boss has turned into a nightmare

[tightsonatrain]

AIBU to try and assert myself more with boss?

No idea what to do. In a career where it is extremely competitive. Contracts are short lived and there's too many extremelely well qualified people trying to climb the ladder. This creates a very unhealthy atmosphere. Burn out is common.

It's standard to make your own schedule and work whenever you want to, as long as your projects get done and you go to your meetings.

My issue is that a while ago my boss as if I wanted to be involved with a specific project that they were running. I said yes as this aspect she was asking me to sounded like a good thing to get onto my CV. All went fine.

Shortly after, they asked if I wanted to take over managing it. The main benefit for me is that I'd get a specific job title I'd be able to add to my CV if I did this. I asked what proportion of time this would take up, and they weren't able to answer (again this very common in my industry). In the end I said no, as it's not in my job description, would involve a lot of work that I shouldn't be doing (admin and PA type stuff) and I didn't see how it would be possible to do all my other work on top of this.

Despite this, I keep getting tasks related to it sent my way. It is taking up so much of my time I'm not able to get my usual work done. I get regular unshecduled texts and phonecalls on my personal phone about it (again, pretty unheard of in my industry). Every issue that comes up is urgent, so all my current work has to be shifted in order to solve it. I have explained how I don't have enough time but their opinion seems to be that I should be able to get it all done. I'm frustrated that I seem to be doing 90% of the work but without the benefits of actually being project manager.

The issue is that there is no end in sight and if I don't do it, there's no-one else which is why it's all being dumped on me. I don't understand how they could've organised such a project without getting appropriate workers to cover it, as this started as almost a favour to them (when they asked if I wanted to be involved), so no idea what would be happening now if I'd said no in the first place.

Their attitude towards me has changed and meetings are stressful. They've started micromanaging (all the phonecalls) and picking at mistakes, some of which I never actually made in the first place.
I've started having chest pains and palpitations. My son has commented on how I'm no fun to be around :( I don't see any solution apart from quitting my job but that's not an option. I hate it because my actual work, I love, but right now I have no time to enjoy or do properly because of the situaiton I'm in.

So essentially, the business has taken on a piece of work, assumed you'd do it and when you said no gave it to you anyway.

Now it's becoming an issue they're bullying you into continuing with it?

Is the project business critical? Will something massive fall down? Will they lose a client or similar?

I'd park how its affecting your family and stress levels. It goes without saying that that is a huge motivating factor but essentially you drew a line and they crossed it.

You say there are lots of short term contracts that come up all the time - are you in the mix to get one of those? There or other companies? If so can you get looking for another one and do damage control where you are whilst you're waiting to jump? Or is this a do or die situation?

I understand that you feel obligated, you take pride in your career, but is it worth it or is this something to chalk up to experience?

Also do you have any allies within the business? That might be another option depending on who they are.

Also - to the question 'should I be more assertive?' - you know the answer to that already. The question is how. That's where allies might help.

Do you have an HR dept? Arrange a meeting where you state that you’ve been given all the work despite saying you didn’t want it and were asked and declined. You should not be receiving calls on your personal phone. I went a bit mad at my boss for her regularly contacting me outside of work. It’s made her stop, but it shouldn’t have happened in the first place.