Soon to say Good Bye to IDog

One thing I have learned from where I work now:  The more work that can get done with less people, the more work is expected to be done with less people.  I don't recommend you quit, or slack off any of your responsibilities, but if you do in fact step up and do the work of three people there will be no need to hire any replacements at all.  What for? Super Dynamo You will take care of the problem for them, so no need to hire 'extraneous' employees to share the work.  Do what you can within a reasonable amount of time, but don't bail them out or you will be scr**ing yourself in the end.  We went through that here, and we actually had people in tears trying to do the work of two and three people it was so stressful.  We actually lost production trying to reduce the workforce to save money.  It took a couple of weeks of misery, but they went back to the original staffing levels.  Hang in there my dear.  Keep your cool.  Breathe deeply, and try not to stress too badly, it only hurts YOU.  Best of luck on this one.  BTDT.      Jules

Yeah keeping cool is going to be hard.  I'm just a tad bit too stressed out to have this added onto it all.

You can survive it, yeah it stinks...   Just don't take THEIR problem, and make it YOUR problem.  )  Jules

Will you be geeting the pay of 4 people??[]  That may help!!  Good luck!

ORIGINAL: julesmac8

One thing I have learned from where I work now:  The more work that can get done with less people, the more work is expected to be done with less people.  I don't recommend you quit, or slack off any of your responsibilities, but if you do in fact step up and do the work of three people there will be no need to hire any replacements at all.  What for? Super Dynamo You will take care of the problem for them, so no need to hire 'extraneous' employees to share the work.  Do what you can within a reasonable amount of time, but don't bail them out or you will be scr**ing yourself in the end.  We went through that here, and we actually had people in tears trying to do the work of two and three people it was so stressful.  We actually lost production trying to reduce the workforce to save money.  It took a couple of weeks of misery, but they went back to the original staffing levels.  Hang in there my dear.  Keep your cool.  Breathe deeply, and try not to stress too badly, it only hurts YOU.  Best of luck on this one.  BTDT.      Jules

i have been trying to explain just this to my wife. she is always taking on more and more work. so much so that her stress level is making me crazy. and they just keep asking her to do more and more. i told her to just do what she can and leave work at a reasonable time, but she wont listen.[:@]

I can attest to the taking on extra work and someone else never being hired. Because I am always willing to help out at work I am responsible for coding and billing for the biggest hospital we bill for.. some days that means I bill out over 300 EKGs a day. In addition to that I am responsible for the collections for both hospitals we bill for, the return mail for the entire office.. patients and insurance companies.. (we sent out over 2000 statements a month.) I also have recently starting getting all the claims ready and mailed out each night...
 
There will not be anyone else hired.. that is just my job now..

You have to realize that it isn't all about how great/amazing/skilled/efficient/dedicated you are (along with all the other ego stroke words bosses use) it is all about the bottom line.  Who benefits from keeping labor costs next to zero?  It is not the exhausted overworked production unit with a name and a social security number.  It is the BOSS who benefits.  I am not only an employee but I am also a small business owner and have been a manager at other places.  Doing more than a little extra on a permanent basis is a slippery slope you will have difficulty getting off of once you get on.  Once you adjust to the increased work load you will in fact be asked to 'adjust' to yet another heavier work load to meet new productivity goals.  If you are willing, well more power to you and God Bless but think hard about what you are obligating yourself into in the long run.  It's no fun to be exhausted, bitter, jaded, overworked, and burnedout.  You teach people how to treat you, it is not wrong to assert yourself and it's dangerous to teach them that you are the equivalent of a 'papertowel'.    Jules