-
ChristIsKing.eu has moved to ChristIsKing.cc - see the announcement for more details. If you don't know your password PM a mod on Element or via a temporary account here to confirm your username and email.
Career And Job Advice Q&A
- Thread starter bubs
- Start date
Use Jobscan.com to tailor your resume to match the application. Worth the $10 a month.
Been forced from a project manager job into in a management and sales job where I'm now struggling. Got a couple employees that work for me now that run circles around me in most every way. One of them is much better qualified than I am to be in this new position I've been forced into, and feel like I have a bullseye on my back. I probably make at least 30% more than this individual does. Should I go to the owner to suggest a position swap (he clearly sees what's going on as well), suggest I take a pay cut go back to being a great project manager? Despite me doing great work before, I think the owner doesn't like my high-salary, and possibly may be doing a reorganize for a potential sale (just a possibility/speculation on my part). Or ride it out in this crazy position I stink at/have no aptitude as a saleman, and see how it plays out? I'm giving it my best but its a quite stressful situation.
Personally I would ride it out and maximize the salary.
But you should always be looking for the next best thing.
I would NOT go backwards. It won't look good on your resume.
That's a tough position, but run with it, for now. Play your strong hand - product knowledge - and run hard.
As a PM you had to persuade others that your idea was the correct way to go. You had to integrate work to a common goal. You can't be a good PM without a decent level of persuasiveness.
Sales is just another way to say "power of persuasion." Earnest people, quality/price balance-focused, have a strong chance. You might not be the golf foursome guy or the conference schmooze guy, that's ok. Just try to build relations with your top 10 customers. Let them know you care. Tape a list to your desk and call them each once every few weeks, just to check. It's your job to monitor the relation. "You purchased XYZ 3 months ago, how is it working? What can we do better? What do you like most about XYZ? What other needs do you have?" Touch the 5 Ps - product, price, placement, people, promotion.
If the owner is considering a sale, he may be putting you in this position just to give you sales experience - thinking you might be a better senior executive for it - once he's gone. Buyers are asking - with whom do we replace the owner? Not this guy - he's never talked face to face with a customer. Not the top sales guy - he's marginally competent about the product and what's behind it, so there's no way he can run production.
Many sales reps are good at selling themselves - to their bosses. They aren't as good at selling their products to their customers. Many reps are order takers and schmoozers with company credit cards, afraid their boss will figure it out. Businesses are littered with them. Your top sales guy might be one of them, maybe not. Either way, treat the Sales Manager job as a new program you have to manage, and go manage it relationship-wise.
If you call customers to check on your company's QC, then your sales reps should appreciate the backup, even if they are protective of their contacts. Don't try to bypass or cut them out - you don't want that job anyway. You don't need to ask the customer "how's my rep taking care of you?" They will likely offer the info. Just thank them and call the next customer. Encourage them to call your great sales rep anytime.
By the way - many truly good Sales Reps make lousy Sales Managers (and the owner knows this, even if the great rep doesn't). No disrespect and you should want them to still thrive, but some great sales reps are just NOT cut out to be managers. What do you care if they make bonuses that run their pay higher than yours (for now), so long as you are happy with your pay? That's a way to prove your net worth to THEM and to your boss. Then ask for another promotion and get away from a job you hate.
Yes, agree I'm about 2 months into this new role and doing everything I can to make the best of it. I'm in my 50's and looking to retire in about 10-12 years, so I feel like I've reached a plateau (actually more like a pinnacle that may be hard to maintain IMO). In this final act, really just looking for a 9-5 job that I enjoy/contribute well to , have a decent boss and short commute. That's all I need and I'm pretty happy and content. Long hours to climb the corporate ladder is no longer my goal.
Basically what the owner (small company <20 people) has done in this reorganization 2 months ago, was making all our staff to be involved and have roles/responsibilities in all aspects of the business (sales, marketing, along with continuing in their specialized expertise they were hired for). So there were 3 people at the same grade level before. One loved doing the client relations stuff, once was like me and loved doing project management, the other was very well rounded and did everything well with no complaints or weaknesses. Now all 3 have to spread across all those activities and being evaluated in their annual reviews according to the new generic position grade expectations. It's like instead of having a cohesive band that functions well with a singer, drummer, bass player etc. the owner now expects everyone to now be proficient and contribute well at all their instruments. Clearly a few people shine and others struggle at certain things as that's just human nature. Makes no sense at all from anyone I've talked to except: a) creates a more generic org structure that works more effectively for a sale or b) weed out existing people who only provide a niche specialization and the owner wants to replace them with expert people who are expected to do very well at many things. Although no one has been let go in over 2 years I've been here. The owner prefers to bring in young, inexpensive staff vs. veteran more experienced staff. 2 years ago I was the last highly experienced person they've brought in...probably added 7+ people all under 30 years old since then. I get it if the focus is on improving bottom line with lower salary, yet at the same time ower overrides my decision to keep existing staff as we can saturate more projects with same staff but he brings people on board way ahead of the new agreements in place and revenue guaranteed and also its a strugge as a manager to keep them busy (so under this strategy the ower doesn't care about the bottom line?). Its extremely confusing to figure out what's going on with this strategy. More staff = more attractive for a sale? If there is anything else logical that I'm missing here please let me know. And if the owner were to sell the company, it woudl be to be absorbed by a larger competitor (whom we've actually poached a few recent employees from).
For what its worth the last 2 years prior to this reorg. have been the best work experience/job in my whole career. I knew to appreciate the ride while it lasted but I never saw being stripped out of what I was doing very well for the company and put into a position where I struggle. I guess it could also be a passive/agressive way to try to get me to leave on my own terms vs. being let go. Since others in the company have also been impacted by this change however, I don't think singling me out in this way is likely.
Last edited:
Where would you guys recommend looking for remote work? Like what sites. My skills are junior but I will be looking for web development jobs in the new year and possibly IT help desk as a backup or friction job but there is nothing in person within an hour commute in any direction. I have a list of a few online sites I've gathered from reddit but I am wondering if the crew here might be more in the know of what's worth your time.
MosesTheBlack
Orthodox Catechumen
You’re better off getting advice and mentorship from colleagues, friends, and mentors in real life.
From my 1 minute perusing this forum, it seems you have members who don’t believe in space, so I’m sure some will lie to you about their worldly success.
Tell the members here to send a screenshot of their gross income per year or weekly checkstub (anonymized of course), before taking any of their advice.
Agreed you should only take advice from people who are successful...but not everyone has mentors in real life.
There are general discussions points here that people can investigate for themselves.
There’s to little info. But in abstract when employees are demoted is for them to leave. Will give a quick example which is not the case but translates. In a high end department store. If one employee from one section is caught stealing. He is fired. But the entire section can´t be fired. It would be unjust. But at the same time management know they most certainly knew and said nothing. So what they do is downgrade all section. If they were selling something lucrative like perfums, expensive jewelry, etc. They will send them to the dog food section. As a punishment. This directly affects they´re sales comission income. It´s a veiled punishment. Normally after a while employees will leave with a good package.
Another more positive option is maybe he believes you lack commercial skills in your previous role and is aiming for you to improve them. But from my experience I would go for the first option. He wants you to leave. He doesn´t fire you. Because either he is too weak. Or wants to keep you around for an emergency.
I would advise on starting looking for a job. And if there´s a strong new job prospect before leaving talk with the owner.
As a side note to other poster. Nobody needs to post proof of nothing to give advices. It will up to the recipient to evaluate their worth.
The usual argument of CIK membership can´t be trusted because of x, y or z. But the guy who posts is a member. Adds zero value. Only useless noise.
Consider sharing your thoughts candidly with the owner, non-confrontational as possible. Your dismay is justified, and it sounds like others are also confused. Do it in a "what are your expectations/goals for me" fashion.
If he is the type of boss that needs chaos around him in order to secure his own position (and keep newbie salaries low), then you may be in a dead end. Organizational chaos is not a good thing to do before a sale, but who knows with some guys. The justified criticism of many small biz owners is that they are often wacky. You might be dealing with this.
BTW, if he is younger than the competitor you mentioned, he might be looking to buy them out, even if they are bigger. Strange as it sounds, it is happening nowadays with lots of boomers and even us Gen X guys retiring. Some businesses can't find buyers, but they want a decent, younger guy to buy them out (and do right by their people and customers). Yes, some decent people exist. It is happening up/down the supply line, as well as within direct competition.
When I first joined RVF over 11 years ago I was in a bit of a rough place career wise, and some established guys a few years older pointed me in the right direction. So, more than happy to return the favour to others on this forum. If anyone needs some advice on anything in either brand or affiliate marketing, copywriting (incl. AI and its impact positive and negative), or just general help with CV/resume then shoot me a PM.
Palsofchaos
Catholic
Linkedin.
But
Remote may be hard for entry level. Career fairs or some sort of connection with whomever gave you your degree are the alternative. If you did well earning your degree, your teacher/professor/instructor won’t have a problem pointing you in the right direction.
Remote jobs are a lot easier to find once you have some experience. I would take anything you can get when just starting out.
Circling back to refresh some updates on my job situation. I had my annual 2023 review with owner recently. Despite the upward feedback from my staff being very negative about me overall as their manager (most of them say I don't have respect by the team nor am I a highly effective leader). The owner stated that he has my full support to take the team to team building event somewhere to try to rally behind me. I'm planning that as we speak. Also the owner stated (he brought this up, not me) that if wanted to go back to just being a project manager and managing projects like I have been for last 2 years very well, he would be very fine with that and wouldn't even cut my salary. He acknowledged that I did very well as a project manager for the prior 2 years. I told him, lets revisit in 3 months to see if anything changes with me as the manager.
So this seems strange to me that the owner would be fine with me assuming my previous role w/o any pay cuts. I was able to see the salaries of the individuals working for me and the next closest person makes about $60K less than I do as it stands right now. Does anyone else see this as a red flag? I'm still planning to update my resume and get some feelers out, while I'm doing my best to be a strong leader. My ideal situation would be to stay with this company long term as a project manager. Love the company, love the people (except 1 person who seems to be trying to take my management job), work and benefits etc. but I'm 100% sure if I were to leave, I'd probably only get 50%-70% of my current salary, more costs/worse benefits and so on. This is best company I've ever been at and don't want to have to walk away from it.
Good luck! It sounds like the boss doesn't want to lose you in spite of what's happened so far.
I work golf course maintenance as my main job, but work slows down in winter so I've been looking for a part-time job or two to stay busy. It was absolute hell trying to find even basic jobs a monkey can do. I can't believe how inconsiderate and picky many of these hiring managers are. Some even expect you to come in for an interview within a couple hours of contacting you, then ghost if you can't drop everything and be there right away.
The only reliable places have been the local ski resort and the park district. So it actually worked out because these places are a lot more enjoyable than all the other garbage out there. But I feel for all the people that really need work and have to put up with this garbage. This current economy and work environment is a joke. So many awful companies and people out there.
The only reliable places have been the local ski resort and the park district. So it actually worked out because these places are a lot more enjoyable than all the other garbage out there. But I feel for all the people that really need work and have to put up with this garbage. This current economy and work environment is a joke. So many awful companies and people out there.
You sound like a tyrant if your team thinks that negatively of you there is probably a reason. A lot of people who are technically competent still make bad managers. Have you considered that maybe you have an attitude problem and need to be kinder to other employees (especially your team).
I think it’s actually the opposite. I’m mostly a softy manager and not a tyrant. All of the survey results said that they felt that I genuinely care about them as people and listen to their input when making decisions, but they don’t respect me as a leader and don’t feel I’m competent to lead them. I think from at least 2 of them (both young women), they want to be in charge and see me as an obstacle, so a lot of what I read from their comments was mostly unconstrcutive criticism for the purpose of the review, to expose some of my weaknesses to the owner. They weren’t inaccurate in most of their comments, just clearly a passive aggressive way to try to usurp me as a manager as fast as possible.
Anyone here have some sort of above-average experience or authority in the corporate world?
I am just wondering if white men in the DEI era should leave corporations or if there are means and ways to stay inside within some form of merit-based air pocket.
If so, I will explain my recent experience with a STEM globocorp.
I am just wondering if white men in the DEI era should leave corporations or if there are means and ways to stay inside within some form of merit-based air pocket.
If so, I will explain my recent experience with a STEM globocorp.
Last edited:
I just submitted my notice to my current employer. I was demoted and it was time for me to go.
It's not the most prestigious employment for a man my age, but I'm going to work Door Dash and Uber for a while. It's decent money where I live, and I love setting my own hours. I just need to figure out the best way to get health insurance, and how to do my taxes so I don't get totally screwed.
It's not the most prestigious employment for a man my age, but I'm going to work Door Dash and Uber for a while. It's decent money where I live, and I love setting my own hours. I just need to figure out the best way to get health insurance, and how to do my taxes so I don't get totally screwed.