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Hi Linda! I am so sorry that you have to deal with that! It sounds like the lines of communication are not all that clear. You don't want to be caught between your new manager and your new VP, of course. I'd go to your manager right away, early in the day tomorrow or the first chance you get to talk with him or her, and say, "Oh, Roberta, I need to fill you in -- Stan called me into his office yesterday and put me to work on this payroll project. Do you want the details, or am I bothering you? I just want to keep you in the loop."

Your boss will be HUGELY GRATEFUL to you for keeping him or her in the mix. It is a horrible thing for a boss (especially if she or she doesn't have a ton of management experience) to get a new hire and have that team member effectively plucked away from him or her by the bigger boss. It's awful for everyone -- the new hire who's caught in the middle, and the supervisor who feels like "What am I, chopped liver?"

So you'll be doing something really important by filling your boss in with as much or as little information as he or she needs to feel okay and plugged in with respect to this project. A good rule of thumb is "the more communication at work, the better." If your boss and the VP already have a very casual everybody-manages-everybody thing worked out, your manager may say "Oh that's okay, do whatever Stan tells you to, it's all good" then you can relax and not worry that maybe you're stepping into a political landmine situation.

Write back and let us know how it goes! Congratulations on the new job, by the way!

Best

Liz

My pleasure Linda! Enjoy your weekend -- Liz