A reader writes:
Short version: I truly suck at, and therefore hate, my job, but I’m otherwise a delightful person and employee — so says pretty much anyone who works with me (they don’t say “delightful,” but they use complimentary terms!). But I love my company and want to stay. Is that just a pipe dream?
Long version: I started my job about a year and a half ago. It is in the same industry I’ve worked for the past 10 years, but doing something different – I spent 10+ years doing medical billing and the new job is processing medical insurance claims. I was burned out on the collections end of medical billing and was delighted to land this position, thinking that my billing experience would be beneficial, and as a bonus, I’d never have to speak to disgruntled patients about why their bill was so high! The company I work for is fantastic – I always loved working with them from the billing side, and they are doing their best to actually HELP people with their medical care – they are not an enormous medical insurance company who doesn’t care.
It takes about six months to be fully trained to process all types of claims, so it’s a pretty intense process. For quality control, processors must maintain 98% accuracy when processing – this is done by spot-audits from another department.
Turns out, this job is JUST processing claims. I can do it, and I can even do it well, but I can’t seem to do it well consistently. I’m not meeting the accuracy standard, and it’s stupid mistakes that I know better than to make! But I get so bored, I think I just zone out. I just can’t make myself care, and I can’t convince myself that it matters. I’m more than happy to fix mistakes, but it makes more work for everyone, which is why we have the 98% standard.
My supervisors have been great about this, offering to help, checking in with me, etc, but the reality is, I just suck at this. However, my supervisors have assured me more than once that I’m a great employee, have a great attitude, and am the type of person they enjoy having on their team. It’s just … that’s not enough! I’ve never had an experience where I’ve been so consistently bad at an aspect of my job – and this isn’t an aspect, it’s the actual job! It’s disappointing, and quite frankly, it’s embarrassing!
There are no current openings within the company that I am qualified for, or that I’m interested in, but I really love this company and would like to stay. But this job is boring! My supervisors and HR even had me do a strengths assessment, which confirmed that this sort of thing isn’t great for me, but the type of job they indicate I’d be good at (marketing) is nothing I’ve ever thought of or worked in. My self-assessment is that I like “consistent variety” – I like having structure and knowing what is expected of me, but I need a little variety in there to break up the day and keep me focused. I like to feel I’ve accomplished something, whereas processing claims is literally never-ending – not even in a way that I can finish a batch and start another one.
So do I cut my losses here and just see what else is out there? I hate starting over, and haven’t really been here that long, but I’ve been trying for months to do better and just can’t seem to get it together. Thoughts? Reassurances? Advice?
Ahhhh, I so badly want to be reassuring here because I do believe you are a delightful person! But …
I wouldn’t stay at a job you’re bad at, even if they think you’re lovely and are lovely back to you.
First, there might be a point where they become less patient with the mistakes. Right now, they might be in “give it time” mode, hoping/assuming that you’ll bring your accuracy up once you’ve been there longer. If that doesn’t happen, it might not be realistic for them to keep you in the job indefinitely.
But maybe more importantly, it’s not good for you to stay in a job you’re bad at. You won’t be building a reputation for doing strong work, and at whatever point you leave, it may be harder to find your next job if you have several years (or more) of not-great work. You’ll have fewer people excited to vouch for you or connect you with job leads, and your references won’t be strong (at least in regard to your work quality). And getting used to being Not Very Good can mess with your head in ways that might be hard to shake once you leave.
Normally I’d tell you to have an honest conversation with your boss to explore whether there might be ways to tweak your role or more you into a different role entirely, but it sounds like you’ve already done that and that your manager and HR are being pretty proactive in trying to work with you on this.
So yes, it does sound like it’s time to start looking outside your company. I get that you really like them and want to stay … but your day-to-day, hour-to-hour work is going to have a lot more influence on your overall quality of life than being at a great company will (as important as that can be too). Plus, if you leave on good terms soon-ish, you’re more likely to preserve the ability to come back there in the future if a job that’s better suited for you opens up … whereas if you stay for a couple of years with a mediocre performance, that may be harder to do (especially if your manager leaves and is replaced by someone with a different take on all this).
I suck at my job but am otherwise a delightful person was originally published by Alison Green on Ask a Manager.
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