many failed projects since. Then you have piles of them – failed project trying to fix the previous failed project which …
 
Jarick said:
I don't think so, it's one of the top employers in the state that has a great reputation. I think the job itself is just not a fit.

My manager, coworkers, and people in other departments are all really nice. I get a lot of good feedback on the work I'm doing, but I just perpetually struggle. I feel like I'd be a lot happier doing something else within the org.

Going to meet up with my old boss who I'm friendly with and get some advice. He went through a really bad job situation after he left our company and is now doing some freelancing work. So want to get some feedback in terms of when to keep trying to push through vs when its a bad fit. He's been a good mentor for me.

Absolute worst case scenario, my old company continues to not find anyone to fill my old role and reposted the job again this week lol. But I hate admitting defeat, and there's a reason I left that place.

Really it's just, I kinda want to take a step back and doing something more operational and straightforward. The pressure and continuous energy required to be more in management is really draining. Even though I get great feedback from my leadership team and they want me to pursue a management path, I get energized doing smaller scale work with lower stakes.
Click to expand...
Freelancing can be decent. The market is just packed, but it depends upon the market where you live. I've done a few local contract gigs but there winding down and a lot of the 100% remote (or <10% travel) are extremely sought after and it's difficult to get chosen for an interview even with 20+ years experience and 100% match.

Ageism is real and has been a larger focus item at least since 2016-2018 timeframe.
 
The highs and lows with this job are nuts.

Two weeks ago this project was at significant risk and we had no chance of meeting requirements. Tens of millions of dollars and a lot of jobs were at stake.

I threw a crazy hail mary idea out and stuck my neck out to try and prove it out. Looks like it might actually be pulled off! Every SVP and director I've met with has been fully supportive and complementary of the creativity. I'm extremely close to getting approval to implement.

Thrilling as all that is, I still would much rather be doing something low key. My old boss always used to say "the reward for good work is more work" and the company already has been wanting to get me into a management track. Ugh.
 
Another month down. I've been a ball of stress for the last two months. Haven't really had much mental or physical energy to do anything outside of work and scraping by the bare minimum at home. So much work to do that I can't take PTO.

Project is hitting crunch time ahead of trying to launch, but then I've got more and more hurdles. I keep getting good feedback, but it's so much pressure all of the time. Constantly straddling between asks and expectations of senior leadership, constraints and difficulties from the external partner, limitations of my project team, and all the PM documentation I'm supposed to be doing.

Not really sure what to do...keep pushing forward and hope it gets better or look for something else. From a resume perspective, I really should have at least a year with the company to get some accomplishments. But it just seems like a really bad job fit for my personality, skills, and working preferences.
 
Jarick said:
Another month down. I've been a ball of stress for the last two months. Haven't really had much mental or physical energy to do anything outside of work and scraping by the bare minimum at home. So much work to do that I can't take PTO.

Project is hitting crunch time ahead of trying to launch, but then I've got more and more hurdles. I keep getting good feedback, but it's so much pressure all of the time. Constantly straddling between asks and expectations of senior leadership, constraints and difficulties from the external partner, limitations of my project team, and all the PM documentation I'm supposed to be doing.

Not really sure what to do...keep pushing forward and hope it gets better or look for something else. From a resume perspective, I really should have at least a year with the company to get some accomplishments. But it just seems like a really bad job fit for my personality, skills, and working preferences.
Click to expand...
Based on what I have read here, I would stick with it through this project! that would be my goal!! Once launched, I would let those above you know that if they want to keep you, things need to change! But deliver big on this project with all you can!!! That is my $0.02 ;~)) Best wishes!!!
 
I'd stick until the product launches, then you can tell you helped launch a complex product if you choose to change jobs.
 
Got approval from leadership on a pilot for my project which is a big win. And getting nothing but positive feedback from everyone, so that really helps. Job definitely oscillates between "hey I'm actually doing pretty well" and "this is a complete nightmare". I'm actually learning quite a bit to roll with the punches as much as possible.
 
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