Forgotten at Work
Forgotten at Work
Her email said you can only control what you can. And I thought, she's right, again.
I sat at my desk and drew one dot, a small one which is what I could control, and a slighter larger circle which is what I could influence. The rest of the notepad: well that was out of my control.
I'm dead, I thought. But as implied by my wise colleague’s email, I had to be stoic about it.
For I had been silenced, or forgotten, whether by accident or design, I cannot say. And should those circumstances recur, I would be unsure what to do. For the lines of communication both above me and across through me had ceased to exist.
In the last five or so months of my role, people stopped contacting me for work. My manager only met with me fortnightly. And even those meetings began to taper off. Most times she would be late meaning the half-hour was only twenty or so minutes. Sometimes she did not turn up at all. I thought I would be proactive and check her schedule. There was no free slot. Unless you counted her team catch-up. Which I wasn't invited to. Nor was I inclined to gate crash.
I had reached out to other managers across the workplace as per that manager's suggestion. But the trail turned cold quickly. What was needed was a survey. And that had been shot down stone dead. Or a process where people could contact me for their training needs. Which required a process restructure that would require the renegotiation of an existing outsourcing contract. Nope. Not a chance.
And I thought, what would the social media manager of Volunteer Funders (me) do? That was a charity I created to sponsor volunteers via crowdfunding (using social media).
So I decided to create a marketing campaign for myself (as implied by a previous manager). I created a logo. I started composing posters and other promotional material. I even priced merchandise (t-shirts, pens, etc and so on).
And just before I clicked, I thought better of it. Because two months out, I still hadn't heard back from either the marketing or social media people. Even after following them up.
And without their knowledge, they obviously would neither support nor approve what I planned.
And is was then I realised that none of my emails were being answered: regardless of whom I escalated to or who I reached across to (all except one). In fact it took me three weeks to contact my manager's manager about a trivial request. Anything more than that would most probably be ignored. Any chats I initiated were either ignored or not responded to.
Or when I did make contact, people made promises made were never followed through. Even after I followed up. And I kept a record. But there's no point contacting a mature adult and saying you've forgotten me again. They most probably won't reply.
The next step was to plan my departure. Which I did. And I requested the position not be readvertised. Because in my selfish compassion, I didn't want anyone to go through what I went through. Not without the above changed.
Still I don't understand what happened. Or what I should have done.
Which is the problem with the silent treatment or ghosting or being shunned. Until one receives a response, one does not know what the issue is. And consequently, one does not learn from it. Effectively the silent treatment is a living death whether applied at work or at home.
So what does one do when one is forgotten or shunned at work?