To the principal's office?

I'm fairly certain it's schools' fault that I'm conditioned to think I did something wrong whenever someone senior tells me they want to talk to me. Or maybe it happened at work, because, let's face it, if you are getting the job done, do they ever come out of no where and say, let's talk!

It happened today. One of the people on the leadership team that I work with asked if I could go to his office. What did I do, or, knowing this particularly leader, what was he about to do that would make my life difficult.

Turns out, there is a promotional opportunity he thought I should consider. This is the second time it's become available. The first time I declined it and someone else stepped in, but now they have moved on and it's up again, and the powers that be think I know my stuff. They aren't wrong, I do know stuff.

So I didn't get in trouble, and people are really trying to do nice things for me. I mean, the job would be eliminated in 18 months, and the job I'm in now, might not be. Do I chance the promotion for something secure? Do I go for immediate satisfaction with increased risk, or lower risk with less satisfaction? I'm usually pretty cautious at weighing the odds and making the right choice, but I don't know here.

But isn't it nice they thought of me? And for an extra added ego boost, the boss man messaged me again today to tell me that in the staff meeting people had great things to say about me and that I was in the top 5% in the company for using our new rewards program. Pretty stinking amazing since I am also one of the most critical bosses with the highest standard around, or at least that's what the team says.

Did I do something?

An hour before I left work today, my boss instant messages me, "Everything Ok?"

As a parent, and people manager, I know that often I ask questions I already know the answer to, and so does my boss.

Flashing through my head in the seconds before I respond with a resounding "Yup!" I am thinking, did I do something that got escalated to my boss? I said no to his boss yesterday, do they think I'm broken because I don't want to be treated "like a girl"? Did my staff complain about me? What's his angle?

He then proceeded to give me a pep talk on being positive and engaging, because as he puts it, "it's my thing."

He says that there is no cause for this pep talk, nothing triggered it. So it was either completely random and out of left field, or he was lying to me. Regardless, I'm now left pondering WTF.

I have coworkers that call me Pollyanna and Mrs. Smiley. I have had a huge focus on appreciation and recognition within my team, and outside of it, and then he throws this at my feet?

Um, ok.

I suppose context to this situation is 6 months ago we were told that our jobs would be eliminated in 2 years, except my role and my teams role is kind of up in the air as far as how much we are impacted, which means we are the last men and women standing and have to keep being productive and entertaining until the last person gets kicked out the door.  But I just saw the dude on Friday and he is traveling today and generally doesn't message me when he's traveling unless he needs something.

Ugh, I must have done something. I hate reading between the lines, it's so much easier when they just spell it out for you. Life of a cubicle dweller I suppose.