I notified my work months ago about a non-refundable family trip in August, and now they're trying to guilt-trip me into canceling it because of their poor planning.
I feel like I'm going crazy over this work situation and need to know if I'm overreacting.
I work in operations at a specialized global logistics company. I'm one of the few people who really understands the job, and I carry a lot of extra work because we're always running on a skeleton crew. Management loves to say things like 'we're a well-oiled machine,' but honestly, I feel like they mean we're just barely getting by.
My manager is also taking a vacation this summer, and we were talking about our plans when we discovered our vacations overlap. Her first reaction was to tell me I had to change my travel dates. I explained that I couldn't; everything was booked and non-refundable. I'm just a cog in the machine, so I never thought to check my manager's personal calendar. That's not part of my job. She then threatened to deny my leave and told me if I went anyway, she'd fire me.
Just great.
So I went to *her* manager to be proactive and try to find a solution. I presented him with a full coverage plan, which included him sitting at my desk for two hours each day to handle customer inquiries and urgent requests. I even offered to log in online for an hour or two each day (and get paid for it) to help. He seemed agreeable and said he would present it to upper management.
A few days later, he got back to me. The decision? The senior managers told him he was 'too valuable and his salary too high' to waste his time covering for someone in operations. Instead, their brilliant idea was to offer me $500 to cover the costs of rescheduling my entire vacation. I did the math, and the cancellation and rebooking fees for flights, hotels, a rental car, and pre-booked excursions for five people would easily exceed several thousand dollars. This trip is coordinated with my husband's work schedule, his three kids, their entire summer schedule of camps, shared custody agreements, and their mom's travel plans.
They asked me to cancel and find another time. I gave them a firm 'no.' The kids are at a perfect age for international travel, we're all incredibly excited, and there's no way I'm going to be the one to tell them it's all canceled because my job can't get its act together. Seriously?
What's driving me crazy is this: I'm just an employee. Why does my being away for 8 workdays cause a complete meltdown? I gave notice in January for a trip in August. There are a million ways to solve this. They could bring someone over from another department for a few days, or use a temp. I even offered to help remotely.
Shouldn't this be a huge red flag to management about how dangerously understaffed we are, to the point that two people being absent at the same time brings everything to a halt?
This has never happened to me in all my years of working. I always give notice for my vacations very early, and the response is always 'Thanks for letting us know!'
Did I do something wrong? Is there something I'm not seeing? Any advice would be very helpful.