AIBU to be thinking f**k this sh*t?

I just feel now I’m fed up with people coming in with what they think are new whizzy ideas, which we’ve seen before, but new person is trying to get promoted on the back of it, and the staff who have to work with said no new whizzy idea are just collateral damage and will still be there mopping up the shit after new whizzy person disappears off into the sunset.

Totally and if you point anything like that out even gently then you get told you’re being negative, or ‘can’t do’ attitude, or obstructive and unwilling to change.

To me it’s a sign that I’ve stagnated in my role and I need a new job and a change.

NHS by any chance

I took early retirement last year for similar reasons. Got sick of a procession of 'managers' on their career paths who come in, and instigate new ideas, despite staff saying they won't work, we've seen it all before. Can we just have decent staffing, equipment, and some pillows, that would make the job easier?
Over the years I, ve saw so many communication initiatives, you could spot that they had been on a course a mile away. 'Communication cascades', 'listening in action', 'brainstorming buddy', 'see it do it'. all released with big fanfare and the promotion of someone to 'cascade manager' all to disappear in about 6 months until they attended a new course, The managers usually stuck around for 2 maybe 3 years then moved on to somewhere else to cause havoc there.

I’m in the private sector and feel the same. Been at the company for too long I think but don’t expect it will be different anywhere else.
Constant new managers initiating time-consuming reviews of processes. These invariably result in a ‘radical new way of doing things’ which is suspiciously similar to the old way, just presented in shiny new packaging. Lots of restructuring of departments and endless meetings and new projects. While those of us that are just the worker bees just try and actually get on with the work that actually needs to be done.
The older I get the more I focus on work to live rather than live to work but it’s hard not to get drawn in to all the crap and internal politics. Too late to retrain or start over, but so far from retirement. . . .

Teaching a bit like this too.

Yep, I've worked in both public and private sector, it's maybe slightly worse in the public sector but not a lot!

Yes. And if you say this is what happened when we implemented that approach previously you're marked down as resistant to change/uncooperative whatever. If you implement it and the same problems occur you get blamed for not telling them, even if you did .

Am I just getting too old/cynical/jaded? Do other people go through this?

my experience is pretty much the same in the corporate sector. I don’t think you are old/ cynical or jaded, you have a firm grip on reality. Reality sucks sometimes.

@reesewithoutaspoon 😂 you must work at my trust! Every word of your post I've said to the younger colleagues, think they are sick of me saying... 'we did that 10 years ago it didn't work' or 'everything goes full circle' they go back to something that did work but was replaced umpteen times in between but it's some 'newbies' brainwave........... And don't get me started on pillows🙄, they can pay a fortune on managers/consultancy companies to do goodness knows what but not a few pounds on some extra pillows so poor patients aren't using rolled up blankets on trollies in A & E🤦

Post Office was very similar.
Thank fuck I don't do that anymore......

It's just the same in my private sector job. Tired of 'bright ideas' that didn't work in 1998 and won't work now.

My job is a bit like that too, the only saving grace is I'm very part time and can escape.

When I start to feel to down about it I watch episodes of Yes Minister to release the tension.

I work in the private sector and it’s much the same. I once calculated that I spent at least half a day a week on ‘non work’ stuff, sometimes more if we had new management or were going through a restructure, which happened a lot. I just coast along now and view all the non work stuff as me being paid to not really work. Keeps me sane anyway.

Local authority is like this. New manager comes in with amazing brilliant idea. We point out this has been tried several times before and we are just awful and negative.
They implement new idea in a totally half hearted way and badly and fuck everything. They distance themselves from it as soon as it doesn’t work, blame staff. They leave. We tidy up. And repeat.

Yep. You're over it. I say this as someone who is looking at "it" in the rearview mirror. Don't even bother challenging the bullshit - you'll be increasingly sidelined and perceived as a dinosaur. Time to disinvest and work on accelerating the exit plan.

I could have written your post OP! Same age, same caring responsibilities, public sector for 18 years. Also jaded by being managed by people young enough to actually be my children, who are reinventing the wheel for the sake of it.

I started a new job internally a month ago. New team, new role, significantly higher average age, experience and qualification. And respect!!it’s amazing being treated like a grown up!

@Mossstitch I worked in ICU. average staff attrition ran at around 16 % due to the nature of the job. We had 150 staff so each year we lost 20 or so staff. We dealt with this by having 2 recruitments a year approx 10 to 12 staff. You cant take on more than that because they need training and supervision. They aren't really competent until at least 1 year and it's a further year or so before they can take the sickest patients unsupervised safely. So recruiting any more really screws up the skill mix.
The new manager cancels this recruitment despite opposition from our ward manager. shaves 500k off the nursing budget. gets a promotion because they saved all this money then leave to repeat at two further hospitals. Meanwhile, in 2 years we are 40 staff down and the hospital is spending a fortune on bank/agency and overtime just to staff the ward for the beds we are commissioned to provide. Took 3 to 4 years to get staffing back up because you can't just recruit 40 junior staff with no ICU experience all at once.
There was never any forward planning, just constant firefighting and lurching from one crisis to the next.
Glad I,m out of it now.

Not the point of the thread at all, but thank you for explaining why my dad’s pillow from the care home he lives in went with him to A&E and he is now using it in the ward he is in. No glasses, but he has his pillow. I had been wondering, but I understand it now.

When I start to feel to down about it I watch episodes of Yes Minister to release the tension

So, so true. It’s incredibly topical fir something that’s 40 years old!

Have you read the book of *Salmon Fishing in the Yemen^? It’s largely written as emails, memos and letters, and based in the fiction version of the ministry I work for. Very close to the bone!