Recently, my boss promised me a performance bonus that he did not make good on. I need help with how to both deal with and get over this tricky bonus/work situation.
Recently, my boss promised me a performance bonus that he did not make good on. Needless to say, I am very disappointed, but I want to not be. That's not the whole story, though. Please bear with me. I am trying to give all the facts because I am anonymous and I also am trying not to give away any identifying details.
At my job, upper management launched a competition amongst its managers where bonuses were paid out quarterly. Each week, us managers are evaluated by 3 criteria, and we would receive emails detailing our rankings by these criteria. For the whole quarter, I was number one. This was no small task. I'm omitting the industry, but this was very hard to do, given how this industry was affected by the economic slump. Further to that, I was the only manager who generated a profit every week, while *all* of the other managers were in the red every single week. During this time, I broke two sales records, and received so much positive customer feedback.
So, the bonus structure works such that the #1 manager would get the largest bonus and #2 would get the next biggest, and so on. #1 and #2 are very big amounts. The one caveat is that if you do x, you are disqualified from being #1. This one thing is sort of like a report not being submitted on time or correctly. The downside is you are indirectly responsible for the report, because it's part of your job to manage everyone, and it falls under the duties of your third-in-command.
Well, my third in command failed me. To be fair, I knew this was the disqualifying behavior and had been on top of it, but he dropped the ball on this one week before the end of the quarter, thereby disqualifying me from what I had worked so hard for the prior 12 weeks.
All of upper management was extremely sympathetic. When it happened, I was so appreciative of the outpour of support from people who I didn't think cared or even knew me. It turns out I had been a hot topic because I had performed so well, and it was unprecedented. Further, one coworker (not a manager, but someone who works in the office) let me know that without my sales profit, it was likely that no one would have received bonuses (managers and upwards). The president of the company and my boss both came to me straight after the upset and said they would make up for it, because while they (and I) understood I couldn't get the #1 bonus, they still wanted to do something to honor my hard work and effort. Specifics did come up in terms of numbers, and I thought what my boss threw out was a fair compromise. It was a halfway point between the #1 and the #2 big prizes. I didn't get it in writing, because I didn't ask/fish/pout for this action, and didn't want to seem like I was looking a gift horse in the mouth. Clearly a big mistake and lesson learned. A lot of their reasoning and actions seemed to be based on the fact that they didn't want their top performer to get de-motivated or be demoralized. Fair, I thought, because I was headed that way.
Bonuses are given out a month after the end of the quarter at our formal quarterly gathering, and I was disappointed that I wouldn't receive the honor of being #1, and also a little embarrassed because other managers definitively expected that I would be the #1 (usually there is a little bit of guessing who would be #1, but since the weekly results are distributed and I had been #1 every week, there should have been no surprise this time).
But I was surprised because my bonus was $7,000 short. It was less than half of what was promised. No follow up ever came from either the president or my boss.
I stewed for weeks. I was upset because I worked so hard to achieve what I did, only to have it thrown away for something that had not happened before and was sort of out of my control (I go back and forth on that - to be honest). But, I am really upset because my cohorts did nothing to deserve the #1 and #2 bonus really other than submit the report on time (again, it's not a report, but trying to not list anything identifying). They were all (15+ others) in the red for the whole quarter, and I was subjected to weekly meetings and emails where the managers were given a talking to about their underperformance. I mention this to show that performance is the key and the report/technicality is sort of a small thing, and at best negligible to the actual goal. It would be like if you were disqualified from being valedictorian because you were late to school once, in the way that attendance contributes to the student as a whole, but the grades and effort are obviously the key component to being considered for the honor in the first place, ya dig?
I admit that I despise confrontation, and so I was slow to bring this up. I'm even afraid that my boss was banking on that. When I finally did talk to my boss, after weeks of dodging (I believe) my email requests to speak about this, he finally came back last week with the bonus amount being discretionary, which is funny because this is the line he gave in support for the promised bonus. He also mentioned that they did promote me one month after. I take issue with that because my performance gained me that. They didn't do me a favor by promoting me. And, it was sort of a lateral move – I am still a manager, no raise or title change, but for a new business unit. To be fair, in this company, that is considered a promotion. He also mentioned how they consider me for all sorts of opportunities within this company (being made partner, moving to the next level of managers, etc), but I now take this with a grain of salt, because I was already promised something, and looked how that turned into this long anonymous metafilter post. I am angry, and I do feel that any attempts to explain why I didn't get my promised bonus is really him minimizing my efforts and unprecedented accomplishment . Is that irrational?
Also: shortly after I received my bonus letter, I received really good tickets to an event from my boss and the president (unclear who was doing the giving) that I have repeatedly expressed interest in, but no reference to the disconnect in what was promised vs. What was given. The tickets were not paid for. They told me that a business partner had them, and they passed it along because they knew I liked it. In fact, when I went to the event, another one of my colleagues was there. Since they didn't mention it in reference to my bonus, I took the gift as a nice thing, as a prior boss in the same company had once *purchased* tickets for me to an outing as a thank you. Now, I'm worried they think they were making up for the missing money OR doing something nice to prevent me from asking about the bonus. Again, no mention of the promised bonus, and that infuriates me because I wouldn't have accepted them if there was some ulterior motive.
I apologize if I sound entitled. I know a bonus is just that - a bonus. I am thankful to have a job during a time when others aren't so fortunate or even certain about the future of theirs. But this is a very demanding industry in the most demanding city, and i worked 18 hour days, never took vacation, neglected my partner and myself, not for the bonus, but to keep my momentum going. I also feel some kind of way that they never communicated that things had changed, and instead left me to be disappointed and follow
up with them (in essence begging for the money).
So, my question is two fold:
A) How can I get over this and be motivated again to work hard, when I believe in my heart of hearts that any reward could be taken away from me because of a technicality (even if it is explicit)?
B) How can I best appeal to my boss and get what I think I deserve?
posted by anonymous to work & money (11 comments total)
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"i worked 18 hour days, never took vacation, neglected my partner and myself, not for the bonus, but to keep my momentum going"
I'd revisit the decision to put Everything Else In Life on the back burner. Maybe you just reorganized your priorities for what was obviously a stressful and deadline-oriented period of time for your organization; maybe you always function like that. But I bet you'd be moving onward and upward with more...I don't know...ease? Peace? Optimism? if you could reconnect with the rest of your life.
Honestly, if it were me I'd "take" the rest of my bonus in the form of taking some serious time for myself and my partner. (Whether that means actual time off or just increasing the mental space between Work and Real Life or what.) But, uh, I've never worked in the corporate world, callow overgrown middle-schooler, etc. I think I understand your frustration but it does sound like you're over-invested in your career success as your identity. And while that produced great results for your employer in the short run I worry that you're seriously short-changing yourself and all that good stuff that "really matters" in the long run.
I hope you can find some peace. As for approaching your bosses about the discrepancy, it would be my inclination not to. But there are probably real grownups better qualified than Neofelis to address that.
Good luck. I sort of want to give you a hug.
posted by Neofelis at 5:59 PM on June 12 [2 favorites has favorites]