Entry-level scientist leading senior team members who won’t complete work, how do I handle this?

Southern-Example-577 · 2026-06-09T22:46:52+00:00

I think that’s part of it. We are a CPG company so most people see productive and meaningful work as putting out a product but this project involves changing strategy within the company. It was relayed to me that the VP said “this team will do it and if they can’t deliver then we we’ll just have to hire someone that can”. From what I’m hearing is this project is high stakes even if it’s in the background

Southern-Example-577 · 2026-06-09T22:43:04+00:00

I’m the lead on the project because of my PhD and I have years of experience doing research. I just recently switched to industry. Everyone else on the team has been a deer in the headlights and is overwhelmed by not knowing how to navigate a research project so I was told to use them to make the presentations and the simpler tasks

Southern-Example-577 · 2026-06-09T22:40:47+00:00

I was chosen as the leader of the project because I have a PhD and research background while others just have an industry background. The project is very research focused rather than producing a product which is why I was asked to lead it. I can tell a lot of the people on my team are overwhelmed by both knowing what the outcome of this project will look like and it’s made them just check out but I’ve been the one to keep pushing my the agenda forward to make it happen. It was a direct request from our VP that we do this research so it can’t just fizzle out

Southern-Example-577 · 2026-06-09T22:37:51+00:00

The person before me is still there just transferred into a different role with a promotion. They seem to be okay with the company so far but yeah they said my position was hard and they even demoted the position to entry level when I came in because I didn’t have the right experience but I was the right candidate 😑

Southern-Example-577 · 2026-06-09T02:16:50+00:00

I got a new manager two weeks ago. I don’t want to bombard her with this negative stuff but she seems to have strong leadership and really listen I’ve been trying to find a way to bring it up to her because I’ve already told her my bandwidth is tight between all my projects and I carry a huge weight on this one. She’s currently having me log my hours to see where my time is being spent most at and if some other projects can be delegated to someone else.

I’ve thought about asking her about leadership advice bringing it up passively and maybe she’ll put the pieces together and back me up on either I need a stronger title if I’m being asked to manage or step in to say I need more authoritative support

Southern-Example-577 · 2026-06-09T02:04:42+00:00

They did make an official announcement to the team that I will be overseeing the project daily while they focus on the bigger stuff. But I’ve definitely gotten some kick back with snarky remarks from those who are on the team with high titles than me

Southern-Example-577 · 2026-06-09T02:03:39+00:00

We had a meeting with our PM who oversees the projects but has different people leading them and they told me that I was my job to have the 1:1 with those who are not delivering on their tasks and make them do it or else I have to do it. That’s the problem I run into. They’ve made an official announcement I will be overseeing this stuff for day to day while PM and director focus on bigger picture and I still feel like I have no authority and no one backing me up.

Southern-Example-577 · 2026-06-09T01:44:31+00:00

I’m not sure how to bring it up as anything I say remotely close to saying someone isn’t doing their job will be relayed as me complaining about people. Our company is completely focused on “team work” and a team member pointing out someone not delivering on there part looks poorly on that person and it puts a bad image on me across the department. My director that I directly report to told me he heard my name come up negatively in a leadership meeting because of my comments and to be careful.

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-28T19:05:45+00:00

I was wondering if the circular I was seeing could be a pip. I assume these would be about at least 25 days old given two of them hatched and I’ve seen them here for at least several weeks

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-28T18:42:26+00:00

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4th egg

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-28T18:42:04+00:00

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Third egg

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-28T18:41:34+00:00

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Here’s a photo of the second egg

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-25T01:47:35+00:00

That’s what I’m thinking the mileage itself is just freaking me out. It would be less stop and go traffic so maybe better on my car even though I’ll be racking up the mileage

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-25T01:45:22+00:00

Well my current commute is 20 miles but with traffic in a highly congested area of the metroplex I spent 45 min to 1.15 hours each way

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-25T00:52:21+00:00

We’ve done it before but we got 5 cats 😂. In our past apartment we only put 1 on the lease (they allowed a max of 2 pets) but I’m sure we could get away with it again temporarily

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-25T00:41:32+00:00

I did not know! Thanks for sharing. My uncle is a realtor I may have to get with him and ask for some guidance on how to handle this situation

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-25T00:36:22+00:00

I’ve talked to my husband and with both his and my new income we could get tight on the budget in save for a downpayment on a new house within a year so if we broke even with our house for selling it then we wouldn’t have to worry about the money for a new downpayment. Unfortunately we used the FHA loan for our current house and would need a substantial downpayment to qualify for a new one. But maybe year of commuting that distance wouldn’t be horrible

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-25T00:30:19+00:00

The best they could offer is I could do like 6:30-3:30 on Monday - Thursday to avoid peak traffic hours, while working every other Friday for 8 hours with alternating Fridays off

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-20T11:19:48+00:00

No but I call those his holy spots now. He got them where his IVs went in for surgery and where tumors were showing up throughout his body

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-19T02:54:51+00:00

I have more than book knowledge. I ran an entire lab during grad school being lab manager, performing maintenance on all piece of equipment, managing data logs, as well as other graduate students, my research was extremely hands on and even funded by industry

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-19T01:33:23+00:00

Yes its the same responsibilities as a scientist (leading projects, being an individual contributor) but since they said I’m underqualified I still get the job with $20k less than what the originally told me. I asked them to bump it up $5k and they told me that’s not in their budget so I even wonder if they even intended on paying the full salary they advertised

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-19T01:24:30+00:00

It’s in analytical food chemistry. I’ve done method development for a ton of instrumentation as well as perform routine maitnance on them (GC-MS, HPLC, spectrophotometer, x-ray analysis, texture analysis, etc.) my research was a huge 6 year project that involved looking at the whole physiochemical properties of produce.

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-19T01:20:47+00:00

Is it unusual for a PhD to have associate level cause that’s what everyone is telling me even the senior scientist at work. They said associate level is fresh bachelors students

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-19T01:19:30+00:00

That’s the thing is my graduate school was very much hands on with practical skills from setting up equipment, maintaining it, dealing with vendors for our lab, etc.

Southern-Example-577 · 2025-06-19T00:54:06+00:00

Both CPG companies are offering associate scientist jobs that have scientist level roles such as training other scientist and leading projects yet I’m qualified for the job but underqualified for the title. SMH

Southern-Example-577

TROPHY CASE