Hi all,

I've been working for my company for just over three months now. I initially applied for the role of Quality Manager because I have over ten years experience and qualifications in quality, health and safety, production and business management.

I didn't get the QM role but I was still hired as Quality Assurance Assistant with 'some Health and Safety responsibilities'. Even though it was a dramatically lower salary I was desperate so took the job.

The person who did get the QM role is now my line manager, she started the same day as me and sits next to me. Unfortunately she is not a good manager, she doesn't communicate anything, she doesn't do much of anything at all.

I was given all of the Health and Safety duties and responsibilites (but without the reflective salary, the boss is a miser) but I've done excellently, already turned around the H&S Culture and made positive change throughout the four companies which has been largely well received, even when I've rocked the boat with my changes, after the initial grumbling resistance, the changes have been approved and accepted, I've made significant progress and I'm proud of my work.

I passed the company through the ISO 9001 transition from 2008-2015 single handedly with the inspector from LRQA (30yrs experience) stating that the systems I put in place were 'the most robust he had ever seen'. which I'm proud of.

It was this accolade and the extensive and varied set of quality and health and safety documents I've produced... (34 new documents and countless reviewed and updated documents in only three months, sounds excessive but the whole place was in shambles and didn't have some of the most basic of documentation and systems in place when I started!) ...That I went cap in hand to the boss with the proposal that I officially take on the duties and responsibilities of Health and Safety RP with a title and salary to reflect the role I am already doing. The boss surprisingly accepted the proposal, well the lower end of it anyway, everything but the salary, which he just ended the meeting on, still unclear on whether there will be an increase in pay or not, I'm going to wait to see my pay packet at the end of the month and if it hasn't increased then I'll bring it up again...

The problem now really is my line manager, I'm doing a lot of work away from quality focusing mainly on H&S and I really run my own workload without much need or input from anyone else. This may be getting the Quality Manager's back up, though as I mentioned before she doesn't say anything so it's really hard to tell.

Our desks are next to each other yet all she ever says is 'good morning' and 'good night' I've tried gleaning more from her but met with silence. I normally wouldn't care but there is an ever growing pile of work, documents, internal audits, risk assessments, etc. that I need approving to close my action list, which are just sitting on her desk, being added to each day but seemingly being ignored.

I did a health and safety consultation survey to all employees to get a measure of attitudes, incidents, needs (PPE, Training etc.), and of the 77employees 9 were sick or on holiday, 67 responded with a completed survey and one person ignored the survey and subsequent prompts to chase it up... Guess who!

Basically with such poor upper management control and accountability in conjunction with my being new to the company and already being demanding and rocking the boat, albeit with excellent results. What can I do about this line manger who is not managing and who is slowing my work? I'm concerned that she may be purposly sabotaging me? Am I being petty or ridiculous? 

There is no HR department to discuss this with, just QM then MD, neither of which are easy to talk to! 

Thanks

(This sounded like a much bigger problem when I started writting this, I guess on reading it back it's not so bad, but venting has already helped and any advice is still welcome and appreciated!)

Well done.

Sounds like you are making good progress, where it matters...at the coal face.

I have worked for many organisations with paperwork falling in to the void. I learnt to document the handover...usually in email so i had a record.

"Please find attached the action plan following last weeks meeting. You will notice some of the items have been allocated to you, or await your approval, as my line manager/MD/account holder/person responsible for this area of the business. If I have had no reply to this email by Friday 12th, I will assume you accept full responsibility for these items, having been informed in writing."..........edit to something more appropriate. From this point onwards list their name, date request made, and leave it on the document as outstanding until they get back to you...if ever. Remember to send as a read receipt.

If they ask why you are doing this tell them directly, you need a record as historically items sent have not been addressed and in the event of an issue, you now have documentation that can demonstrate your involvement.

As for their personalities, attitude, involvement. Grow a thick skin, and think about looking at courses on the softer people skills involved in our work.

Keep going.

Or the manager could just be settling in herself and feel overwhelmed by what she has to do!

Self and Hasty

The behaviour your outline, and enact yourself, provides good maerial for working out how you and the QM make sensse of your organizaton.  What appears lacking is an independent account of what is going on.

Books and papers by Karl Weick offer useful guidance, illustrating how each of your are exemplifying approaches to making sense.