Coffee Break With Me

Woke up this morning feeling not so well-rested. Hubby had crashed next to us after burning the midnight oil finishing his report. Khayla was already awake and doing her favorite activity - standing and holding to the bed head. Thinking to tease her, I shifted over to hubby and cuddled up to him - and as expected, Khayla felt left out and started to crawl over and try to get between us. She is such a jealous baby. Camane la nak ada adik ni?

Morning activity is the same. Prepared porridge for my little girl (broccoli, carrot and blended anchovies), and while waiting for it to cook, bathed her. Khayla soon started to crawl after me and whine for food after her bath - so I gave her a plate of chopped banana which she contentedly ate and afterwards, played with while sitting in her baby chair. After she had had enough of banana, I scooped some porridge and we settled down in front of the idiot box watching Babytv while having a proper breakfast.

Hubby had to leave for a group discussion and there was just the two of us to continue with the day. After finishing her porridge, she nuzzled closer for a cuddle and a round of breastfeeding session. After she dozed off, I put her down and went to hand wash her clothes - then put them for a spin in the washing machine. By that time, Khayla had woken up only to find Mommy is not around. It was already 12pm, I scooped her up and then brought her to the guest room to iron our clothes - we were going to a kenduri kahwin in Bukit Damansara.

After that, I had to leave Khayla by herself while I took a quick shower. She was in full tantrum mode by the time I was done, and yet I could not pick her up because I had to: 1) put on my clothes, 2) re-heat her porridge, 3) prepare a bottle of formula milk for the journey, 4) store the warm porridge in a container for the journey 5) pack her bag, 6) put on some makeup and my headscarf, 7) put everything in a carrier bag ready for the trip. After all was done, then only I picked up my crying little girl and changed her into a matching outfit ;)

Then we went down to the car, but once I had settled Khayla in her car seat, I couldn't find the GPS holder - then I remembered it was on the fridge (dammit!). So I made a quick dash (it was drizzling some more!) back to home (with Khayla) to fetch the GPS holder, and also to fetch her dummy. After she was settled down for the second time in her seat, I noticed that one of her sandals is missing. So it was a third trip to trace the sandal (without Khayla this time). By the time I went back to the car, my little girl was crying - again.

All set and done, we drove off to our first destination - the petrol station to fill up on fuel. Then, to the gift shop to get a wedding gift. After all that needed to be done was completed, then we set off.

It was lucky that I simulated the journey before we went for the trip because most of the journey, the GPS was not working. It is the stupidest GPS navigator I've ever invested in (it's called Papago, installed on iPhone 4). So I had to rely on my memory to reach the destination, based on the journey simulation.

We reached there at almost 2pm, Khayla had fallen asleep in the car after a bottle of milk and a nibble on a biscuit (she dozed off while holding the biscuit - such a dear sight). Getting out of the car while holding the baby, a bag and the gift was a chore - luckily I got a parking close to the entrance.

Khayla was hungry when she woke up and she ate a good deal of her porridge. After the wedding, she was in a better mood and she fell asleep again during the journey back. We decided to stop by at a bakery to order her first birthday cake this coming 15th. Gosh, I get teary-eyed whenever I think of my little baby who is growing up into a little girl. I wished we could spend a lot more time because I never get tired of my little baby.

We reached home at almost 4pm. By that time, I was tired and my hands were aching. After settling down a bit, we both took an afternoon nap - such a wonderful nap it was!

Never will I venture out of the house with only the two of us - it's too tiring! So, how's your weekend, my friends? :)

Everyone keeps pointing out to me how lucky i am to be working with a giant company in Malaysia. Just mention where I work, and everyone's eyes lit up - they start to imagine how big the paycheque is, the perks, the travels, etc.

Maybe some people working here do have the luxury of that feeling, but for me, I feel that  my pay does not match up to my workload. I believe a lot of people here share the same sentiments too.

It's not that I'm ungrateful of what I have. I remember the feeling when I first joined the Company - it felt like I had been rescued from raging torrent. Fast forward 3 years later, the energy had run out. I used to have a great leader who is concerned about us, and who is fair and sympathetic to our burdens. But my current leader is - to quote my colleague, she's a nice person but as a boss, she sucks.

She is hardly visible from the bottom perspective, unlike the previous boss. She's surreal to our daily operations, and has no idea the suffering and pressure her staff is going through. She leaves office early every day, so has no idea how long her staff has to stay back to ensure that people are happy with the services provided. If she had to stay back, she does not observe - to her people staying back is normal. If she had an ounce of concern, she might go back and think - my staff also have family, why do they have to stay back? Is there too much workload that they can't finish it on time?

I'm not the perfect boss either. I am strict to my staff, I put high expectations and can be very demanding. I rule by emotions too, and I have little patience for silly mistakes and ignorance. But when it comes to personal time, I don't encourage staff to sacrifice their own time for work. I don't do it, so why should I expect they do it?

But to me, the worst thing she does as a boss is giving unequal distribution of workload to her staff. One department is so overworked, and another is so relaxed. You can practically divide the division into two zones - a happy cheerful zone (goes back on time, not much workload blabla), and the quiet, much more subdued zone (overworked, operations get diverted to them as they are the true implementer of service, blabla).

During year end performance review, I tried to highlight that as the lowest grade executive in the Company, I am being tasked to run a department without a direct reporting line to a manager (or put it this way, other departments have their own managers, I don't). Where the tasks of decision making, strategy formulation and policy-making are given to the managers in other departments, I have to carry those responsibilities in my own department. Of course I have my executive job as well to do, and when my staff get stuck with a lot of work, I help out with their daily operations as well.

So you can imagine how exhausting it is to be in my spot - a manager one hour, an executive the next and occasionally a supervisor or a clerk. Eventually it affects my work quality, and gets me so concerned with such working arrangement that I voiced it up. After all, I'm only paid to do one level  of job scope - as a junior executive. Why do I have to be tasked with responsibilities that even senior executives don't carry? Senior execs for example, have only one or maybe no staff reporting to them, I have 2 to manage (previously 3).

But of course she did not see it that way. She said my job is created in a flexible way that even junior exec can sit on it. Of course she can say that, because I get things done. What if I just told her to shove it if she asked me to formulate a policy or write the next board paper? (I'm just a junior exec, get someone else to do it!)

Hmm. That reminds me to print my own PD and put it at my work station so I can point out that I'm paid to do only a certain level of task, so she can give it to someone else or do it her own. If one thing I know best - it's delegating. All this while, I've been delegating downward,  maybe it's time I delegate upwards.