The Tuesday my manager got laid off, and I ended up running the whole project
Two weeks ago our team lead got let go in a 15 minute meeting, and I got his project handed to me that same afternoon with no warning. I had 9 days to get a client demo ready in Chicago, and I'd never even talked to that client before. First thing I did was block two hours every morning just to read through his old notes and Slack threads, which honestly taught me more than any onboarding doc ever did. I also started sending a short update email at 5pm every day, just 3 bullet points, so nobody above me could claim they didn't know where things stood. Demo went fine, and the client actually said our handoff was smoother than the last team they worked with. My advice is to write things down the second you take over something, even if it feels like a waste of time. What's the fastest you've had to pick up someone else's mess at work?
That sounds like a rough couple of weeks, getting thrown into a client demo with zero heads up is no joke. The daily update email was a smart move, it covers you and keeps everyone in the loop without extra meetings. Writing stuff down right away really does save you later, even when it feels pointless in the moment.