Paying Your Dues.......

A hundred years ago… I started out as a project coordinator in a national IT company. I liked the job but decided that I wanted to grow up to be a project manager. In this particular company a coordinator was mostly a dead-end job, with not much of a chance to advance to project manager.

A Service Manager (we’ll call him Earl) asked me to become his personal assistant. I said, (and I quote), “Why the hell would I want to do that?”

“Because, if you help me get to be a director, I’ll make sure you become a project manager. I’ve seen you work and I’m smart enough to know that you can get me the position.”

“You mean you want me to package you like gum, and sell you to the corporation?”

“Precisely! You pay your dues, and in return, I’ll make sure you become a project manager! And the company will pay for all the classes.”

I agreed and began a process of sending out Service Updates, reports, spreadsheets, PowerPoint presentations all with the Earl’s name on them. Most of the time he never even saw the reports— it was flattering to be trusted, I thought. Little by little, the corporation started to recognize Earl.

I began to take project management classes as fast as I could, and took to the methodology like a fat man to cake. When my chance came, I needed to be ready.

Earl was given more and more internal reporting projects and I did a damned good job on them. Then a glitch. A vice president decided to come to town and requested a PowerPoint presentation on a new flow I did regarding triage and the expediting of the service division. Honestly, it was a thing of beauty and the best part was that it actually worked.

We had a one day notice, and Earl doing the presentation… was not in the cards. Don’t get me wrong, Earl was a very bright man, with a lot of charm and could smooge with the best, but presenting someone else’s work without time to internalize the work behind it, was… not going to happen.

Luckily he came down with (wink-wink) ‘laryngitis’, so I had to do the presentation and explanation. It was flawless and the VP was very impressed with ‘Earl’ work.
After the presentation, he took Earl and I out to lunch to discuss some of the fine points. As he was studying one of the spreadsheets, he mentioned how complex it was and asked how long it took to learn Excel to that depth.

I said, “Well….” When Earl jumped in and blurted out, “she prints them out for me.”

“Well, I’m really impressed,” he smiled.

I was dumb struck. Then to add to my pain, there was talk of making him a director, and no sign of making me a project manager.

Later, I nailed Earl on it and he said, “I’m sorry.”

Sorry? He blatantly lied and took credit for all my work without even a crumb of credit. Fucking Sorry just didn’t cover it.

Thanks to Karma; two weeks later, all my work paid off. The same VP called me and asked me to do him a favor and take over a project for a PM that was getting married and quitting the business. I told him I’d be glad to. The bad news was the project was clear across the country and would run another four months.

The good news was it was a very high profile project and would solidify me as a real PM. The company agreed to allow me to fly home every weekend and pay for all my time, including flying. In three days, I was on a plane; first class. I worked hard, learned and completed the project on-time with a 4.85% approval rating out of 5.

When I returned home, Earl was anxiously waiting for me with a stack of work, but my position as project manager was solid. Earl would now have to sink or swim on his own.

Sixteen months later, Earl was back working as a service manager, and I was a credentialed project manager. Karma, baby — you got to love it!