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My new job has gone sour

I have a big problem with my boss. He seemed to be a nice guy and freindly when he hired me, but now he does not even say a word to me. Always a mean face and not even a hello. My reasons for leaving my last job for this one were for more money, of course, closer to home, and to advance up in management. Instead,I find myself very alone at work,and everytime I bring up a great idea or comment, it is knocked down by everyone. I have tryed to fit in with them, but I see myself going nowhere.

Miserable again

Docpotter's Reply:

This sounds like a dreary work situation and you should probably be making a plan to move on from it. Only this time you need to do a better job of finding a new job.

It sounds like your boss has some problems, is stressed out and not happy. This is infecting everyone so that the entire environment has become negative. You are feeling this and it is beginning to infect you, too. This is not your fault. Nonetheless, you can begin to think that your boss's non-reactions or negative mean face, etc is due to you. You can take it personally as some kind of failure or other negative judgement. This is bad and will erode your confidence and performance. This is why you probably need to get out of there, because it doesn't sound like you are going to be able to change this situation.

I suspect that you did not do a good job of evaluating this job and job enviornment before accepting the job. This would be like marrying someone after a 15 minute meeting! It is important to make sure that the job is a "good fit" interms of your values, style and so forth. A bad fitting job is a drag. You are in a bad fitting job! A good fitting job sets up a success cycle so that it is easy to succeed, whereas a poor fitting job set up a failure cycle.

In your next job move you need to evaluate the company and the job better to make sure you get a good fit. There are a lot of books on that subject, such as "What Color is Your Paracute".

Finding A Path With A Heart: How To Go From Burnout to Bliss tells how to assess a new company by doing a "Corporate Culture Audit" to determine how well it fit you. It also describes the importance of finding a job and company that fits you well.

Meanwhile, you can use your current job situation as an opportunity to "practice" new skills like dealing with grouchy boss.

-docpotter