I've read this thing probably three times now. I'm in a murky situation where I'm an apps engineer, but manage/pair program with a more experienced software contractor. The contractor complains about how I'm the only one he gets to talk to. And he has a damn good reason to complain after working for us for nearly a year, but I think this will change in the coming months as the work he's been doing for a while will finally start coming together and become usable enough for engineers to try/give feedback. I'm also covering him from noise to focus on development.

Worse though, my manager left 5 months ago and now the "director" is managing the group. The director seems to talk to everyone except me, and I'm the most senior member in the group. I had a good relationship with my old manager, yet the director hasn't had a one-on-one with me once, actually I can't think of a single instance since he joined a few years ago.

Part of me wants to initiate contact, but I'm more motivated to look for new work because of the whole scenario. Overall I feel like I'm dealing with the "management"-issues of keeping people happy while being stuck in a position with no growth or communication with management myself.