Hi Mumsnet,
I'm 5 months pg with my first dc and I've been in a new promoted role for the past 4 months managing a team of two people (senior team members with a large workload) and doing lots of the hands-on work as well. I didn't know I was pg when I accepted the promotion. Things have been tough since one of my seniors left shortly after I joined and the remaining senior is underperforming and I've had to also do a lot of his work which has meant lots of overtime for me and often no lunch breaks (just eating at my desk - I work from home). Luckily though, I have a new senior joining us in a few weeks.
My manager has been praising me until now but in my last meeting this week he awkwardly felt the need to tell me that just before I went on leave he had a chat with my "team co-manager" and realised I hadn't been keeping her up to date on some critical deadlines (I thought he was doing that tbh) and that I had also made a mistake with some dimensions I got wrong and thirdly, that had I been more organised with one of my projects it could have avoided some last minute pre-holiday work that came up that he had to cover for me.
He added that everyone in the team has been under lots of pressure and making mistakes like this and for him it's also been the worst time in his career as our company is placing an immense workload on us and we're also getting negative press for our output. He recently got negative feedback from someone high above his manager so he's feeling the pressure even more.
I apologised about everything he raised and offered reasoning where I could and said I will do my best to make sure it doesn't repeat. At the same time, I felt the need to tell him that this immense workload we're all suffering from has come at the same time as my pg so I will do my best but my best might not be as good as my best before pg was and he said he understands that and is mindful. And then I felt the need to ask if anyone in the team, or the team as a whole is at any risk given the negative attention we've had as a team recently. He assured me that nobody's at risk (as far as he knows) and that he's happy with my work and looks forward to continuing to work with me now and after my mat leave.
The reason I asked the last question is because while he seems like a reasonable person his manager ultimately gets the final say in all decisions and he has been known to swoop in and change performance ratings from passes to fails on the grounds that a person isn't excelling in their job (he has very high expectations). However, we have a new head of dp joining us in a few weeks and so he will no longer be his manager and may adopt a different approach.
Also worth noting, is that my next performance review is in 3.5 months which is one month before my DC's arrival date. In my last review I got an "excelling" rating which is why I got my promotion.
I suppose my concern is that I'm already giving my 100% and have felt that I'm just about scraping by and now I'm worried that I have to give 150% since he raised these mistakes I made which means he expects me to do better. It's alarmed me more than I thought it would because ultimately it means that even though I've been working very hard it's not quite enough (I have been suffering from bad fatigue and brain fog due to my pg). And because I am a worrier, it's also got me thinking about work all the time now and not my pg. My DH pointed out that while we've got a big scan coming up in a few days that I was super excited about I've not mentioned it once since that conversation.
My question to Mumsnet is whether I should do things to create a paper trail to back myself in case of a negative performance review and whether I'm overreacting. Until now I was certain that they wouldn't send me off on my mat leave with a nasty surprise waiting for me when I return but my mind has been doing somersaults since the conversation because I don't have full confidence in my abilities to improve anymore due to my pg.