How to handle overlapping work projects
May 27, 2020 11:56 AM Subscribe
I was assigned a project. Another team claims that they are working on it and that I should stop.
I am in a very awkward situation. I don't know the way forward.
My manager assigned me a project "X." I was planning on a kick off meeting to talk about it, but then another member of another team and objected that it overlapped with "Y." They said that they would like their manager to speak with my manager and to not start work on it.
I spoke with my manager about it, and he said to just proceed and do the project without informing Y.
My options right now are:
1. Proceed, do the work, and annoy the members on Y. This is probably the fastest way.
2. Try to incorporate the other team, against my manager's recommendation, at the risk of them delaying things and shutting me down. I also am at the risk of looking like I can't complete projects assigned to me.
This is a particularly difficult situation since I don't like upsetting people, but I guess I need to learn how to navigate. I am also feeling upset and incompetent, as well as annoyed at myself that I find this situation confusing and not sure how to proceed.
Overall, my impression is that this shouldn't be my problem since it's reflecting poor management and politics outside of my control. Ideally, I wouldn't be even operating in this context but here we are.
I am in a very awkward situation. I don't know the way forward.
My manager assigned me a project "X." I was planning on a kick off meeting to talk about it, but then another member of another team and objected that it overlapped with "Y." They said that they would like their manager to speak with my manager and to not start work on it.
I spoke with my manager about it, and he said to just proceed and do the project without informing Y.
My options right now are:
1. Proceed, do the work, and annoy the members on Y. This is probably the fastest way.
2. Try to incorporate the other team, against my manager's recommendation, at the risk of them delaying things and shutting me down. I also am at the risk of looking like I can't complete projects assigned to me.
This is a particularly difficult situation since I don't like upsetting people, but I guess I need to learn how to navigate. I am also feeling upset and incompetent, as well as annoyed at myself that I find this situation confusing and not sure how to proceed.
Overall, my impression is that this shouldn't be my problem since it's reflecting poor management and politics outside of my control. Ideally, I wouldn't be even operating in this context but here we are.
Response by poster: They were over a phone call so I don't have "documented" instructions. But now now I will go that route
posted by pando11 at 12:18 PM on May 27, 2020
posted by pando11 at 12:18 PM on May 27, 2020
Send a follow-up email to your manager recounting your understanding of the the phone call and your intentions to proceed with project "X" as instructed.
posted by RichardP at 12:21 PM on May 27, 2020 [22 favorites]
posted by RichardP at 12:21 PM on May 27, 2020 [22 favorites]
Send your manager an email or IM, whatever written way you communicate, and say something like "Just wanted to confirm from our phone call that I am clear to proceed on project x despite pushback from Y, thanks!" and then save your manager's response.
posted by phunniemee at 12:21 PM on May 27, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by phunniemee at 12:21 PM on May 27, 2020 [5 favorites]
You've done nothing wrong!
It's easy for me to say, but don't worry about upsetting people with this, you have your orders. Anybody besides your manager who has tried to steer your work priorities is wrong. They should have talked to their manager before bringing you into it, in which case their manager would seemingly have told them to mind their own business. It's only "poor management" in the sense that the other team wasn't already on the same page, but again, it was poor behavior by the team member(s) who contacted you. In more structured organizations, it's insubordination.
The hopefully-reassuring part of this is that if they come at you again you can say, "Yeah, that's already been sorted out. Talk to X (their boss)." If you want to stick a knife in, say "we've already sorted this out." and/or "X didn't tell you?" or even "You're not my real mom/dad!" /bitchy
posted by rhizome at 12:25 PM on May 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
It's easy for me to say, but don't worry about upsetting people with this, you have your orders. Anybody besides your manager who has tried to steer your work priorities is wrong. They should have talked to their manager before bringing you into it, in which case their manager would seemingly have told them to mind their own business. It's only "poor management" in the sense that the other team wasn't already on the same page, but again, it was poor behavior by the team member(s) who contacted you. In more structured organizations, it's insubordination.
The hopefully-reassuring part of this is that if they come at you again you can say, "Yeah, that's already been sorted out. Talk to X (their boss)." If you want to stick a knife in, say "we've already sorted this out." and/or "X didn't tell you?" or even "You're not my real mom/dad!" /bitchy
posted by rhizome at 12:25 PM on May 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
"They said that they would like their manager to speak with my manager and to not start work on it. ...he said to just proceed and do the project without informing Y."
Also document that in writing. Perhaps "As I mentioned, [person] requested that you speak with [other manager]. As you instructed, I am leaving any necessary coordination to you and will not talk directly with anyone in [other section] about the project." That is, you're not keeping a secret, but you trust your manager's judgement about what information to share. (If he judges that it's appropriate to keep it a secret, then it's on him.)
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 12:50 PM on May 27, 2020
Also document that in writing. Perhaps "As I mentioned, [person] requested that you speak with [other manager]. As you instructed, I am leaving any necessary coordination to you and will not talk directly with anyone in [other section] about the project." That is, you're not keeping a secret, but you trust your manager's judgement about what information to share. (If he judges that it's appropriate to keep it a secret, then it's on him.)
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 12:50 PM on May 27, 2020
It's hard to answer this question without knowing your situation more precisely. At my company, for instance, the correct move is for you to talk to your manager and explicitly ask "hey, why are you telling me to work on this project when there's another team working on the same thing?" and then you and the person on the other team talk and you decide what you're going to do and then let your manager know. But this is a non-toxic bottom-up kind of culture, and it sounds like this is a company you were already planning on leaving because it sucks.
Regardless, though, I don't know any company where #2 - disobeying direct instructions from your manager without working it out with them - is a good idea. Your choices are basically do #1, or gather a bit more info about Y and then try to make a case to your manager.
(You're getting a bunch of CYA advice from people, which, ok, you might have to do, but it sounds like you're capable of switching jobs, so if you're in a position where this is something you need to worry about, you should just switch jobs.)
posted by inkyz at 12:58 PM on May 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
Regardless, though, I don't know any company where #2 - disobeying direct instructions from your manager without working it out with them - is a good idea. Your choices are basically do #1, or gather a bit more info about Y and then try to make a case to your manager.
(You're getting a bunch of CYA advice from people, which, ok, you might have to do, but it sounds like you're capable of switching jobs, so if you're in a position where this is something you need to worry about, you should just switch jobs.)
posted by inkyz at 12:58 PM on May 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
I don’t see any reason why you wouldn’t comply with your manager’s direct instructions. I understand not wanting to upset someone, but I’d be a lot more upset if my direct report were insubordinate than if some random person on another team possibly duplicated my work. The other team does not affect your performance reviews, raises, promotions, etc.
The real question, to me, is why this other team cares so much when it seems that the most likely negative outcome would simply be duplicated work. My guess is that they probably don’t care that much, and you’re probably reading more into their reaction than they intended. You should spend that energy listening to your boss.
posted by kevinbelt at 12:59 PM on May 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
The real question, to me, is why this other team cares so much when it seems that the most likely negative outcome would simply be duplicated work. My guess is that they probably don’t care that much, and you’re probably reading more into their reaction than they intended. You should spend that energy listening to your boss.
posted by kevinbelt at 12:59 PM on May 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
Nthing the advice to comply with your manager's instructions. There's several reasons I can see for why you should go ahead with what you're doing:
* It's very possible that the person you spoke to misunderstood what you said you were doing, and is wrong about project X and project Y being the same.
* There could be some kind of legal reason for why project X and project Y have to be kept separate.
* There could be some company-structure reason why project X and project Y have to be kept separate.
If there's literally no way to proceed with project X without consulting with people in project Y, I'd speak to your boss again for safety's sake ("Hey, I know you said not to tell Y about this, but they're the only people who can help me with this one part of X that I'm aware of. How should I proceed?"), but otherwise go ahead.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:08 PM on May 27, 2020 [3 favorites]
* It's very possible that the person you spoke to misunderstood what you said you were doing, and is wrong about project X and project Y being the same.
* There could be some kind of legal reason for why project X and project Y have to be kept separate.
* There could be some company-structure reason why project X and project Y have to be kept separate.
If there's literally no way to proceed with project X without consulting with people in project Y, I'd speak to your boss again for safety's sake ("Hey, I know you said not to tell Y about this, but they're the only people who can help me with this one part of X that I'm aware of. How should I proceed?"), but otherwise go ahead.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:08 PM on May 27, 2020 [3 favorites]
I would not be willing to "do the project without informing Y." It's ridiculous to try to deceive other people adjacent to you in your company about who is doing what.
I would work on X, but continue trying to understand what is going on by further clarifying with Y and Y's manager what they are actually doing. Perhaps you will find that there is not actually a conflict, or perhaps you will find that there really is a conflict and it's for political reasons, or perhaps you will find that there is a conflict and Y is happy to stop working on it once they realize what's going on, or perhaps you will find that there is some technical reason why the work needs to go on in parallel as EmpressCallipygos postulated. It shouldn't be mysterious and unresolvable.
posted by value of information at 1:16 PM on May 27, 2020
I would work on X, but continue trying to understand what is going on by further clarifying with Y and Y's manager what they are actually doing. Perhaps you will find that there is not actually a conflict, or perhaps you will find that there really is a conflict and it's for political reasons, or perhaps you will find that there is a conflict and Y is happy to stop working on it once they realize what's going on, or perhaps you will find that there is some technical reason why the work needs to go on in parallel as EmpressCallipygos postulated. It shouldn't be mysterious and unresolvable.
posted by value of information at 1:16 PM on May 27, 2020
The other team member knows you’ve been told to work on it. Presumably they’ve already informed their own manager about this. If something comes of that, you’ll know all about it. In the meantime, continue working on the project. You take your direct orders from your manager, not random other colleague and that’s what I’d be telling them if they give you any pushback later. But definitely make sure you get your instructions in writing from your manager first.
posted by Jubey at 2:20 PM on May 27, 2020
posted by Jubey at 2:20 PM on May 27, 2020
I vote #1. It can be both good and bad. Say project needs some X and Y, but while you the X knows everything about X and can do some Y that Y is great at Y but knows nothing about X. Y would take months to make polished project and would need lots of teaching about X (probably from you). You can ugly but working do project in a week. The Boss^1,2,3 know this so they tell X and Y to do the same project. Y starts, X starts, by the time Y is asking about X, X hands over the X bit, project is done in two weeks instead of two months. Y don't really need to know about X, X doesn't really need to know about Y, or each other would be in different departments. Your jobs are not for Y to teach X about Y or for X to teach Y about X. Maybe the B^1,2,3 know that this sort of parallel project work will make project end faster because there isn't a lot of mostly wasted effort with X and Y trying to teack each other about Y and X. Different domain knowledge. The final project might be intended to have the great Y and great X combined while avoiding weeks of back and forth knowledge transfer.
posted by zengargoyle at 2:36 PM on May 27, 2020
posted by zengargoyle at 2:36 PM on May 27, 2020
I mean, in my working culture my manager would either convince me why we needed to work on it in a parallel track without informing the other team, or I would convince my manager why we needed to work with the other team. I haven’t worked in environments where you just take orders without any discussion...unless you are in the military or a very unusual work environment, it doesn’t have to be that way. What is YOUR opinion? If it’s different than your manager’s, talk it out with him. If you’re not sure, go back and be honest. “Jim, I really don’t want to upset everyone on the other team. Why do you think we should start working on it separately instead of collaborating?”
posted by amaire at 5:50 PM on May 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by amaire at 5:50 PM on May 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
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