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Hi, Queens!
I've been at the company I'm at for 3 years now and the first two years I have gotten exceed expectations for my performance (I don't like performance rating btw, it's crap because companies budget play a huge role in this). I have always been a top performer in all of the organizations I worked at prior to this. The third year they changed my leader as she got promoted to VP and I started reporting to a new director who is so different than my previous leader. I had a mentor and someone who is wonderful as a female leader so I lost that and the first few months with the new leader I just knew that she will not be able to sponsor me internally and support my career growth. With this change they gave me a direct report who is basically a "lemon". I got this extra responsibility with NO RAISE. She was an ok performer (not top performer) and reported to many different people before and they didn't know what to do with her so she was hired under me because they loved my personality and energy so they thought I can help coach her. She was very difficult, lied about her hours, capacity, disrespectful and rude especially when I give her feedback on how to improve. The only raises I have gotten are my normal annual bonus and annual merit increase which was 5% based on my performance.
I had a lot of issues with my employee and I wanted my leader to provide me advice and help coach me since this situation was unique. She didn't want me to go to HR which was my preference as I need to resolve things on my own. She also wouldn't listen to mt observations that this employee has behavioural issues as a person and not just poor performance. My year end performance was last week for merit and bonus plus year end rating. For the first time ever my boss gave ne "achieved". I was so shocked, as my work was done above and beyond, my projects went live on time and a lot of initiatives went live ahead of time. I even proposed an enterprise initiative outside of my role and my department for HR that was approved and they want to roll it out this year. I was devastated because her reasoning was my "leadership" even though I did whatever per her guidance and she didn't understand the stress that was added to me on top of everything else. But for my performance to be impacted because someone else is a poor performer which she knew about and she mentioned how difficult she was as most people did when they gave her to me as if they set me up for failure and they also didn't give me a raise.
I was surprised and my boss saw it on my face but obviously gave me BS excuses. I'm now going to start looking for another job as I don't stay in relationships where im not valued. I'm planning to have a conversation with her but knowing who she is, I don't want to work under her anymore. I found an internal job yesterday and told her about it today that im going to talk to the hiring manager. It's a lateral move and I might lose a direct report but im not willing to impact my reputation or performance. She can have her.
What are your thoughts here? Do you have any advice for me? I feel that they set me up for failure and that I no longer can go to her to coach me because now it's being used against me. Part of being a leader is coaching. If coaching me means im not a top performer then no thank you. She said there are room for growth .. yes for you too woman. No one is perfect but my work and my performance have been top notch everywhere. My motivation now is 0 and my engagement is 0.. I don't want to do anything except the bare minimum.
When top performance is rewarded with more and more unreasonable hoops to jump through, you know that you're not valued. Companies get my best as long as they have earned it. Your boss un-earned it and so it's wise to use your talents elsewhere. I had a similar issue in the past where I just suddenly couldn't seem to do it right by anyone of the "higher ups", although my work had consistently gotten better and better and I had become the most knowledgeable and versatile person on my team who could be trusted with anything (not my words btw). It's not that your work is actually lacking, they want to keep you from being too sure of yourself so you won't go harder for a raise or promotion. I later on realized that my bosses used this tactic with every employee who started to soar, not just me. Go somewhere where your wings ren't clipped.
It sounds like she was out of her depth at being able to help you mentor your direct report, and instead weaponized this "weakness" as a cudgel in your performance review. It was lazy and lacks integrity. If you hadn't sought her help, she would never have known your direct report was a dud.
Either way, now you know where you stand with her now. 3 years is long enough, time to move on and get a raise.
Your feelings, thoughts, and reactions are completely valid. I find that it helps me to focus on what is in my control: your boss’s approval? Not so much, we really can’t control what other people think about us. We can however stack the cards in our favor…what are your boss’s insecurities? Ie if she is threatened by you, play up how capable she is. Everyone wants something. Does she want male validation? Talk about what a catch she is, or how smart she is for the decisions she made in agreeing with him. This is called “managing up” and politics is a huge necessity for any high paying career. Read the 48 laws of power (& take it with a grain of salt). And sometimes this works well enough. But I too would feel disappointed if knocked it out of the park and was down rated- you may want to look for other jobs anyways, especially if you gain more money or opportunities elsewhere! That is within your control.