Cogito ergo scribo

Gee, i can't believe it's July already and half of 2011 was gone. Time flies by so quickly that it's scary.

It has been a busy week for me. I worked till 4am on Tuesday night, or rather, Wednesday morning. I couldn't complete the report as i had planned even though i worked through the night. For all the previous reports that i needed to revise, normally i was just correcting the English. Hence i could complete them over the night. This time 'round, i needed to fill up the content too and that took me longer than usual.

On Tuesday night, i met the senior consultant on MSN. I clarified some of the points with her, and then also took the chance to tell her that i felt she did not put her heart into the work this time. As it was late already and i wanna continue with my work, we didn't chat much, and she logged off and went to bed (yeah, while her boss was about to work overnight to clean up the work that she did not do properly).

Then on Wednesday, i worked from "home" and had to help to do a little bit of babysitting. I will elaborate more on this in another post.

When i woke up at 10am+ and started working, i saw the senior consultant put a long message on her MSN. It was something along this line: "i did what i was told and now you said my work is not good. I am very confused." When she saw me online, she immediately deleted the message away. I'm not sure if i should be glad about this, for it at least showed that she would still be worried about me seeing it.

So i pretended that i didn't see anything and proceed to clarify a few points with her again. I also asked her why certain things were missing from the report, and she then started telling me how those were supposed to be covered by the Malaysian finance lady and not her, and she was there only to cover the portion that she was told to do. As i carried on asking her some more things, she still continued in such manner, kept on saying that she did not want to do the part where the management had said that finance lady could cover, as she did not want to be seen as a busybody. I saw that the conversation wasn't gonna work and decided that it was best for me to talk to her face-to-face when i am in KL. Then i ended the chat by diverting the topic to another work issue.

This senior consultant had really disappointed me greatly. Actually on the very first day when we were in Shanghai office, she had already exhibited (in my opinion) unprofessional behaviours. In the meeting with the China management before we started working, she was typing away on her laptop and did not participate in the discussion at all. Basically, she was showing her silent protest by giving this aloof attitude.

Then after the discussion, we concluded that the finance lady and the senior consultant will talk to the users together, while i worked on other stuff. Just before we went off to start our own assigned tasks, the senior consultant spoke to me softly, "can she just go by herself?"

She was referring to the finance lady. She was basically telling me that she did not want to work with that lady and would rather that lady talk to the users on her own. Then i got quite pissed, wondering how she would even need to ask such question. I just felt that she was being non-cooperative and throwing her tantrums even. I mean, c'mon, we were already there at Shanghai and we gotta do the work no matter what. So are you telling me that the company would fly you so far to just sit there in the meeting room and do nothing? How is it gonna reflect on the regional team?

But then, we were at a country office and i couldn't possibly show any sign of internal problems within the regional team. So i replied to her softly too, but in a straight face, "OF COURSE NOT."

Then unwillingly, in a sulking face, she went off with the finance lady to talk to the users.

A few minutes later, she came back to the meeting room (leaving the finance lady alone with the users) and started complaining to me in a very emotional manner. She was obviously very upset and then even told me that she was already unhappy with a lot of things in this company, and this China incident might very well be the push factor for her to leave. I did not want to aggravate the matter there and wanted her to quickly go back to join the discussion with users, and hence i just allow her to let off her disgruntlement.

After she finished her whining, i told her calmly that i understood her frustration, but at the end of the day, we would be the one who needed to write the report. If the report is not good, we will be the one liable and not that finance lady. I told her to just ignore that finance lady and just do as what she would normally do like all previous tasks. We have to ensure whatever we needed were covered just so that we could write the report.

Anyway, apparently, what i told her did not register into her mind at all. Now she actually told me that she did not cover the part that the finance lady was supposed to cover, even though she had told me how the finance lady seemed to be at a loss and did not ask users a lot of questions (she told me this just to prove that how lousy that finance lady was). Then i wondered - seeing how the work wasn't done properly by another person and you could actually let it slip, and didn't even bother to fill in the gaps? Where is the professionalism and sense of responsibility?

In fact, throughout the entire trip, she had shown her moodiness on-and-off. During discussion, she would just keep mum and kept on typing on her laptop. I intentionally asked for her opinions a few times, and she would just give simple reply or just say "i have nothing to add".

It was the worst working experience i've had with her so far. She has always been a responsible person but this time her emotion and negative thoughts got the better of her. Her behaviours and work attitude were totally out of my expectation, and i felt that this is not the end of it yet. This case had such big impact on her that she is now more like buying time only - she is looking for job (even during office hours) and she would just leave once she got a better opportunity elsewhere.

I definitely have to talk to her next week. Uh huh, i'm going to KL again next week. I think the talk gotta be something that either change her mindset or make her determines to leave. Seriously, if she can't change and still continues in such manner, i would rather she leaves than to become a tumour in the team. I would rather free up the headcount to get someone who can be more passionate about the work, than to have someone occupying the position but not being productive or not doing a good job at all.

This is not gonna be easy for me. I really hate doing this people management thingy, but i gotta do it nonetheless. See, it's similar as what she went through - being put into a situation or dealing with people that we would rather not have to do. The difference in how we handle it is that i know this is what i am being paid to do, this is my duty, and this is something i do not get to choose so long as i still want this job. Therefore i just have to do it to the best i can, no matter how unwilling i am and how frustrating it may be. I just wish she can understand this principle, just like a matured professional ought to.

Labels: rant, work