This doesn't seem like an urgent situation to me so why not just take your time, get your resume in order, start doing some informal networking and maybe talk with some recruiters and see what your alternatives might be? Might be good to put together a list of non-negotiables/nice to haves prior to really looking at other options so that you are clear in your own head what will make a move attractive/feasible.
No, I guess it's not urgent. This is a very good reminder; thank you for infusing a calm practicality to this question.
Just sounds like poor leadership to me.
Manufacturing experience in the Bay Area is very hard to find, so if you are interested in leaving at all, you should look.
I’ve been trying to hire for a finance manager role in Livermore and it’s been incredibly challenging to find someone with experience and interest working for a manufacturing company.
I agree that the leadership is poor. For a time, I thought I could be happy as I knew Boss wouldn't hold me accountable to the highest standards since that's how she rolls. But I'm not really happy about that after all - I could be learning so much more; I could be tackling interesting things.
Are you looking for a remote senior manager? My strength is as an individual contributor rather than a people-manager 😊 Manufacturing is still interesting.
So, why is your coworker leaving? Did they say they were fed up with things? Just greener pastures? Personal reasons?
If not "for cause," then I don't see why that triggers you to want to leave. Maybe their replacement will be great, too. Since your "other" tasks are so broad, can you work your way to be on the interviewing committee for that role?
Other than that, it seems like you have a typical experience working for a private company. Without some of the BS driving public companies to document the hell out of things, they don't have them documented. But then you say that part of your "other" is process documentation--which you say elsewhere is clearly lacking. It seems to me the solution to both is somewhere in there: take your documentation tasks with the mindset that you are providing permanent answers, and maybe they will become more desirable in your mind.
I haven't had a chance to talk to the coworker, but will find out their reasons tomorrow. The news served as a trigger for me to look at my own situation and evaluate. I've not been 100% happy here for about 12 of the 16 months at this job.
If their replacement isn't great, it won't be a big deal to me because that person would be trained by their peers and would quietly do their work from their own home. It's a different sub-division of the department. The reason I've worked with the incumbent at all is because they are so great they go above & beyond the daily grind to find process improvements, put documentation in place & generally help out in any way they can (reminds me of my work style). So we've been paired up to tackle some problems.
I might be able to get on the interview committee, but I work so little with that position that I won't see much benefit/change in my day-to-day.
About the process documentation - regardless of what a boss wants, if there is no documentation I always make it for myself. Of course I share it if that is something the company values. In this arena, I'm doing two things. One, leading other sub-departments in their documentation efforts and two - documenting my own job. For the first, I'm simply a stand-in for Boss, who has other tasks to tackle. I can work with that - and any unknowns here are solved either by the team or by Boss if they can't figure it out.
I've done the best I can on my own-job documents, but there are still places where I have to go to Boss to ask "what do I do in *this* situation?" If that question gets turned over to the AC, I don't get trained or told how to resolve...AC just does it & moves on. So I can't document! I get that AC is overworked, but that won't change if she won't let me help. And I get that it's an incredibly complex thing with lots of moving parts. The answer is to just keep documenting these so-called unique situations as they arise and eventually patterns and best practices will become evident. The new situations should become more rare as my learning/documenting progresses, and...they're not. I'm being held at the same level of understanding by the dynamics of Boss and AC. I've reached the limit of what I can document.
Is your goal to attain a certain position/status on the corporate ladder or is your goal to achieve FIRE asap? "Tragically overpaid" speaks volumes and utterly cracks me up.
I'm not looking to move up the ladder per se. I want to do interesting work (combo of routine stuff & problem-solving or big projects); continue learning; be a resource for my team mates. At the highest salary possible...but only in order to achieve FIRE asap.
It's tragic because my skills are sadly under-utilized. I haven't reconciled anything since I've been here, and that is one of my strengths. Recently I've been tasked with teaching everyone how to use LastPass (LP) (you know, the password manager). This is not an accountant's job. Not that I mind doing it, but it's just far more representative of the sort of thing I've been assigned at this job. I have about 1/4 of a workload that is actual accounting.
Also, it's caused me a lot of angst over the last year. On many days I feel I'd rather take a pay cut and work at a lower level, if it meant I had a full work load. The pull of that is strong, but that would delay FIRE. I'm already looking at 3-7 years more and I ain't gettin' any younger, ya know?
Hello! Fellow accountant here, also similar age. I've also worked my way up from staff accountant, to senior, to Controller and now Assistant Controller. I moved down to AC for more money and flexibility, but honestly the duties are the same. In fact, I've also had more responsibility and interesting duties as a senior accountant. Many, many times I've felt like an overpaid AP clerk. All this to say, I agree that your experience is pretty typical of accounting (in my experience) in industry, and the grass is not always "greener." But--it might be! It's a good time to be looking and you might find yourself in a place with better management, which would make a huge difference.
If you choose to stay and your company pays for staff development, maybe look at your state CPA society's website to see if any classes interest you (you can take them for a few dollars more, if not a member; you don't need to be a CPA). It might spur you to think of an interesting project you could take on at work.
Hello! As far as the grass not being greener - last place was overworked & underpaid and now I'm underworked and overpaid. But the free time in my work day is turning out to be bad for my psyche.
This is a great suggestion and well-timed. The company just created a position & hired someone to be the staff development coordinator and they just sent out a survey to see what we are all interested in learning. Something about leases changed and it would be good to get up to date on that.
I'm an auditor, so have worked with many accountants. And we're cousins in terms of jobs.
The higher up you go the less grunt accounting work you do and the more planning, strategy, and management you do. Similar thing happens in auditing, which is why I'm a senior after 15 years. I've turned down manager roles. The money isn't worth the tradeoffs for me.
Your bigger factor is going to be culture. Sounds like your culture is iffy at best right now. Start getting your resume in order, casually look around. If you see something you're interested in, great. You don't have to accept an offer if you don't want to.
askamanager.org for resume/cover letter advice.
I could understand trading off grunt work/calculations for planning, strategy & management. However, I've been given more administrative tasks that a non-accountant could do! I specifically looked for a role that was non-supervisory, with the thought that I would get to be an individual contributor. However I find myself with a greater share of my job being some of the supervisory tasks offloaded from Boss than accounting tasks. I don't actually have responsibility for the performance of anyone and that's a relief, at least.
Now that you mention it...when AC was promoted from Senior to AC, she just took all the Senior tasks along with her...not sure that she's doing any more planning etc. She just has a bigger paycheck & higher status for the same work (as far as I can tell). Not that she doesn't deserve it, but it would have been great growth for me to take on some of that.
Yeah, time to polish up the resume and put myself out there.
If I'm still around when Boss gets back from her month-long working vacation overseas, I'll make it clear that I'd prefer a greater portion of my job be actual accounting tasks. We've talked about this before but nothing has been done. There's always something (year end, audit, vacation lol). In the mean time, quiet job hunt.
Thanks
@lhamo @Joel @reeshau @Dicey @Avolonte @Sibley for helping me parse this and look at it from other perspectives. Very helpful.
