Today I had a meeting with my principal to discuss my work. I wish I could say I prepared for it, but I didn’t know it was happening. The notice I received was an email yesterday asking if we could meet this morning. That was it. Nothing else. Needless to say, when the conversation started I was caught pretty off guard. Apparently, my department chair had some complaints about my work, which she expressed to the principal instead of me. 2 things: not getting work done in a timely manner and not following through on my commitments. I asked for examples, none could be provided. Now, criticism is never easy to receive, but I like to think I’m pretty coachable. This was hard to swallow. The glaring aspect to me was the person giving feedback. Why didn’t my department chair talk to me about this?! She shares an office with me. It would’ve been so simple to just chat for 15 minutes about the issues she saw. Then she could’ve expressed why she felt this way and her recommendations for improvement. Instead she took her complaints to my “big boss”, who could basically only be a messenger. Fortunately I’m a volunteer, so #1 they can’t really fire me and #2 my contract doesn’t go beyond this year. If I was a normal employee though, I’d be pretty mad! That meeting could be the difference between having a job next year and not. As it is I’m going to have to work pretty hard at separating my feelings from the feedback enough to actually use it for improvement.
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