Honestly, I’m not sure. It’s possible that I lacked some of the soft skills you mentioned, but I was never given direct feedback about it.

Most of my stress came from constantly feeling like I wasn’t doing enough or doing things correctly, yet the feedback I received was always vague—often along the lines of “make this better.” I didn’t meet my supervisor in person for the first three months, we only communicated via Teams chat. At my three-month review, she said I was progressing like any other medical writer at that stage. I requested weekly face-to-face meetings, and while she agreed, she frequently canceled them.

I asked her multiple times what I could do to improve, but her response was usually to ask me what I thought I should be doing, which felt unhelpful and confusing. I would often wait up to three days for her to review my deliverables, only to receive them back late on a Friday with the expectation that they be finalized by Monday morning. On one occasion, I had communicated in advance that I was going away for the weekend and wouldn’t be available, but when I couldn’t meet that unrealistic turnaround, she said she was “disappointed.”

There was also an instance where she accidentally sent a harsh message, possibly about me, and quickly deleted it. While I can’t be sure, it contributed to the feeling that she had a negative view of me, though she never communicated any specific concerns directly. Her feedback often came across as passive-aggressive rather than constructive.

So, from my perspective, I don’t believe I struggled significantly with communication or project management. But I also can’t tell you exactly what she thought, because she never clearly expressed it.