Wednesday, July 10
It turns out that my wonderful “Short Term Disability” benefit truly believes in the “short” in its name, and so, reluctantly, I had to return to work this week. That’s the bad news. I would much rather keep spending time on the couch with the ice machine keeping my knee from overheating and swelling, working crossword puzzles, rubbing CBD oil on the painful parts of my leg, reading books, and, of course, watching The Great British Baking Show. And, well, also, going for walks, and spending a few minutes a day on my stationary bike, and starting up my PT exercises again, and generally finishing the job of healing and recuperating and getting back up to full strength again.
The good news is that my first two weeks back to work are at 50%, so at least I can ease into things. But, oh, what a roller-coaster ride this returning to work thing has already been. And it’s only Wednesday afternoon.
My work is all project-based, and that suits me fine. I’ve had staff positions in the past where I’ve been bored out of my skull. Working in a project environment feeds the part of my soul that needs new: new challenges, new environments, new people, new schedules and budgets, new scenery. My work is also very matrixed: working for a company of somewhere around a hundred thousand employees all around the globe means that the company is sliced and diced and divided into all kinds of organizations. And that means lots of politics, and oftentimes your fate is in the hands of people in different parts of the world who know little or nothing about you.
In such a matrixed environment, it’s often a challenge to keep assigned to a project (or projects), but that’s the name of the game. You need to have a billable charge code at all times; when you don’t, you’re always at risk. Not having a project is referred to as “being on the bench” - or is it “on the beach”? Being on “the beach” implies that you’re vacationing, enjoying downtime, and having some nice colorful icy drinks with little umbrellas. The reality is actually more of being on the bench. Put me in, Coach! Too much bench time means you may not have a job when the next round of layoffs comes around.
The last few years have been challenging for me: way too much bench time for my comfort level. I’ve had a variety of projects, but none have been full time (or at least not full time for very long), and none has been long term. I envy my colleagues who are on multi-year projects, who never have to worry about what charge code they’ll use this week, or what they’ll be doing next week. But over time, I’ve cobbled together a number of contacts at a number of customers, and managed to stay mostly busy - or at least busy enough to keep me off the layoff list.
Earlier this year, I picked up a nice little project for a customer in Seattle. It was not a long term project - scheduled to complete in September, or perhaps October, of this year - but it was a good one. Big enough to be a challenge, including a product that was new to me, so a good learning experience. The team was already in place when I picked up the project, and how lucky I was to get a strong team. One of the technical leads is a guy that I first worked with at least a dozen years ago. He was a great resource then, and an even more valuable one now - and it was a treat to finally, after all these years, get to meet him in person. The other tech leads were also great: skilled, experienced, and very responsible. And every bit as important: all really nice guys.
When I knew I was going to be out several weeks for the surgery and recovery, I approached my boss, and we talked about getting coverage while I was out. Ultimately, the decision of who would cover for me was in the hands of the guy who was my superior on the project, a guy I'll call "Mr. Matrix". We pitched my colleague Drew, who was, to our way of thinking, a perfect fit, to Mr. Matrix. Sadly, Mr. Matrix rejected Drew without even seeing his CV or talking with him, and chose to put in, as he said, “my own guy” for the short term that I would be out. The plan was still for me to step back into my role once I got back on the job.
Monday was my re-entry day, and I spent my four hours doing email triage and feeling exhausted and wishing I didn’t have to be back at work yet. But Tuesday morning was my first team meeting, and, oh, what a nice welcome back. I had forgotten how much I liked this team, and how good they all are - beyond competent, beyond intelligent, beyond professional. They started the process of bringing me back up to speed, and we spent some quality time putting together our weekly status report for the customer for our weekly Wednesday meeting. By late afternoon - well beyond my four hour time limit for the day - I was feeling really positive about being back at work, and back on this project.
Only then did Mr. Matrix send me a “welcome back” message, telling me he was replacing me with "my own guy", immediately. It was a risk that my boss and I knew existed when I announced that I would be out for so many weeks, but it was still a shock. And a disappointment. I was in the middle of a conference call with the team when I got this message - a message that came via email, not even the courtesy of a phone call - and I felt tears start to burn in my eyes. These guys were my work family, if even for just a few months. I spent the remainder of the afternoon trying to work whatever angle I could to save my role on the project, but Mr. Matrix had made up his mind, and he’s in charge, and, well, that’s that.
So today was a sad day. I had to tell my team that I was out, and then I had to tell the customer that I was out. My consolation prize was having the guys all say nice things about me, in a lovely heart-felt way. The customer contact - a guy I thought was incredibly tough when I first met him - brought tears to my eyes when he said nice things, too, telling my replacement, who was on the call, “you have big shoes to fill”. A person could have a much worse sendoff.
It’s all part of the work world, and all part of this project world I’ve chosen as my career. By mid-morning I had already been in touch with my boss, and was already talking with other people involved in other customers and other projects about what I might do next. In a week or two, this project will be just another entry on my resume. In a week or two, I’ll be asking someone else for a charge code, and setting up other meetings, and working on other project plans. But right now, as I sit on the couch with an ice pack on my knee, I can't help but spill a couple more tears from just one more unintended side effect of this surgery.
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