Fell into the vague job description trap

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When I hired on at my current place I interviewed for one position. When I arrived at work the first day I was given different duties. Then three months in I got moved to a new task. Now all three of these things were well within my skills and interest but I probably should have said something.

Yesterday I was chastised for not taking ownership of yet another new task and one that I do not like at that... and just heard about in the past five days. I knew I should have hammered out the duties more right up front but that did not happen and now I am in the doghouse with the director of my department.

How is the director mad at you for not doing a task that wasn't assigned to you in the first place? Are you supposed to be a mind-reader?

When he was using words like 'initiative' and 'ownership' I realized he was expecting more than we discussed. The new task revolves around a problem exposed in the reporting I programmed in the third task. So uncovering a major fundamental flaw in the way things are operating also apparently means I bought in to solving it too.

I am being partly facetious of course...