Constant Brain Dump

like his first week we were on a team call, he was sat next to his manager in the office, and he was just doing other shit on his laptop and paying no attention to the meeting. his manager had a word with him after.. and then he did it when working from home multiple times so the manager had words again.

he’s been really slow with work too. so they’ve had words with him about that too.

apparently he home schools his children so they think he’s potentially doing that when he’s meant to be working.

then the other week we had some planning meetings about a new thing they’re building on the app, that i’ve designed. the tech lead then went on holiday but he’d discussed with them multiple times about how he expects it to be built.

then this new guy shared a video with me on thurs showing what he’s done so far and it looked exactly the same as the current app, and not like the new designs that are v different. so i asked what was going on and he gave a reason that made no sense.

that day the tech lead logged on despite being on holiday and spotted the same thing and so he messaged the devs asking if they’re approaching it in the way they agreed on the week before and they said yes. but they’re clearly not.

then yesterday me and the PM noticed he’d picked up 9 pieces of work at once cos he’s been using AI to try and do more. which is somewhat fine. the devs all use AI… but you have to be careful how much you do at once or it becomes a total mess and impossible to keep on top of and test everything and make sure it’s done a good job etc.

he then shared videos of all 9 things at the end of the day…. and again it looked like the current app, not the new designs. so i just replied asking when i can see the new stuff. he said tomorrow cos AI had done something weird and he didn’t notice until the videos had already sent….

so then today his manager came back to work. had a catch up with him and questioned wtfs going on. his answers weren’t good enough. so they’ve decided to get rid of him. the engineering manager actually said he should have been let go the second time he was spoken to about not doing enough work a few weeks back really.

so now the manager is gonna have to basically get rid of everything this guys done for the past week cos it’s all useless, and start again. cos it’s easier than trying to fix the mess he’s created.

only me and one other designer (out of 9) shared something

i only started mine yesterday so it’s very early on. i explained the context behind it. explained what i’d done and why, based on calls ive had with users about what they need.

we got questioned about how we expect users to use it. my PM answered. his answer was based on what users have told us.

the stakeholders then proceeded to tell us how they think users need it to work based on things they’ve learned from users over time.

i said we’ll take it all on board and we need to speak to users more in depth anyway cos we didn’t get into enough detail in the previous calls we’ve had with them. and i mentioned how we haven’t had chance yet cos we literally started this yesterday.

then after the call the head of product messaged me and my PM, and included my manager too. and basically insinuated that we came across like we don’t know what we’re talking about and that we haven’t spoken to any users. and that we need to be confident about what we’re building.

we replied and said we’ve actually spoken to over 15 users but we haven’t gone into depth about this specific area yet. we’ve only briefly touched on it on some calls, so what we did so far, was based on what we knew so far. we will of course be showing this to users and getting their feedback and making changes based on what they tell us…. which we do for every fucking piece of work and we’re one of the only teams that does it pretty consistently.

so to insinuate that we’re not doing anything properly is really fucking unfair. especially when he asked for things that are early in the process. like of course they’re not gonna be perfect. i’ve spent like 3 hours on it for fucks sake.

one of my students who started 2 years ago as such a shy quiet girl performed, we’ve noticed her strength and confidence grow so much over the past year and it’s been so lovely to see. she did so well and was so confident on stage! i cried my eyes out 😂 and then multiple of my friends who have never freestyled before did it last night too and im just so proud of them all it makes me so emotional!

i however did not freestyle hahaha idk that i feel ready for that yet. like i can freestyle dance but during a performance i feel like i’d just freeze or something. i did put a routine together the other week in a couple of hours and haven’t practiced it since, so i did a decent job of managing to remember it!

i really enjoyed the performance anyway, it was v fun and my routine was pretty simple and the audience seemed to enjoy it!

yesterday i had my first full proper experience with another girl and it was great 👀 eeeek!!!!

this is all above board with M btw haha we have spoken in depth about this for years since i came out as bi and we know all of our boundaries etc etc and he’s v happy for me!

she’s a friend of mine and fully aware of my situation and stuff too so it’s all very clear and what we all wanted.

its cos i have quite a few leg tattoos now and i dont think she realised quite how many / how big some of them are.

turns out i hated it. my brows looked so messy! i think it was mainly because she didn’t manage to get all the tint off. but then she barely shaped them at all either. and the lashes really didn’t make much difference. i’ll post some photos…

one of the other designers is interviewing this person, with a head of one of the departments.

this designer hasn’t done a final interview before so she’s been asking questions which is fine of course… but she’s clearly overthinking and fretting over nothing..

she just messaged me saying when she had her interview here, she doesn’t remember if people had laptops or not. so she’s assuming she shouldn’t take her laptop in. but in our recruitment software there’s a lot of questions so she’ll have to try and memorise them as best as possible.

i read it about 5 times just thinking….. how the fuck have you come to this conclusion 😅 WHY would you think that’s expected of you. of course you take your laptop in!? you have to ask questions and write notes about their answers into the software?! we do the same thing in second stage interviews, which are online, and she’s done loads of them.

so that’s over 2 hours of talking a lot and listening really carefully

the choreo is for an event in a couple of weeks which is like an open mic night but instead of a mic, it’s a pole lol. so you can sign up to perform on the night. so i’ve planned smth for that yay!

then on sunday morning she asked if she should bring M’s bday presents to the cinema or wait til next weekend when we go for a meal.

i said she could bring them to the cinema or could come to ours for a bit after the cinema, thinking she’d come and see the house like she wanted to.

instead she just went “we’ll just park near you instead”

shit like this always pisses me off because they rarely come to our house and it’s always been like this. when we lived in salford, they’d often go to the trafford centre and not visit us, despite us being a 10min drive from it. and i barely saw them back then either, so it made me feel shit that they could be bothered driving all the way there, but cba driving an extra 10mins to see their daughter at uni.

and now it’s the same even though we live 20mins from them. they don’t often come round, it’s usually us going to them. but they often come to the town near us, which again is 10mins away. and not once have they ever messaged asking to pop round whilst they’re nearby?!

i just find it kinda rude and also hurtful. like yesterday after giving M the gifts, my mum said they best get back and make tea…. then her and my dad both commented on the fact they’re not even hungry… like exactly so you could have just come to ours for 30mins to actually spend time with us couldn’t you?! cos sitting in the cinema isn’t spending time together really cos you can’t exactly talk.

my day in photos!

we did the food shop and a tip run this morning. then went to a few shops to find some nicer door knobs for the kitchen cabinet. then went to see Disclosure Day.

honestly we didn’t enjoy it. i love the premise but it was just so so so slow. my mum loved it though.

got home and noticed a bloody screw in my tyre. it barely even pierced the rubber though so i think im safe thank fuck.

my parents got M a load of plants for his bday and we have no idea what the one in the photo is lol

and then he put our new doorknobs on!

i’ve got classes soon and the main road is closed from 11.30-2.30 for the carnival parade, so i guess im stuck at the studio for that entire time (classes finish at 1.30) cos i literally can’t get home without a 40min detour lol. stupid town only having one main road through it.