Conflicting Instructions, Confusion city

LegacyUser

AHHHHH!HH!H!HH!H! GHGHH!H!H!H
Seriously ! Will someone please give me some advice/help/pethadine


This morning, I went into work, to my job which I am grateful beyond belief for, and which I do well, to the best of my ability. I break a sweat every day, I don't stop until everything that needs to be done is done. I go back over things, if I've overlooked something.

There's a girl in work who is employed to do the very same job as me and nothing more. She has been there less than 1 year, and her contract states, she tells me, that she has exactly the same position as me.

YET, she was asked to take on extra supervisory respopnsibilty by the head of the Department. And for some reason, she took it on, Maybe to gain exp or whatever.

So I have been listening to HER instructions mainly, and of course the instructions of the head of my department. Yesterday, without going into tooo much detail, I noticed something was not done, I brought it up with her, explicitly told her that I thought it needed to be done, and she told me ... "no, we do this on a thursday"
Obviously there are certain tasks asigned to different days of the week. So of course, with confidence in the person whom the head of the department places so much trust, I Did'nt do the thing which I thought should be done. I overrode my own judgement, because I was told to.

So then the very first thing this morning, what did the head of the department pull me up on !! ! ! ! ????? YOU GUESSED IT, the very thing I thought should have been done yesterday.

So here is the problem, there are two people, giving me conflicting instructions.
I am ONLY doing what I am told to do! But it seems even that is not enough !! ! !


LAMB OF GOD, GIVE ME PATIENCE

bbam

Have a meeting with both parties present, explain your position..

looksee

Its probably too late to do anything about that incident, but surely the obvious answer was, 'X gave me new instructions that it was to be done on Thursday, and since she is supervising that, I followed instructions and left it till Thursday. Or words to that effect.

You should not have to untangle the chain of command from the bottom (though it does happen that you have to sometimes ), and you need to know who you are taking instructions from.

Sorry bbam, I don't agree that she should ask for a meeting with the two supervisors, they need to sort it between themselves, but the OP should not be involved in that.

OP, if you feel you should have been asked to take on the supervisory position you should maybe arrange to have a quiet discussion with your Department head as to what you might do to be offered this opportunity in future.

mikemac

This goes on all the time

I don't think a meeting is necessary.

Just tell the head of department exactly what you have told us. The supervisor gave instructions and you followed them.

This issue is for them to sort out, you are blameless here

dan_d

ugh. I remember that situation.

It bit me in the ass once, and after that I double checked everything with everyone....rather than say anything about the other person....unless it was happening every day.

Either that, or I went back to the original person and said "are you SURE ...", because if my instincts were telling me that strongly, I wanted to know exactly WHY we weren't doing a particular thing so I could explain to anyone who came my way afterwards.

Trashbat

looksee wrote: »

Its probably too late to do anything about that incident, but surely the obvious answer was, 'X gave me new instructions that it was to be done on Thursday, and since she is supervising that, I followed instructions and left it till Thursday. Or words to that effect.

This is good advice, but ensure its done in a professional "matter of fact" manner. Do not get defensive, or make it appear that you are shifting blame.

Do nto call a meeting. This makes things overly formal and could harm existing relationships.

John Mason

sounds exactly like my place but the instructions change every 5-20 mins., one person saying "do this" and then next saying "why did you do that" on and on.

whenever i now ask for clarification from one person, get them to put it in writing, if they email me, i bring it down to them to get an original signature on it.

so 5 mins later when someone is going off one i can show them what i was told to do and not to argue with me about but to speak the other person.

so then the 2 of them get together and come up a completely different option :mad::mad::mad:

i have taken it one step further this week, i have refused to call clients back to tell them the change, as i am sick to death of looking incompetant.