Some lessons are learned the hard way - Studio Manager DAYA Foundation Employee Review

I'd like to share a few cons with the caveat that you, the reader, understand I am incredibly thankful for my experience at DAYA Foundation. In a nutshell, I am a better person for the experiences of working at DAYA Foundation. Sarahjoy Marsh, the interim Executive Director, hired me to help DAYA Foundation. I was told that 2016 was a poor year because of employee choices that were poor and expensive and poor PR on the previous manager’s part. I moved across the country to work at the studio. I was as excited to turn an entire organization around as I was about the mission of the studio itself. Had I read Glassdoor's 6 Red Flags to Look Out for When Interviewing article from May 18, 2017, before accepting the job (an impossibility, I know), I would not have been so excited to accept the job. Almost all the red flags were there: high employee turnover, a lengthy hiring process, unclear job description, an unclear definition of success, and trash talking. HIGH TURNOVER / TRASH TALKING There is high turnover in the office and the interim Executive Director (ED) is quick to trash talk all the employees who have failed the nonprofit. There were times the interim ED said “XYZ is why the past studio manager didn’t do a good job” and it was a successful education, of sorts, for things I should not do. I should not request meetings, I should not ask for too much of her time, I should not, etc. The amount of trash talking was enough to shock me, a “nice” Midwesterner. The interim ED gossiped about past employees, of course, but also spoke poorly about the teachers, the production of my subordinate, and some of the students. I learned quickly to watch my step and guard myself, though I knew that wouldn’t keep me from being the recipient of trash talking. STONEWALLING The office is a 10x10 space with up to five people working in close proximity. Yet, instead of responding to me directly in the office, the interim ED sent me emails in reply to questions or FYI emails. The interim ED would ignore me (my coworkers noticed) while being available to the other employees. I heard the same stories of the “terrible” things past employees did over and over again. After about 2-3 months, I was treated as though I was the culprit. It was painful and demeaning, to say the least. After three months, I asked for my 90-day review and was denied. I was denied a review for nearly seven months because the interim ED was "uncomfortable" with these kinds of conversations. UNCLEAR JOB DESCRIPTION / UNCLEAR DEFINITION OF SUCCESS I was given a job description that had been edited, but not finalized. On day two of the job, I made a simple request of someone who, according to my job description, was my subordinate. She replied back in a hostile email that she would not do what I requested, that she was under the impression that she didn’t have any other boss except for the interim ED. The interim ED replied back with vague, passive language that eased the other woman and left me feeling as though I was “wrong.” This is one example of a pattern of communication that would repeat over and over and over. I was hired as a yoga studio manager, yet I didn’t have the authority to hand-select the team of people working with me. The actions that I took in marketing campaigns and marketing improvements around the studio were reversed. When I came home from one vacation, a marketing implement had been removed from the wall. My subordinate/number two/right-hand woman and coworkers expressed their discomfort in the aftermath. I tried to bring new, creative ideas but each idea was met with resistance, negation, and hostility. I tried to establish goals for the teachers and myself, and my choice of language was challenged. (I used the phrase “score card” in conjunction to class sizes.) The people I met and my experiences at DAYA Foundation fostered my growth and learning as a human. I have to admit that my standards for workplace integrity, collaboration and communication are much higher that they were pre-DAYA. Now I know to watch for high employee turnover, a lengthy hiring process, unclear job description, an unclear definition of success, and trash talking. And for that education, I am thankful to the DAYA Foundation.