Last Wednesday after delivering my final month-end reports, I resigned from my role. I didn’t quit because of the workload. I didn’t quit because of burnout. I didn’t quit because of the company’s vision or some personal entitlement.
I quit because I was no longer adding maximum value.
To give some background: My previous director invested heavily in me even in my few failures.I experienced what a good leader looks like and as a result, my peers who he personally hired are awesome. We operated like a well oiled machine. We all backed each other up and knew the mission we had to focus on. Our director departed last year. We have a new lead and his accolades are impressive, but the hires from his end in the past several months have been lack luster to say the least. Specifically, the senior managers being brought in. They have the right attitude and know the lingo but.. There was a lot of action missing. In the past three months I’ve noticed myself getting increasingly irritated. My girlfriend noticed I was bringing this frustrated attitude home. I wasn’t the only one on my lateral team who felt this way. We made this clear to everyone above. These new people were coming to us for so many tasks. And I don’t mean anything complex where your own analysts couldn’t do, but it was really tedious but serious work. We couldn’t tell if they didn’t know how to do it or were just passing off work. Really strange stuff like not knowing about foundational files that sit beneath every budget and management report.
What killed me was this one meeting the newer people didn’t connect the dots. These were people who apparently came from relatively large orgs. They would pull some of us aside to look at a budget variance report showing “positive performance” and then be confused when the CFO explained why cash flow was negative. Ok no problem. I can explain this. I get how that might be a bit tricky if you haven’t done things our way. But why would you go to the CFO and OPENLY celebrate revenue growth without realizing gross margin was eroding, which meant our operating margin was shrinking quarter over quarter. This was painfully comical
Chris didn’t make me quit
Chris isn’t actually his name but let’s call him that for now. Our previous team was so bang on because we want everyone within our team to do well. It’s a reflection of us as a team to everyone we engage with. Other divisions knew us as “Rock Stars” But then comes Chris one day trying to throw one of our other colleagues under the bus on some mistakes that in hindsight wasn’t even that serious. I felt some strange embarrassment for some reason. Our own team member. The same guy who idiotically asked, “why couldn’t we just spend down the marketing budget since it was approved” without realizing his receivables were stretched out and his book literally didn’t have the cash in hand. Another time he didn’t understand why a business unit with 55% gross margin was still operating at a net loss because overhead and SG&A were climbing faster than revenue. Ok fine, maybe that could be beyond him but he is in no position to be sandbagging anyone to their boss.
This created some strange mistrust in a few of us. I was beginning to hold back and not speak up on things. I could see myself and maybe others as well were fractures to the team. And when we make multimillion-dollar decisions, I feel irresponsible not doing what I previously did well. Not adding value.
GOD I HATE POLITICS. I avoided it for so long since I left being an entrepreneur but I guess I'm due for it.
A couple of weeks went by and he’s still having us managers handle some of his book. I raised this problem to our leadership and promises were said but not kept.
Here’s what I mean by Chris didn’t make me quit. What made me quit was my leadership team’s response after my last time expressing concerns. Even they were tired of hearing from us managers and their blunt conclusion was: Be a team player.
Why I had to leave:
I like my team, the work, most of the clients, and the banner I represented. I wasn’t quitting the company itself. The company can hire whoever they want. But when their hires impact my function and role, it’s a problem. Whether the leadership knew or not, we couldn’t just deny helping them because we share some budgets. This was leveraged against a few of us whether it was intentional or not.
I don’t mind being the person people come to for “homework help,” but months of this with no end in sight is absurd. Even though the irony is that as a kid, I was the one asking classmates for their homework because I didn’t do the work myself. Hah.
As much as this sucked, there is a tiny take away from this experience. For years I have seen myself as the “young worker” who still has a lot to learn and has a few decent skills. Fearful of dramatic actions like this; I’ve never felt more sure and confident in who I am and the place I need to be. When I was 25 at Auto Trader,I used to confuse the company needs with my own personal needs. I now certain I am no longer that person. I am now a leader who has seen what “good leaders” look like.and can confidently say I want to be on track to operate the way he did. I have the luxury to leave the work to pursue while my other colleagues cannot. I can’t waste this opportunity to pursue what satisfies my desire to work