Too Little, Too Late

Today was one of those days where any doubt about taking on my new job was utterly erased. Thank God I begged off rehearsal tonight. The fever started around 11 am. The my chest started hurting in the early afternoon. I've been feeling crappy for over two weeks. Not sick, not well, but the last couple of days I had really been feeling a lot better.

But because it is so reactive [when it shouldn't be], my current job has a way of running me into the ground. Lately, it's been running me into the second strata, which is why I found a new one.

But first, some background...

In late December a mat leave position came up at work. It's a Producer role for two preeminent women's websites at my company. Given that my job history has essentially been on the execution side, it seemed utterly crazy to me to pass up an opportunity to shore up my brand management and content strategy skills, even if I had no guarantee that the job would go permanent.

I've decided that despite my literary and thespian aspirations, I can't afford to make the mistake I did in my 20's, which was letting my day job progression atrophy. My philosophy was that it didn't matter because I'd get to do what I really wanted to do eventually.

Except that that I didn't, and after "life" happened, I found myself years later still in the same quagmire of getting paid a pittance for the privilege of having my intelligence insulted day in and day out. I was finally able to break out of that two and a half years ago when I obtained my current role.

I remember how wonderful my job was at first, how grateful I was to be released from the toxicity of my previous environment. But it quickly became obvious that I wasn't going to be able to fully utilize my skills, that to a degree, I'd been hired as a glorified fulfillment agent. But no matter. I had a good job, an opportunity to learn a lot and had fantastic people to work with.

But the beat unfortunately went on. And on. And on. I raised concerns with the right people in late 2006. Nothing changed. That wasn't necessarily anyone's fault, but nothing changed. And by the end of 2007, I was quickly coming to the conclusion that once again, I was experiencing the uniquely corporate phenomenon of being punished for being quietly effective and decided I had to once and for all get out of "get it done" occupations.

The sad thing is that I feel like I worked at 30% of what I'm capable of doing for two and a half years. If I'd actually had support and a proper mandate and oh I dunno, perhaps as a project manager had some autonomy to you know, actually manage I could have really made a difference instead of just continually saving the division from itself. Hell, I think if given half a chance, I could have had our production area whipped into shape in two weeks. The big unwieldy projects we had to contend with and our day-to-day could have actually been a sane experience for everyone involved.

But it hasn't been that way. Most times the production team and I are the last to know and frankly, being consistently treated with low grade disrespect wears you the f*ck out. There. I said it.

What's been really gratifying about this move is how congratulatory everyone has been, how genuinely happy they have been for me.

What's been really weird is how surprised some people are that I'm leaving. I'm surprised they're surprised. It's amazing how people pigeon hole you, as if being the person who gets everybody's else's ideas accomplished is all you could be and do forever and ever. Amen.

Frankly speaking, I only stuck around as long as I did because I've worked in worse places. But today, when yet again, I wasn't in the loop on a vital bit of information, I realized this had been going on for too long and just wasn't healthy. I no longer have any threshold to wait things out and hope they get better.

Despite how much I'll miss everyone, the time has simply come to move on.