Job Dilemma

**conradd** · #1 03-10-2002, 10:18 PM

I took a half-time position in January that I enjoy tremendously, but I'm a bit worried about continuation. It's a public agency and I asked during the interview if the funding for the position was hard or soft money. They assured me that there was guaranteed adequate funding for at least the first year and high probability of funding after that. Fine, I took the job (with a little help from Amy, Andrea, and Sara

).

Shortly after that, one of the major supporting players who had promised $20,000 backed out citing post 9/11 budget cuts. This was a major piece of my half-time budget. If the funding had been pulled before I'd been hired, the offer would not have been made.

So, we are writing grants to cover the funding for my office and position. The first grant meeting was last week. The director asked me to present one piece of the budget (a stand-alone program). She would present the request for my salary/office. The meeting began and my program was called. She wasn't there, she had been told to arrive at 10:00 and it was 9:30. If no one presented, the funding was lost. So, I presented a not-my-best overview of the budget request and was met with a great deal of hostility, not only from the review board but members of the audience who are competing for the same funds. Evidently there are some deep political currents that I'm not aware of. Anyway, the program was rated low priority.

I presented my stand-alone program, it went over very well and received high priority. Because it is a state-wide program, I'll be approaching other regional boards for funding as well. This should cover about half of my position. While the agency has the funds for the other half, I'm wondering what the ethics are of continuing. I could cut back to .25 and do just the one program. I could look for another job. Oregon has one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation right now and the job market is extremely tight. I consider myself fortunate to have found this one.

I think the possibility of finding grant funding for the major portion of my job is pretty slim. There is a perception (which has merit) that it duplicates efforts by other community agencies. However, if my office coordinated efforts of those agencies, clients would be better served since they wouldn't have to make multiple phone calls and provide the same information to a number of agencies. That message isn't getting across to the funding agencies however and I don't think it should be coming from me anyway.

If I leave, I can teach as much as I want in the evenings - I get better faculty evals than anyone else in the program right now and student retention is a key factor. Teaching pays twice as much as my day job but it's a 150 RT drive each night. I do get reimbursed for mileage. I'm adjunct faculty at night with no benefits, and the day job requires 30 hours a week for benefit eligibility.

It's an interesting dilemma. Any ideas?

Deb

**pluckyduck** · #2 03-11-2002, 08:05 AM

Wow.

My mind isn't accustomed to working in the non-profit sector so I'm not sure how helpful I can be. I'll give it a stab.

I don't see the money issue with the agency as being an ethical problem. You were offered a job. You took the job. It's not your responsibility to make sure there is money to pay for your job (ethically, though it might then become a job duty). It's not your responsibility to cut your own hours.

Stepping back for a minute, the bigger question might be -- what do you want to be when you grow up?

I'm less concerned with whether or not the agency needs you or the college needs you than whether they are filling your needs.

Do you want a permenant faculty position? Is teaching as many classes as you can at the unversity a way to achieve that goal?

Do you prefer a patchworky kind of life where you are putting good part time jobs together in a way that you choose? Is that less confining and more desireable for you?

Do you want something else altogether, and these jobs are a way to pay the bills until as you work towards something else altogether?

Andrea

kurt_messick · #3 03-11-2002, 08:30 AM

Ugh.

Sounds similar to my dilemma. I'm afraid I don't have any great advice, other than to say make a chart of pros and cons of both sides.

Don't forget to put what you enjoy in the calculation!

poseidon · #4 03-11-2002, 10:05 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by kurt_messick
Ugh.

Sounds similar to my dilemma. I'm afraid I don't have any great advice, other than to say make a chart of pros and cons of both sides.

Don't forget to put what you enjoy in the calculation!

Oooooooooooh! Making charts. My dad would be proud.

Jeff
who could only convince my father that my engagement was a good idea by presenting him with a chart showing pros and cons of Michelle and I getting married.

**mrisch**[$] · #5 03-11-2002, 12:02 PM

What Plucky said.

Also, other questions:
1. Can you buy cheap health through the school?
2. If you get paid twice as much at the school, does it make sense to add 1/4 time there to make up for half time work?
3. Can you teach during the day at all? Longer days make the drive more worthwhile.

magenta321 · #6 03-12-2002, 01:10 AM

Deb, personally, I wouldn't worry where the money came from. You didn't create the job, nor did you create the funding. If the funding is coming from the wrong place (which, who knows, it might not be), then that's someone else's fault.

That job is 30 hours a week (minimum) for benefits. But how flexible are your hours. Would it be a possibility to work three ten hour days? If so, would that be hard for you to do? Personally, two extra hours a day wouldn't be difficult, but to other people it would be torture.

If you could work, say three days a week there, then you would have two days where you could work at night teaching. Perhaps it would even free up days for teaching, if there were teaching positions open in your area of expertese.

That's personally, the way I would play it, unless it created too many problems in my family life. If they could do without me for those hours, and if I could arrange my positions that way, I'd be a happy girl.

I also agree with Andrea's question about what your ultimate goals are. If you are going to choose between keeping one of these jobs or the other, I would suggest you pick the one which holds a better future for you, or at least holds your interest better.

Good luck. There are never easy answers to these questions!

**conradd** · #7 03-12-2002, 01:13 AM

Thanks for the feedback, Andrea and Kurt. I talked with the ED today and it sounds like there's enough residual funding to keep me around for at least a year. By that time, I should have proved myself invaluable, right?

The best thing about my day job is that it's public employee retirement and, since I'm fully vested, there's a 19.46% contribution fully paid by my employer. That's a huge benefit - I won't retire for another 30 years or so, but I need to be building it up. I have a TSA and IRA but I lost years of contribution while I was in grad school. The university I teach for is private for-profit, so there's no pension plan for adjunct faculty, but I'm putting 10% of my salary into a stock plan. Visions of Enron dancing through my head.

Quote:

Do you prefer a patchworky kind of life where you are putting good part time jobs together in a way that you choose? Is that less confining and more desireable for you?

I do enjoy the freedom of being able to arrange my own hours. Right now, with Shane finishing high school, it's very nice to be able to fit my schedule to his. If there really is Life After Children, within a year, I'll be able to put my needs at a higher priority.

Truthfully, I love teaching and I'm good at it. I was recently named undergraduate area chair for quantitative subjects my high school math teachers would not believe this and I pick up a fair amount of extra $$ doing faculty mentoring and staff development. What I'd really like to do is teach a little and work with faculty to enhance their classroom effectiveness. When money is tight though, faculty training isn't very high on the priority list.

Alternately, I'd love to get a faculty contract at the local community college. Turnover is non-existant though . . . the last Business faculty position was hired in 1997. I'd enjoy a training position too, but the one I was angling for (and dangling for a year now) isn't going to be filled, per a successful hostile takeover.

I'll keep the day job as long as it lasts. I do enjoy the challenge (even though the politics drives me nuts). Just in case though, I'm taking all the night classes that are offered to me. It's a hard schedule; work MTWF from 8:30-1:30 in town, then drive to Portland MTWH to teach from 6:00-10:00. I can do anything for a year though . . . if I'm able to secure enough funding to increase my hours to 30, then I can drop a night class or two.

Deb
who appreciates the listening ears.

**conradd** · #8 04-02-2002, 02:58 PM

My dream job just opened up.

Okay, it's a bit of a step down in terms of responsibility and pay. However, it's a first step in what I really want to do . . . work in academia, work with students, work close to home. It's .8 FTE, so I should still be able to teach night classes. It's benefit-eligible, although the retirement contributions aren't quite as good as where I'm working now.

However, I've only been on this job 3 months. I'm now struggling with the ethics of applying for and (if successful) quitting a job that I really like and I think I'm good at. Sigh.

Deb
wishing for the first time that she was a bit stronger on the SJ instead of FP continuum

**mjfrombuffalo**[$] · #9 04-02-2002, 03:26 PM

Non-profit situations are very fluid. I've had four positions within one agency, one transfer due to bugets being cut but them not wanting to lose me. I've twice been given brand-new jobs (jobs just invented that no one had before). The first I took on, altered to fit my needs (subtly), then presented my original job description with the description of what I was actually doing and the corresponding pay increase I felt I deserved - and I got it. The second brand-new position is where I'm at now, a position that gives me a lot of freedom and some muscle (and I negotiated a nice chunk of change at the same time).

IF YOU WANT TO STAY THERE - if you think you'll be working at this AGENCY (not necessarily this DEPARTMENT) for the next 30 years - you can make it work. You can fill needs as you spot them, you can do some grantwriting to close the budget gap (and maybe be made official agency grantwriter or whatever)... be creative. Get your face known to highers-up and to directors of other departments.

IF YOU DON'T WANT TO STAY THERE - if you see this agency's goals/mission/values/ethics/whatever in conflict with your own, then go for the other job. Look at it this way - if you were on a 3-month probation period and your employer found someone better to do your job, would they (the corporate entity, not the individual supervisors) not be doing right by their company to ditch you and take the other person? Same on your side: if this job ain't all it's cracked up to be and a better opportunity is out there, go for it. You and your employer can both say "well, it didn't work out and I wish you luck." Bothered by the ethics?

1) the current job isn't what it was when you originally accepted it - not really anyone's fault, it just isn't.

2) you won't be doing your current employer any favor by staying on to avoid feeling guilty; you'll be preventing them from getting the perfect person for the job.

Ethical - apply for the new job; let your supervisor know that because of the changes you may have to leave for a new job; give your supervisor ample notice if/when you leave.

Unethical - apply for the new job; badmouth your current job to your prospective new job; don't tell your supervisor you're leaving until lunchtime of your last day; steal all the office supplies on your way out the door.

Hope this helps!

mj

**pluckyduck** · #10 04-02-2002, 06:56 PM

Wow. MJ said it all.

She's good!

Andrea

kurt_messick · #11 04-03-2002, 12:25 AM

Go for the dream.

Corporations (even small non-profits, mom-and-pop, etc.) get over it faster than you will if you don't go for the best thing for you.

There's a potential job at a major corporation that pays about 10 times any other job I'm likely to land. That job won't be open and interviewing until the fall, possibly next spring. If I get a job this month and then interview and get offered that job, will I leave the first one? Probably.

Will they get over it? Definitely.

And I look at it this way -- every job I've ever left has had people waiting in the wings who thought the one I was leaving was the perfect one for them (and, fortunately, a few times that has been right). There were people emailing and telephoning me at CTS when my departure was announced there; people were willing to take the job at half the price (alas, there isn't even half the money in the budget to hire a replacement).

**conradd** · #12 04-03-2002, 04:00 AM

MJ and Kurt, thanks for the feedback. I think I'll send them my resume and see what happens. Having health and dental insurance benefits would be worth a bit of a pay cut to me. I have a bargain basement medical policy with a $500 deductible on Shane but I've taken a chance on my own health.

The job starts on July 1, which gives me a bit of time to see what will happen with my present job. If things pick up and funding improves, it would be hard to walk away. But, right now, I could cut my hours by half and still be hard pressed to fill my time. I don't like sitting and doing nothing. Right now, there is literally nothing to do. I spent two hours color coding a spread sheet this morning that no one will ever see but me.

MJ, the problem isn't the values and mission of the agency. I find them in perfect congruence with my own. I love helping people and that is what this job is all about. It's also what the new job would be all about too.

The probabilty of an upward career move at present is unlikely. However, if I were offered the new job, I think I could use it as a springboard to some sort of regional coordinator position. I know that I could walk in and do the job.

It won't hurt to apply, I guess. If it looks like I'll be offered the position, I'll have a heart-to-heart with my boss. I just don't want it to look like I'm trying to negotiate a raise or more hours since I knew what the parameters were when I took the job. With the budget cut, however, it might be in the agency's best interests to incorporate the parts of my job that are left into existing jobs that also faced cuts.

Deb
who reflects that she won't have a problem if she isn't offered the job

**pluckyduck** · #13 04-03-2002, 07:24 AM

Deb -

FWIW, no one is happy when someone who is relatively new to a job leaves, but it happens all the time and is pretty much a fact of life. In the case of your job, with the funding issues, it may be on of those "best things for everybody" kinds of deals where your boss could be relieved to be able to restructure the position to fit the money.

Now, Good Luck and good thoughts on the possible new gig. Things happen for a reason.

Andrea
who notes that the reasons are usually of the good sort

kurt_messick · #14 04-04-2002, 04:28 PM

I would go for the chance at advancement. Good luck to you -- I followed the link, and if I was in Oregon, I'd be inclined to apply for one of the jobs listed

pisces · #15 04-12-2002, 05:10 PM

"Go for the dream. "--Kurt

Yes, but cautiously. You always have to leave yourself an escape hatch and allow yourself the ability to recover, if you need to, from making poor choices down the line. Also, allowing yourself the necessary time/money to recover from someone else's poor choices that you had no control over while aiming for your dream.

Always good to think about how much time/money it will take to re-establish yourself should you not succeed, which we know you will.

I just think it's always wise to make allowances for the unexpected and/or mistakes or changes of heart, and a back-up plan, planB, plan C etc....for if things don't go quite the way you thought. And, what you would do about it.

Sort of leaving yourself wiggle room.

**conradd** · #16 05-16-2002, 05:57 PM

Just in case anyone is interested

, I turned down a chance to interview for the second job today. It actually pays the same as my current job (didn't know that) but I did the pro/con analysis that Jeff suggested

and I decided to make my current job work for me. There is just so much that I like about it, and to leave it for the uncertainty of another new job is more than I want to risk right now. So, I came up with a couple of ideas to increase my current FTE and am actively looking for funding. The ED is very enthusiastic.

And, more good news is that she's bringing on an intern to help me research funding opportunities so I won't have to do all the work myself. TPTB like the work I'm doing and that is a very good feeling.

Thanks everyone for listening (reading?) and providing some great feedback. Very helpful.

Deb