This is rather long. I'm trying to be thorough, but I hope its not too long.
I am currently employed at a very large, American corporation. I have generally had a good attitude during my tenure here, especially as they gave me a start on my career (I have no college degree, and am self taught, and they trusted me enough to get started). However, my company is going through a massive reorg, and the work for the team where I have been happily working for years is being physically relocated. Due to life circumstances, I was not willing to move.
Trying to avoid being randomly assigned, I jumped ship early to another team with a manager I previously worked for. He assured me that his team was not moving as a part of the reorg, and he had some pretty interesting work for me (not the usual work of his team) that intrigued me. Well, shortly after switching teams, he discovered that both his team's work and he himself are moving. So, the work he had planned for me was no longer an option, as it would require probably at least 9 months to accomplish... so for the last several months, I've been working on refactoring the codebase of a test automation team. Shortly after finding that this new team was also moving and my project would not exist, another manager (who I will call Bob), who was previously my coworker, expressed interest in me joining his team when the reorg was realized. I also wanted to work there, as the work was relevant and challenging, and we (thought we) talked to the necessary people to make it happen.
Partially as a result of being on a test automation team at the time the reorg movement triggered, and partly due to either negligence (not mine) or politics, I was assigned blindly to another test automation team. I was shocked, because of said previously mentioned agreement with Bob; it seemed to me that if a manager wanted someone, and that employee also wanted to work for that manager, that would be a match they would accept because it was one less placement to work out, and everyone would be happy. But no.
I scheduled a meeting with my future manager, and in that meeting he expressed concerns that he had been deceived -- he interpreted an email recommending my general capacity to be an expression of my expertise in test automation (which I'd been doing for less than 2 months by this time). He also had never heard of any such arrangement with Bob. I tried to express that I didn't feel like I would be a good fit, without being offensive. A couple days later, Bob sent him an email, expressing concern that I might "look for other opportunities" if the work wasn't a good fit, and that maybe they could talk further. (He did this with my permission). Short version, it was brushed off, with a comment like "time will tell whether its a poor fit."
I have looked specifically at the work of my assigned future team, and it is shockingly bad. I have no desire to work on this team, as I want to continue to grow and challenge myself, so "fixing their problems" is not a good fit for me. I already have several final interviews done, with the possibility of multiple offers (outside my current company).
How can I phrase my request to my future manager that his team's work is unacceptable to me, that I have no desire to be the repairman for his team, and that I feel mistreated and will leave the company if I'm not allowed to go to Bob's team? If he does not decide to listen, however, I don't want to burn my bridges here -- I may want to come back in the future. This is not (necessarily) his fault, but he is the one with the power to let me move.
