Tuesday, March 06, 2007

squeaky wheel gets the grease

Those of you that know me well know that I despise causing trouble or causing any sort of confrontation (especially in work situations). Well, this past Saturday, I did just that. I'd finally had my fill of 10-11 hour workdays. Besides being overworked and under-slept, it was also my birthday week (always a bad time for me), and I was hormonal. Taking all that into account, it was no wonder I almost blew a gasket at 4am Sunday when I was just finishing up at work. I'd been all ready and geared up to talk with my immediate supervisor about what we could do about the schedule, but he left before I could get with him. Arrgh! When I had fumed internally for a couple of hours and then cursed about the lab (I was alone so no one heard any of it) for a while, I sat at the computer and wrote out an email to the boss. It was very nice and polite (which I really wasn't feeling) but got my point across: I'm tired, I can't keep working at this pace, please fix it. Well, let me tell you what happened. When I got to work Monday night, I had a reply from the big boss-man saying how sorry he was that we are so short staffed, and it was never his intent to work me so hard. He also said what a valuable employee I am and how he will do whatever he can to try to remedy the situation asap. On top of that, the schedule had been changed, and I am no longer working so much stuff. YAY!

Lesson learned: the adage is true--the squeaky wheel indeed does get the grease.

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