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It’s true…some people just don’t know how to manage workers.

But, unfortunately, a whole lot of folks who fit that description get put in charge of workers, and we end up with countless stories like the one you’re going to read today…

And that’s pretty darn frustrating, if you ask me!

A woman explained why her manager is not fit for leadership…and why she’s paying the price for it.

Let’s take a look!

My manager’s poor delegation has somehow become my problem.

“I just need to rant because I genuinely don’t know if I’m overreacting here.

I work at a relatively small company, and our “office” is literally in the parking basement because there isn’t enough space on the shop floor.

We have three designers — two girls and one guy — and we’re all in junior designer/entry-level roles.

Our marketing lead/manager is not a designer by background, which honestly isn’t the problem. I’m not formally trained in design either, but I’ve taught myself and have some experience.

Uh oh…

The bigger issue is that she clearly has favourites and, for whatever reason, seems to trust my design skills more than my male coworker’s.

She has consistently given most of the design work to me and another girl who worked here. She was also quite rude to that coworker, to the point that she resigned last week.

And now I’m basically dealing with the consequences.

This sounds really frustrating.

Since she never really included our male coworker in most of the work, he doesn’t know how a lot of things are done. So instead of distributing the work between the two of us, most of my former coworker’s workload has now landed on me.

I wanted to take leave today. I eventually did, but before approving it, my manager started guilt-tripping me.

How rude!

“You’re already taking leave on Saturday for your graduation. Are you sure you want to take leave today? There’s so much pending work. I don’t know how you’ll cope with it. I don’t know what I’m going to tell upper management. You’re putting me in a difficult position.”

And I’m sorry, but… how is this my problem?

This is a six-day-a-week job. I’m entitled to take leave. And if the workload is so dependent on one person being physically present, that is a management/delegation problem.

This sounds pretty unfair…

What really annoys me is the double standard. If my male coworker takes leave, I’m expected to handle his work on top of mine. I don’t complain about it because that’s what you do when you’re working as a team.

But if I take leave, suddenly there is nobody who can do my work.

So basically, because my manager chose not to train or involve another designer, I’m now somehow responsible for making sure everything gets done even when I’m on leave?

We’re literally junior designers. The whole point of an entry-level role should be learning, getting exposure to different kinds of work, and being taught how things are done.

Instead, one person is trusted with everything, another person is barely given anything, and then the workload becomes a disaster when the first person takes a day off.

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I don’t even know what the solution is at this point. I just needed to get this off my chest because I’m so tired of feeling guilty for taking a completely normal day of leave.”

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a tech support worker who told a manager a computer needed replaced, only to be told no thanks.

Here’s what a reader had to say about this story.

This manager shouldn’t be in charge of anyone!

FULL STOP.

No way!

She needs to start looking for another job TODAY.

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Author

Matthew Gilligan