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13 Nov 16:53

Pluralistic: For-profit healthcare is the problem, not (just) private equity (13 Nov 2025)

by Cory Doctorow


Today's links


A black and white photo of an old hospital ward. A bright red river of blood courses between the beds. Dancing in the blood is Monopoly's 'Rich Uncle Pennybags.' He has removed his face to reveal a grinning skull.

For-profit healthcare is the problem, not (just) private equity (permalink)

When you are at the library, you are a patron, not a customer. When you are at school, you're a student, not a customer. When you get health care, you are a patient, not a customer.

Property rights are America's state religion, and so market-oriented language is the holy catechism. But the things we value most highly aren't property, they cannot be bought or sold in markets, and describing them as property grossly devalues them. Think of human beings: murder isn't "theft of life" and kidnapping isn't "theft of children":

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2008/feb/21/intellectual.property

When we use markets and property relations to organize these non-market matters, horrors abound. Just look at the private equity takeover of American healthcare. PE bosses have spent more than a trillion dollars cornering regional markets on various parts of the health system:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/28/5000-bats/#charnel-house

The PE playbook is plunder. After PE buys a business, it borrows heavily against it (with the loan going straight into the PE investors' pockets), and then, to service that debt, the new owners cut, and cut, and cut. PE-owned hospitals are literally filled with bats because the owners stiff the exterminators:

https://prospect.org/health/2024-02-27-scenes-from-bat-cave-steward-health-florida/

Needless to say, a hospital that is full of bats has other problems. All of the high-tech medical devices are broken and no one will fix them because the PE bosses have stiffed all the repair companies and contractors. There are blood shortages, saline shortages, PPE shortages. Doctors and nurses go weeks or months without pay. The elevators don't work. Black mold climbs the walls.

When PE rolls up all the dialysis clinics in your neighborhood, the new owners fire all the skilled staff and hire untrained replacements. They dispense with expensive fripperies like sterilizing their needles:

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/the-dirty-business-of-clean-blood

When PE rolls up your regional nursing homes, they turn into slaughterhouses. To date, PE-owned nursing homes have stolen at least 160,000 lost life years:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/02/23/acceptable-losses/#disposable-olds

Then there's hospices, the last medical care you will ever receive. Once your doctor declares that you have less than six months or less to live, Medicare will pay a hospice $243-$1,462/day to take care of you as you die. At the top end of that rate, hospices have to satisfy a lot of conditions, but if the hospice is willing to take $243/day, they effectively have no duties to you – they don't even have to continue providing you with your regular medication or painkillers for your final days:

https://prospect.org/health/2023-04-26-born-to-die-hospice-care/

Setting up a hospice is cheap as hell. Pay a $3,000 filing fee, fill in some paperwork (which no one ever checks) and hang out a shingle. Nominally, a doctor has to oversee the operation, but PE-backed hospices save money here by having a single doctor "oversee" dozens of hospices:

https://auditor.ca.gov/reports/2021-123/index.html#pg34A

Once you rope a patient into this system, you can keep billing the government for them up to a total of $32,000, then you have to kick them out. Why would a patient with only six months to live survive to be kicked out? Because PE companies pay bounties to doctors to refer patients who aren't dying to hospices. 51% of patients in the PE-cornered hospices of Van Nuys are "live discharged":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/26/death-panels/#what-the-heck-is-going-on-with-CMS

However, once you're admitted to a hospice, Medicare expects you to die – so "live discharged" patients face a thick bureaucratic process to get back into the system so they can start seeing a doctor again.

So all of this is obviously very bad, a stark example of what happens when you mix the most rapacious form of capitalist plunder with the most vulnerable kind of patient. But, as Elle Rothermich writes for LPE Journal, the PE model of hospice is merely a more extreme and visible version of the ghastly outcomes that arise out of all for-profit hospice care:

https://lpeproject.org/blog/hospice-commodification-and-the-limits-of-antitrust/

The problems of PE-owned hospices are not merely a problem of the lack of competition, and applying antitrust to PE rollups of hospices won't stop the carnage, though it would certainly improve things somewhat. While once American hospices were run by nonprofits and charities, that changed in 1983 with the introduction of Medicare's hospice benefit. Today, three quarters of US hospices are private.

It's not just PE-backed hospices; the entire for-profit hospice sector is worse than the nonprofit alternative. For-profit hospices deliver worse care and worse outcomes at higher prices. They are the worst-performing hospices in the country.

This is because (as Rothermich writes) "The actual provision of care—the act of healing or attempting to heal—is broadly understood to be something more than a purely economic transaction." In other words, patients are not customers. In the hierarchy of institutional obligations, "patients" rank higher than customers. To be transformed from a "patient" into a "customer" is to be severely demoted.

Hospice care is a complex, multidisciplinary, highly individualized practice, and pain treatment spans many dimensions: "psychological, social, emotional, and spiritual as well as physical." A cash-for-service model inevitably flattens this into "a standardized list of discrete services that can each be given a monetary value: pain medication, durable medical equipment, skilled nursing visits, access to a chaplain."

As Rothermich writes, while there are benefits to blocking PE rollups and monopolization of hospices, to do so at all tacitly concedes that health care should be treated as a business, that "corporate involvement in care delivery is an inevitable, irreversible development."

Rothermich's point is that health care isn't a commodity, and to treat it as such always worsens care. It dooms patients to choosing between different kinds of horrors, and subjects health care workers to the moral injury of failing their duty to their patients in order to serve them as customers.

Hey look at this (permalink)


A shelf of leatherbound history books with a gilt-stamped series title, 'The World's Famous Events.'

Object permanence (permalink)

#20yrsago New Sony lockware prevents selling or loaning of games https://memex.craphound.com/2005/11/12/new-sony-lockware-prevents-selling-or-loaning-of-games/

#20yrsago Dr Seuss meets Star Trek https://web.archive.org/web/20051126025052/http://www.seuss.org/seuss/seuss.sttng.html

#20yrsago Sony’s other malicious audio CD trojan https://memex.craphound.com/2005/11/12/sonys-other-malicious-audio-cd-trojan/

#15yrsago Will TSA genital grope/full frontal nudity “security” make you fly less? https://web.archive.org/web/20101115011017/https://blogs.reuters.com/ask/2010/11/12/are-new-security-screenings-affecting-your-decision-to-fly/

#15yrsago Make inner-tube laces, turn your shoes into slip-ons https://www.instructables.com/Make-normal-shoes-into-slip-ons-with-inner-tubes/

#15yrsago Tractor sale gone bad ends with man eating own beard https://web.archive.org/web/20101113200759/http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40136299

#10yrsago San Francisco Airport security screeners charged with complicity in drug-smuggling https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndca/pr/three-san-francisco-international-airport-security-screeners-charged-fraud-and

#10yrsago Female New Zealand MPs ejected from Parliament for talking about their sexual assault https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/11/new-zealand-female-mps-mass-walkout-pm-rapists-comment

#10yrsago Councillor who voted to close all public toilets gets a ticket for public urination https://uk.news.yahoo.com/councillor-cut-public-toilets-fined-094432429.html#1snIQOG

#10yrsago Edward Snowden’s operational security advice for normal humans https://theintercept.com/2015/11/12/edward-snowden-explains-how-to-reclaim-your-privacy/

#10yrsago Not (just) the War on Drugs: the difficult, complicated truth about American prisons https://jacobin.com/2015/03/mass-incarceration-war-on-drugs/

#10yrsago Britons’ Internet access bills will soar to pay for Snoopers Charter https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/nov/11/broadband-bills-increase-snoopers-charter-investigatory-powers-bill-mps-warned

#10yrsago How big offshoring companies pwned the H-1B process, screwing workers and businesses https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/11/us/large-companies-game-h-1b-visa-program-leaving-smaller-ones-in-the-cold.html?_r=0

#5yrsago Anti-bear robo-wolves https://pluralistic.net/2020/11/12/thats-what-xi-said/#robo-lobo

#5yrsago Xi on interop and lock-in https://pluralistic.net/2020/11/12/thats-what-xi-said/#with-chinese-characteristics

#5yrsago Constantly Wrong https://pluralistic.net/2020/11/12/thats-what-xi-said/#conspiratorialism

Upcoming appearances (permalink)

A photo of me onstage, giving a speech, pounding the podium.


A screenshot of me at my desk, doing a livecast.

Recent appearances (permalink)


A grid of my books with Will Stahle covers..

Latest books (permalink)


A cardboard book box with the Macmillan logo.

Upcoming books (permalink)

  • "Unauthorized Bread": a middle-grades graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2026

  • "Enshittification, Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It" (the graphic novel), Firstsecond, 2026

  • "The Memex Method," Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2026

  • "The Reverse-Centaur's Guide to AI," a short book about being a better AI critic, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2026


Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources:

Currently writing:

  • "The Reverse Centaur's Guide to AI," a short book for Farrar, Straus and Giroux about being an effective AI critic. FIRST DRAFT COMPLETE AND SUBMITTED.

  • A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING

This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commercially, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net.

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"When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla" -Joey "Accordion Guy" DeVilla

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13 Nov 15:40

A Poetic Look at Life & Death: “En lo más negro del verano / In the Darkest Domain of Summer” at the Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin

by Isabel Servantez

En lo más negro del Verano / In the Darkest Domain of Summer lyrically emulates the poem of the same name by Peruvian poet Blanca Varela. The exhibition, like its namesake, creates space for viewers to contemplate death at a deep and lasting level. The show, put forward by the Mexic-Arte Museum as part of its annual Día de Los Muertos observation, celebration, and exhibition, detours from the overt frivolity of previous years and instead aims to create a space where viewers can engage more solemnly with the afterlife.

An installation image of various artworks by different artists in a group show in a gallery.

An installation view of “En lo más negro del verano / In the Darkest Domain of Summer,” from the back of the Mexic-Arte Museum looking toward the beginning of the exhibition

Walking through the show, like reading the poem, it is made clear that even during summer’s brightest moments death is an ever-present partner; a partner that we should not be afraid to sit and engage directly and at long stretches with. When we do this we can eschew the notion of treating death as a taboo subject and embrace a greater part of what makes us human. 

Luisa Fernanda Perez, Mexic-Arte’s Curator of Exhibitions and Director of Programs, said recently about the show, “We [this generation] are now able to access all of our feelings, but we move from each one rather quickly, but with the exhibit, it allows us to sit with that sense of beauty; that sense of loss.”

An installation image of traditional ofrendas on view in a pink-walled gallery.

An installation view of traditional Día de Los Muertos ofrendas in “En lo más negro del verano / In the Darkest Domain of Summer” at the Mexic-Arte Museum

The creation of such a contemplative space has been successfully made through a series of innovative visual decisions throughout the Mexic-Arte galleries. These visuals start with muted pink wall segments, which bookend the museum, pointed out by Perez as the only visual references to a narrative structural beginning and end. Perez also noted that the pink walls might be seen as aesthetically pleasing, even seen as beautifully feminine, but pink is also, and in parallel with the poem, present in many moments of loss. Metaphor is used heavily in Varela’s poem like the opening lines from which the title comes:

“Your face like water singing
in a corner of the garden,
darkest domain of summer,
as though it were the moon.”

This line of words hinting at the core of the poem; an ever-present darkness, even when there is beauty and light, is not perfectly transmuted into the exhibit. In place of Varela’s metaphors Perez and her team have used dramatic lighting throughout the show to reflect the poem’s thesis. The often drastic lighting, accomplished with heavy use of spotlighting that cast shadows, connects the show from one end to the other, weaving its way over, under, and around Mexic-Arte, sewing together the art objects selected for the front galleries to the more traditional ofrendas in the museum’s rear space.

An installation image of a concrete sculptural object by Camila Abbud.

Camila Abbud, “Puente Libre II,” 2023, concrete, iron, mixed medica, and found objects

Collaboration was at the heart of En lo más negro del Verano / In the Darkest Domain of Summer, including artwork selection and presentation. Each artist approached for the exhibition was presented with Varela’s poem and responded to it either with new or pre-existing pieces. From this interaction choices were made between the artists and Perez. An ingenious example of the collaboration among the Mexic-Arte team and their artists can be seen in the presentations of Camila Abbud and Jahaira Daga Acevedo. Both artists responded to the poem by presenting artworks dealing with the continuous passage between worlds. Abbud’s photorealistic pieces Puente Libre I and Puente Libre II show movement between the Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, and El Paso, Texas, border as a “threshold of light and shadow, traversed by stories of struggle, loss, and hope.” Acevedo’s Latente, a short film capturing the journey between Cerro de Pasco and Lima, Peru, plays on a wall near a mounted set of bus chairs — sourced and installed by the Mexic-Arte team, led by preparator Oscar Guerra-Briseño — to give viewers a semblance of the experience depicted in the film. Like the poem, according to the accompanying wall text, in each of these pieces “beauty and hardship coexist within these complex spaces.”

An installation image of a pair of blue chairs sitting next to a video played on a screen that resembles a window.

Jahaira Daga Acevedo, “Latente,” 2019, video

Unique and inventive curatorial approaches, mirroring the emphasis of Varela’s poem, are further on display in the presentation of art by Rubén Ulises Rodríguez Montoya and Jonathan Hernandez. For Montoya’s Vampiritxs (Edition 01), a sculpture resembling a shape shifting creature (nahual) that, “feeds off capitalism, born of labor, migration, and resistance,” Perez worked closely with Guerra-Briseño and her lighting technician Preston Rolls to create a floating display and dramatic shadows. A similar focus on lighting and shadows was applied to the partnering installation by Herandez’s, How long have you been away?, which “evokes the vulnerability of the laboring body and the resilience required to survive it.”

An installation image of a work by Jonathan Hernandez featuring two plastic helmets, a downturned flag, and a candle in a vitrine.

Jonathan Hernandez, “How long have you been away?,” 2025, rectified readymades

When I recently spoke to Perez, I asked her if it was possible for one art form to replicate another: here, an art exhibition from a poem. She said that with this exhibition, the goal of her and her team wasn’t to replicate the rhythms or specifics of Varela’s poem, but to capture its moods and feelings, and like Varela, offer a space that holds a similar room for viewers to sit with what comes after this life and to engage with the enormity of what that means in our day to day. 

Perez and her team have succeeded not in replicating the words and beats of Varela’s poem, but in conjuring the same mental and spiritual space; a space that asks the viewers to do more than briefly acknowledge death but instead to sit with it, like you might sit for a long while in the middle of a calm forest, full of bustling leaves, dancing shadows, and rustling water. Perez and her team have created a space where death is something not to be ignored as it often is in the United States or zealously over celebrated as it can be with some Día de Los Muertos festivals. No, here it is something that should be engaged with at length, so that you can have a full understanding of what death takes from you when it fairies a loved one away and what will be taken from others when it fairies you away as well. Here they have created a space to sit with death for a long while so that you can have a full sense of grief, loss, beauty, and life, and from that, have a fuller sense of what it is to be alive.

 

En lo más negro del verano / In the Darkest Domain of Summer is on view through January 4, 2026, at the Mexic-Arte Museum in Austin.

The post A Poetic Look at Life & Death: “En lo más negro del verano / In the Darkest Domain of Summer” at the Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin appeared first on Glasstire.

13 Nov 14:34

#Kento #RoninWarriors

#Kento #RoninWarriors


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13 Nov 14:27

Would you like to Supersize it?

Would you like to Supersize it?

13 Nov 14:26

Long awaited sex bots arrive, immediately self destruct rather than deal with men

by Ian Fortey

LAS VEGAS – A massive fire destroyed the RealGirlz Headquarters in Las Vegas, Nevada on Friday morning which CEO and founder Jeff Morrow called a “deliberate act of arson.” Morrow, who first made international headlines in 2012 after promising that his line of RealGirlz sex dolls would one day replace real women as the ideal […]

The post Long awaited sex bots arrive, immediately self destruct rather than deal with men appeared first on The Beaverton.

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13 Nov 14:26

“Trump is a pedophile” email raises questions about whether Trump is a pedophile

by Mark Hill

WASHINGTON, D.C. – With many of Jeffrey Epstein’s documents and emails now available to the public, subtle messages from the disgraced financier like “Donald Trump is a sex criminal I have done sex crimes with” and “Would anyone like to hear about how big of a pervert Donald Trump, the pedophile, is?” have raised some […]

The post “Trump is a pedophile” email raises questions about whether Trump is a pedophile appeared first on The Beaverton.

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13 Nov 14:25

The Beaverton will tell Doug Ford a tunnel under the 401 is the dumbest idea of all time for just 8.5 million

by Luke Gordon Field

“We’re willing to negotiate down to 8.2.” Luke and the Panel (Ian MacIntyre and Nile Seguin) delight in the chaos consuming the Conservative Party, wonder why the Democrats are incapable of not shitting the bed, and try to understand the government’s plan to put 300,000 civil servants in the armed forces. Then the Approximately 10 […]

The post The Beaverton will tell Doug Ford a tunnel under the 401 is the dumbest idea of all time for just 8.5 million appeared first on The Beaverton.

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13 Nov 01:41

20.6 - I am mediating a crisis

This week on Lost Terminal: Quent & Stillman talk it out, and Seth overcomes his misgivings and learns secrets.

Lost Terminal will return next week!

📓 Free transcript: https://www.patreon.com/posts/143196877
🎵 Today's SIGNAL is: https://namtao.bandcamp.com/track/sister-megan
🦣 Mastodon https://namtao.com/@lostterminal
📝 Tumblr https://lostterminalpod.tumblr.com
🎙️ Recorded using a RODE NT-1 v5 USB in 32-bit float, edited with REAPER on Linux

🙏 CREDITS
  • Credits narrated by Lucy Stringer
    ❤️ Thank you so much to everyone who supports me, but especially my Patreon Producers:
  • Ada Phillips
  • Kit
  • Mike McCaffrey
  • Jade Felicity Bilkey
  • Stephen McCandless
  • Mike Schneider
  • Catoxis
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13 Nov 01:41

Japan Deploys Troops To Combat Deadly Bear Attacks

by The Onion Staff

Japan deployed troops into its northern rural regions to combat a surge in bear attacks that has already killed a record 12 people since April, as experts link the crisis to climate change and rural depopulation. What do you think?

“Be careful. Once they get a taste for combat, troops will keep coming back for more.”

Collin Gurworth, Protein Advocate

“Hopefully this show of strength will convince the bears to come to the negotiating table.”

Athena Kalogeras, Clarinet Repairman

“Hopefully humans and bears can set aside their differences and find a common enemy in squids.”

Jon Fosmark, Bell Ringer

The post Japan Deploys Troops To Combat Deadly Bear Attacks appeared first on The Onion.

13 Nov 01:39

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal - Prayer

by Zach Weinersmith


Click here to go see the bonus panel!

Hovertext:
You ever notice how weird it is that an immortal bothers to kill a bunch of people instead of just waiting 100 years?


Today's News:
13 Nov 01:39

Car Size

'They really shouldn't let those small cars drive in traffic. I worry I'm going to kill someone if I hit one! They should have to drive on the sidewalk, safely out of the way.'
13 Nov 01:38

A Proposed Federal THC Ban Would ‘Wipe Out’ Hemp Products That Get People High

by Manisha Krishnan
The provision, tucked into the spending bill that could end the US government shutdown, would ban intoxicating hemp-derived THC products, including gummies and drinks.
12 Nov 21:07

my coworker is blackmailing me not to take time off for my honeymoon

by Ask a Manager

I’m off today so here’s an older post from the archives. This was originally published in 2020.

A reader writes:

I work in an office where I’m the only person who can do 75% of my job, but there’s a second person who can do essential functions. We have a policy that only one of the two of us is allowed to request advance time off at a given time (so one of us is always in, barring emergencies).

I’m getting married in October, and in relation to that requested — and was approved for — two days before the wedding and the two weeks following. I don’t take much time off and have more than enough “in the bank” to cover that with some left over. It was approved immediately by my supervisor.

Since then, my close coworker (Jane, who covers some of my essential duties) first started asking if I really “need” that much time off. She then dropped a bit of a bombshell on me and said that she “really needs to go to Florida the following weekend (after my wedding) for a cousin’s wedding” so asked if I could be in for the second half of that week as well as the following Monday. I told her that my plans weren’t certain yet, but that I didn’t want to commit to that and leave those requested days open.

That was met with a tirade about how she “always looks out for me” and that I need to “do this one thing for her.”

We normally have a cordial, if not especially friendly, relationship but she has turned nasty and threatened to blackmail me over a a sick day where she claims I “wasn’t really sick.” She had seen me at the grocery, where I was mostly picking up a prescription but also doing general grocery shopping, but don’t have a doctor’s note if push comes to shove. When she brought it up, she said, “That day I saw you at the grocery store, I know you weren’t really sick but were just goofing off for the day. I’ll report you for that.” I responded with, “I was there to pick up a prescription, even though I bought some other things because I didn’t have anything at home that sounded good.” She responded, “If you don’t let me have this, I’m still going to report it.”

(For context, this happened during the work day, probably around 1:00 in the afternoon. Sometimes one of us will go to the store to buy work supplies during the day. When I saw her there, I had just come from the doctor’s office, which is literally right across the street, and was shopping for other things while waiting on a prescription to be filled at the store pharmacy.)

This has gone on for a week and she’s not dropping it that I need to be in those specific days, and I’m not relenting.

There’s a possibility that — for a variety of reasons — I won’t even be working there in October, but at the same time I don’t know how to handle this. I mentioned it in passing to my supervisor, who wasn’t overly interested and he indicated that I was “okay” since I’d requested the time 9+ months in advance. Still, though, I feel that the battle isn’t over yet, and it’s negatively affecting my ability to actually do my day to day job as Jane is refusing to do the small part of her job that I don’t have the proper training/credentials/ability to do.

In addition, there are the logistics that if our supervisor agrees to let us both off, I’m no doubt going have two dozen calls/texts a day on my honeymoon from people who are persistent enough to call me 10 times in a row if I don’t answer. Needless to say, that’s NOT a situation that I want to deal with, but it happens any other day when both of us are off (heck, it happens when I’m off just because of the sheer volume of stuff that she doesn’t care to learn to be able to answer).

Jane is a jerk.

But not a very smart jerk. She thinks she has way more power here than she does! And I think you think she does too.

You requested time off for your wedding and honeymoon nine months in advance. It has been approved. Your manager reiterated that your time off is secure.

Jane’s blackmail attempt is embarrassing — for her. It has no teeth at all. You don’t have anything to hide because you didn’t do anything wrong. You’re allowed to pick up prescriptions when you’re sick. You’re also allowed to buy yourself groceries when you’re sick. But if your manager really doubted you for some reason (which is unlikely), you could always contact your doctor’s office to get documentation that you did indeed have an appointment that day. It probably won’t come to that, though. But if you needed to, know that you could get the back-up you need.

Unless your boss is a complete fool, I can’t imagine he wouldn’t be at least slightly interested in knowing that one of his employees is (a) attempting to blackmail another (b) into altering her wedding and honeymoon plans (c) that have already been approved and (d) is refusing to do part of her job because of a personal vendetta.

I strongly suggest that you talk to him and say this: “Jane is harassing me about the time off I had approved for my wedding and honeymoon. She wants some of those same days and told me that if I don’t change my own time off request, she will report me for misusing a sick day. That’s false. She saw me in the grocery store while I was picking up a prescription on a sick day. I can get a note from my doctor that I was seen that day if you need me to. I think it’s hugely problematic that she’s trying to blackmail me to change my days off, so I want to make sure you’re in the loop that that’s happening. She also is refusing to do (specific work tasks) because she’s upset with me. Obviously, I rely on her to do XYZ to be able to do my own job. Can you intervene, so that her harassment stops and I can do my work?”

If your boss won’t intervene, then he’s passive to the point of negligence and you should say the above to HR as well. This is the kind of BS that managers should handle on their own but which HR will usually step in on if you need them to.

Meanwhile, with Jane, tell her this: “I’m not going to discuss my time off with you any further. If you want to report seeing me in the store picking up a prescription, feel free to. I can get documentation from my doctor if I need to, and I’ll happily let (manager) know the situation myself. But I’m not going to discuss this anymore.” If she continues to push, say, “You need to talk to (manager) about this. It’s not up for discussion between us anymore.”

But if your boss is at all decent, he’ll shut this down once you explain what’s been happening.

If the outcome is that he gives Jane the days off she wants and so you’re both gone on the same dates, let people know ahead of time that you will be on your honeymoon and 100% not reachable. Tell them you won’t be responding to calls or texts, and then stick to that. In fact, block everyone from your office during that time away so you don’t even see it if they’re trying to contact you. If you feel weird about doing that, then tell your boss in advance what you’re worried about, and reiterate that you will be 100% inaccessible. People do this! You’re allowed to take a freakin’ honeymoon without work calls.

But stop fearing Jane. What she’s doing is super messed up in a way no decent manager would condone, you have the power to expose that, and you should use it.

The update to this letter is essential reading! Do not miss it.

The post my coworker is blackmailing me not to take time off for my honeymoon appeared first on Ask a Manager.

12 Nov 21:07

how should I manage someone who uses the Gen Z stare?

by Ask a Manager

A reader writes:

I have been managing a corporate team for a little under a year, and I’ve gotten to know them all over the last few months. One employee, Sally, is smart, quiet, and a hard worker. However, when I talk to her, I started noticing that I was getting a lot of silence and a glazed look back. I tried a few different ways to ask questions and have a conversation over the months, but nothing has led to a change in her demeanor. At one point, I was wondering if she was high at work, since she seemed to me to be so checked out during conversation.

Then a few months ago, I learned about the Gen Z stare – and I think that’s what I’ve been encountering! Sally is Gen Z, and the uncomfortable silence and blank stare fit what I’ve been seeing. It’s definitely frustrating and awkward to be on the receiving end of it.

I’ve been thinking about it ever since! I’m a Millennial, and I know that I have Millennial generational quirks that probably drive others at work crazy. It doesn’t feel right to bring a critique to someone that is generational, but at the same time, would it be doing her a service to tell her how this could be perceived in a professional setting? I’d love to get your thoughts on this as workplace norms change over time, and as a manager, how do you respond?

For people who haven’t heard the term, the “Gen Z stare” has been getting a bunch of media coverage. It’s the idea that some Gen Z employees, when spoken to by a colleague or a client, will just respond with a blank, disengaged expression. People older than them tend to read it as rude indifference or even hostility.

I’ve heard it explained as Gen Z being cynical about work, feeling disconnected, and not into performing fake enthusiasm. But the issue with the “stare” at work isn’t the lack of enthusiasm; it’s the lack of anything — no response indicating that they heard what was said, and no information offered in return. Some people say the stare also has an element of “this is stupid; why would I respond?” — which is something they can certainly think privately but which isn’t okay to convey at work. The other explanation getting offered is that this generation came of age with fewer face-to-face interactions and more screens (particularly because of the pandemic) and so they genuinely don’t know what the expectations are around non-digital communication. I think that theory is pushing it, but who knows.

In any case, you’re right that it’s going to affect how your employee is perceived, and it would be a kindness to spell out what appropriate responses at work do look like. The easiest way is to be clear about what you want from her when you see it happening. So for example, if you say something that you’d expect a response to and she looks at you blankly, you could say:

* “What are your thoughts on that?”
* “Does that all make sense to you or do you want me to clarify anything?”
* “I’m having trouble reading your response to that. Can you tell me what you think about the client’s feedback?”
* “I’d like to hear your perspective on that.”

If you do that every time, there’s a decent chance she’ll start learning she’s expected to respond and will start doing it without being prompted every time.

But if not, you could address it more big-picture. For example: “I’ve noticed that when I share feedback or plans for a project or pass along info for our work, you often don’t say anything in response, which makes it hard for me to tell what’s going on on your end of our conversation — whether you’re still thinking about it, or confused, or disagree, or even if you’re just thinking about something else entirely. In a work context, the expectation is usually that you’ll respond out loud in some way when someone’s talking to you one-on-one. If you need a minute to think, it’s okay to say, ‘Give me a minute to think about that.’ But I need you to stay something in response so that we can have a real conversation.”

You should also address it if you see her doing it with a client or a colleague: “When Jane said X, you just looked at her and didn’t respond. In a situation like that, you need to (fill in with examples of appropriate responses).”

Say all of this neutrally, rather than sounding frustrated or irritated. Start from the assumption that she genuinely doesn’t know how it’s landing, and coach her on it just like you’d coach her on how to run a meeting, or how to pitch a client, or how to write better copy. And really, it’s at least as much as a service to her as coaching on any of those topics would be.

The post how should I manage someone who uses the Gen Z stare? appeared first on Ask a Manager.

12 Nov 20:52

what to do if ICE agents come to your workplace

by Ask a Manager

With aggressive ICE raids expanding to an increasing number of cities, I’m sharing the following guidance from a community organizer in Chicago about what to do if ICE shows up at your workplace.

I’m in Chicago, which has been targeted aggressively by ICE and Border Patrol for the last two months. ICE actions are expanding into many other cities, and I wanted to share some resources and tips from our city’s experiences with your readers.

Inc. has a solid article on the rights of business owners when ICE shows up. It’s important to know what your rights are, especially about private areas and documentation. However, ICE frequently and blatantly disregards legal limitations, and when confronted with armed, masked strangers, it may be difficult for individuals to physically intervene to stop them from going into off-limits areas. Owners and managers should provide information to employees about their rights, as immigrants and as citizens. Be prepared to document ICE when they’re at your business; you may need evidence of their actions if they violate your rights or abduct any workers. (The latter is critical to help families find out what happened if someone is taken.)

As an employee, you may be more limited, especially if management isn’t supportive. Many places, especially large corporations, are adopting a neutral position towards ICE’s activities, which effectively means letting them operate unchecked. Employees can leave Know Your Rights (KYR) info in staff areas for people to take. Try to get in touch with your local ICE Watch or immigrant rights groups as well. Many of them are sending out alerts when ICE is active in a particular area, so you can be aware if they’re near your place of business.

Some other, more hands-on tips:

  • Landscapers, construction workers, and other contractors are extremely vulnerable. Despite claims that they’re arresting “the worst criminals,” ICE literally drives around and abducts brown people working outdoors. If your business employs any of these services, work with them to develop a safety plan if ICE shows up. For example, letting them come inside and go into an employee-only space until it’s all clear.
  • Share information and resources, but do not make risk assessments for other people. Don’t tell Latino coworkers to work from home because it’s safer for them, for instance. Instead, if you’re in a position to do so, allow for more flexible WFH as a choice for anyone who might need it.
  • If you’re a manager, try to offer compassion and flexibility. Vulnerable employees are going to be extremely stressed with the constant, unpredictable fear of friends, family, or even themselves being abducted. You may also have employees who are volunteering with ICE Watch organizations, which can be emotionally and mentally draining as well.
  • In Chicago, raids have been extremely unpredictable day-to-day. We don’t know when or where they’re going to hit. You unfortunately have to assume that ICE could show up at any time. This is why it’s critical to have plans and education as soon as possible.
  • Do NOT post about what you’re doing on social media or non-secure servers — which often includes workplace communications. Use a secure app like Signal or have conversations in person. This goes double if you record a raid. Don’t post it online, save it for the lawyers and immigration advocates.

Above all else, the best thing that you can do in your community is to connect with local ICE Watch and immigrant rights orgs. They have information, resources, and contacts that will help you and your neighbors. Get info, coordinate with your coworkers, and build a community to protect each other.

I’m updating this post to add these additional resources shared by a reader:

  • The ACLU has a webpage with free, downloadable KYR social media graphics, including phone backgrounds so folks can see their rights without unlocking their phones in the presence of law enforcement.
  • If you want to help people share KYR information at work, the ACLU also sells 10 packs of KYR wallet cards in multiple languages that outline your rights if you interact with ICE agents at work.
  • For a free version of this, ILRC has a free, downloadable “red card” that you can download in multiple languages and then print and cut up at home.

The post what to do if ICE agents come to your workplace appeared first on Ask a Manager.

12 Nov 20:12

the fake charity, the Photoshop predator, and other times AI got it wrong

by Ask a Manager

We recently talked about times AI got it really wrong, and here are 20 of the most ridiculous stories you shared.

1. The fake initiative

Our execs usually send out a hype email right before the annual employee morale survey, emphasizing wins from the past year, basically trying to put people in a positive frame of mind.

Last year’s included the announcement of a major new program we knew employees really wanted. But it was a bit surprising, because it fell in an area my team was responsible for, and we were out of the loop, despite advocating strenuously for this over the years. So I went to the exec to a) convey enthusiasm for his newfound dedication to launching this program and b) ask what support he needed from my team/get us involved again. It turned out the program wasn’t launching at all; he had just asked AI to edit the email to make it sound more exciting and appealing, and it had done so by … launching my initiative.

2. The predator

Sometimes at work my colleague uses AI in Photoshop to extend a background in a photo or clean up the background. We had a photo of a senior staff member outside: the background shows a building to the left of him and some trees and a road to the right, but it was portrait and we needed landscape. He asked Photoshop to extend the background on the right.

It generated a scary looking woman creeping up behind the staff member.

3. The nickname

I was on a Zoom call with AI notetaking software and was referring to a colleague named Bridget–but on the transcription, every time I specifically mentioned her name, it appeared as “Piglet.” This did not happen when others on the call said “Bridget”! It looked like that was just my nickname for her. I was so embarrassed.

4. The fake charity

My company hired an account manager who insisted he was a phenomenal writer and asked if he could contribute to our blog. The first pieces were just AI slop so I politely thanked him and said we had plenty of posts already.

So he posts a third “article” on his own LinkedIn account in which the AI described how our company collaborated with the CDC on researching a certain disease and publishing a groundbreaking study. Then we apparently went into underserved communities and funded a bunch of clinics and immunizations. NONE of this happened. It was hours before I saw it and forced him to take it down, and there were many surprised comments and shares. Months later, we were nominated for an award on our commitment to caring for vulnerable populations.

5. The transcript

I forgot the meeting was being transcribed and was talking to my cat while waiting for others to show up. “Baby, let me put it in” was at the top of the transcript to my absolute horror.

I was talking about his ear mite drops.

6. The grievance meetings

At my former workplace, the HR director did not know that her AI notes tool was recording her classified grievance meetings with the union representatives and sending a full recap after each one to all parties invited on the calendar invite, even if they weren’t in attendance. We got an email after a bit saying no one was allowed to use AI note takers any longer.

7. The “verifiable information”

Me: I’m doing a competitor analysis on [product type] for [customer segment]. Please give me an overview of all the [product type] products offered by banks in [my country] for this type of customer.

AI: (gushes) Sure! What a fantastic question, you’re a genius! (paraphrasing). Here is the overview.

Me: (searching for one of the product names listed … cannot find it anywhere) I can’t find this product anywhere. Did you make it up?

AI: Ooooh … did you mean actual products? Sorry! In future I’ll only reference verifiable information.

Me: (eye roll, crying into coffee mug, closes AI window)

(It continued to manufacture content.)

8. The job description

My mother is on the board of a wildlife habitat nonprofit. They work with wetland preservation and with both bats and owls. They were looking for a new director, so someone on the search committee decided to have AI make up the job listing. It included several useful traits (a reasonable amount of education, experience with fundraising, etc.) – but it also said the position required “five years’ experience teaching birds to fly.”

They rewrote the job listing.

9. The performance review

I had an employee request to use an AI to take notes during her performance review. The summary was one line: “No meaningful conversation took place”. I was glad I decided to take pen and paper notes because it was a very productive conversation indeed. Apparently the AI disagreed!

10. The baby announcement

At the end of a meeting, a colleague asked their boss to stay on the line for a couple of minutes. The colleague then confidentially shared the great news that they were expecting a baby, and they and their boss talked about a few next steps to plan for parental leave. The AI notetaker then sent out notes to everyone who had attended the meeting with the headline, “Colleague Is Having a Baby.”

11. “Dazzling you”

I’ve been involved in beta-testing and quality-controlling AI translation output because my employer wants to see if has utility in professional use cases. Here are some highlights:

– In an AI translation of a report about elder abuse, it randomly inserted the word “child” in front of the word “abuse” in various places. The concept of “child” did not appear in the source text at all.

– Every single abbreviation in the text was incorrect in a different way every single time. There was not a single correct abbreviation, and not a single abbreviation was translated the same way twice.

– The word “negro” was randomly inserted into a sentence for no apparent reason. This was early in my exposure to AI translation and I had no idea it could mess up that badly, so I spent ages trying to figure out if there was some stealth hidden racist dogwhistles in the source text. A colleague of mine also had a recurring problem of the word “bitch” randomly being inserted into sentences.

– Random misnegating – for example, the statement “more work is being done” is translated as “no more work is being done,”

– It translated the standard “Dear Sir or Madam” opening of a letter as “Dazzling you.”

– Rewording the source text in the source language rather than translating it. Yes, all the settings were configured correctly.

12. The Powerpoint

I asked Copilot to create a table comparing two things. It did an okay job. Then Copilot asked me if I wanted a Powerpoint slide of the table. I said sure, since I was going to put it into Powerpoint anyway. Copilot created the ugliest Powerpoint I have ever seen. Three slides (I only needed one) with a color scheme of lavender, salmon pink, and orange. The background of each slide had kind of a plaid pattern a coworker said reminded her of her grandmother’s couch. A random picture in a cartoon cloud shape.

However, that is better than our company’s internal AI. It doesn’t have the ability to output content into powerpoint, excel, etc, but it thinks it does. It’ll offer to create one for you and then do nothing. Coworkers have spent ages trying to figure out where AI is saving their non-existent files.

13. The comp titles

I work in publishing and I wanted to do some research on competing titles for a potential book we had in the pipeline. Asked AI for the bestselling current books on the topic, and it came up with a list that had some really interesting titles on it – great, I thought, I’ve never heard of half of these so we definitely need to check them out. Yep – turns out the AI had just completely made them up.

14. The editable document

Me: Copilot, can you turn this scanned PDF into an editable word document?

Copilot: Sure thing, Another Kristin, here you go!

Me (after opening the file): Copilot, this file is completely blank.

Copilot: Sorry, I made a mistake, here it is!

Me: (opens second file, sees that it is also blank, closes AI window and puts in request for OCR software)

15. The attack

A friend of mine showed me an AI summary of a meeting where the AI notetaker decided to attack someone for no reason– in the middle of the notes about what everyone was saying, it inserted, “Jane contributes nothing to the conversation.” I guess it was accurate because the coworker had been quiet since that part of the meeting wasn’t relevant to her projects … But why did it do that???

16. The scam

We work with a lot of small businesses just starting up, and as a result are asked to recommend professional services often. Knowing this, a client passed on a discreet warning about the bookkeeping firm we’d recommended to them. They had issues with their accounting software, Quickbooks, and called for help. It was right when Google started providing AI summaries for everything, and apparently their account rep pulled the phone number for Quickbooks’ support out of the AI summary, rather than off the website.

You can probably guess where this is going. The number wasn’t legit, but instead put him in contact with a scammer who’d managed to astroturf their way into the AI summary. The account rep gave the scammer full access to our client’s accounting software before he realized his error. Our client didn’t share a lot of details about the damages — I got the sense that they were saying very little because they were planning legal action — but they wanted to let us know so we wouldn’t recommend them again.

17. The transcript, part 2

A woman I work with introduced herself before an online presentation. Her last name is Buckman. The AI transcriber recorded her introduction as “Hi, I’m Amelia. F*ck, man, it’s nice to see you all today.”

18. The transcript, part 3

Two people stayed on the call after the rest of the team had left and complained about others on the project. Not only did the transcription record this, it tagged the individuals being discussed in the summary as an action item: “@Jane needs to stop dragging her feet and get her sh*t together”

19. The equipment

I recently saw a ~$50,000 piece of industrial equipment damaged and taken out of commission for about a month because Google AI search told a worker that the tightening torque of a screw was 50 ft*lb instead of 50 in*lb.

This resulted in them over-tightening the screw by a factor of 12, which unfortunately didn’t strip the threaded hole (which would have been a smaller problem) but instead warped a bearing assembly that required a full rebuild at considerable difficulty and expense.

The kicker is that the correct torque value was clearly printed in the service manual that is stored in the machine.

20. The privacy expert

We once had a IT person come into a meeting to talk about the importance of data privacy and security who didn’t realize he had an AI notetaker signed in until someone pointed it out.

The post the fake charity, the Photoshop predator, and other times AI got it wrong appeared first on Ask a Manager.

12 Nov 19:27

Study Finds Most Americans Can’t Find Where They Are Being Deported On Map

by The Onion Staff

The post Study Finds Most Americans Can’t Find Where They Are Being Deported On Map appeared first on The Onion.

12 Nov 17:46

my coworkers have a crush on my boss … and are taking it out on me

by Ask a Manager

I’m off today so here’s an older post from the archives. This was originally published in 2020.

A reader writes:

I’m the executive assistant for a small company. I’m the direct support for the VP of human resources, “Dave,” who is very charismatic and likable and a generally nice guy. He’s also very good looking. However, he’s very professional with great business boundaries. I enjoy working with him.

Two managers in particular, “Karen” and “Nancy,” need to meet with him all the time. All. The. Time. Their departments aren’t undergoing any HR issues, they don’t have any staffing needs, and they’re not hiring or firing anybody right now. They call to schedule multiple meetings a week, drop by to see if he’s available for 1:1s when his schedule doesn’t have a single second free, and call him multiple times a day. Dave always routes them back to me to take a message or schedule them with him. Nancy gets angry with me when I tell her he’s not available and blew up at me last week that I’m “not his chaperone.”

Dave has noticed it and so have a few other execs. Dave’s been very clear about making both of them go through the same process other staff members go through to schedule with him. Just the same, other staff have started calling them his “fan club” and me the “bouncer.”

When I was working with the other assistants and operators on a training, word about his “fan club” had gotten around and one person mentioned that Karen calls me names and tells the other staff I’m in love with Dave and don’t want other women near him, which is why I never let her schedule with him. She even showed me a few emails in which Karen advised her department support professional to go over my head to see Dave and that I wasn’t the “keeper of his zipper.”

I’m not sure how to approach this. I’m more angry than I am embarrassed. I’m also bothered because the support staff report to me, and some of my staff have reported both Nancy and Karen as being difficult to work with and unpleasant in other aspects of the day-to-day, not just in regards to the Dave thing. Where do I start with this?

This is so gross!

If Karen and Nancy were simply trying to meet with Dave all the time, that would be annoying but manageable. Even then, though, at some point Dave would probably need to shut it down more firmly than he has. (Not that he’s at fault here! It sounds like he’s managing an uncomfortable situation pretty professionally — but needs to hear how it’s gone off the rails.)

But this is more than Karen and Nancy trying to get a weird amount of Dave’s attention. Blowing up at your for doing your job, calling you names (!), spreading rumors that you’re in love with him, and ever uttering the words “keeper of his zipper” in a work context is … ugh, so over the line and gross and violating. To you, and also to Dave.

It’s time for you to talk to him. It’s going to be awkward and uncomfortable, and you need to do it anyway. (Remember that the awkwardness is 100% on Karen and Nancy, not you.) He needs to know the full extent of what’s happening, how out of control it’s become, and how it’s affecting you.

If you’re hesitating to do that because it feels uncomfortable or you don’t want to burden him with this or you feel like you should be able to deal with it yourself … you still need to talk to him, for three key reasons. First, he deserves to know what’s being said about him so he can decide for himself how he wants to handle it. It’s not right to let this happen behind his back without informing him. Second, as your boss he needs to be aware that you’re being harassed and mistreated. Third, as the VP of HR, he has a professional obligation to intervene and ensure this is shut down — his job in the company requires it (and there’s a point where not acting will make people question HR’s competence, and how seriously HR would take it if someone else were facing similar issues).

So talk to Dave. Tell him all of it — the name-calling, the yelling at you, the rumors, the undermining you, all of it. And I’m sorry to say, you’re going to have to repeat the “keeper of his zipper” line because that makes it clear just how over the line this has become.

You can tell him you’re embarrassed to have to repeat all this, but it’s important that you tell him it’s happening, and that you tell him it’s at the point that HR needs to intervene and shut it down.

If Dave is as great as he sounds — really, even if he’s only sort of okay — he’s going to be grateful you told him and will deal with it so you don’t have to. It’s his job! Let him have the info he needs to do it.

The post my coworkers have a crush on my boss … and are taking it out on me appeared first on Ask a Manager.

12 Nov 17:45

husband says it’s inappropriate to dine or carpool with my boss, bowing out of a cooking competition, and more

by Ask a Manager

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. My husband says it’s inappropriate to dine or carpool with my boss

I have a great relationship with my boss. He is incredibly supportive of my professional growth and is a good mentor. We work well together on projects and complement each other’s skills. We’ve built a great team and are very intentional about culture. Relationships are incredibly important in our field. Some context: He is a man, I am a woman, and he’s about 10 years older than me.

My husband hates my boss, and he’s not shy about it. He says my boss doesn’t look him in the eye or shake his hand when they run into each other at work functions. He always has something nasty to say about him. I don’t get it.

From time to time, my boss invites me to grab dinner after work events or carpool to things together. This sends my husband through the roof. He says it’s great that we work well together but there is no need to socialize outside of work. He’s convinced my boss is being inappropriate. I enjoy carpooling or grabbing dinner with my boss from time to time! It’s fun to unwind and socialize. We talk about work and non-work topics. I NEVER feel like my boss is being inappropriate or flirtatious. The relationship genuinely feels friendly. His wife is awesome, I like socializing with her too from time to time at work functions!

I know you’re going to ask how my marriage is. It’s okay. We’ve been married a while now, there have been bumps that we’ve tried to move past. I genuinely think he’s projecting his issues onto this situation.

But my question is about work. Is it inappropriate to get dinner with your boss and socialize? We’re not in an industry like sales where dinners or social outings are the norm. Our jobs are stressful and it’s just fun to unwind together.

It is absolutely not inappropriate. It’s a normal thing to do when you work with someone. You have a good rapport and good will toward each other, and you have a shared frame of reference (you know the same people, projects, industry, obstacles, etc.). When you’re leaving a work event together, it makes perfect sense that you might decide to grab a meal or a drink before heading home.

Your husband doesn’t even want you carpooling with your boss? I could almost excuse him feeling weird about the after-work socializing (although that would still be way too controlling of him), but objecting to driving together to work events takes this into a different territory of problematic.

Something is going on with your husband / your marriage. It’s not about your job.

2. Should I bow out of our holiday cooking competition?

For about a year, I have worked at an office job where I very consistently bring in baked goods or shareable food items. But I am not pressured to or criticized when I don’t.

My question is related to an upcoming holiday potluck where there is also a cooking contest. I won last year and got a gift card, which was great, but I’m debating if I should even enter this year. Mostly, I’m not sure that’s fair, because I have to imagine consistently bringing in items biased the judges in my favor. (It was anonymous, but I am of a cultural identity that is unique amongst my coworkers, so the flavor profile probably gave me away. Also, small office.) And there are other excellent bakers and home cooks as well, irrespective of whether I’ve brought more items in total and engendered good will that way.

But I don’t even know if I’d win again, so maybe it’s arrogant to assume I need to bow out? As you can tell, I’m overthinking this. But people are asking if I know what I’ll be making, and I’d like to have either an answer or a good excuse soon enough.

You don’t need to bow out! I don’t think you have an unfair advantage just because you bring in food more than your coworkers do; the judges presumably aren’t judging based on the entirety of your contributions over the whole year, but rather on the specific dish you enter into the contest. Moreover, if you do bow out because you feel it’s unfair to participate, there’s a risk of coming off as patronizing to your coworkers — as if you assume they couldn’t compete with you.

I do think that if you start winning the contest every year, it would be gracious to occasionally bow out and cite holiday baking fatigue or similar. But no need so far.

3. Employee says they think the feedback is unfounded … but then makes changes anyway

I have an employee who has been struggling with soft skills in their role — managing relationships with partners, navigating differences of opinion, openness to changing approaches, etc. These are non-negotiable skills for the role given our business model. They’ve been coached on this repeatedly, and we’ve seen some up and down improvement in the past year but it hasn’t been sustained. In their latest performance review, they were told they were not meeting expectations and a plan for correction has been introduced.

In conversations since then, their response has been to dispute the feedback, including things like saying the skills named aren’t requirements for the role (they are), hinting that this is just a matter of opinion and trying to ascertain whether “others” feel this way, and making comments that suggest the feedback isn’t “fair.” When I’ve said that this response is making me concerned about whether they’re taking this seriously — after all, how can you internalize and act on feedback you don’t think is valid? — they’ve said they can find the lesson in anything and they’re committed to working on it. They do seem to have taken the feedback seriously and made changes, but historically that has then been followed by regressions. Given that they’re disputing the feedback but at the same time acting on it, what do you recommend I do?

They can think the feedback is unfair, but if they’re making the changes you want, that’s ultimately the most important thing. Care more about what they do and less about what they think (unless/until what they think starts coming out in disruptive ways). It’s not that the fact that they disagree doesn’t matter — it does, partly because it suggests lack of alignment between the two of you about the fundamentals of the job, and that’s likely to play out in other ways too — but ultimately what matters is what they do.

If they regress again like they have historically, you’d address that at that point (and really at that point should probably conclude that they’re not well matched with the job). Ideally the formal performance plan would have been explicit that the changes need to be sustained over the long term and you won’t start the process again from scratch if they backslide. If it didn’t, then at whatever point the plan is completed, you can remind the employee of that (while also recognizing that they’ve done a good job in building the skills you asked for, assuming that’s the case).

4. I feel guilty about getting my coworker’s job after they were let go

I was offered my coworker’s job the day after they were let go, and I don’t know how to feel about it. I feel guilty but I also really wanted this promotion. I don’t know how I feel about my boss firing him and hiring me in the span of about 12 hours.
Do you have any advice?

It can be weird to feel like you’re benefiting by someone else’s misfortune, but that’s not the right way to look at it! Your coworker presumably was going to be let go regardless and there are all kinds of things that could have been happening behind the scenes, including your coworker simply not being suited for the work after having been given opportunities to improve. You’re not required to turn down a promotion on principle or out of solidarity with someone else.

Realistically, you might not be able to logic your way out of feeling weird about it for a while because that’s how minds work, but if it helps, you’re not wrong to accept the promotion, regardless of the reasons it was available. (I would have a different answer if you, like, set them up unfairly in some way, but I’m assuming that didn’t happen.)

5. We can’t request accommodations until after planned surgeries are over

A few years ago, I had orthopedic surgery. It was scheduled a few weeks in advance and I knew after the surgery I’d be in a brace for a period of weeks, with requirements to ice frequently and physical therapy exercises multiple times per day. I was given restrictions on how far I could walk and what I could lift. I stayed with my parents during this time because I needed a lot of help as I rebuilt the muscle. In advance of the surgery, I requested a temporary accommodation under the ADA to work remotely the entire time I was in the brace. I received a letter from HR saying my request did not fall under the ADA as it was temporary, but nevertheless they supported allowing me to work from home, and my request was granted for the specified date range. My letter was very specific that if anything changed, I had to submit new paperwork and go through a new approval process.

A work friend of mine is now having a similar procedure and asked me how to submit the paperwork to work remotely as she recovers; she said she already talked to her boss, who was fully supportive and just asked her to make the accommodation official. Turns out, our HR department has now changed the policy so that an accommodation can’t even be requested until after surgery because “how can your doctor know what you will need?” and “you won’t need the accommodation until after the surgery.” Both of our procedures were relatively predictable (e.g. you’ll be in a brace for 4-6 weeks and physical therapy will likely last X months) and my friend isn’t requesting the accommodation start until the day of her surgery. HR has also told her they need to decide if her post-surgical medications preclude her working. Again, the post-surgical protocol across these procedures are pretty standard and no one is on very heavy painkillers and certainly not more than a week or so. Our work involves typical office computer work, and public-facing work is pretty minimal and scheduled in advance.

My guess is this new policy falls into the category of “crappy but legal” to make someone worry about submitting paperwork for an accommodation as they try to recover from surgery. But I’m very curious to get your reaction to this.

This is ridiculous, and it’s probably legal. Ideally she can get all the paperwork together and ready to go before her surgery and have her boss file it for her the day of, but there’s no reason it should need to be done that way, and they’re just creating more headaches and stress for employees at the exact moment they’re least equipped to deal with it. Any chance your managers want to band together and push back?

The post husband says it’s inappropriate to dine or carpool with my boss, bowing out of a cooking competition, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.

12 Nov 17:26

mst3kgifs: …And have concluded that the boilers have not moved...



mst3kgifs:

…And have concluded that the boilers have not moved for some time.

12 Nov 17:26

Trump’s White House Renovations By The Numbers

by The Onion Staff

President Trump’s remodeling of the White House continues, which so far has included the demolition of the East Wing to add an expensive ballroom and outfitting his ensuite bathroom with premium Italian marble. The Onion examines the key facts and figures behind the renovations.

3:

Chandeliers in the situation room

$500 million:

Funding from wealthy donors who expect nothing in return

18%:

Percentage of White House doors that will open to nothing but solid wall

12:

Seats for dignitaries in the T-Mobile Club Magenta VIP area

76° Fahrenheit:

Water temperature of sub-dance floor piranha tank

6,000:

Projected instances of sexual harassment in ballroom’s first year

The post Trump’s White House Renovations By The Numbers appeared first on The Onion.

12 Nov 16:06

A little sarcastic, Mike?

A little sarcastic, Mike?

12 Nov 16:06

A phalanx of reporters comes swooping down! …Well, someone from the Home Shopper pulls up in a…

mst3kgifs:

A phalanx of reporters comes swooping down! …Well, someone from the Home Shopper pulls up in a K-car.

12 Nov 14:22

FAQ About Our New 100-Year Mortgage Loan

by Gracie Beaver-Kairis

“Trump introduced a new idea to tackle home affordability: a 50-year mortgage loan. Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte called the proposal “a complete game changer.” … but many housing experts warn the plan could backfire, raising the cost of homeownership by stretching out payments, adding more interest over time, and driving up home prices.” — CNN

- - -

Q: What is a 100-year mortgage loan?
A: We offer the flexibility of financing your new home over an entire century, theoretically lowering your payments as the loan is spread out over a longer period of time.

Q: Who is this loan for?
A: Everyone. But especially immortal wizards and vampires; people who think “100” sounds like a nice round number; and us, your lender, who will be collecting interest on this loan until you turn to dust.

Q: Does this actually save me any money?
A: It absolutely might.

Q: Can you give an example?
A: With a $400,000 30-year mortgage at 6.5 percent, your principal and interest payment is $2528.27, and over the life of the loan, you pay over $500,000 just in interest. Now, let’s say we take that same loan at 6.5 percent over 100 years. Your principal and interest is $2169.99–a savings—and all you have to do is pay $2.2 million in interest over the life of the loan.

Q: So, the interest rate would be the same on the 100-year mortgage as it is on a 30-year mortgage?
A: No. Because it’s a longer-term—and therefore riskier—loan, the interest rate on the 100-year mortgage is higher. If the rate were, say, 7.5 percent instead, your principal and interest on the 100-year mortgage would increase to $2,501.42, which is still technically a monthly savings.

Q: What is the rate on the 100-year mortgage, then?
A: We can’t give specifics without a credit score and a signed NDA, but it’ll be somewhere between the rate on a T.J.Maxx credit card and the rate of one of those Western Sky payday loans (RIP), where they warned you in the commercials that the money was expensive.

Q: Can I buy my rate down?
A: We offer a unique program where, in exchange for a slightly lower interest rate, you can sign up for the ever-present threat of henchmen showing up to break your legs if you miss a payment.

Q: When will I own my home outright?
A: With the average age of a first-time homebuyer now being forty, we encourage homebuyers to reframe their goal as seeing if they can survive at least half the full term. Alternatively, after retirement, you can refinance into a reverse mortgage. It’s like Dominic Toretto doing a sick handbrake turn and spinning his Charger around on the highway without making any real directional progress.

Q: Will I build equity in my home?
A: You’ll build equity much more slowly than you would with a traditional loan due to the massive amount of interest you pay each month, but it adds up. For example, after thirty years, you may have enough equity in your home to buy one dinner off the Applebee’s value menu. (Be sure to ask about our home equity loans.)

Q: Should I just keep renting?
A: Why keep throwing your money away on rent when you can feel like an actual adult by throwing your money away on a century-long loan you’ll never repay? As a bonus, you’ll be 100 percent responsible for any repairs to your appliances.

Q: Will my children or grandchildren have to keep paying this loan after I’m dead?
A: Yes, if they want to keep the house, and you had them co-sign with you as we recommend you do. Also, if you took the henchmen incentive for a lower rate.

Q: What other differences are there between the 100-year mortgage and a traditional mortgage?
A: Most lenders utilize current technology like DocuSign to streamline paperwork, but the 100-year mortgage requires all disclosures to be signed in person and in blood, in the inner sanctum of a participating satanic temple or abandoned Countrywide Financial building.

Q: Is there anything else I should know about the 100-year mortgage?
A: The 100-year mortgage is like your parents’ sex life, the environmental impact of AI, and relationship updates about teenage TikTok celebrities: The less you know about it, the better it will be for your sanity.

12 Nov 14:20

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal - Boss

by Zach Weinersmith


Click here to go see the bonus panel!

Hovertext:
Of all the AI concerns, the one about wanting to replace management with algorithms is the most monkeys-paw-ish.


Today's News:
12 Nov 14:19

Pregnant woman startled by unexpected symptom of everyone being really nice to her

by Staff

VANCOUVER – Sarah Jenkins, 32, who is seven months pregnant with her first child, has reportedly had some difficulty adjusting to a strange new symptom: colleagues, acquaintances, and even strangers being bafflingly nice to her. “The first time some teenager got up and offered their seat to me on the bus, I thought it was […]

The post Pregnant woman startled by unexpected symptom of everyone being really nice to her appeared first on The Beaverton.

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12 Nov 14:18

Answering your questions about the Ostrich story your uncle won’t stop posting about

by Luke Gordon Field

You have probably seen your right wing family and friends post a lot about ostriches lately. And, since you don’t follow Rebel News and a lot of twitter accounts with fucktrudeau and fringeminorty in their username, you might not know why. So we’re to help answer all your questions with the speed and grace of […]

The post Answering your questions about the Ostrich story your uncle won’t stop posting about appeared first on The Beaverton.


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12 Nov 14:18

Demonic dog baring teeth and growling just happy to see you, says owner

by John Hansen

ARNPRIOR, ON – Local residents expressing concern over the behaviour of an aggressive dog were reassured by its owner that he is actually quite friendly and loves people. Residents walking the paths of the Gillies Grove Nature Reserve reported encounters with a large dog that left them feeling shaken.  “I was walking through the woods […]

The post Demonic dog baring teeth and growling just happy to see you, says owner appeared first on The Beaverton.

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12 Nov 12:05

Woman Trying To Find Nonpolitical Way To Say Her Cleaner Was Deported

by The Onion Staff

CHICAGO—Struggling to explain the recent development during a polite conversation at her neighbor’s house, local woman Sarah Walker reportedly tried Tuesday to find a nonpolitical way to explain that her cleaner had been deported. “Maria will no longer be coming by to tidy up on Wednesdays because of everything going on right now,” Walker said about the woman who was seized by masked men without a warrant, detained in an overcrowded cell, and sent to El Salvador despite being from Mexico. “She’s relocating, which a lot of people are doing these days. It’s too bad that it happened totally out of the blue, but now Maria is with people who share her culture, or close enough. She’s also a little closer to her family, if she can find them. This has all been very inconvenient for me, especially since I have a 30% coupon code from the cleaning service that’s about to expire.” According to reports, Walker then returned home to find that her landscaper had also been deported.

The post Woman Trying To Find Nonpolitical Way To Say Her Cleaner Was Deported appeared first on The Onion.

12 Nov 12:03

TLC Sues ‘1000-Lb Sisters’ For Losing Weight

by The Onion Staff

SILVER SPRING, MD—Accusing the pair of a severe breach of contract, TLC filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the stars of 1000-lb Sisters for losing too much weight. “We are asking both Tammy and Amy Slaton to return to their original sizes immediately,” said TLC spokesperson Richard Lemmers, who alleged that the reality series stars had conspired to lose over 650 pounds collectively despite signing a contract with the network in 2019 in which they promised to weigh, combined, a minimum of half a ton. “They knew what they were agreeing to when they signed their names on that dotted line. In fact, when the elder Slaton was served her summons, she was standing on her own two feet. This blatantly flies in the face of the legal agreement they made with TLC. Exacerbating matters, we are alarmed to learn that Tammy Slaton has undergone skin removal surgery. We are demanding that she have it swiftly reattached.” The judge assigned to the case immediately issued a summary judgment siding with the plaintiff and ordering the sisters to wear fat suits until they had fully regained the weight.

The post TLC Sues ‘1000-Lb Sisters’ For Losing Weight appeared first on The Onion.