Offloading!

When was the last time you gave up a job that was having a huge impact on your health and well being?  What do you do when you know that the job you are in is causing far too much stress for you? How do you handle the stress and move forward? Or do you stay stagnant for fear of change and uncertainty?

Four months into her employment as a supervisor, she left and this gave me every reason to question why? Why did our supervisor want to leave only four months into her employment. First red flag. Then more red flags came along as my days in my job passed.

On average, we spend a good part of our day at work, five days a  week, therefore it needs to serve us well otherwise we take the negative vibes with us and this affects our lives at home with the people who matter to us the most.

I have learned to walk away from whatever is not serving me well and leaving my last job was the most important thing I needed to do for myself. I knew that I would miss the girls and boy in my team yet I have learned to take care of number one and that is ME!  No one is here to take care of me for me, therefore it is up to me to take care of me for my health and well being.

There have been fun moments and lots of banter with my team and we work well together as a team yet our manager has been the major issue for us. We get no support that helps the team to strive to do better. We get no recognition for all the damn hard work we put in, in every shift. We get no positive feedback on how well we did. We got lots of destructive, soul destroying and shaming comments. We got lots of anger, toxicity and drama which is very draining for me. I could see our manager was reacting to what we did not do yet she neglected to see all the things that we did do and recognise us for those. I picked up so much toxicity and shame from her words. I also got her bluntness and rage at times. From what I learned over the past five and a half years from my personal development, I could see she was a very poor leader.

Having fun at work was one of the best ways to banish the negativity we got from our manager. Looking for solutions was another way to conquer all the challenges we faced on a daily basis. I learned how to be more productive with my valuable time and get more done, without the drama.

Being a housekeeper for a budget hotel has been most challenging and physically demanding for me since I left work at the Chinese take aways and restaurants many years ago.  My body is ageing even though I am feeling very young at heart. The physical demands of a housekeeper can only be known to those who have kicked ass each day as a housekeeper. Until someone has had the experience, one shall never know the daily challenges one faces. My team has no idea when we finish our shift due to the nature of our job. We do not know when our days off work shall be until we get our new rota for the upcoming week.  Our weekends are the the most gruelling times for us due to the high physical demands and high work load. We all really need the Monday off work to recover yet not all of us gets it due to the shortage of staff.

With the bad there is the good. As a housekeeper, I got to have my phone on me at all times. I had my upbeat music on at full blast to get me through my days of working on my own. To fill the silence, to pick me up and help me work faster. I would sing and dance to the music which was so much fun. I get to have my water with me and could snack on my protein bar whenever I felt hungry hit me. I could use the toilet without walking very far which was a huge bonus for me, as I remember having to walk “a mile” to use the toilet at my M&S job!

I have had the opportunity to see from my own eyes how the company works and how the management deals with and handle their staff. Being told constantly that what we do is never good enough is soul destroying, destructive and drains us from our positive energy. I have been very fortunate to have had my five and a half years of personal development to deal with and handle whatever life throws at me,  in a constructive manner. I see red flags where there is something that just doesn’t feel quite on par to what I want from a job. I see who the good leaders are and who the weak leaders are. Giving us threats yet not following through with their words is definitely a sign of weakness. Saying one thing to us and doing another is also a sign of weakness. I could also see how productive our manager was and what she used her time on which was to me, also a sign of weakness. Checking up and sneaking up on us was a sure sign that she did not trust us and our capabilities. Shouting at us, talking down to us and swearing at us are all a sure sign of weakness. I had wondered at times during my employment, how on earth did she get the job and stay in it for so long as a manager?  I could see that she was micro-managing us when she put our names onto our caddies,  chemical bottles and toilet brushes. What a total waste of time to me! Surely she has more important tasks to complete than waste her valuable time on this stupid task???? It became so obvious to me that she was not one who focused on being productive!!!  There were a number of occasions where I could see that she lacked emotional intelligence and would react to whatever triggered her emotions and take it out on her staff.

Thank goodness from my personal development over the past five and a half years, I was able to put up clear boundaries with such a toxic manager and tell her what I would and would not tolerate. What I would be able to do physically and what I was unable to do. There is a limit to everything.  I put my foot down and stood up for myself because that is the best way to protect myself from unreasonable demands and abuse.

Why would anyone who is smart enough to know what they deserve  want to stay in a toxic environment at work and be abused?

You are fired stupid manager! Woo hoo!