8

What a week... I feel like I am on here ranting more than usual.

The Marketing Director and Project Manager keep telling me to let them know when I am stuck on tasks so they can unblock for me, but I FUCKING DO. I don't understand why they keep telling me to speak up, because I use multiple channels to tell those who are the blockers that I need an update.

I add comments on my Monday.com tickets and @ the relevant people, I send MS Teams chats to them, we even have a daily standup where I mention that I am stuck, as well as a OneNote daily update that gets sent to management where I mention that I am stuck and tag the people who need to help me out.

I have been stuck on a task for two sprints, which should have taken me a couple of days to do.

I really feel like I'm talking to brick walls, am I that unimportant? This is supposed to be "agile scrum kanban blah blah blah sprints story points people over process bullshit". I hate it. Y'all are doing it wrong... Fuckin robots.

I need a fuckin drink, thank God it's Friday.

Comments
  • 2
    Weird.

    Since they keep asking you - it they don't consider you unimportant.

    My best guess would be that these managers are aware that you have blockers - but they are A) asking others to help you, but unsure if they do - so they asking you for a follow up to see if you actually got help.

    Or B) they really want to help you but are unsure what to do, or are busy and keep forgetting so they are saying "I know you have blockers and I haven't helped. Sorry..keep reminding me"
  • 2
    Schedule a meeting with whoever is needed to help you. Make sure they can't duck out of it. Give it an hour or 2 in duration - however long you need to be unblocked.

    If they decline, loop the project manager in and ask him/her to tell those guys to prioritise your work, or suggest another time.

    If that doesn't work, schedule a half hour catchup with your PM, marketing manager *and* everyone who needs to help you. Get them all in a room, get them to commit to something then and there.- be that a longer call, time to help you then and there, or something else helpful.
  • 0
    @AlmondSauce Trust me, I did this :( The people I need work from to continue mine are also getting work dumped on them by this very same Marketing Director. It's like he doesn't have a clue what's going on in his own department. I don't know...
  • 0
    @dissolvedgirl What happened at the meeting you scheduled - or did no-one show up?
  • 0
    @AlmondSauce The people said they'll send stuff ASAP haha.
  • 2
    @dissolvedgirl

    > "getting work dumped on then by this very same Marketing Director"

    Damn, I can relate. I call it "manager amnesia" - I once worked 50-50 on website A and B, both had the same manager. On Monday morning they told me to fully focus on a feature for A til I was done, then before lunch we had the meeting for B and they told me to "focus on a feature for B during the start of the week".

    I had to remind them I got conflicting orders...and the response was they just panicked and said "Um...just do 50-50" 🤷‍♂️

    I had to remind them "didn't you say last week doing two things at once is slower than doing one thing first than the next?" 😆
  • 1
    Follow up:

    Normally a manger can snap out of "manager amnesia" (telling someone that multiple things are top prio) by simply nagging them to the point where they go "OK it seems other thing1 is more urgent than thing2 as it's I'm getting notifications about it from another team"
Add Comment