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I'm in a team that is comprised of 4 backenders, 2 designers and 1 frontend (me), and my teamleader. Most of the work i do is maintenance, mostly related to bugs from code that was written by other people and everytime a major project needs frontend, i'm assigned with all of the work, and i start to pile up tasks.

It happens that, when i have to work on new projects, they just sort of hit my desk, and i have to manage to do all of it alone. Whenever i have a question, i really don't know who to ask, because my teammates don't even bother to help me, or complain when i ask for their help, saying that "it's frontend". My teamleader is (of all of my teammates) the one that is most involved with the frontend, and he keeps forgetting about me, even skipping my 1-1s, and has most of his time occupied by meetings.

This is driving me crazy, because it seems that my work is not valued (my teamleader keeps forgetting about me on 1-1s, and i just can't seem to talk to him), and nobody really cares about what i'm doing (. I don't want to come across as a whiner on the workplace, but i't seems that i have no choice, because if i don't ask for their attention, i keep hitting obstacles that i don't understand and end up getting frustrated because i'm just afraid to ask them for help.

How can i not feel frustrated/neglected/forgotten about this?

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  • I'm not sure if we can tell you whether or not you should feel frustrated - that's a pretty open ended, opinionated question. You may want to take a look at the [workplace.stackexchange.com/help](help center) to get an idea of what's considered on topic here, and how you may be able to edit your question to make it more answerable within the typical question and answer format here.
    – dwizum
    Commented Mar 12, 2020 at 18:21

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Ensure your immediate superior / manager (not the teamleader) knows about your workload when you are assigned all these projects to do alone. If you are missing deadlines, explain that you are receiving no support from team members and are largely being left to manage alone.

Have you tried turning to the employee(s) who were responsible for your on-boarding? Are they the same employees who refuse to help you now?

Also, have you considered emailing your teammates for help instead of asking them directly? Bear in mind that programmers "in the zone" hate interruptions; email may be a safer channel for requesting help.

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  • Good advice but what if no one answers his emails?
    – reg
    Commented Mar 13, 2020 at 16:11
  • @reg it's still a good step to take, even if no one answers. It will help the OP to prove that they tried to reach out to coworkers for help, and it will document that they are overworked if anyone wants to accuse OP of just being lazy.
    – NegativeFriction
    Commented Mar 13, 2020 at 18:35
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    @NegativeFriction Agreed! I should have stated this in my original answer. My intention was for the OP to at least have a "paper trail" to show that they have tried to get help from the team. If the OP is stalled on a task and no-one helps, at least the OP can verify this when management asks questions.
    – Alex Barber
    Commented Mar 13, 2020 at 20:28
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Radical transparency! Make it known what you're working on and who you're waiting for.

About overwork: maintain a list of tasks you have on your plate in priority order. Four hours before your scheduled 1:1 meetings with your team leader, email them the list. Ask for them to review it and tell you if you need to change priorities.

Then, when somebody asks for something, respond with your list of priorities and say it's been reviewed by the team leader.

As far as being ignored, it's unfortunately common for people who work solo in their discipline, like you. You should ask for information / help / advice in writing, and you should put "blocked waiting for Jane's input" or other such things on your priority list.

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