Greatness of a small company

Working for a small company can be the best job you'll ever have!  I've worked for huge companies like Hershey and now I work for a small family owned company.  I loved both jobs for different reasons.  For now, I'll share why I love working for a small company.  I was hired as the office manager.  There were 2 other girls that worked for me in the office.  We accomplished all office tasks necessary for our company, hr, ar/ap, accounting functions, payroll, and customer service.  I was hired over the other top choice for my position because I had interest in getting out of the office and helping elsewhere in the plant.  I have learned how to run our store from cashier to shipping.  I have learned how to run the packing room (at least the basics of how we pack and how to manage the personnel that we have on any shift).  I have been given the basics of how to bake (could fill in for a few hours, but nothing like what the real bakers can do).  Most recently, I've really been working on my warehouse skills.  I've been picking orders for several months now, but officially on Friday drove a forklift onto a truck (a little scary to drop onto the back of a trailer).  Each day brings new challenges and new excitement.  I know personally each employee that works for our company.  I can stop and chat about their family or what happened over the weekend with any one of our people.  This is a huge advantage over a large corporation.  We all have to work together to get the job done.  In the end our team effort is to get the best pretzels out to our customers. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with working for a big company, but if you ever have the opportunity to work in a small company, take it and treat it like it's your own company.  You might really like it!

Demotion Dilemma

So here is my current dilemma, since I know you all want to hear about my every problem every week.  I work with a supervisor (let's call him Ed) who was an equal to me when I was hired.  About 2 years ago, he was demoted.  1/2 of his job was given to me and the other half was given to another supervisor who is also an equal with me.  This has gone on this way for about 2 years now.  Ed was very gracious and took his time to teach me how to do the part of his job that came to me.
Within the past 4 months, I have noticed that the problems Ed was having with his job (and why he was demoted) are happening to me as well.  As for the other supervisor who is doing the other half of Ed's job, same issues there.
Here's the dilemma.  How do I deal with the fact that Ed was demoted based on continued errors in his job, yet both the other supervisor and I have the same problems Ed had?  At this point, I only have myself to worry about in this situation; however, I know that the general manager will be on me soon about the other supervisor not doing his part of the job adequately.  In another year, this all becomes my problem.  I have no idea how to fix it.  This is my first problem.
The second part of the problem is dealing with the other employees who know and love Ed.  They (including me) saw his demotion process happen.  They know pieces of what really went on behind the scenes.  They know a little from Ed's point of view (although, Ed is a stellar employee and took the demotion as any of us would, yet really did no harm to the company through it all).  Now, I am being questioned by the other employees as to why Ed got demoted for these problems and nothing is happening to me or the other supervisor.
From an employee morale point of view, and a management point of view, do you all have any suggestions of how to deal with this appropriately?

Not My Department!

"Not my department" has become my new favorite phrase.  I don't like to be an employee who isn't willing to step up wherever I am needed so this is a bit frustrating for me.  I've always tried to be the person that anyone could come to with a problem or suggestion and I would do my best to relay it to the right person or take care of it myself if I could.  In recent months, my job has become complicated.  I have been going out of my way to make sure that I'm not stepping on anyone's toes.  I'm trying very hard to keep anyone informed when something happens in their department or if there is a problem the supervisor needs to be aware of.
In the last week, I have been talked to twice from the general manager that I'm overstepping my bounds.  I am trying to do things that are her responsibility.  When I asked her for specifics (since I'm trying so hard to do the opposite) she could not come up with anything.  Today, she came up with something that once confronted, I explained clearly how she had misunderstood.  I did nothing of what she thought.  I tried to take the criticism well, but I didn't do what she was acusing me of.  She did agree that she misunderstood what was said previously, but she's really pushing me to hide from her and slack off from my normal push to get the job done.

Paper Topic From My Perspective

You know that I can’t write a paper for class on a topic like Glass Ceiling without approaching it from a unique angle.  (Maybe you don’t know that because you don’t know me very well, but my friends and family would not be surprised at all by this declaration.)  I don’t buy into the pathetic viewpoint that women are oppressed and held back by men who won’t let them advance in jobs.  If I believed that then, I am not in control of my own future.  I believe that anyone can advance as far as they choose or are willing to strive for.  (Maybe this is a naïve thought, but I’m sticking with it.)  I am a cynic and do not like to live in a position of inferiority or needing someone else to cut me a break.  When I picked the topic of Glass Ceiling, I actually thought it might be too much of an obvious topic for a female to write on.  I definitely didn’t want it to be just another whiney paper about how women are treated unfairly or unequally.  I have been doing research now and have found a different way of approaching the topic that fits much more into my personality.  I’m going to write on the decisions that women make and actions women take that prevent them from reaching the higher executive positions.  This views the glass ceiling from a power perspective instead of a helpless perspective.  I am pleased to be able to take this approach.  It fits my personality.

Timing is Everything

My current dilemma is setting aside time to accomplish all the required tasks for my job and class.  I have had this problem since I started back in grad school.  Each semester I have to set aside time after my daughter goes to bed to work on homework for class.  The big issue that I have is that under normal circumstances, I used this very same time to work on work for my job.  I have an employer who has been great about letting me do work from home.  When I had my daughter 3 years ago, the company set up access for me to log into all my work stuff from home.  This allowed me to keep up with the basics of my job while I was out on maternity leave.  Since then, this feature has allowed me to work only 4 days a week in the office and do whatever work I can from home to be with my daughter 1 day a week (besides the weekends).  I make up the work by working after she goes to bed at night and during napntimes when she is home with me.  This is a huge benefit that my company has given to me.  It will unfortunately be coming to an end within a year, but I have been able to enjoy my baby girl very much with the time I have been given.
The reason that I go into all this is that I now have the difficulty of deciding whether to spend the precious time after Sami goes to bed doing school or work.  My theory is currently and has always been that since work pays my paycheck then that is priority.  Also, I'm voluntarily taking classes.  Work is not requiring or even requesting me to take classes.  With this thought in mind, I am having great difficulty accomplishing the work load that is required for some of the classes I've had to take.
I have a full time job and a family besides taking classes.  I wonder if anyone else has the same conflict internally whether to do your job well and miss out on homework opportunity or is something else lacking in order to accomplish both well?  Also, I'm wondering why it seems that some professors understand that their class is not the only task we have to deal with in our lives and others seem to think that their information is so important that even if a relative dies, we would have to skip the funeral to take care of class or homework.

The need for boundaries - RL Wolfe Case Study

I have been working diligently this Sunday afternoon on the RL Wolfe case study that is due this Wednesday.  In my first run through of reading it, I did not really see any major problems.  The plant is outperforming other similar plants.  They have lower call off rates and lower turn over rates than the other plants.  They are still remaining non-union as well, which is a good thing in my opinion.  All of these things seem to be working well, yet the managers are not satisfied.  I agree that once we reach a point of satisfaction then we start to decline, but how can I solve a problem if I don't really perceive a problem?
All of this aside, I only agree with self-directed teams to a point.  I believe that you should hire good employees that you can trust to do their jobs right and do them well.  Once you hire these employees you train them how to do their jobs and let them go.  Where I don't see self-directed teams working is in setting some policies or changing the policies in place.  I am all for my employees making suggestions how to fix or improve problems that exist.  I encourage that kind of thinking.  What I don't want is rule by the masses.  I am a capitalist not a communist.  I do not agree that there should be no higherarchy in management structure.  I do not think we are all equal or should all be treated as equals in every sense.  I think without guidelines and goals some people will excell and set their own guidelines and goals and be very successful.  I also think that some people will wander aimlessly through life.  We all have different personalities and different motivators.  Without boundaries, decisions are very difficutl to make.

Glass Ceiling Opinion

I am working on the research for my paper on the topic of the glass ceiling.  I did find the reading for class this week very interesting since it was on this subject.  My initial feelings on the subject are that I feel this issue is not a major issue any more.  Now, I speak from my own limited experience.  I've had 4 "big girl" jobs as I like to call them.  The first job I was a secretary for a department whose department head was a woman.  My second job was as a buyer with a female VP of the company.  My third job was almost totally male, but there was a female manager in our agency.  My current job has a female GM.  The smaller companies that I've worked for have been much more female friendly.  I didn't really get to see much out of my department in the larger companies that I worked for based on the job I held at the time.  I also feel that as a mom and wife, I am not looking to move into too much more stress in my jobs.  Maybe I will be looking for that in the future after my daughter is grown, but not for now.  I have all the stress I can handle.  I think perhaps the smaller companies are more willing to take on females in higher positions than larger companies.  All the normal reasons are used in my logic on that particular point.  I'm more looking at the issue of whether women are holding themselves back.  I have no problem admitting that I would rather not give up any more time with my family.  I don't feel that it makes me less of a woman or less of a leader to say that.  I feel it makes me a better manager since I need to get the tasks done and get home.  No dragging things out forever to make a decision.  Another issue that I have no problem with is riding the coattails of someone else to get the position that I want.  For instance one of my "kid jobs" was for a huge corporation.  I started at the very very bottom.  After 6 years I'd moved up in the part time positions to where I'd go full time to keep working there.  They were not female friendly, however, if I had a male friend in management that was on the rise and liked me, he would have pushed to take me with him.  I'd always have to stay behind him on the corporate ladder, but I'm ok with that.  I know others will disagree with me on this, but I think it opens up an interesting debate.

Balance of family, work and school

The thoughts on my mind tonight are revolving around finding a nice balance between family, work and school.  I'm always amazed at the amount of time that can be taken up by any one thing that leaves no time for anything else.  My job seems to be in crisis mode about half of the time.  We manufacturer so there are always issues with breakdowns or call offs or ingredients that have to be dealt with before I can go home for the day.  If there is an overwhelming amount of problems, then the stress of work comes home with me for sure.  Mentally I bring it home and sometimes I bring actual work home that needs to be finished.  I very much enjoy my job and my husband works a job with long hours too.
Once I get home, there's all the normal stuff like making dinner and cleaning up from dinner.  Then I get to play with my daughter for a little while before she goes to bed.  I enjoy this time and struggle with it as well.  With stress from work hanging in my mind, I have found that my patience with my 3 year old is very limited.  I don't enjoy playing the same thing over and over again, but I know this is what she enjoys and needs for her development right now.
Add to all this, school work.  If it was just going to class, that would not be too bad.  One night a week out at class while my daughter and husband get to bond is not a bad thing.  The tough decisions come into play when my daughter goes to bed at night.  This is the brief amount of time that I have to accomplish whatever I need to get done.  This is sometimes work, sometimes school work and sometimes taking care of my home.
How does all this stay in balance?  My husband is very understanding and knows that this stress is temporary.  It lasts for a semester then there is relief for a few weeks before it begins again.  Do I spend my small amount of time on things for work or school?  Do either of these items cut into my time with my daughter?  I pretty much hold that time for her since I work all day, but how do I make this time relaxing and not stressful?  Many questions to answer as a working mother and wife.