Instead of looking at this as a negative, look at it as an opportunity. You might want the VP job in 5 years. This is your opportunity to show them how you handle being short an employee and still get the job done, how you handle stress and pressure, and the opportunity to hire your first employee(make sure you hit a home run with your hire).
Make a good first impression with this initial challenge and it will be remembered when they’re doing future planning for the VP replacement. Do a crappy job and leave a bad first impression, it will also be remembered. You’ll never have another opportunity like this as it will truly shape the way you’re looked at over the next few years.
And you get the chance to better put your own stamp on the job. I’m never one to advocate trying to fix what isnt broken. But there now may be more opportunities to make improvements that the long-time, inherited worker may have resisted (Think: “Why do we do this?” “I dont know, it’s just how it’s always been done.”) Granted, that “institutional knowledge” was/is also valuable for preventing you from making mistakes, so the door does swing both ways.
Thanks for the replies fellas. Whenever I’ve been trying to motivate myself the past few days, your points are exactly is the sort of stuff I’ve been thinking. But with the good temp disappearing, now I’m telling myself, “You were surprised to even get anyone for that one day last week. Just look at it as a training practice run.” Now the question is, will I get anyone next week? I think there is a decent chance I won’t and I’ll have to train a temp after my employee is gone. So I’m going with that attitude and if anyone shows up, I’ll just consider that gravy.
The amount of emails she responded to asking stuff that is below me that I wouldn’t be able to answer anyway is what I think I’ll miss the most. Thankfully the CEO has addressed the expectations from my shorthanded department with the other department heads, so I’m pretty sure the people that read between the lines from the CEO’s directive will understand those emails aren’t going to be answered immediately, at least for a while. For those that don’t yet, they’ll get it soon enough.