To lie and not travel to a work meeting?

[mamabeeboo]

At the company for just over 2 years and dates/location have been announced for the annual work meeting. It's a lot of meetings, presentations, the CEO will be there (woop-de-dah!). It's somewhat relevant to my role, but wouldn't make a difference if I went/didn't go. I know this because when it was on last year, due to budget restraints, some people were not invited (like my team) and this didn't impact anything at all, targets were met and all went well.

I am invited this year and I don't want to go. I don't want the hassle of waking early to take a plane for work, participate in the fake niceties, spend all day trying not to dose off during presentations, have crappy buffet sandwiches daily, then networking dinners, enough to be exhausted to collapse into your hotel room ready to do it all again tomorrow, it's a 3 day long conference but 4 days total including travel time.

Work are arranging the travel that I am there just for the meetings and not a second to spare to see the city or do anything I want to do.

Manager has said it's a great opportunity to meet the wider team (yawn) and the CEO (yippee) and learn more about our products.

No it's not compulsory but "It would be nice" if I could attend.

It's also clearly not an important part of my job, because if it was, I'd have been invited last year.

I have blamed childcare and no one to look after DC. Which is a lie because DH can do it. Manager has expressed disappointment and has been a little off with me (or maybe it's just me overthinking) and has asked maybe DH can take time off work, maybe grandparents can help? I've said no and no.

AIBU?

OP your attitude stinks. Your laissez faire attitude and your cavalier attitude to lying about childcare.

No I would never use my children like that so you don’t speak for everyone. I take responsibility for my decisions and don’t blame them on children’s care.

You are paid to go to work and do a job to the best of your abilities. I can almost guarantee that your contract says that occasional travel is required so they aren’t being ridiculous for a once a year trip.

You may not like it or want to do it but guess what? You are being paid to go. What you do at work isn’t a choice and if you want it to be one then find a new job.

If this was a post for someone who had to go to a work trip but was a single parent and was worried about what to do then absolutely fine. But your casual dismissal of an annual conference and lying about why you can’t go stinks.

They will have the measure of you as your feelings will start to leak of you aren’t seriously careful.

Childcare as an excuse ... Well, it's one of the very small perks of motherhood isn't it?

Only if you're extremely short sighted. Every time a woman says she can't do something at work because of childcare, she reinforces the reasons women are discriminated against in the workplace.

This.
There's no I in Team.
It's a reasonable management request.
I would take a dim view and I hope your disrespect for the CEO and disregard fir the organisation don't show.
If you look up you'll see a double glazed glass ceiling.

until society stops viewing childcare as solely a woman's role, then childcare issues will continue to be a legitimate reason why women are unable to attend events away from home.

But op is reinforcing the view that childcare is solely the woman's responsibility. Her husband could have done it, but she lied to her manager and said he couldn't.

(I think I I'd be pissed off if I was her husband, that she thought it was ok to use me in this way to get out of something she didn't want to do, instead of being honest.)

Yeah, that's really out of order.

Trust me it makes a difference when you show up (or not). Who knows what opportunities it could lead to. Your view seems very short sighted.

Your manager is already pissed off. That sort of thing could make a difference if there are eg redundancies.

It's a once a year thing and you can't be arsed to go.

I would 100% go to this if my manager asked, it's times like this as a team we do our best relationship building with the rest of the business. I'm away with work on Tuesday night and then working from home the following week. I really don't find this a hardship, work will take care of my hotel plus my expenses and I get to talk to people face to face in a different office.

I think you have a lot of front to respond with blaming child care and refusing to look at other childcare options instead of asking your manager what they think you would get out of it and questioning why you would be needed, you should at least had a think about it and talk it through with them. Some parents don't get that support and would love to be able to take that opportunity.

I don't know how many of you have been in the corporate world

🤣🤣🤣

No that's right @mamabeeboo you have a fab attitude and you are completely right. We're a lot of internet numpties who know nothing....

Childcare as an excuse ... Well, it's one of the very small perks of motherhood isn't it? I'd be surprised if no one here has used their child as an excuse at least once for something, even if it's leaving a dinner early or not being able to make something because DC are 'sick'.

fuck no

Especially because I am a woman, so I wouldn't play that stupid game in the workplace. Would a MALE colleague do this? I have never seen one playing the "kids" card. (exception being an injured child, or very serious life-changing illness).

Just because I have kids doesn't mean anyone is allowed to treat me seriously than any other person, male or female, anywhere .

You don't have to give a shit about your job, most people don't 😂, but you are making it very obvious you don't, and as a woman it annoys me you use your kids as an excuse - especially when you don't have to!

I don't know how many of you have been in the corporate world

I don’t know about anyone else but I came down in the last shower 🙄

YES PLEASE!!!

PPs quoting me made good points about how some of the corporate travel is beneficial. I think that's true enough, and I was exaggerating, a bit. But what my mega corp found is that there was definitely fat to trim in the business travel budget, and there's less travel, but not less actual communication.

Right?! I'm honestly astonished that there is anyone who wants anything other than this!

Interestingly the op started another thread about how to advance to directorship asking for advice

I’ve posted on that one…. Attend conferences that your manager would clearly like you to!

Ohh where is that one?

YABU for using childcare as an excuse as it exacerbates the notion that mothers are unreliable workers, not team players and don't want promotion.

You should have just told the truth, that you don't see it as impactful in your role and not the best use of your time.

Gosh, you sound as if you despise the company you work for and the people in charge! Obviously you don't have to go to this event, but it may be your underlying attitude being picked up by your manager that has made relations less affable.

It's quite the other way round. Systemic sexism in the workplace and employment law is what causes women to be discriminated against. Then, when they find themselves in precisely the position into which a system already weighted against has placed them, they're accused of reinforcing that system and are blamed for that, too. Of course discrimination against other women in the workplace must be caused by women who either play by those rules or actively kick back against them.

Either way, women lose. They don't receive a fair or level playing field to begin with. As for the 'glass ceiling', you'll probably find you hit that at some point in your career whichever side of the fence you sit on. So is it really surprising that some women have decided not to play by those rules, or feel to hell with 'progression' and 'responsibility', we'll sit in our little box and meet our targets and go home?

The fault here lies with the attitude of a society which views women as default carers and support humans, widens the gender pay gap, denies women the same opportunities as men in the same roles, denies women opportunities on account of ageism, always has a reason why women 'can't' do the jobs they were employed to do (first maternity, now menopause), and has now got on board with the current insidious creep against women's rights in the workplace to boot. OP has decided to hell with playing by those rules, and I don't blame her. The kiss-butts are rarely thanked unless they are in privileged circles to begin with.

This is the real rot that needs tackling here. Of course, it's easier just to blame women.

'Do you really just want to stay in a little box meeting your targets and being left alone?'
Thousands of us have seen the light and want exactly this.
Right?! I'm honestly astonished that there is anyone who wants anything other than this!

OK, so you'll be happy if there's no innovation, progress or development in any area? No new products, no new creative work, no medical or technological advances? Because you think no-one should ever want to do anything but sit in a little box and have no ambition, no drive to discover or create anything new or fight to make it happen?

Pity time travel isn't a thing, you could go back in time and tell Shakespeare, George Stephenson, JMW Turner, Florence Nightingale, Joseph Bazalgette, among many others, that they did it all wrong - they should have spent their lives sitting in little boxes.

Ignore all the finger waggers and do what suits you. I hate this idea that we owe our companies these extras. It does sound like a total cringe. I also don't see why they couldn't have made it so you could fit in a bit of sightseeing, they way they have organised it you have all the inconvenience of travel with none of the perks.

Work are arranging the travel that I am there just for the meetings and not a second to spare to see the city or do anything I want to do.

It’s a work trip not a holiday 😂

Use your own money and annual leave if you want to see the city and do things you want to do.

If you don’t want to go on the work trip, don’t go. But if I were you, I’d be looking for another job that I had some interest in. Life’s too short to be bitter and miserable in a career you hate.

In my experience, it doesn't seem to matter if you are a mum or not. Being a women is enough to keep you out of more senior roles. It is a perception thing...you have a pair of tits, you must need to be looking after someone. The glass ceiling is a real thing, and if you try to smash through it, you will receive massive pushback.

In my 20s, I was called "a girl". I was told....too young in my 30s for a managerial role and told to take another decade "to develop", and then I was too old for one in my early 50s, and there were allusions to the oncoming menopause. I just got promoted the best I could, got my professorship, and when I got pushback for wanting to go higher, just did my job till I retired.

Companies/institutions don't give a damn about their employees anymore. COVID showed us that in a lot of ways.

Systemic sexism is a problem and women like the OP are a problem. We don't need to pretend only one can be true.

'OK, so you'll be happy if there's no innovation, progress or development in any area? No new products, no new creative work, no medical or technological advances? Because you think no-one should ever want to do anything but sit in a little box and have no ambition, no drive to discover or create anything new or fight to make it happen?'

'Pity time travel isn't a thing, you could go back in time and tell Shakespeare, George Stephenson, JMW Turner, Florence Nightingale, Joseph Bazalgette, among many others, that they did it all wrong - they should have spent their lives sitting in little boxes.'

You should spend some time in a little box working on your reading comprehension skills. Who said no one should want to? I said thousands of us don't. You go ahead and knock yourself out.

That's the trouble with people like you. Driven, ambitious, innovative and always always a little bit stupid.

Enjoy running yourself into the ground and accept that not everyone wants to join you.

Do they offer a remote option ?

Personally I despise these events and always have. I can't bear corporate bullshit ( even for a day, let alone four) and am extremely introverted. Largely Emperor's new clothes.

But I am old and cynical. I managed my career away from the private sector. It's still present, but not quite so horrific.