My coworker is a construction supervisor he seems to have worked on a lot of projects and has a lot of experience. He offered to be a sort of mentor to me since I am very new to construction. I agreed and said that would be great.
My actual supervisor didn’t mention anything about me helping this guy but I do it because I am a team player and because it would be nice to build a good relationship and learn from people with experience.
The problem is that this guy is very old to the point where he struggles both mentally and physically to perform any task. He kind of reminds me of my father and it’s very sad to see him like this. So I try to help as much as I can. He unfortunately either knowingly or unknowingly started taking advantage of this. I told him three times now as tactfully as possible that I have some things I am working on and that I will handle whatever he wants when I am done but he doesn’t seem to want to back off. He has been given work on a project that won’t happen until a year from now while I am given work on a project that we are currently doing.
I need to be on top of my work so that it doesn’t reflect badly on me. So in terms of urgency my project should come as a priority. Yet this guy would basically hand off task after task to me that he is trying to do for his project the entire work day to the point where I can’t do my own work at all. Keep in mind all the tasks he gives me are essentially to help him understand the project better.
Things like overlaying drawings. Arranging them in certain ways or color coding certain things or just writing up something in a table. It never stops and they are so minor, tedious, and pointless that I get more upset because now I have to continue work from home in the short amount of time I have after a 12 hour work day because I am essentially this guy’s unofficial secretary.
Am I wrong for complaining to my boss about him?