Job Advice Thread

[chen35]

I thought it would be a good idea to start a thread where we can discuss issues in the workplace, work-life balance, etc. Feel free to post your work place issues here!

[chen35]

I'll start.

Including commuting time, how long are your days? I leave the house about 7:00 am, and usually get home around 6:45. It seems like a lot, but given my profession, I don't know that there is much to be done. I try to take breaks throughout the day to work on personal stuff, paying bills, budgeting, etc., so that I don't have to do those things at home. I also have a housecleaner come every few weeks to do the deep cleanings. Those two things seem to help a lot, but I start to feel overwhelmed from time to time. 

[yogiii]

I leave at 5-515 am and get home at 430 pm.  It's really wearing on me.

[Pants]

Clhen - the thread title here is very close to the "Job Hunt Thread" over on YM. You may want to specify "Job Talk" or "Job Advice" or something? 

[chen35]

How do I edit the title?

[Pants]

Erm - my solution is usually to yell for a mod...   midjd mmhmm

[midjd]

I'm here! 

You should be able to edit the title if you go in to edit the OP -- just click up top where the title goes. If that doesn't work (and my dashboard is a little different so I'm not sure what yours looks like) just let me know and I can do it.

[midjd]

Mar 25, 2015 11:38:05 GMT -5 chen35 said:

I'll start.

Including commuting time, how long are your days? I leave the house about 7:00 am, and usually get home around 6:45. It seems like a lot, but given my profession, I don't know that there is much to be done. I try to take breaks throughout the day to work on personal stuff, paying bills, budgeting, etc., so that I don't have to do those things at home. I also have a housecleaner come every few weeks to do the deep cleanings. Those two things seem to help a lot, but I start to feel overwhelmed from time to time. 

I should leave at 7:10 and get home around 6. In reality I leave between 7:25 - 7:35 and get home around 6:15 (I can flex my hours as long as I average 75 per 2-week pay period). DD's daycare closes at 6 and I'm usually one of the last to arrive.

It doesn't bother me too much except when my teacher friends who live within walking distance from work decide to go out for drinks at 4pm and I am still stuck here 

[Pants]

Mar 25, 2015 11:38:05 GMT -5 chen35 said:

I'll start.

Including commuting time, how long are your days? I leave the house about 7:00 am, and usually get home around 6:45. It seems like a lot, but given my profession, I don't know that there is much to be done. I try to take breaks throughout the day to work on personal stuff, paying bills, budgeting, etc., so that I don't have to do those things at home. I also have a housecleaner come every few weeks to do the deep cleanings. Those two things seem to help a lot, but I start to feel overwhelmed from time to time. 

I'm lucky in that I made my commute real short right after I had a kid. DH's is still long. In exchange for that, I spend more time with B right before and after work. 

My commute is about 15 min, plus 10 min for daycare drop. Most days, I leave the house at 7:30 and get home at 5:30. A couple times a week it's earlier or later. I will also log in and do work after B is in bed maybe once every couple of weeks. 

[Sam_2.0]

I leave at 7:40 and get home at 5. Main reason I took this job, otherwise I would be leaving at 7:40 and getting home at 5:45 on a good day. I really want to talk to my boss about flexing my schedule in August so that I can either do preschool drop-off or pickup. I would love to do pickup and then just log in from home for the rest of my day, but I am not sure he would go for that.

[shanendoah]

I leave the house 6:30-6:45am and get home right around 5:30pm most days.
We are looking at moving this summer and one of the goals is to make my commute shorter (35-45 minutes in the morning, 40-? in the evening- generally around 50 minutes).
Though if the girls get into the private school we just applied to, I'll change my hours from 7:30-4:30 to 9-6 and be able to take the carpool lanes in in the morning and miss the worst of the commute coming home. Last week I stayed at work until 6pm to help at an event and my commute only took about 30 minutes (so stayed at work 90 minutes later than usual, got home only 60 minutes later than usual).

[yogiii]

That happens with me also, if I can't leave by 345-350, I may as well just stay and work until 615.  The problem is the kids go to bed at 7pm (and I already don't see them in the morning), so I don't like that being more than a very rare occasion.

[chen35]

I have the same issue, but not as bad. If I can't leave by 4:45 (which is maybe once a month), I may as well stay past 6:00. I hate traffic.

[shanendoah]

yogiii - C and I were talking just the other day about how if we could only move the kids' bedtime back an hour, I wouldn't have to get up so early/have such a long commute home. But sadly, Pop Tart, at least, is one of those that NEEDS her sleep. She's a little brat when she's tired, and Cupcake, at only 7, still needs a goodly amount of sleep, too, so the moving of bedtime isn't a good idea. And me only getting to see them for 90 minutes in the evening also doesn't seem like a good idea.

[Pants]

mid - who is her supervisor? Your friend needs to start building a relationship with her managers manager in order to hedge her bets on her supervisor's insanity. 

[yogiii]

I would probably continue to do my work and make it obvious I'm not devoting my attention to her in the hopes that she would eventually stop coming by or it would decrease in frequency.  Likely not the best approach but what I would start with.

[wvugurl26]

I leave around 6am, I should be home around 530. Lately it's more like 6 because I can't leave work on time. One caveat is my schedule is compressed so I have every other Friday off. Work is just crazy lately.

[chen35]

Are the play by play's affecting your friend's work? Or is it more of an inconvenience? I agree with building a relationship with the supervisor's boss. That will help if things end badly. 

Does your friend have an office she can close the door when she needs to focus on something? Would that help?

[tcu2003]

The goal is to leave around 6:45am - usually it's more like 7. I try to leave work by 4:30 and am then home by 5:15 after picking up DS. DH and I carpool, so the leave time doesn't always happen due to one or both of us, but we typically pick up DS by 2:30 or 3 every couple of weeks to make up for some of the days he stays a little later (he can stay until 6pm at daycare, so we're never that late).

[shanendoah]

midjd - sadly, this is reaching a point where your friend does need to get HR involved, perhaps in some mediation. Or perhaps to try and push the supervisor toward a comprehensive medical evaluation. If this is relatively new and out of character behavior, there may actually be something wrong. Since she and the supervisor have been close, maybe she knows if there is family she could talk to (it sounds like there isn't a husband, but I could be wrong).

[mroped]

Or your friend can do the penguin move: "smile and wave boys!" Maybe she can act like she's listening?!

Typicaly, when I work I try to make it on the job by 8 but that means sometimes I have to leave at 6:45 and sometimes I can leave at 7:45. Rarely happens that I leave the job site later than 4:15. Normally is arround 4. 
My typical job site is within one hour from home.
No kids to pick up or drop off and traffic is inexistent. More than 10 cars at the traffic light is rare.

[TheHaitian]

midjd I will have to disagree with shanendoah. I would be careful involving HR unless your friend boss is doing something:
- illegal
- unethical
- harmful
- all the above

Also with the way you listed it, seems she has no direct supervisor. Small world, your friend piss her off she might black ball her.

I say be polite/respectful and try to avoid her as much as possible... suggest the following to your friend for every time the boss corners her or walk in, tell her :
- got to use the bathroom
- have to return a call right this minute (pick up the phone)
- have to go talk to a colleague before she forgets
- tell her assistant to come into her office within 2-3 minutes of her boss walking in there.

Eventually she will find someone else to tell her stories too.

[chen35]

When someone is in my office and won't stop talking, I so this thing where I stand up and walk to the printer or somewhere away from my office. Most people feel awkward walking back into my office, and it typically gets them to wrap things up.

[TheHaitian]

Mar 25, 2015 22:27:04 GMT -5 chen35 said:

When someone is in my office and won't stop talking, I so this thing where I stand up and walk to the printer or somewhere away from my office. Most people feel awkward walking back into my office, and it typically gets them to wrap things up.

Yep something like that 

[Knee Deep in Water Chloe]

I also pull the "keep working on something and then start moving around" trick. The difficulty for me is that I am the supervisor, so I have to balance meeting others' needs with still getting my work done in a reasonable time frame.

[flamingo]

Mar 27, 2015 15:52:43 GMT -5 Knee Deep in Water Chloe said:

I also pull the "keep working on something and then start moving around" trick. The difficulty for me is that I am the supervisor, so I have to balance meeting others' needs with still getting my work done in a reasonable time frame.

Yes, I have that same balancing act issue. For some reason seeing my door open just invites all the "black holes of conversation" right on in.

Good thing for me (?), as a manager, I spend most of time in meetings and in other people's offices, so it's not as bad as it could be.

[Knee Deep in Water Chloe]

Mar 27, 2015 15:57:47 GMT -5 flamingo said:

Mar 27, 2015 15:52:43 GMT -5 Knee Deep in Water Chloe said:

I also pull the "keep working on something and then start moving around" trick. The difficulty for me is that I am the supervisor, so I have to balance meeting others' needs with still getting my work done in a reasonable time frame.

Yes, I have that same balancing act issue. For some reason seeing my door open just invites all the "black holes of conversation" right on in.

Good thing for me (?), as a manager, I spend most of time in meetings and in other people's offices, so it's not as bad as it could be.

That's been  my new approach this year--schedule things elsewhere in the building so people cannot come and talk to me. I hate the question "Are you busy?"  Of course I'm busy! Why would I be at work if I didn't have anything to do!

[flamingo]

I had an employee come in to see me the other day, unscheduled.

Her: Do you have a minute?

Me, looking at the clock: I have exactly 30 seconds until my next meeting starts.

Her: Oh, good, let me shut the door and talk to you about all my problems!

Seriously. And, best part of that is, we had just come from a meeting where we talked about how scheduling meetings is important so that both parties were prepared and feeling rushed or blind-sided. It was awesome.  The joys of being a manager, right?!

[Ombud]

Commute: I leave at 6:30 so I can get downtown by 7. Stop at Starbucks as I don't start until 8 (7:30 until the 15th) If I leave at 7 I get downtown by 8. Leave work at 4:30 & home by 5, get stuck till 5 & it's 1 hr commute. Leave at 5:30 and it's worse. Hate traffic

Work flow: Proofers a procrastinator, I'm not. Does affect flow

[Wisconsin Beth]

Mar 27, 2015 16:14:02 GMT -5 flamingo said:

I had an employee come in to see me the other day, unscheduled.

Her: Do you have a minute?

Me, looking at the clock: I have exactly 30 seconds until my next meeting starts.

Her: Oh, good, let me shut the door and talk to you about all my problems!

Seriously. And, best part of that is, we had just come from a meeting where we talked about how scheduling meetings is important so that both parties were prepared and feeling rushed or blind-sided. It was awesome.  The joys of being a manager, right?!

Boss, I didn't know you were on here! 

In my defense, I literally needed 30 seconds on her time.  Spit out the situation, told her the current snafu was a 2 click fix but the decision was above my pay grade.  She said "go ahead" and out the door I went.