Glass Breakers: I’m a Remote Project Manager

Welcome to our first installation of our Glass Breakers Series! We are so excited to share the week in the lives of female professionals around the world.

For us, sharing these stories allow us to shed light on what it is we actually do in our jobs and businesses. But also sharing in transparency about what we make, and how we balance our work and personal lives.

For our first installation, we’re following a Project Manager who works fully remotely from Austin, Texas.

Job: Project Manager

Industry: Healthcare

Age: 38

Marital Status: Single

Remote/Hybrid/In-Person: Remote

Location: Austin, Texas

Years in Job: 6 Months

Salary: $110k

Monday

I start my days pretty much the same, I wake up around 7am, respond to messages from bed and snuggle with my dog before we start our morning routine.

My first meeting starts at 9AM Central time so I eat breakfast, check my meeting schedule for the week and work on some plans for what I need to get done. I’ve been trying to use different project management tools to stay organized, right now I’m using Clickup - I like it because it has lists, boards and the ability to have docs, keeps my notes organized for meetings. Once my meeting starts we run through the status on my portion of the project with my consultants. We’ve been looping in various stakeholders from other teams so they know what we’re building and get their feedback. We’re in what we call the “design” phase, we’re going through every screen, field and function to make sure we build the platform to the specifications for the teams using the system. My organization is currently transitioning to a new cloud base ERP (Enterprise Resource Platform) for three different departments. It’s a massive, three to four year project with project managers covering every unique module in the system.

There are a lot of times where I feel like my job is email and meetings - and sending emails to schedule meetings. But I love what I do. My last job was incredibly toxic and I found myself in a very bad mental place. It took me a solid 5 months to get back to feeling mentally healthy. I grab a quick snack because I won’t have time to eat lunch until after my next meeting. My meetings are often back to back so I barely have time to go to the bathroom, so I try to have on hand snacks that are easy to eat off camera.

My next meeting is pretty quick - it’s our opportunity to vent our frustrations about things happening with the project. We’re in a crucial stage where everything is converging all at once and we’re all feeling a bit rushed.

Because of the nature of my module, I’m included in everyone’s meetings because my module interacts with every team. So it’s important for me to know how to use the system. So for this meeting I’m listening in on the review of the RAID log. A RAID log is a log of items that are classified either as a Risk, Action, Issue or Decision. We track all of these items and the deadlines to close them out.

I make it through my next couple of meetings and I have to take off a bit early because I have my first occupational therapy appointment because I broke my hand on NYE. I make sure my car is charged, gather my things and head on over. I run a few errands after my appointment for the girls night I’m hosting to watch Love Is Blind.

Tuesday

I start my day the same way, except today I won’t shower until mid day like I normally do…so I shower before my meetings start. My first three meetings are back to back, once those are done I grab a late breakfast then go into my next meeting. We gather as a team to review everyone’s status updates, which is always nice because we’re able to hear how other people are struggling with similar obstacles.

I have another quick break before my next super long meeting. It’s 4 hours and thank goodness for this one I don’t need to turn on my camera. Usually I do, but when they are 4-6 hours we don’t need to. I throw in a load of laundry and grab something to eat while there’s a lull in the meeting. The meeting, thankfully, ends early which is somewhat normal due to lack of preparedness by this particular team - which we have complained about. It’s a hot mess.

I was supposed to get sushi tonight with a guy from Bumble, but didn’t hear from him at all to confirm even though he made the plan. It was pretty ironic considering he had a whole speech about connecting with people. I shoot him a message telling him I didn’t hear from him and that I made other plans so good luck. I really think its important to call out disrespect, even a quick message of hey I’m not going to make it is all that’s required at a minimum.

I dig around the freezer to make dinner, I recently lost 40lbs (thanks Semiglutide!) and I just came off the shot so it’s been interesting. I’ve gained about 5lbs back and have noticed a difference in my appetite. So I make something quick and head upstairs to watch a movie.

Wednesday

Today’s another long day of meetings, so I’m up and showered before my first meetings. I’m trying to anticipate the longer day today with a full spread of snacks and drinks.

I have 4 meetings this morning, to review requirements and policies and try to keep track of all the needs by the various teams. I finally get a break to go to the bathroom and grab some more water before my next 4 hour meeting starts.

My 4 hour meeting starts and while I should be working on other stuff, I’m listening this time - so I decide to put on some press on nails while I’m paying attention to the meeting. I made a complete mess of myself…so much glue everywhere.

Finally done for the day and I tidy up the house before my friends come over for Love is Blind! I’ve been on a mission to make some new friends in my neighborhood. It’s been super fun making new single girlfriends.

Thursday

I stayed up pretty late with the girls and texting the new guy I’m talking to. I’m actively trying to put myself out there to date because now that I’m in a lot less stressful job, I feel more like myself and excited for love. Today is the first day this week that I didn’t have extensive meetings all day. So I’m actually able to work on presentations and knock off items off our RAID list.

I’m still pretty new to the organization, and it’s a very old healthcare system - so there are tons of folks with a lot of historical knowledge. Being new, I just don’t know all the details. So I actually try get folks who know way more than I do on calls so I can learn more.

I have a nice break, so I hop in the shower before my next meeting. I schedule periodic meetings with one of our leaders on our Customer Experience team. I’m learning a ton from him and sometimes I think I tooko the wrong career path! CX is really interesting and is applicable to HR. We’re both fairly new, have similar ideas and come from different backgrounds outside of healthcare. Sometimes we’re like what the heck…why are we doing it this way.

One more big meeting of the day, we’re presenting a pretty big change in process for the team I’m working with and we’re hoping it will go over well.

The rest of my afternoon, I continue to work on my presentations and RAID log items. I’ve got my audio book on in the background (listening to the Crescent City Series by Sarah J Maas and I’m hooked). Once I sign off, I go meet up with my friend to work on some marketing items we’re working through for the new quarter. When I finally get home, I throw on pajamas and watch a movie in bed.

Friday

My first meetings of the day start at 8am. The majority of my team is in the midwest so my meetings tend to start early. My second meeting of the day is to meet with the software company we’re transitioning to, to review the functionality gaps and see what they’re going to do to fix them. It was less than productive, they’re trying to be a little sneaky about things that are basic functions and the product manager we met with didn’t even know about the software like she should have. So we have multiple follow ups with different subject matter experts because she couldn’t answer 90% of our questions. It was super frustrating.

I have a decent break so I hope in the shower and grab breakfast, before I go into my next meeting. We’re continuing to review needs and requirements. Everytime I get into a meeting reviewing the current system uses and requirements for the future system, I learn of another group I need to reach out to. My list is getting longer and longer of different groups using my module.

I wrap up early today, still working through those logs and presentations, while summarizing my notes from all the meetings over the week so I’m ready for next week.

I have to bring my dog to the groomers, so I go drop her off and head back home to clean up. I have another neighborhood get together tonight so I’m excited to hang with new friends.

I pick up the dog, get changed and ready to go over to my neighbor’s house. We’re having a wine night…and boy did we drink wine. But it’s so fun to have girls in the neighborhood who enjoy hanging out, are single and all homeowners. There are more of us than single men in our neighborhood.

Overall, it was a good week. I’m so much happier with my new job and even though I never thought I’d like working remotely, I actually love it. I have to be more deliberate about being social which is totally ok and has been working well for me.

Want to participate in our Glass Breakers Series? Email us at GlassBreakers@glassceilingsinc.com for more details. Or visit our Write for Us page.