When I went back to work last week it didn't appear that I was working in the communications department. There was an eerie silence and my boss stopped making eye-contact apart from severing verbal communications with me. Was it my sabbatical request? Or was there a corporate storm over the weekend that brought down all the power and communication lines? This silence reminded me of our childhood fights and how bullies in the gang stopped playing and interacting with us to get even or to make us to listen to them.
Three of us sit with him in the same room, and this eerie silence wasn't helping us to function in an healthy way. Over the instant messenger, the two of us exchange conversations and punctuated with emoticons to lighten the situation. Though one of my colleagues recommended that I do a follow-up on my request, I kept focusing on my work and I let the day pass by with any incident. May be playing cold and distant was one way of keep me away from him and away from my request?
The following day he started to involve me in some projects that were scheduled to go-live in the second half of the year, my alarm bells started to ring loudly. Is my sabbatical request falling into deaf ears? Am I being taken seriously? I continue to contribute in the meeting and upon concluding the meeting I sent him an email reminding him of my request for sabbatical. My email brought in another wave of silence at the lunch table and now I was able to confirm that the silence is a consequence of my sabbatical request.
Why can’t managers find a professional solution rather than turning a team member's request for a sabbatical into a crime or something personally directed at them? Upon returning from lunch that afternoon, he passed on the ball to HR with a hope that they would shoot my request down. Not long after, I had a chance to sit down with the HR and have a conversation about my sabbatical.
The HR colleague was very calm and willingly to listen to me. During the course of the meeting she even told me that my manager could have made the decision and there was no need to have a conversation with her since there is a policy in place. I gave her my canned response for a sabbatical, but soon she wanted to have more information. She asked me about my two year experience in France. Before responding, I quipped that question sounded like an exit interview and not a sabbatical interview. Finally, the meeting concluded with the HR honoring my request and in fact I was surprised when she asked me how soon I would like to begin my sabbatical. When we are interviewed for a position we answer a similar question, how soon could you join us and this time around I was asked how soon I would want to leave. Nevertheless, the question sounded like music to my ears.
The favorable response given by the HR annoyed my manager and instantly reaction on his facial resembled severe facial constipation. He immediately went around the office trying to gain sympathy and making my sabbatical sound like a time-bomb. He called his deputy for a quick huddle to chalk-out a survival plan and he went out for a lunch with his superior to discuss the situation. With no solution in hand, he stopped exchanging pleasantries with me.
Every time I stepped out of the room, he would start whispering to my colleagues in the room and the whisper would stop as soon as he heard my footsteps. Internal communications office had become a water cooler. I found this behavior annoying and I even offered to park myself in another room until my last day so that they can have a comfortable conversations and not be forced to mumble, mutter and abruptly end them.
With no solutions in sight, he came back to me the following morning asking if I had any recommendations on how to tide over the situation. He requested if I could put together a job description for my role and suggest names of colleagues who could take up my role. By the end of the afternoon, I sent him my job description and shared a few ideas to tide over the situation. I never envisioned I had to do all this before I embark on my sabbatical.
By the end of the week he started to express the real emotions in him. Now I was seen as a mini version of Edward Snowden and was considered high-risk and removed from high-profile projects and meetings. The following morning he came into the office and told me how disappointed he was with my decision and how I let him down. I quickly shut his mouth by reminding how disappointed I am with him and how he had let me down.
I had resigned from my job on January 5, citing a few professional reasons and he made promises like our politicians and even documented them over an email and requested me to take back my resignation. A few weeks ago when I checked back on his list of promises, he said he couldn't make any of it happen. After a failed resignation bid, I felt a sabbatical option citing health and family reasons was my only way out.
While he expressed his hidden emotions, I felt that his reaction and cold behavior resembled that of a high school bully and a feuding partner and that was giving me additional stress. I told him that I was beginning to experiencing the same symptoms that I had 3 weeks ago. So, what happened 3 weeks ago that quickly made him retract his statement?
Come back next week to find out more.
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