updates: I had to stay in a horrible hotel on a team-building trip, and more

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager .
Here are three updates from past letter-writers.
1. I had to stay in a horrible hotel on a team-building trip
I am the letter writer who had to stay at a horrible hotel on a team-building trip. I am happy to report that I have a new job!
When I wrote my original letter, I was feeling stuck and discouraged. As many commenters guessed, the trip and bad hotel were just the tip of the iceberg with my old job. I had a director who was indifferent to the fact that we were understaffed and overworked, and a manager who didn’t support us or advocate for us.
I was out of the workforce for an extended time to raise my family, so I am older than my former manager and my colleagues at a similar career level. Even though I have strong technical skills and an excellent reputation, I had become pigeonholed as the department workhorse, always there to solve a problem or pick up the slack, but not expected to advance. I also have a professional designation and was trying to move up within the “Professional Designation” department because I thought that was the best way to strengthen my resume.
About a week after my letter was published, a former manager told me that “Cecelia,” a manager in another department, was hiring for a role he thought I’d be great at. It’s in an area of the business not related to my designation, so I thanked him but didn’t plan to apply. The next day two more colleagues reached out to tell me about the opportunity. Both had worked for Cecelia and had nothing but praise for her. The phrase that stuck with me the most was, “I always knew she had my back.” I thought to myself that someone like that would not have stuck me in a fleabag hotel and expected me to work around the clock.
I had a closer look at the job posting and realized that it probably would suit me. It’s about half work related to my professional designation and half work on larger projects and initiatives. I got excited when I realized it could be a way to move my career in a new direction. I applied and got the job!
Cecilia is as great as everyone says. For the first time in a long time, I feel valued and respected at work. Ironically, I probably wouldn’t have considered this job if the horrible hotel hadn’t been the last straw for me. I didn’t end up going to HR about the hotel or having an exit interview, but the VP (Director’s boss) reached out before I left; we’d worked together on a few projects and had a good rapport. I tried to give her a neutral account of the reasons I was leaving without burning a bridge or throwing my manager under the bus. I don’t know if it will change anything, but I tried.
I’d like to thank Alison and the commenters for your advice and encouragement. Good luck to all the discouraged job hunters out there. I hope you will soon have good news of your own to share.
2. How to talk about a personal crisis at work (#4 at the link)
I was able to find a way that felt right to me to talk about my partner’s health crisis and as several people advised, was approved for FMLA time to help structure and protect added flexibility to accommodate my family’s needs. I’m really glad I did—I was able to get support I needed at work without feeling as worried about what impact it might have had on my performance. And, being at least somewhat open with folks about what was going on allowed me to more authentically decline meetings if things felt overwhelming, if I needed to move things around to get longer blocks of focus time, or make space to get family members where they needed to be.
It also helped me be a lot more confident in the kind of support my manager, team, and company were willing to provide.
My partner died suddenly about a year after I sent in that letter, and when my manager told me to take several weeks off right away, I completely trusted that I could take that time, focus on getting us through that initial shock, and work with them to develop a plan to ramp back up responsibly. At other jobs I’ve had, bereavement policies allowed time off in the order of days, not weeks, and I really don’t want to know how it would have gone had I been required to return to work before we’d even been able to hold the funeral.
3. How do I pass on institutional knowledge before I retire? (#5 at the link; update here )
Longtime commenter Free Meerkats here. Well, today is my final workday on payroll. The new person is going to be excellent in this job and I’m comfortable passing the fasces on to him. I’ve also suggested AAM as a source for him as it’s made me a much better manager than I would have been without regular reading of your sage advice and the comments from your readers. Thank you all, you’ve made my life simpler and easier to navigate.
I’m still not sure exactly what I’m going to be doing with myself in the next phase of life, but I have time to figure that out. I won’t be gone from the site completely, but will be reading it less and commenting even less than that.
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