A Bad/Wrong Decision?

Thank you SO much. I have a very hard time with letting go of mistakes.

He knows it was a mistake on my part, and I owned up to it with him.

Yes, I am sure it was a shock. He told me he felt totally blindsided by it which is what made me feel SO horrible.

UGH. I will try to let this go.

I suppose the good news is:

- I'm told my CEO respects me
- I'm told I'm doing a great job by all higher ups
- I'm the most senior in my dept, and therefore, they lean on me for my expertise
- I don't think they'll fire me because we're already understaffed
- I'm having a 1:1 with my boss tomorrow to make the reports more efficient

Whether it was right or wrong to go to HR before speaking with your boss, it happened. You made the best decision you could at the time with the information and resources you had. Hopefully you and your boss can move forward and improve your working relationships.

Thank you! I really like this viewpoint -- it helps!

It sounds like some gray area here. I’ve made decisions like yours when I’ve reached my breaking point... I’ve spoken up and rocked the boat and it’s very uncomfortable at first. That said, I do not trust HR and I do not trust company policies - in my experience HR is there to protect the company and company policies are only to protect the company. Often I’ve experienced pressure to go against policy in order to get the work done meanwhile management is loudly proclaiming we must all follow policy. I guess my point is that everything the company does is to protect them and NOT you. So sometimes you’ve got to rock the boat but definitely pick your battles. You’ll feel uncomfortable about this for a while but it will work itself out in time I think. My personal goal is to learn to step back from work pressures. I would do a lot less rocking of the boat if I just didn’t care. I keep trying to draw boundaries and just accept what I can’t control but it’s very hard to do. Best of luck. It will be ok.

Thanks, Sisabel! I appreciate your reply and support!

I 100% agree about HR being foremost concerned about the company. I've been burned in the past by going to HR.

I care too much as well and am trying to step back. It's NOT my whole life -- it's 40 hours of my life every week. I need to learn to let go.

I really hope it all works out for the best! Thanks again.

I’m sure it will work out. The reason I think so is because you do care and it sounds like your diligent about getting your job done. And not just that because that’s not enough... you’re also willing to speak up and that’s important too. I find it incredibly hard to step back and let things go. I promise myself I will do it and then I find myself all tangled up in nonsense again. I’m glad for this group on work and career issues. We are all a work in progress. Keep us posted how it goes.

Thank you, Sisebel!!

Yes, we are all a work in progress, no doubt. Yes, I care and I care too much!

Good to learn how to shut it all down after work hours, put it all aside, and focus on self-care and enjoyment in life. Right?

I have a different take on this - or at least on a more commercial level. You can take it or leave it, but I've been stuck in a tough commercial deal recently and realised how much my bosses have explicitly taught me about business.

I should also say that I have anxiety crises, bad ones, super bad ones. In the past I've endured them but now I am having to get familiar with my emotional geography because I don't have therapeutic help and I need to negotiate some difficult deals. Some days I learn a lot about myself, and some days I take sleep meds because I'm exhausted - also some tough Work in Progress!

But in business I've learned that OCCASIONALLY (only occasionally because it's so uncomfortable for me) I have to take action that is going to seriously upset someone - and I need to take responsibility for riding that out. Being in the vulnerable child part of me and placating the authority figures - which is what I've done at work and what I see you doing somewhat - doesn't cut it.

Recently I had to override some professionals working for me. I tried persuasion but they were too entrenched in their own comfort zone to listen. So I trapped them into an agreement that they didn't see coming. At that moment they were furious and told me so: "sometimes you don't realise how nasty your behaviour is". Now two weeks later, it's obvious that I was right. If I hadn't overridden them, I'd be "stuffed".

It might be a good idea to weigh up other people's emotional reactions and whether confrontation is the only possible route forward, but if you need to confront then take responsibility for the havoc that it might wreke inside you... and do it .

You boss has his own emotional triggers and limitations: another learning curve for your internal emotional geography perhaps.

Sorry if I'm obscure or intruding.

I'm just tryng to say that if your boss isn't going to run with your best ideas - for whatever reason - then you might need to let him know that you are going past him and to DO THAT. The emotional havoc is a consequence - his emotions and your emotions.

A boss once advised me about something several decades ago when I was emotionally distressed, and in my current situation his business advice is saving my life.

It's an issue internally about asserting your power and your intelligence at the cost of triggering childhood emotional reflexes => internal conflict... yours to manage...
your boss has his own emotional issues, and his own responsibility for managing them.

You are no longer in your parent-child situation, so deep learning...

I think what you did was brave and ultimately what you had to do. In a perfect world HR would actually protect its employees but they are more interested in protecting the company. Be on the lookout for any kind of passive aggressive retaliation.

Thanks so much for saying this! I appreciate it.

God, I hope there's no retaliation. That would make things FAR worse for me.

As a general manager I tell my staff come to me with any issue. If i can't solve your issue then feel free to go over my head.

"I have a feeling that the end result would not have occurred if I had only gone to my boss about this issue. "

you say this but then you repeatedly state he is the best boss you have ever had & tell him so....my question is what exactly is he?

I think deep down you went to hr to get your point across. you could have waited one day for him to return and had a meeting..it sounds like this was a long term problem, not something that just popped up...you knew he was out....I think it's pretty common knowledge to not jump the chain of command

I was a supervisor in a large gov't operation....I t is stressed that folks run the chain...don't jump the steps....really if we can fix a problem at the lowest level then that is so much better..not everything needs to hit the top level to be remediated...not should it be. and a good top level manager will ask: have you addressed this issue with YOUR supervisor? it just makes everyone look bad. you telling your boss belatedly that he is the best thing since sliced bread really doesn't mean much at this point..if he was so great you would have waited to speak to him..& respected him on this point.

You're implying that I disrespected my boss? Honestly I don't appreciate your post very much and I don't find it to be very supportive.

For your information, everything turned out just fine. I met with my boss 1:1 today. He said he is not angry with me, when I asked. He said it's good that our CEO knows the reports are too lengthy, and it was a productive meeting about how to reduce the size of these reports.

Also, as I have made perfectly clear in this thread: this was an ongoing issue, it was the heat of the moment, I was overwrought and needed someone to talk to.

So thanks, but no thanks. I don’t need any lectures thank you. I’m freaking 48 years old and have worked full time for 25 years. Plus I work in a small family like organization that cannot be compared with your larger govt organization.

You show NO empathy and neither do those who “thanked” your post: seesaw, Guinness and cold soul. NOT SUPPORTIVE. If you’re going to just lurk don’t bother with a “thanks” on an unsupportive and Unempathetic post.

I’m going to ask admin to close this thread.

I thank those who have been supportive of me in this situation.

when you post to a public forum and ask for opinions, that's what you get...opinions. some you like, and some you don't. sorry you found mine not to your liking. in a perfect world everyone would say, gee, you did everything right & let's hug it out. but it's not a perfect world..as you know because you posted an issue at your workplace. I posted my response and opinion, not in an effort to hurt you but to post my response, just as all the others did.