u/Its_fine_for_now

I’m not sure if this is a unique situation or not.

Before now I worked as a consultant in a very specific thought leadership field. I worked with many customers for this (basically an internal management methodology) and one of the customers liked me so much, they hired me to run their program full time.

Fast forward, I’ve worked for this company for 3 years. I’ve been asked by a vendor of my current company to participate in an interview, discussing my experiences holistically and how other subject matter experts can use my ideas. This vendor is the provider of the software we use to manage said program I manage.

This interview would be a pretty cool thing to have under my belt, just due to the extent the interview will cover my specialty (which is pretty niche). However, my current company has denied me this opportunity, because (in their opinion) it looks too much like my company is promoting the vendor itself, regardless of the actual content material.

While I understand my company’s concern, the vendor has gone so far as to offer that my title / place of employment would be anonymized in the article (referred to simply as a “global company”). Of course, a bit of slutheing on my LinkedIn would reveal which “global company”, but again the subject matter of the interview has almost nothing to do with the company I currently work for, and everything to do with the programs I build (and have built since before becoming an FTE for this org).

What do I do? Does my company really have the power to stop me from doing this type of interview, when it has no direct correlation with the company itself?

Also just to add a few last bullets that might be important:
- this methodology I specialize in is not industry specific; all companies can benefit from it so it’s not like this is some industry formula my company has figured out.
- the interview has no mention of the software, anywhere. While the content is being hosted by the vendor, the information they are getting from me is purely methodology & programmatic

Currently laying in bed with an ice pack on my tailbone and ankle.

My friend was opening the gate out of the round pen as I was riding out, and my foot got caught on the side (horse was waaay too close, I should’ve corrected), so I lost my stirrup and got pulled backward, knocking me off center.

Bless my horse, I think he did the best he could. He stopped, we are in between the round pen and the open field, I’m trying to adjust back into center, and my nervous friend was yelling for the horse to calm down (she’s not a horse person).

Whether I kicked him by accident, my friend yelling just set him off, or just act of god, he bolted through the round pen, causing me to hit my head on the top bar (it’s low; I always have to bend down to get under it anyway - thankfully I was wearing a helmet!!!!) and officially lose all balance.

Fell to the side, landing in a sweet spot between my tailbone and hip. Ouch. But definitely could’ve been worse - THANK YOU HELMET! I definitely would’ve concussed my head from hitting the bar.

I don’t blame my horse at all. There are several things that we both need to improve on from that, but he’s already a nervous lil dude and for whatever reason, that all was too much today.

I am sore, I am disappointed that I couldn’t hang on, but as soon as I’m feeling better I want to get back on, and just start slow in the round pen.

In the meantime, if anyone wants to tell me about their recent falls to help me not feel like such a loser, that would be appreciated <3