I feel a responsibility to talk about the very real problem areas, but having worked here for such a short time, I really want to do it in a constructive ‘big picture’ way.
Treat employees with respect and help each other to succeed.
When it was made clear to me that my team members had been complaining about my work style, instead of coming to me to ask what I was doing, or how we can fix it, the manager let these complaints build up until I couldn’t bounce back from it. If he knew I was having issues why did he wait so long to bring it to my attention, and then not offer a solution, but a demotion? Management acknowledged my “effort and desire to succeed”, so why wasn’t I given the chance to grow professionally?
There were several times when I came to my manager with explanations for his concerns about the project, only for that explanation to be looked over or ignored. When my male coworker would repeat what I said, only then did the manager understand the issue and how we were going to solve it.
Be aware that putting someone more qualified than the position you chose to place them in leads to discontented workers.
I was told that it was “clear that lack of domain knowledge of different disciplines was impacting my job on this project.” However upon starting my new position in which I have little experience in, I noticed there was a profound lack of leadership and knowledge from the lead. I can’t help but think that this department is a repository for unwanted employees. Having been in a Project Management position for close to 9 months, learning and experiencing the flow, how is it beneficial to the company to remove me from something they’ve already invested time and money in?
After making the best of what I could with the materials (no employee handbook, no guidance) and philosophies for project management, I was told I was “exacerbating the (scheduling) issue” and “creating more work” for my team members. In truth, I was not asking more of them than what had been laid out for me to achieve.
My responsibilities included:
Keeping the development schedule updated as far as programmers are concerned; making sure tasks are marked in the correct status and updating the estimated days to reflect the actual or new estimates
Ensuring designers have access to builds and are able to review
Being the POC for programming across external studios including the publisher
Fully describing tasks before disciplines are given to resource
If no info, make sure they can talk to someone who can
Taking the design from the task sheet and add it to the tasks
Understanding if the task is finished
Making sure to know what the end result is will help me anticipate other questions for similar tasks
Utilizing my Japanese for translation and interpretation for other projects not just the one I’m currently on
As I see it, if I was creating work for anyone, it was because they had not done what was required for the project.
Transparency is the key to communication
Upon being told of my demotion into another department and that I should “take your time and it's not urgent” my access rights to all project documents, project channels on the company group chat, and group Skype chats was revoked without any notice. It was never explicitly stated that this would happen so I was understandably confused. It also caused me embarrassment as project members were asking me directly what had happened. Since I was cut off from communicating with the team about the project and had no access to the development schedule, I effectively had no work to do. I immediately told my manager that I can start the position in the new department because I was in fear of losing my job.
This has been an underhanded and inefficient approach to a simple problem.
I feel that I was given tasks with no resources and a position with little or no possibility of success. Receiving no feedback along the way has led to an unmanageable situation.