Sorry if this is long winded but want to give as much context.
I’ve had a lot of issues with this job in the span of working here for a month and a bit but today was honestly defeating and I’m wondering what the best way to respond would be. I’ve never had to confront a boss about this sort of thing.
I work at a barn and this was my first week back after being off due to a workplace injury so I’ve been doing half days which end at 12:00pm as to not reinjure myself.
So today, 12:00pm comes and I leave, so far all my responsibilities are completed and even some extras, I’d consider it a very productive work day. About an hour later I get a message saying “TarukMaktwo, how come you left before the barn was mucked today”. No hey or question mark.
For context, I’m in charge of that whole barn minus 5 stalls which is the responsibility of the staff at the top barn. Each stall takes about 5-10, max 20 minutes on a bad day. It’s been that way since I started. The person they sent had adequate time to finish these stalls, about an hour/hour and a half. They have 4 staff up there (usually) while I’m solo.
Now for the past problems, majority are from lack of communication and understaffing or inefficient staff. This isn’t my first rodeo, I’ve been doing this type of work for two years so I know when someone is just dallying.
Through messages my boss does not answer questions, best example I can give is when I asked if a horse should go out at 6am or 8am and they just responded with another critique, no response to the question and this has happened multiple times.
I’m assuming the other staff were behind today but there was no mention of that, I’m not up there so it’s not like I can see it either. I just assumed they’d be able to finish the regular work which I don’t think is inappropriate?
I’m looking for other jobs actively as obviously there’s a lot of issues stemming from poor management, however I don’t want to quit till I can assure a landing. This post is kinda a rant but also I was hoping for advice on how to respond to the quoted message. I don’t want to throw the staff under the bus because we’re all overwhelmed but I also don’t want my reputation sullied because of their disorganization. I honestly love this kind of work and take pride in it but it’s the job ‘aspect’ that makes me miserable. Dealing with the people sucks…
And to mention this is all for a dollar over minimum wage.