I haven't talked much about my job, partly because I work in tech now and I don't want my co-workers finding this blog, but also because things at home have occupied a lot more of my emotional energy. There is no question in my mind why I have suddenly had a horrendous IBS flare-up or why a blood vessel in my right eye keeps rupturing making me look like I have some sort of hemorrhagic fever. The rupturing has occurred about every other week since early December. I'm afraid to even tell my eye doctor about it.
I've been involved a project at work that is destined to fail. It's a crappy product and nothing any of us do on this end can make it better. Unfortunately, the vendor won't let us upgrade any of our other products until this piece of crap is updated, but the update they have given us hasn't been tried out by any other health institution in the US. There was one other hospital that was supposed to go live a year ago, and scrapped the plan. it just isn't well enough built, but regardless, we are going through with it. On go live day it's going to look like that turkey on Christmas Vacation. The bird looked so beautiful, but dissolved into a puff of smoke it was cut in to.
I have felt like I have been set up from the beginning--I was brought onto the project in early December, even though they knew I would be out for several weeks for training. It's worth noting that they have been working on this project since LAST spring and should have gone live last summer. I wasn't told exactly what to do or what they needed and I was excluded from all the meetings and weekly conference calls to the vendor until 3 weeks ago. It's amazing that I did such a kick ass job without any input.
I have kept the PM abreast of what all I have done (once she returned 3 weeks ago from her extended leave--it was the first time I had met her since I started my job). Last Thursday my boss called a meeting with the PM and me to discuss my contribution. Ok, that sounds ominous. I ended up having to defend myself. My boss wanted to know why I was so busy all the time (uh, because I'm testing 4+ hours a day on top of my regular duties). She wanted to know why I was testing--uh, because I was told to (and I later learned from my preceptor that my boss DID know that I was testing and that she approved it! Evidently my preceptor has written proof in the event I need it). My boss and the PM also wanted to know why I set up a meeting with someone in another department about the product when the PM told me not to. Uh, because I didn't. The other department head set up the meeting and invited me (for those of you intimately familiar with Outlook E-mail you know what I'm talking about). I told her I couldn't help her and forwarded the meeting invite to the PM. On several occasions during the meeting my boss said to me "you are swimming with sharks". I couldn't help but think I was probably sitting next to at least one of them.
I was told that they didn't need me for any further testing and the only thing they needed was my workflow--which I could only partially complete until testing was done. I made sure to explain this and then I completed the workflow like a mad woman last Friday and sent it off. I get an e-mail from the PM on Tuesday asking what the state of the workflow was and where were the flowsheets (she used multiple exclamation points and unless I know you and am excited, I don't use multiples). After feeling the blood vessel in my eye pop once again, I replied very nicely to her email telling her that I had sent her the present and future state workflows on Friday and that I couldn't complete certain flowsheets until we had decided something or tested it. If that didn't meet her needs, I offered to meet with her immediately so that I could satisfy what she needed (get your mind out of the gutter). I also carbon copied my boss. I'm tired of this s***. Hours and hours pass and she finally sends a really nice, sugary-gaggy-sweet email about how they couldn't have managed without me or my flowsheets. It was, of course, also cc'd to my boss. The following day my boss, who was out of town, emailed to say it was the best email she had gotten out of our town all day. I hope she was being facetious.
Well, the PM didn't invite me into any of the meetings this week or the testing so I don't know the workflow and now I need to have it completed by tomorrow. I did drop in on one meeting today and I already solicited an invite to the workflow meeting tomorrow. How asinine is it to not invite the workflow person to a workflow meeting??
It gets better. The PM and one of the builders have nearly identical names. All of us involved with the project were sent an e-mail detailing the workflow issues. I thought the builder (a woman I trust and gotten to know really well) sent it so I emailed back:
I couldn't have said it better myself. Thanks for doing that. How are the meetings going this week?
Well, evidently it wasn't from the builder--it was from the PM, the woman that accused me of not doing the workflows and the woman that excluded me from the workflow meetings! Woops. I'm so glad I didn't make a nasty comment, which would be my normal behavior.
It gets better. We are supposed to save all our documents on the network drive under our own personal folder. It's like that scene from The Firm where they try to hurry and get copies of the documents made before the other lawyers and security know what they have done. Actually, I guess it can be any movie where two parties are both trying to get to something before the other. I suddenly realized that she could easily go into my file and alter or destroy those files. I started making copies, sending them and all these emails to my home email address and saving things to my laptop's hard drive.
So, now I at least have a record of everything--both in email and on here. Hopefully that won't come back to bite me. Until then, I am going to try to avoid swimming with the sharks and the piranhas.
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