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The day you never hope to have as a manager

So in my career I feel kind of lucky.  I have made it 9 years and only ever been responsible for managing 1 employee.  That’s the beauty of being a project manager, responsibility for a project and its outcome but not for the people.  Managing people is a lot of work.  But it’s one of those things that must be done.  It’s how you create good employees.  I had amazing managers for almost my entire career that taught me a lot about how to do my job but also about life.  I have been trying, some days more successfully than others to, share the things I have learned.   And then I took on my new job.  I have 29 people reporting into me at the moment and a few at a second level.  It’s been a growth experience learning to deal with so many personalities, from so many technical disciplines or maybe not so technical.  I’m responsible for enabling them into good opportunities.  And I’m also responsible for when they screw up.   I’m pretty black and white.  It’s either right or wrong and I generally know where I find myself.  I’m an open book and don’t try to hide things, which makes my job easy.  So when I found out something about one of my employees, I knew exactly where it had to go.  I contacted everyone that needed to get involved so everything was handled correctly.  And the worst possible outcome happened, I had to walk them out the door.  It was an oddly weird feeling.  You feel bad for what you are doing because you know the impacts it will have on their life, but they did something wrong that cannot be excused.  It was a terrible feeling but at the same time I didn’t feel bad for doing it.  I love my job but this was one of those days I wish I was still just an analyst, head down staring at my computer and not responsible for anyone.    

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