Take Aim...
It is a sad reality that when you are in the habit of living and telling the unfiltered, raw, unflinching truth, you tend to paint a target on your @$$.
As a consequence of my wanderings into Death, I structure my value system in unusual ways that often put me in conflict with "norms." I value ideals over people, for instance. My loyalties in a work environment are to the ideals of an organization (so long as I agree with said ideals) and not to the individuals within said organization, no matter how much I like the individuals personally. Most of my staff have varying degrees of loyalty to tiers of persons in a ranked system of relationships. I don't. I have loyalty to principle only. And as for the concept of loyalty itself, I value honesty over loyalty in ALL cases. Particularly when it comes to speaking truth to power.
So, here it is. There is a supervisor at the County who manages all the regional teams of case-managers. This person does not return phone calls or respond to emails. She does not attend any of her own staff meetings. She rarely sets foot in the regional offices. And she does not attend any of the multi-manager meetings that she and I are both requested to attend. As a result of this, her teams are left to direct themselves. Some of them are dedicated to dignified client care. But the rest have settled for doing the minimum amount to still get a paycheck, as that is the example she is setting. And the clients suffer as a result. Which impedes my work with said clients.
One of her case-managers was in my office the other day asking me to present a referral at the multi-manager meeting, because her boss was not going to attend. I commented that such a referral is not supposed to come from me. She then expressed frustration at the lack of response and direction she was receiving from her boss. I expressed sympathy and support for her in this and commented that it was a shame her supervisor was so incompetent and useless. I then went to the meeting and carried on with my work week.
At the end of the week, I get a call from the Chief Medical Officer for the County. He tells me that he heard about the conversation I had and that the people I talked about were upset. Immediately, there begins a raucous argument within the inner committee about what exact level of not-giving-a-crap should apply here. It is decided that since we have a rather lovely working relationship with this man, we will not be totally overwhelmed by not caring. I ask him if he wants me to fix it or to tell him what happened. He opts for the latter. So, I explain the context of the conversation and the on-going frustration that Supervisor Useless is causing. He seems partly relieved. But only partly.
I ask him what else. He says that he was told I was talking crap about the Head of Mental Health. This one was a little left field. It seems that Supervisor Useless doesn't like being called out for not doing her job, but instead of dealing with that, she makes up supposed insults that I leveled at the head honcho. Funny that she thought this would shut me up. I explain to the Chief Doc that I did reference the Head Honcho. I had asked why it was that Supervisor Useless never attended any of her meetings and was told that she was working on a special project for the Head Honcho. So, I said that I didn't think he realized what was going on because he had bigger fish to fry. Chief Doc seems particularly relieved to hear this.
I tell him that I don't mind helping him fix this, but that he needs to bear in mind that I have honesty Tourette's and lack tact of any kind, and that if "fixing it" involves apologizing for telling the truth, that I WILL NOT do, ever. He opts to fix it himself, though he laughed out loud at my self-diagnosis.
I then call my boss to inform him that my big mouth is getting us in trouble and relay the above to him and let him know that Supervisor Useless will probably be calling him to ask that I be written up. He laughed and said, "She can try."
And then it was done? But then the visceral response set in. Last time something like this happened, I got fired. And I'm still carrying a lot of body memory from that experience. And it all came up to bite me. I couldn't sleep, eat, or stop the mental chatter for the entire weekend, and got myself quite ill. I hate that I somaticise distress.
Anyway, she didn't show up to the multi-manager meeting this week, again, thus proving my point. But everyone else did, and brought their camera phones too hoping that we would throw down. Apparently, I am not alone in my opinion, but the others who try to say things about this get written up. I am an out-sider, though. And my work speaks for itself, so she'll be hard pressed to get rid of me. Particularly since the Chief Doc emailed me after the meeting to express how great it is that I attend it. So, I consider the matter blown-over.
The trick will be for me to resist the urge to act out in kind. At the moment, that is difficult. The more deviant sides would like to call her directly and say, "Here is my boss's number; take your best shot."
--Randir
As a consequence of my wanderings into Death, I structure my value system in unusual ways that often put me in conflict with "norms." I value ideals over people, for instance. My loyalties in a work environment are to the ideals of an organization (so long as I agree with said ideals) and not to the individuals within said organization, no matter how much I like the individuals personally. Most of my staff have varying degrees of loyalty to tiers of persons in a ranked system of relationships. I don't. I have loyalty to principle only. And as for the concept of loyalty itself, I value honesty over loyalty in ALL cases. Particularly when it comes to speaking truth to power.
So, here it is. There is a supervisor at the County who manages all the regional teams of case-managers. This person does not return phone calls or respond to emails. She does not attend any of her own staff meetings. She rarely sets foot in the regional offices. And she does not attend any of the multi-manager meetings that she and I are both requested to attend. As a result of this, her teams are left to direct themselves. Some of them are dedicated to dignified client care. But the rest have settled for doing the minimum amount to still get a paycheck, as that is the example she is setting. And the clients suffer as a result. Which impedes my work with said clients.
One of her case-managers was in my office the other day asking me to present a referral at the multi-manager meeting, because her boss was not going to attend. I commented that such a referral is not supposed to come from me. She then expressed frustration at the lack of response and direction she was receiving from her boss. I expressed sympathy and support for her in this and commented that it was a shame her supervisor was so incompetent and useless. I then went to the meeting and carried on with my work week.
At the end of the week, I get a call from the Chief Medical Officer for the County. He tells me that he heard about the conversation I had and that the people I talked about were upset. Immediately, there begins a raucous argument within the inner committee about what exact level of not-giving-a-crap should apply here. It is decided that since we have a rather lovely working relationship with this man, we will not be totally overwhelmed by not caring. I ask him if he wants me to fix it or to tell him what happened. He opts for the latter. So, I explain the context of the conversation and the on-going frustration that Supervisor Useless is causing. He seems partly relieved. But only partly.
I ask him what else. He says that he was told I was talking crap about the Head of Mental Health. This one was a little left field. It seems that Supervisor Useless doesn't like being called out for not doing her job, but instead of dealing with that, she makes up supposed insults that I leveled at the head honcho. Funny that she thought this would shut me up. I explain to the Chief Doc that I did reference the Head Honcho. I had asked why it was that Supervisor Useless never attended any of her meetings and was told that she was working on a special project for the Head Honcho. So, I said that I didn't think he realized what was going on because he had bigger fish to fry. Chief Doc seems particularly relieved to hear this.
I tell him that I don't mind helping him fix this, but that he needs to bear in mind that I have honesty Tourette's and lack tact of any kind, and that if "fixing it" involves apologizing for telling the truth, that I WILL NOT do, ever. He opts to fix it himself, though he laughed out loud at my self-diagnosis.
I then call my boss to inform him that my big mouth is getting us in trouble and relay the above to him and let him know that Supervisor Useless will probably be calling him to ask that I be written up. He laughed and said, "She can try."
And then it was done? But then the visceral response set in. Last time something like this happened, I got fired. And I'm still carrying a lot of body memory from that experience. And it all came up to bite me. I couldn't sleep, eat, or stop the mental chatter for the entire weekend, and got myself quite ill. I hate that I somaticise distress.
Anyway, she didn't show up to the multi-manager meeting this week, again, thus proving my point. But everyone else did, and brought their camera phones too hoping that we would throw down. Apparently, I am not alone in my opinion, but the others who try to say things about this get written up. I am an out-sider, though. And my work speaks for itself, so she'll be hard pressed to get rid of me. Particularly since the Chief Doc emailed me after the meeting to express how great it is that I attend it. So, I consider the matter blown-over.
The trick will be for me to resist the urge to act out in kind. At the moment, that is difficult. The more deviant sides would like to call her directly and say, "Here is my boss's number; take your best shot."
--Randir