Tuesday, November 30, 2004

The secret is out

As I've posted on here before, my boss and my close co-workers (all 2 of them) are all in the loop with my business school plans, but I've kept it quiet at work outside of that small circle. I really wanted to keep it on a "need to know" basis until I had some decisions in hand and my boss was down with that. So imagine my surprise when I sit down in a meeting with several representatives from each department and have one of the senior managers (from a department other than mine) ask me how the b-school apps are going. Loud enough for other people to hear and go "What's that you say? You're applying to b-school?"

{picture my smiling face trying to hide the shock and desire to kick my boss's ass}

Yeah, not so happy about that, but what's done is done. I had my regular one-on-one development meeting with my boss shortly afterwards and I grilled him a little. I definitely felt betrayed by him and was not happy about the public ambush, but so it goes. He explained that at first he only told his boss (which is perfectly acceptable) and wanted to keep it that way. However, with the departure of one of our team members in early November and some reluctance by our site director to backfill the position, he had to bring more people in the loop and make the case for the backfill to maintain continuity of the business since I'll be leaving in less than a year (unless a catastrophe happens) and it will take a few months to hire someone and get them up to speed. He was in a crappy position and I understood why he did it, I just wish it could have been a little more discreet and I wish he would have told me before or immediately after he let the cat out of the bag so I wouldn't be caught off guard like that. The other thing that I'm worried about is corporate politics and what impact this might have on my performance rating/bonus. People are much less inclined to promote or reward someone who has plans to leave and they may make assumptions about checking out/slacking off in the final weeks. We'll see what happens, I just have to keep kicking ass and taking names and hope for the best.

4 comments:

aregon23 said...

Yuck! That sucks being ambushed in a meeting. How did the guy ever get to be a head of a department if he doesn't know what news to keep quite and what to speak. I hope the repucussions of the MBA don't spoil your bonus numbers because that would totally suck, specially at a time when you will need to salt away the money for school.

Here is hoping you get your admit ASAP, atleast that will take away some of the pain. Any idea when you will hear from McCoombs or Chicago?

droodoggie said...

Something similar happened to me....the pressure of having your boss write a rec for you is somewhat unfair IMO. Sounds like you handled it quite well.

Wakechick said...

I don't care about my boss knowing. I told him months ago and he's been really supportive and helpful. It just bugs me that people who don't need to know...know. People who will be involved in the discussions regarding promotions/bonuses. When trying to create a normal distribution, it's now very easy to stick me, someone who's not planning on sticking around, in a lower bucket than I maybe deserve. Plus there's that potential for public embarassment if the worst happens and I don't get in anywhere. And of course I got on the elevator today and another person who has no business knowing asked me if there was any news on the b-school front...grrr.

Cal Grad said...

Yea, I'm in the same boat ... hate telling people "Nope nothing yet" and dread the thought of possibly saying "Not going anymore, been *dinged* everywhere!" ... errrrr