Saturday, February 2, 2008

New Day

Well I am trying to be optimistic and enjoy my saturday and not think about the incidents of yesterday. Last night I had some handfuls of popcorn at a friends house that I shouldnt have, but trust me, that is not that bad and in the past, something like that happening would have caused me to binge my heart out.

I appreciate all the kind words though. Basically though at my company, you dont make mistakes. Because we have so many big competitors, we just cant allow that.

My company is one of the leading companies in the world of Employee Engagement surveys. my master's degree is in Industrial - Organizational Psychology, which means I use psychology in the business world to help companies restructure themselves and run smoothly. The engagement area is what my company focuses on. We have a great product which is a standard survey which many well known companies across the world use to survey their workers to find out how engaged they are. My job as a project manager in this company is to set up a survey (web or paper), collect the data, report and analyze their data, and basically tend to their every need during all stages of the survey. Then a consultant will work to help the company understand the results, and then help them fix the problems they have in their organization to help them save money. If employees are not engaged, they are not working, therefore the company is losing money.

So basically, as of yesterday, I failed. I did not help the project move smoothly. I made it worse. Yes as you all said, its not really my fault as I didnt intentionally do anything. However, its a project manager's job to keep the client happy. I did not do that. I made things worse and that is why they can easily go with them.

The specific team I work on, the Survey Technology Center (STC), we work specifically with other consulting firms. There are many firms that do what we do, but dont have the technology to run surveys so they outsource it to us. So basically my company is competing with the clients that STC works with. Thats why my company is a double edged sword..we get the consulting firms and unknowingly to them, also get a lot of the consulting firms clients as well through the larger portion of the company, if that makes sense. In any case, the consulting firm we were running this project through got bought out last spring and basically stopped using STC as their outside vendor. This particular company was about 80% of our business. They only came back this year to do a few projects with us, but they were all our biggest projects. THe project I am working on now that I was talking about yesterday is STC's biggest project. If we lose this project as well as the client, we do not have any business anymore. Hence, anyone in STC will be fired. And yes, it is a very real possibly this client goes because since they got bought out, they have the ability to do this project on their own. And yes, the client will leave because if they want to keep the project themselves, they need to keep their client happy. This particular company had done a survey through another vendor with my client and there were many mistakes and that is why the moved away from them and came to use years ago. Now I have a feeling they will be moving on. Especially if anything else goes wrong.

So you see, it doesnt matter if I do a good job or if I wasnt 100% responsible. If there is no more STC, there are no more jobs for this team. The president doesnt want people who cant make him money or make him lose money. Anyone who is involved with big business understands this. They dont care about people, only money. That is why people at my company are very disposable. They fire and hire people all the time. There are many more people waiting to do my job.

Its kind of ironic too...that a company that specializes in employee engagement would care nothing about the engagement of its own.

So this had nothing to do with weight, but maybe now more of you would understand why I am upset. we have a reputation, we have the best technology and web design, and have some clients you would be SURPRISED to know they even care about this. If I lose money for my company, then I am no longer wanted.

7 comments:

Hanlie said...

Thinking of you!

Diana Swallow said...

I'm thinking of you too. Big hugs and good thoughts headed your way.

Anonymous said...

Oh Heather....I'm so sorry. I can totally relate to the responsibility that you feel. Even when something isn't directly "your fault" I know how it can consume a person.

I have worked in the medical field for many years and sometimes, even when you know you did everything you could, it's not enough and I always feel just terrible.

Sending you peaceful thoughts - and thanks for being so good at stopping by my blog! It means alot.

Anonymous said...

That sounds like a company that I would not want to work for lol. I mean if you are treated that way for one mistake or mistakes aren't allowed?

I hope you find a solution to this or whatever comes about that you choose what is best for you in your life right now.

Anonymous said...

I'm so sorry things are going poorly for you. I can't even imagine being in that situation. I'm sending good thoughts your way that your client cools down and gives you another chance.

Susie said...

Yes, very ironic.Employee engagement. THinging warm positive thoughts. Take care.

pointing the weigh said...

WOW! The company you work for sound a bit harsh!

I am thinking of you.

(((hugs))) x

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