I shoulda kept my mouth shut!
By Wendy789
@Drosophila (16571)
Ireland
January 14, 2017 6:57am CST
Hope your Saturday the 14th is going better than mine!
Have you ever caused trouble unintentionally?
I have today! 
My side job is a PM for a social media company.
We usually take over a project after the sales team have nailed the deal.
Lately, there has been some changes in the sales team, and we kept receiving project with vague or misleading instructions.
The consequence is that we have to make last minute changes. Sometimes the project gets delayed.
This lead to a lot of stress for everyone involved.
Today, I've received another last-minute change request, as a result of bad instruction from sales.
This is the 5th occurrence for a month. So, I sent a feedback to my manager about how the process should be improved to avoid such changes.
Three hours later, my manager told me, Jodi from the quality team has been penalized for this mistake, and will not receive her commission for it!
Apparently, Sales have blamed Quality for not picking up their mistake! And the big bosses agreed!! What a stupid decision!!
I have always liked Jodi, and now because of stupid politics, she's done out of a commission!
Arg.. I should have kept my mouth shut!
/Rant over.
My side job is a PM for a social media company.
We usually take over a project after the sales team have nailed the deal.
Lately, there has been some changes in the sales team, and we kept receiving project with vague or misleading instructions.
The consequence is that we have to make last minute changes. Sometimes the project gets delayed.
This lead to a lot of stress for everyone involved.
Today, I've received another last-minute change request, as a result of bad instruction from sales.
This is the 5th occurrence for a month. So, I sent a feedback to my manager about how the process should be improved to avoid such changes.
Three hours later, my manager told me, Jodi from the quality team has been penalized for this mistake, and will not receive her commission for it!
Apparently, Sales have blamed Quality for not picking up their mistake! And the big bosses agreed!! What a stupid decision!!
I have always liked Jodi, and now because of stupid politics, she's done out of a commission!
Arg.. I should have kept my mouth shut!
/Rant over.14 people like this
14 responses
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
15 Jan 17
@just4him ya they were trying to protect their skin.. the surprise is they got away with it
1 person likes this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
15 Jan 17
ya, I didn't even mention Quality in my feedback, which was about how Sales could have improved. It was a total surprise that Sales dragged Quality in. Given that Quality isn't even involved in the sales process. Their rationale was it's Quality's job to audit all processes and catch any mistakes. So it became Quality's fault for not catching them, rather than them for making the mistake?
It really warps my mind.. but I guess they wanted someone else to take the fall
1 person likes this
@just4him (317249)
• Green Bay, Wisconsin
15 Jan 17
@Drosophila That's so sad when that happens.
1 person likes this
@Daljinder (23236)
• Bangalore, India
14 Jan 17
It would have come out sooner or later possibly with even worse consequences.
2 people like this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
14 Jan 17
that is very true. my team was going nuts, so ya just a matter of time
1 person likes this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
15 Jan 17
@BellaDoc ya the drama is far from over.. ah well
2 people like this
@allen0187 (58582)
• Philippines
15 Jan 17
Hate it when office politics rears its ugly head! You don't want to be involved but sometimes you have no choice. It is a dog-eat-dog out there.
2 people like this
@silvermist (19702)
• India
14 Jan 17
What happened cannot be undone.So take it as a lesson.
2 people like this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
14 Jan 17
I think the lesson here is.. bad politics causes harm to good people.
2 people like this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
14 Jan 17
exactly. anyways, it was clear, it was either me making the feedback or one of the team..
I guess if it was someone else, Jodi would get it anyway, and my manager would wonder why I failed to escalate the issue
2 people like this
@pgntwo (22408)
• Derry, Northern Ireland
14 Jan 17
@Drosophila There is that to it, yes. Clouds and silver linings.
1 person likes this
@Happy2BeMe (99380)
• Canada
14 Jan 17
Sorry that happened but I can understand why you spoke up. You had Noni deal what the outcome would be. Don't beat yourself up over it.
2 people like this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
14 Jan 17
ya, I guess. I thought about it, not speaking up means we'll have to keep putting up with Sale's mistake. and that's a no-no. it's a shame an innocent person got the blame. But, that's not something i could've controlled
2 people like this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
14 Jan 17
@Happy2BeMe Ya, agreed. Just that sometimes doing the right thing has negative consequences.. and that's a bit hard to swallow, but such is life.
2 people like this
@Happy2BeMe (99380)
• Canada
14 Jan 17
@Drosophila exactly. You had to speak up. You did the right thing by doing so.
2 people like this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
14 Jan 17
ya, and really it's rubbish when an unrelated team gets the blame
@besweet (9859)
• Ireland
22 Jan 17
It seems like everyone wants to avoid responsibility and poor Jodi was the person that has to pay for the mistakes of others.
I think that the sales team have just lost a friend from the quality team. Now they will be forced to improve.
They may have avoided responsibility in the short term but I don't think that they handled it very well.
In my opinion you did well to have given your honest feedback.
1 person likes this
@besweet (9859)
• Ireland
23 Jan 17
@Drosophila It was expected, I don't know what they were thinking when they decided to blame just the quality department. They could have penalized both teams or just give a warning.
1 person likes this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
23 Jan 17
@besweet exactly, but then, some people won't learn unless from it's rubbed in their face
1 person likes this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
23 Jan 17
Indeed, well quality struck back and became a bottleneck, they want to approve everything now and has slowed the projects down a lot
1 person likes this
@moffittjc (121659)
• Gainesville, Florida
14 Jan 17
I think you did the right thing, even though there was a consequence to someone else because of it. But it's better to correct a mistake than to continually have the mistake floating around out on social media!
2 people like this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
14 Jan 17
ya, and really I think it's just a matter of time before something nasty happens. As this mode of operation is clearly not working
1 person likes this
@DianneN (247186)
• United States
14 Jan 17
I'm sorry you had to go through all that, but you had to speak up. Too bad Jodi had to take the fall. I hope everyone gets with the program. My younger son had to fire a few people after giving them help, hints, lectures, and multiple warnings. Very stressful.
2 people like this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
14 Jan 17
ya definitely not good when people fail to follow clear instructions.
2 people like this
@HebrewGreekStudies (1646)
• Canada
12 Feb 17
I don't think keeping one's mouth shut is the answer, they were just looking to shift blame and would have done it anyway-in issues like that there are a few choices, if the company actually cares, they will remedy it...if they look to penalize someone, a formal complaint can be made again and possibly (if it comes to that) wrongful termination. But it really depends on the value of the job, in a lot of cases, this is why ppl keep silent, the job to them isn't worth it and the company creating foolish issues, well a lot of ppl think if that's how they want it then let them deal with the ulitimate consequences with the companies future. But I do understand how you feel like it was counter productive and even harmful to someone you like, and that, yeh I can understand that, it's a sucky feeling;/.
Fortunately whenever I complain or cause trouble unintentionally it always seems to fall on me and no one else;P.
1 person likes this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
12 Feb 17
Thank you for your kind words. And I am super envious of your skill of absorbing the unintentional damage.
1 person likes this
@Drosophila (16571)
• Ireland
14 Jan 17
except, if we don't, we continue to suffer harm.. such is life.
2 people like this
