Episode 93 | Fences vs. Electric Collars (a.k.a. Knowing Where Your Power Ends)

Question

Hey, Work Wives. It's Susan from San Jose, California. I'm watching an email thread go down at work, and while I think it's very entertaining, I just need your thoughts on this.

I was CC'd because I'm kind of tangential to the project, but I'm not super involved and, you know, like I wasn't really paying attention until I started seeing, like, one-line emails come across my desk. So I'm like, well, "There must be tea somewhere." So I grabbed some popcorn and I just starting watching it go back and forth.

The situation, from what I can surmise, is this:

Someone who's on my level on the other side of the company, is working with my VP on a cross-functional project. She was going back and forth with my VP to request a process change. And my VP kind of put his foot down and was like, "We're not going to do it that way. We've made some accommodations for you, but that's going outside of our workflow."

Basically, what she was asking him to do is change his entire workflow of his entire team in order to accommodate her one thing. And our team services lots of departments in the company, so it was ridiculous for us to try to change how we work for just one department. So her reply to him was, "Ugh, well, we can't take this any further. You're just going to have to talk to my VP." So she's basically escalated it and said, "We're at an impasse," and, and she pulled the whole 'go talk to my VP' card, and I'm pretty sure she forgot that she was talking to a VP.

So like, it feels tense. I'm not going to jump in, just so you know, but I would love to know if you've encountered something like this before and what I can do to avoid being that person. Because I do not want to be like her.

Summary

Kicking a$$ and taking names is all well and good until you say something you shouldn’t or get too big for your britches. So figure out where your power ends, know your boundaries, and don’t make your CEO apologize for you.

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