Saturday 4 May 2013

Gotta love the transition phase


On Friday, in a meeting, it was announced that G will be leaving. He's still not received a contract to sign, but all the powers that be have been having pow-wows about The Move for weeks now behind closed doors, so they felt confident that an announcement to the internal team was appropriate.

On Tuesday he will fly THERE with his new boss to meet'n'greet the client, despite still not having a contract to sign.

G will be back THERE next week for one day.

Then in 3 weeks time, he'll be THERE Monday - Thursday (in other words, no longer working in the UK) until we move sometime over summer.

Maybe between now and then he'll receive the contract to sign.

This happens every move (this is our 4th) - the new team need you yesterday, while the old team don't want you to leave at all, so a compromise is made between the managers. It's organizational internal bargaining at it's best.  The upshot is always G spends more time in hotel rooms and on planes between offices, ramping one role up, while handing over the original role.  He's literally doing two jobs at once. MissM and I see him he's shattered as there's always flights and time zones to deal with.

The transition phase is always interesting. This one is particularly short, unlike previous moves, so we'll see which we prefer. When we moved from Sydney to Ireland G did several trips back'n'forth and they were awful - long haul international flights, different time zones, jet lag, office politics.We were novices when it came to the actual  move. Ireland to Japan was a wee bit easier but again, there were a couple of trips (one for a week, and one for nearly 3 weeks) before we moved as a family. And the packers in Ireland were awful which never helps a stressed out expat wife. Japan to the UK took 6 months between the offer being made and G visa being stamped. Think he did two or 3 trips in that 6 months, so not bad at all.

This is by far the quickest - less than 6 weeks from offer to first meet'n'greet.

An interesting twist to this move is G's parents will be with us in two weeks, til the beginning of August They've had the trip planned for months. They know he's been working mad hours so weren't expecting to see much of him during the week, tho surely one or two dinners wouldn't be too much for them to ask. Tho they won't be prepared for me organizing the move, doing goodbyes and being there for MissM who'll be wrapping up her time at school here.

We p-l-a-n to pack'n'move immediately after they leave so we can settle in for the last few weeks of summer holidays before school starts. Still gotta find ourselves a new home!

We've told MissM that G needs to go THERE this week and next, just for a day to help K out. We'll deal with 'Monday-Thursday' in a week or two. We figure with Grandma and Pa here, she won't mind as much. Being such a daddy's girl, G being away for work never goes down well.

So with G starting to work the transition phase, in-laws arriving, mid term holidays fast approaching, starting to organize things for the move; checking out schools; sourcing moving quotes and more the next few weeks will be FUN FUN FUN

Gotta love the transition phase (at least I know what to expect)

With friendship
x

No comments:

Post a Comment