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We got some news at our team meeting yesterday, namely that "P3" is no longer going to be called "P3," because her title is no longer "Director of Pricing, Promotions and Project Management." Now it's Director of—let's see if I get this right—the Merchandising Enablement Team, I think? I know the word "Enablement" was used and the acronym spells out "MET." So we've gone from "P3" to "The MET," and Gabby was joking that our quarterly social outings can now be called "MET Galas."
The title was not the only thing to change, though. The Category Management Team is now getting folded into our team. Kevin, who does category management for Grocery; and Mackenzie, who does category management for Health and Body Care (HBC), will still be managed by the Senior Category Manager—the position that Beth is leaving soon—but the Senior Category Manager will now be one of Gabby's direct reports. So Gabby now has five direct reports rather than four, but the team is growing from five to eight. And she'll have much more direct involvement in the hiring of a new Senior Category Manager.
We already have our summer social outing scheduled for August, soon after I return from Amsterdam, to celebrate my 24th anniversary at PCC. Now she's going to make reservations for eight rather than five. Or maybe seven; I think Beth may have already moved and is working remotely in her final weeks working technically as a consultant. I can't remember for sure.
Gabby started the meeting with this news, instread of the usual ice breaker exercise. She then held space for any thoughts or questions, and I did have one: I wanted to know how
she felt about this. I said I know it's just me, but I would consider this a lot. She's apparently all about it, though, and has been open about
wanting Category Management to fold into her team for a couple of years. Honestly I should have known better than to even ask. Gabby has long had pretty grand ambitions here. And I say that with respect; she's been a transformative presence here and it's been indisputably a net positive.
Brandy is also getting a new title, I nearly forgot to mention. She was previously "Merchandising Manager," which she said she didn't quite know what that means (I get it), but is now a Program Manager. This does mean that among those of us on the formerly-P3 team, only one of us still has gotten neither a title change nor a promotion. I won't say who, but I will say it's been an open point of resentment on this person's part, and I never know exactly what to think (or particularly to say) about that. I don't manage this person, which would by definition mean there are certain insights I am lacking.
(And thank god, too: I don't want to be managing
anybody. I mentioned to Shobhit yesterday how it kind of felt like Gabby came along, saw what I was doing and kind of wondered: why is this person pointlessly languishing? To me, it was because I very consciously and deliberately had no ambitions; I was good and comfortable where I was. But then Gabby pulled off the hat trick of finding a way to give me a promotion without it bringing any of the thigs I feared, such as significant added stress, or being given direct reports to manage, or becoming a victim of the "Peter Principle," wherein people get promoted to the point of incompetence. I had already taken on a lot of new responsibility since Gabby came along and so she couched it as kind of a retroactive acknowledgment of that. That said, the more Gabby's ambitions move on, the closer we'll get to her no longer being
my manager. Shobhit suggested she could bring me along with her, but I don't see how that would really work, unless I somehow wound up on the Leadership Team or becoming a kind of Personal Assitant, and I don't see anything like that ever happening. Shobhit even looked
way ahead and suggested that after I retire I could wind up on the PCC Board of Trustees, like Elin did, but I have a hard time envisioning that either. Besides, when I retire I'm going to want to live out my twilight years having fun, not working.)
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For some reason I'm having a hard time remembering what I did last night. I did make chai again. Shobhit made more puris to have with his leftover beans and rice. He watched some MS Now programs, since he signed up for a free trial of Apple TV in ordedr to be able to watch the last of the World Cup games—the final one of which is this Sunday, and I will actually be watching. They're having a halftime show and Madonna is one of the performers, along with Justin Bieber, Shakira, and some others.
Oh! I know what it was. We spent a lot of time working on booking and planning for our upcoming travels, particularly the planned day trip from Amsterdam to Rotterdam on July 30. They sell a "Rotterdam City Card" that offers 25% off a bunch of attractions, many of which we already planned to do. The problem is that no matter how many times we tried, or which credit card we used, the Rotterdam City Cards we attempted to purchase online failed on the purchase page every time. I even emailed them and got a response this morning, and they don't know what the problem is.
I was more concerned about booking a Harbour Tour in advance, but it looks like we may be safe just buying the City Card in person at Rotterdam Centraal Station and then buying same-day tickets for the Harbour Tour at that time. I otherwise have a whole walking itinerary planned out, basically a five-mile circle with seven stops.
I did also book our visit to the Royal Palace of Amsterdam. That and the Van Gogh Museum are on the first full day we're there, the day after we arrive at the airport. God knows how jet lagged we'll be or how long that will last.
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I just finished my biweekly Zoom lunch with Karen. We talked about a lot of things, including both her upcoming trip to visit family in Massachusetts and my upcoming trip to Amsterdam. I mentioned two logistical things we should get out of the way, the first of which was to cancel our Zoom lunch on July 31—when, it turns out, she'll be in Massachusetts anyway. The other thing was that she had told me a while back that she had outlet adapters for The Netherlands that she could loan me, so now she's going to find them and then leave them outside her house where we can come and pick them up at our leisure. I'll be thrilled not to have to buy new adapters ourselves.
I don't remember how this came up, but I got a bit of family history from her about her brother, who is eight years younger than her and who is gay. Their family was never religious at all so, even though apparently Eric took a long time to finally come out—like, "well out of college," Karen said—because he still had all the fears about how it might change things, their family history with gay family members was wildly different (and far more accepting) than mine. Karen noted she has several gay people in her extended family as well; I think she named off maybe three others. There's no one else in even my extended family who is gay, or at least not out.
Anyway I need to post this and get some work done!
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[posted 1:12pm]
