Thorns

Posted September 24th, 2004 by Michelle

My brother Sean is constantly writing great blogs about the theater world. He gets in trouble every now and then, but he also totally stands behind his words. I would love to write about the non-profit arts world, but I can’t, not as much as I’d like. And yet, every day brings a new, bizzare event, and as my job is now largely my life, it’s hard to sit down and write about anything else.

One thing we do in my company is a “Lessons Learned” session after any significant proposal or meeting. It’s one of the best tools we have to give each other constructive criticism and really take apart what worked and what didn’t. I do that with myself, on my own, a little every day, because my learning curve is so steep and sharp right now that sometimes it’s hard to even see the top of the mountain, let alone manage to make it there. And the mountain is nothing like I thought it would be.

I didn’t enjoy my work very much the last couple of days. That comes on the heels of weeks of feeling joy in the workplace. But my job has taken a subtle shift, and unless it shifts back… well, I don’t know. I can’t bear to be around people who are so resistant to change. I know they are out there, I know that they are hard to avoid, but I’m just not interested. And it is a thorn in my side.

The woman who had my job before me was accused of withholding information from the board, and I’m beginning to see why. When you have a dysfunctional board that micromanages the executive director, the director will never get anything done. And most of this week, my focus has been catching people up on the minute details of my job, rather than acutally accomplishing anything. Even though I know this is part of what I’m doing as an ED in an organization in a turn-around phase, even though I know it is necessary to train people to be functional, I’m not enjoying it. For the first time today, I thought about giving up. Not on my job, really, but on the organization. If I’m going to bust my ass, doing all this work to undo the damage of years of mismanagement, neglect, and exclusionism, and then get beat up over it… not interested. I’m not remotely worried about finding another great job. But I am worried about how I felt this week.

And the thing is, I absolutely love my job. I love it more than I’ve loved anything I’ve ever done, maybe even theater. It’s the first time I’ve felt that all of my talents have been really challenged and used, in a situation where success is possible. I believe so deeply in what I do, and I look forward to my job every day. It is deeply satisfying, deeply meaningful. But if these fart-knockers want to get in my way because they feel they have to control everything, then they can look elsewhere for a director. I’m going to remind them what I’ve brought to the table, what my father has brought to the table, Where in god’s name would they be without the team that brought me in? Well. They’d be long gone, and not missed. They know this better than I do.

I’m sure next week will be better. I’m sure that this too, will pass, and that it feels so bad because I’m now accustomed to feeling so good. But what do you do when your hard work and success are questioned not because of your performance but because change is scary? There will always be conflict, on every board, in every group, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.