AIBU to think 48 WhatsApp groups for a part-time job is a circus?

[motheronthedancefloor]

Hi everyone, I’m after some advice and maybe just some shared experiences from anyone who’s survived a workplace like this.

I’m in my mid-40s and I’m about three months into a part-time role for a small grassroots advocacy organisation. The people are okay as individuals, but the setup is a total nightmare. It’s essentially run by a working group of volunteers in their 70s and 80s who are very new to having employees, and it really shows. It’s a classic case of "Founder’s Syndrome"—they’ve hired me for my expertise, but they can’t seem to let go and I often feel like I'm being treated like a child.

The main thing is the digital noise. There is no work laptop, no work phone, and not even a work email address. Everything is done via personal emails and WhatsApp. I am currently in 48 different WhatsApp groups and work chats. Forty-eight! I'm expected to check them regularly for tasks/suggestions/ideas, including scrolling back which, as you can imagine, is quite a volume.

It’s all on my personal phone, and even when I mute the chats on days off, I’m constantly being @tagged, so the notifications cut through anyway. Because it’s my personal mobile, I can’t ever actually switch off. It feels like a full-time mental load for part-time hours. I have told them I have had big family events this month and even marked it in the shared calendar - only to get pinged on the day.

I don't have a single manager, so they all give me conflicting instructions and it drives me totally barmy. I’ll spend an entire day on a task, Person X will tell me it’s fine, then Person Y will come along the next day and tell me to change the whole thing. I can go through multiple edits for the same piece of work just to satisfy different personal preferences. It’s constant micromanagement—I have to get approval for the tiniest things, and then they often just redo it anyway because it’s not exactly how they would have phrased it.

I’ve voiced my concerns, but nothing changes. I just get apologies and then the same patterns repeat. There are also massive red flags regarding GDPR. Because I'm using my own kit, I have the personal numbers and emails of very senior politicians, journalists, lawyers, and celebrities on my own phone, along with passwords for all their systems. I’d never share them, obviously, but I feel incredibly uncomfortable with the lack of security. I’ve highlighted this to them, but it’s fallen on deaf ears.

There’s one other employee who is just as frustrated as me, but she’s full-time, better paid, and has been in politics much longer. This is my first political/advocacy role, so I wasn't sure if this was "normal"—but it feels incredibly dysfunctional.

Even getting the job was weird. They weren't happy with standard professional references and insisted on five or six different people, including personal ones. It felt totally over the top and very intrusive. To top it off, I have a disability and have a pre-disclosed block of leave coming up. They’re now stalling on how to record it and suggesting I "make up the hours" on evenings and weekends, which is making me incredibly anxious.

I’m already looking for other jobs, but the market is a total bin fire at the moment. There are so few jobs out there and hundreds of people going for the samae jobs. I can't afford to just walk away with nothing. AIBU to feel this way? Has anyone else experienced something like this?

I thought I’d just left an antiquated organisation but this takes the piss. If nothing else it’s a GDPR/data leak:cyber crime nightmare waiting to happen.
You need to get out.

This sounds hellish, OP. Any chance you and the other employee could get together to write a workplan and get it signed off? (I know this would be a headache.) It would give you the ammunition to be firm and keep some of the chatter at bay. You'd feel better if you had KPIs, not least because you could use your achievements in this job to help find your next one.

I agree with this. The set up is fundamentally wrong. It sounds too far gone to set out the issues and ask for them to be fixed.

Start one WhatsApp group so they can’t override each other

Tell them to switch to Slack. It's free and you can have both on desktop and mobile, and can mark yourself as out of office z

The other employee is meant to be my manager (but isn't really managing me and the others keep giving me instructions too, so I have no idea who is my manager or what's going on). Also one person did suggest slack (and we have slack for some messages) but no one else seems to like it. So if you add slack onto whatsapp, its actually a lot more messages to check.

I can't afford to just quit and my family are very much of the opinion 'its easier to get a job when you're in a job', 'don't burn bridges', 'you work from home, its easy' etc

This sort of thing is right across the charity sector, so much so that your post is giving me flashbacks!

I like pp’s suggestion to buy a work phone - I appreciate that it’s frustrating to use your own money but it’s a reasonably cheap step in order to solve one of the issues completely.

Change your number with everyone at work, add your new number on WhatsApp and remove your personal one. Change your personal WhatsApp to a generic picture and block them all! If someone asks tell them you’ve given your old SIM card to your niece. Then turn it off completely on your non working days!

With the criticism/version edits, I would send an email version of the document to everyone in the organisation asking for changes by email by x date. Then on x date make all the changes (emailing both parties for clarity if two people send opposing opinions). Then proof read. Then consider it signed off.

With the million WhatsApp groups I would make one WhatsApp group called “tasks for Sophie” and add everyone involved. Any time people send you a task in another group, move it to your WhatsApp and say something like “Think that you meant to post that here. Yes, happy to do this on Friday. Please can you sign off travel expenses of £50?”: Again, that way everyone can see what is agreed and after a month or two you can start exiting some of the groups which no longer apply to you.

But, I can’t stress strongly enough that these are sticking plasters and not solutions. All of the trustees are happy with how things are currently so it’s not going to improve. Job hunting is the permanent solution!

The other problem I have, and I don't know if I've said this already, is that our cause is 'controversial'. I wont say what it is but imagine an applicant applies for a role in your company who currently works at a pro-life, or anti immigration, or an anti trans organisation and your organisation opposes such things....

Its none of these things but I'm just trying to illustrate my situation. I can't hide it on my CV can I? it'll come out at the reference point. What the heck do I do?

You defend your views if you're asked although there is the risk of the organisation discriminating if they focus on what you believe rather than what you can do and have done. Most organisations don't have a collective stance on issues. I can only see it being a problem if you were advocating for something at the margins eg the return of the death penalty, involuntary sterilisation for people with learning difficulties, open borders, the decriminalisation of all recreational drugs.

We have one WhatsApp group at work and it is NEVER used outside of working hours except on one occasion where we got a message not to come into the office because there had been a power cut, and that was prefaced with a sincere apology for contacting outside of working hours, so no I don’t think 48 is reasonable or manageable. I’d start looking for any job just to get away because it sounds awful!

The structure of this company is fundamentally flawed

I dont think you will change them. I would move on asap. Let one of the volunteers fill your vacancy

Apply for the dream job! It might open doors to something else and it has to be better than the job you’re in now.

Re having the current place on your CV, can you miss it out? I assume you would use your previous place for references and it’s not unheard of to say that you made a mistake with a job not turning out as marketed.

I don't know if its 'wrong', or 'legal', to leave a job out, my DH suggested doing that but it could show up in checks?
Looking on LinkedIn, the director of the dream job has previously worked in a company that does the exact opposite of our cause, hence feeling quite anxious about hiding it.
I may be worrying unnecessarily, I do have a habit of worrying!

Definitely apply for the job.

You are going to be driven crazy if you stay. There is no way you - one person- can change such a monumentally fucked-up organisation. Don't listen to your family! Throw everything at the other applications!

Thanks, will do the second job application now.

You just put the header ‘relevant experience’ on your CV, then if anyone should find out you simply say it wasn’t relevant. I’ve had loads of jobs because I used to do temping and I couldn’t possibly fit them all on my CV, never mind remember half of them!

Glad to hear you applying for the dream job! Good luck!

Crikey just read through this thread, poor you OP! I've no idea how I'd handle this in reality but would be looking elsewhere tout suite, as you are doing! It must be so stressful.

On one hand I'd love to think I'd set out all of my concerns in writing and say that unless xyz is done to resolve, you will be looking elsewhere at the earliest opportunity. But the fact you are still in probation period means that may backfire spectalularly with them letting you go there and then. So I'm not sure how you should deal with the probation, but it will be tricky to lie and say everything is fine and you want to continue. Can you offer some positive solutions that you would like to implement over the next 3-6 months?

Do you have a plan for if you don't get through probation? Can you temp etc? If you do have a fall back plan I would be tempted to be very clear about your concerns and that you'd like to be part of the solution. I second the pp above who raises issue of you being implicated if things stay as they are and something happens. At least if you raise things now, you will be protected in that respect.

Best of luck with the dream job ap!

No it's not. They're gaslighting you on top of digital insanity. Good luck with the job hunt.

This is utterly ridiculous. You either need to have a F2F meeting with them all and lay down ground rules that they all stick to, or leave. It’s not sustainable. A work phone wouldn’t cost a lot for them to provide and that would be a good start. Where the hell did 48 WhatsApp groups come from?!

@Smarvellous I'm in a union but I haven't asked for help yet as that would really be pressing the nuclear button and I don't really want a negotiated exit or anything like that as I'd not get much and still be left without an income or a job.

48!!!!!!!!! Wtf

Is the cause something you're personally on board with, or at least don't feel strongly about, if it's a 'controversial' issue? If so you could explain that easily. If not, then it depends how controversial it is, I suppose - as a PP said if it's very much on the fringes that could be an issue, but few things are.

Its a cause I feel strongly about but privately - unlike others I don't protest / campaign or put anything on my social media. That's another thing that makes me uncomfortable about this job - I'm seeing some of those who agree with me on the cause go a bit too far.

I joined firstly because I needed a job after being made redundant from my last one (I wasn't finding any jobs at all) and secondly because I thought it would be interesting. It certainly has, but not for the right reasons!