A few weeks ago I interviewed to be 1 of 7 people on a committee to hire a new minister for my church. I was asked to apply, which was flattering and there were quite a few people who applied. I got the call last week that I was chosen. We will meet once a week until next June, which is intense but I feel like the work I will be doing is important. I also do some committee work for a conference for children's literature, and recently joined a committee for a literary award for Maine children's literature. My boss really encourages me to "get out of the house" and get involved with professional stuff like this. I also sit on a board of a local food bank. I sometimes attend a book group at a local library. I host 2 p.m. monthly book groups at my work that run from September until June. Sometimes I do outreach for my work in the evenings too. Phew. How do I have a life? I still find myself with pockets of down time, so it isn't all that bad. But, I decided to contact the person who organizes the children's lit conference to tell her that I need to step down because I didn't want to burn out, but could I join the committee the next year when my weekly meetings for church would be over? Her response surprised me. She basically said that she would be willing for the committee to meet less to allow me to still join them. Wow. I guess they really like me.
Meanwhile I have an internal storm brewing about work. I have one staff member who annually designs a poster which I find visually cluttered and confusing. I love simplicity. She's more chaotic, but only in this way. She also takes things extremely personally, and needs to feel needed. She also openly brags how she does not know how to spell my name, which irks me. I recently took the disability awareness class and learned that when making fliers/posters advertising library programs, they should be in size 14+, sans serif font on matte paper with few graphics to make the piece accessible by all. I shared this with all the staff as a way to broach the subject. My next step is a conversation with her once she gives me another draft of the poster she's currently working on. I think way too long I have been lax with my staff, and they don't respect me. Much of library work is about order and organization, and my staff can be sloppy at times. I often as myself if the conflict I feel with them is about my own issues, or stuff that really happens. I'm just tired of not being respected.
5 comments:
Isn't there a 30 Rock episode like this? I'm sure you can get some guidance from Liz and Jack on it. :-)
Hey, I read your link, and it worked. The line spacing in all of my posts are back to normal. Thanks so much!
And yeah, I know about respect at the workplace. They should just find out what it means to you.
I wish I could get away with stuff that Liz does, like eating ham in my wedding dress, quoting Designing Women, or selling my work to a German company.
Respect that is hard sometimes. Being firm doesn't always make you popular as a boss. Sometimes things have to be the way they need to be, as in the case of disability. I think broaching the subject as you did, and redirecting her in terms of what your clients need, and not as an insult to her design talents would be reasonable, if she can't take that maybe she needs to grow up. As far as the name thing, I am guessing she knows that is a sore point if she brags about it. It sucks being the bigger person sometimes, my grade schooler in me wants to have you just always misspell her name too. There was a girl in high school like that who always called me Norma, her name was Stancie, so I would just call her Stacy in revenge she would always get upset. I found it highly satisfying in a twisted way. Okay I am done writing my book now, I will go away. ; )
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