i know I’m not but I need to get this off my chest because it’s been driving me crazy over the last 24 hours!
My fixed term contract came to an end 6 months ago. I agreed with my boss some work I would continue doing, and projects I would stop. Despite putting up these boundaries, she has continued to chase me on a variety of things.
For context, the project I said i would do is non urgent, an idea I came up with, and that she and others benefit from when it’s completed. They’ve been difficult throughout, including backtracking on the original plan which meant I had to go back to the beginning to rework it. As they are not paying me, they don’t seem to value my time at all.
Due to the fact I have a new paid role and am on another fixed term contract, her work is low priority and so I’ve been slow to progress.
one of the leads asked if I would meet and present what I’d done so far. I said I did not have anything to present but we could chat about where it’s up to and try and come to an agreement on the reworked version.
the meeting was hostile, they were clearly unhappy with me and also seemed unhappy with the project itself and unenthusiastic. Despite this , they were pressuring me that it needed to be done quickly, though not saying by when or giving a reason.
I explained that I couldn’t do it quickly, but they were welcome to find someone else who could and I’d step down, and I was happy to pass on materials. They suggested that ‘we see where we get to’ and I carry on working on it but if it’s too slow someone else will take over. So basically, i do more work for free until they persuade someone else to take over, then I lose all credit.
this kind of behaviour and culture is totally normalised in my industry, but I’m actually flabbergasted about how rude they were 😅 it feels like it’s impossible to truly quit previous roles and you are chased about things forever!