My boss has resigned.
Not that this elicits any joy whatsoever in me.
She is the only competent, humorous, professional, and incredibly honest person where I work (our office manager is smart, but she is also quiet, which might explain why she’s the only one who’s been there for silver anniversary|25 years]). The other woman, who was hired on my birthday and is supposed to take over some of my old duties so that I can focus on the warehouse, is so incompetent that she is a waste of time and money. I have taken to doing her job as well as mine, because at almost 2.5 times my age, this woman just can’t cut it. She has mustered no respect in me and I am about to get really honest with her, which would be unfortunate and unprofessional.
Our new president (a member and volunteer) is a manipulative head case. Using the notorious guilt trip, she has procured unwilling souls to come help us (of course, none of them show up, not to my surprise). Her idea of a good program for us is a ritzy celebrity gala that will get us on the front page of the society news, but nowhere in terms of our mission. This woman has yet to volunteer for Bargainata. The closest she comes is waltzing back to the warehouse and bouncing ideas off me that are 95% idiotic and far-fetched (the other 5% are an insult to intelligence and even more manipulative). Now that my boss has announced that she’s leaving, the prez won’t talk to her any more (what’s your age again?).
My boss came to this job mid-February of this year to revitalize and reorganize our local chapter. She came under false pretenses, told that we just needed to get our membership together and refocus. Well, we needed that, but no one mentioned that our budget was so poorly managed and adhered to that we are about to go bankrupt. In fact, no one had really scrutinized our finances in a long time. From what the two of us saw, our situation now is the result of gross negligence, both passive and active, by women who don’t know basic math or how to draw up a business plan. She spent incredible amounts of time trying out over 10 budget models, and none of them would balance in a realistic situation. Very few board members or outside committee members wanted to acknowledge and grasp our desperate situation. Very few of them really want to commit to their duties as active board members.
Combine this with a generally disinterested membership with fear of commitment no matter what we offer and stuck in their old ways, a volunteer non-profit organization that is staff run and board supported instead of vice versa, a lack of staff and the inability to hire more, an expensive lease in which we are stuck for 7 more years unless we managed to pull ourselves out soon, members that call you at home to whine, a board with no ears, a computer system in serious need of upgrade and maintenance, a low quality quarterly, and no centralization of individual committee efforts, and you have my boss’ private hell. It is wrecking her home life, herself, and her life in general. She signed up for this job with the promise that it was part-time (our hours total to 28/wk.) and has found out that she would need to put in 40+ hours a week to make things work out.
As a seasoned professional, she knows that she can do better than this and can prosper only under a healthy office setting. She already has a new job that she starts in 2 weeks. They expect her to work full time and will pay her accordingly.
She actually survived longer than I expected. There will be less fighting in the office between the board and her, but this is sacrificed for incompetence, pettiness, and general lack of ability. I didn’t agree with her on every matter, but I did respect her and her advice and opinions.
Don’t do this to me.
Why do I have to be the adult?