Tyrant PM - Quit or not?

[BrilloPad]

Keep invoicing. Keep looking round.

Try to get as much as you can in writing.

How do the other team members feel about her?

Personally, I would sign her email up to pr0n sites. Put an advert for her on AW with her mobile. Find her home address and put fish heads and maggots through the door just as she goes on holiday. However I am incredibly childish.

[jmo21]

She wants to micromanage everything & her latest thing is to get us to log everything we do in an email at the end of each day. Each ticket worked on, time spent, what was done, tests performed etc. I pointed out that's what jira's for - no need for an email as I log my work in there.

It's micromanagement for the sake of it.

When I hear this, I think of someone massively out of their depth, who has no idea what is going on (and probably doesn't know how to use JIRA

Point her at your JIRA activity stream page

[radish2008]

I had the same thing with a dev manager - had a quiet word with him and he said that was the way he preferred to work. It cleared the air and I felt better although very little changed. Just roll with it is my advice unless you have something else to go to.

[bassy]

I've had this in the past from a project I was working on and it was actually with the architect. Nothing was right and they constantly would rave and rant at me in front of the rest of the department. I was even ranted at for things other devs had done on another project that had nothing to do with me (I was just a lowly dev on another project). These rants were heard by a number of permies, two of whom reported him to HR for abusive behavior.

There were a load of other things as well but the ranting in front of everyone in the office was a daily occurrence. I was just of the opinion that it made him feel bigger. At first I toughed it out and attempted to speak to him in a civil manner but this did not work. Then thought of the money instead and that did not work. Finally I just thought that life is too short for this, and no-one needs to endure a completely toxic environment so I gave them a weeks notice and left. To be honest when I handed my notice in the department boss actually said he had no idea how I had managed to stand up to the guy for so long and they completely understood why I was leaving.

But yeah life is too short and I contract so I don't need to put up with this kind of behavior.

[lukemg]

I have always stayed in this situation but I would not advise others to do so. I have a very persistent streak that has stood me well but also means I refuse to walk.

One way to cope is to over report to the PM, run every piece of work past them, ask them what they want worked on next, pass all the initiative back to them for sequencing.

Second - you can front them up, have a quiet word preferably. I have had stand up rows in the past, it has never done me any good in the long run especially against perms even if 100% justified.

Third - I call this 'fletch from porridge' mode. Give all the appearance of assistance and agreement but in reality you can find 100 ways to sabotage the process. This works well for me.

Fourth - leave, I won't give them the satisfaction no matter what the personal cost, but hey that's just me.

GLA

[northernladyuk]

Raise loads of risks and issues. That will keep her busy.

[northernladuk]

Cool story bro....

[northernladyuk]

Inneresting story bro....

FTFY

[billybiro]

Personally life is too short to do things and work in places you don't enjoy. I would just walk away....

However, being a contractor means I have enough money to say f*** you and leave... I find that reminding people of that has a remarkable impact on people's behavior towards me.

At last clientco one person who annoyed me was explicitly told by management within 10 minutes to lose their tone and attitude within the office while I was there (she was an utter cow to everyone) as otherwise I would leave resulting in the entire project failing. Clientco thought I had 2 weeks notice, I had zero seconds and stated I was happy to use it... From what I hear her improved behaviour has remained even 6 months later.

This.

Life really is too short to put up with such nonsense. You should always be in a position where you can walk away and wait until another contract comes up, dipping into your considerable warchest (you do have a considerable warchest, don't you?) to tide you over until a new contract is found (at which point, you rebuild the spent funds from the warchest in case the same thing happens again in the future).

[billybiro]

Raise loads of risks and issues. That will keep her busy.

Be careful! This could backfire spectacularly as, more than likely, that work will be "delegated" back to you!