Apologies in advance for the essay.
My department director recently retired, and soon after this the boss I reported to found a new job. I really enjoyed working with the two of them and they were really good mentors.
The department director who replaced the one who retired is a disaster. And not just because learning a new job sucks and you're going to make mistakes – nah. She is bad at managing, lacking in the skills she needs for the job, she is abrasive (interrupts), and worst of all in my opinion, she lacks curiosity to learn. It's one thing to not know the nitty gritty details of a niche industry (government affairs for an animal welfare trade group), but to me the most damaging is the lack of curiosity to learn and her abrasiveness.
This has shown up not just in how she manages internally, but how she interacts with partners from outside groups. She refuses to understand why we as an organization have certain systems in place (i/e subcommittees based on people's specialties – some people we work with are experts in regulations, others – community engagement, and we have another group for legislation. She flat out says these meetings should be cancelled when they very much should not be, and I explained why.
Everyone who has interacted with her dislikes her – except for the board of my organization who likes her and she always goes with them, which is not good imo. We need to have push back and often the vision of the board is a shitty one.
All that being said, I reached out to the chair of a committee I work with regularly and we had a phone call today and I vented/expressed my concerns about her – and mostly covered my own ass saying that I recognize how destructive this change has been and that it's not coming from me.
The conversation went really well, and I can trust our chair -they are very politically astute and understand the situation I'm in as a subordinate just trying to do my job and not being able to.
But now I feel so anxious. Anxious that I was unprofessional and wrong and that somehow that will come back to haunt me. But the thing is – If I had to choose between a good relationship with my new boss, or standing up for my colleagues – who I'd love to work for someday, I'll choose the latter.
When the department director retired, he gave me a warning/piece of advice that I can already see coming intro fruition a bit: I will be the fall person if the people above me can't get my shit together. I'm looking for other jobs, but in the meantime I'm trying to set the pieces so that I don't become that person and ergo can't get another job in my industry.
Other than my own issues with my confidence/adhd/making mistakes, I really loved my job. I never dreaded going into work other than like, being tired and not feeling like working – but not because of the job, if that makes sense. Now I'm absolutely miserable. I've had bad jobs before and I'm grateful now that I'm older I am in a much healthier place (like, job doesn't equal life), but this situation is so stressful.
I'm also tracking the major fuckups she's done because she just doesn't seem to care (and not out of basic human error. But complete dismissiveness and apathy). I'm trying to keep evidence about how it's a pattern. I don't think I'll ever need to use it, but I'd rather be 'extra' and have it as an insurance policy.