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Never Make the Mistake of Crying in Front of Your Boss
It’ll haunt you.
“Please let me know if you get overwhelmed with anything I give you to do, okay?”
The words from my direct supervisor shocked me when she voiced them over one of our regular calls just a few days ago. Though I appreciated the sentiment — it was kind of her — I had to wonder where the root of concern was coming from.
One of my fellow coworkers in the same department had quit suddenly just this past week, but I couldn’t help feeling a spike of worry dig into me anyway that this warning was a bit more personal.
Is this about that time I cried?
For context, at the beginning of summer three supervisors in my department had gone on vacation at the same time. I was tasked with handling two jobs that weren’t mine, and the work piled up very quickly. I made mistakes and felt way out of my depth with everything I had to do.
It got to the point that, on the last day, I called my direct supervisor and ended up sobbing that I was worried she would get into trouble over the shoddy job I had done in her absence. Never mind that this whole scenario had been out of my control. Three supervisors taking leave at the same time and leaving a newbie to keep everything in order? At the time, I had been at my job less…
