The first discovery of extraterrestrial life will almost certainly NOT be when it visits us, nor when we visit it. It won’t be when we see it’s stray TV signals. It’ll be in the excruciatingly faint changes in the color of alien sunsets glimpsed hundreds of light years away. Today we’re going to talk about the first such hint, why it's probably not aliens, and why there’s a tiny chance that it still might not not be aliens.
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Many of America’s lesser newsrooms have recently grappled with setting guidelines for reporters’ use of social media, wary of staffers expressing their personal beliefs and compromising their credibility in the eyes of the public. America’s Finest News Source is no different, and in the spirit of transparency, we…
Donald Trump Jr. took the witness stand Wednesday at the civil fraud trial over whether his father overstated his wealth to banks and insurers, a case that threatens former President Donald Trump’s real estate empire. What do you think?
OTTAWA – Continuing our country’s long standing role as a global leader in humanitarian causes, the government of Canada has stepped forward and announced its support for a 5 minute water break in the ongoing Israel bombing of Gaza. “Israel has a right to defend itself but given the thousands of people who have lost […]
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
A reader writes:
A while ago I lost a position after just a few weeks of working there.
I got really good feedback on my interview, and even got great feedback during the first days for going above and beyond what was expected of new teammembers. After a while my grandboss asked me how I was feeling about my work, to which I replied good, that I thought I built up a solid rapport with my coworkers, and was looking forward to more substantive tasks.
He replied I was utterly wrong about my assessment, and listed a series of complaints some of my coworkers and my immediate manager collected about me during my four weeks, and that they would prefer not to continue working with me.
I was stumped. All of these issues sounded highly trivial.
Including:
– Speaks too quickly in meetings, sounds hurried
– Made one joke we didn’t like
– Told a coworker not to eat during a longer call, said coworker now no longer wants any interaction with them
– Asked too many questions about processes
– Mentioned being left out of two successive “these are the new employees” announcement speeches, and we didn’t like the tone that was mentioned to us
These are all rather minor things, right? Something your boss should immediately mention, as in “hey, speak a bit slower, we are having trouble keeping up ;)”.
I have never witnessed anything like this before or afterwards, but every position I had since then has made me nervous about unknowingly irritating people by using the wrong tone of voice, or mentioning a topic people have decided they don’t like.
How justified am I in being annoyed here?
It’s really hard to say without knowing more. It’s possible that these complaints were all incredibly trivial, but it’s also possible for them to be pretty serious. It really comes down to the details.
For example, was the “one joke we didn’t like” racist, sexist, homophobic, or other otherwise bigoted? If so, that on its own would a valid reason to cut a new hire loose. On the other hand, if they just objected because it was weak dad humor or something, obviously that wouldn’t be.
Asking too many questions about processes is similarly opaque without more information. It’s good to ask questions when you don’t understand something! Questions are normal and expected when you’re being trained. But it’s also possible for the amount and type of questions a new hire is asking to indicate that they’re not well suited for the role. The same thing could be true if you were asking the same questions over and over, or appearing not to retain info or understand the answers.
Speaking too quickly in meetings and sounding hurried: on the surface this sounds petty. But if you were being brusque and impatient with people or making them feel like you didn’t think they were a good use of your time, that would be a much bigger deal (from anyone, but especially so from a new hire).
Mentioning being left out of two announcements about new employees: that’s a reasonable thing to raise on its face. How you raise it matters a lot. “I noticed I wasn’t mentioned in the new employee announcements; is there a place where we could announce it so people know I’m working on X and Y?” is very different from “what idiot left me off of the new hire list”? I’m guessing you didn’t say the latter, but since they mentioned your tone, I wish I knew what you did say.
More than anything else on your list, though, the thing that jumps out is telling a coworker not to eat during a longer call, because … why? That’s not normally a thing you’d have standing to say unless you were their manager (and it doesn’t sound like you were); that on its own sounds pretty line-crossing to me. And since it sounds like you don’t dispute that you did that, I do wonder if some of the more serious interpretations of the rest of the list are more likely.
Again, I don’t know. But hopefully this illustrates how everything listed could be really small or pretty big.
I hope it’s not just me. My backyard is a carpet of acorns, and they just keep falling. There are so many it is painful to walk with bare feet. With such an abundance our younger dog started to eat them—which we tried to stop, but it’s difficult when dogs like to go outside, and this good boy loves to run and play and chase squirrels—and he got really sick because of it. This experience, no doubt, will provide him additional incentive when chasing the squirrels who inhabit our backyard, and are no doubt enjoying a bumper crop of fodder.
This is a mast year for acorns, of course. Scientists don’t precisely understand why oak trees, every two to five years, produce an abundance of acorns. There are some theories, one of the most prominent of which is that a springtime drought is good for pollination. And if you go back to when the oak trees were pollinating this year in early March, much of Houston had not seen much rain for a few weeks. So things were pretty dry. But we don’t know for sure. Most likely it is part of the oak natural cycle to ensure that new trees will grow.
There are also a lot of non-scientific theories that suggest mast years portend a hard winter ahead. But I’d slot those into the category of old wives’ tales, not that I have anything against old wives! So I’m not sure this mast year has much to tell us about the upcoming winter. The only forecast I’m reasonably confident in is that we’ll see a bumper crop of squirrels next spring.
Parts of Texas are experiencing freezing temperatures this morning. (Weather Bell)
Thursday
As expected, temperatures this morning are quite cold. Much of Houston has dropped into the mid- or upper-30s. We’re going to get close to our record low for today, 34 degrees set in 1991, but probably will remain a couple of degrees above this temperature. In any case lows this morning are about 20 degrees below normal. It’s also the turning point for the current cold spell, and marks the beginning of a return to warmer conditions. With sunny skies we’re going to see high temperatures reach the upper 60s today, with light easterly winds. Low temperatures tonight will be about 10 degrees warmer for most locations.
Friday
The warming trend continues as high pressure fully shifts to the east, allowing for the onshore flow to resume. After temperatures start out at about 50 degrees on Friday morning, they’ll rise into the mid-70s with mostly sunny skies. Lows on Friday night will only drop to around 60 degrees.
Saturday and Sunday
The weekend looks warm, sunny, and mild. Highs on both days will be about 80 degrees. By Sunday night, overnight temperatures will only be dropping into the mid-60s, so most of fall’s chill will be gone. Dewpoints will also be creeping up so it will feel humid, but not Houston-humid, if you know what I mean. And unless you just moved here in the last week, you probably do. Rain chances are about 10 percent near the coast, and closer to zero percent further inland.
Next week will be warmer than normal for Texas. (Weather Bell)
Next week
Most of next week looks warm, with highs generally in the mid-80s, or possibly a tick higher on some days. Lows are going to increase to the upper 60s, and humidity will continue to rise a bit. Rain chances increase toward the end of next week in association with what probably will be our next front. But I don’t have much confidence in the timing or strength of said front. So if you like cooler and drier air, my advice is to spend some quality time outside today and tomorrow. Just, you know, don’t let your dog feast upon the abundant buffet of acorn delights.
THE HEAVENS—Mumbling the words “Why hast thou forsaken me?” as He thrashed about in His bed shortly after midnight Thursday, Jesus Christ, the King of Kings, reportedly woke up in a cold sweat after yet another nightmare that He had returned to earth for the second coming completely naked. “It’s terrible—in the dream,…
Cloth mother & wire mother is the best lesbian couple Halloween costume idea in the world
I saw this for the first time in early October last year when my daughter was less than a month old but my partner who was still recovering from childbirth gave a pretty unambiguous no on this one. We would have ate
Pasadena police are investigating after a report that players had thousands of dollars’ worth of jewelry stolen from the Colorado locker room while the Buffaloes played No. 20 UCLA at the Rose Bowl over the weekend. What do you think?
CLEVELAND—Bemoaning the derailment of what was supposed to be an enjoyable evening out with friends, Brownstone Tavern patrons confirmed Thursday that trivia night had been ruined yet again by the bald man with bulging forehead veins playing all alone. “This was just supposed to be a way to blow off some steam with…
WASHINGTON—Admitting that some types of physiques were simply too disgusting to accept, Americans across the country announced Thursday that they drew the line on body positivity at men with oddly small nipples. “While we support people of all shapes, colors, and sizes, the one thing we cannot stomach is a male with…
CHESWICK, PA—His mind racing as he watched his hometown Pittsburgh Steelers play on television, local man Troy Belvedere is said to have flipped this week between Steelers quarterback Kenny Pickett being the best-ever and worst-ever quarterback 386 times in a single play. Coming off a successful completion, the…
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. Should you tell your boss when a sales rep behaves like an ass?
My other half, Gertrude, recently went on a work trip to Japan with colleagues. While there, they were treated to dinner by a rep from another company (flown in from the same city where Gertrude and her coworkers work) who is looking to do business with theirs. She said it was a long, uncomfortable meal, with lots of boasting (harmless enough), complaining about whole groups of people by ethnicity (!!), and talking trash about politicians (to people who clearly supported the party he was trashing). He also treated the waitstaff terribly. His spouse had come along, too, and conducted themselves much the same. (Definitely not great for perceptions of Americans visiting abroad!)
Gertrude is wondering what to do with this info. Suck it up as a bad dinner, or report it to her managers as part of her learnings on this trip? Neither she nor anyone at the office would have to work with him, as he is a rep and not a direct employee. He has also been associated with the company he represents for a very long time, so presumably they know him well enough. Is this a dealbreaker? Is this all part of the schmoozefest that is networking? She is unsure how to approach this with the higher-ups in her company, and her colleagues are also on the fence.
How does one navigate these issues while both attempting to do good business (because their project is important and can have positive effects on the community at large) and calling out problematic people/ideas?
No, this isn’t part of the schmoozefest that is networking! This is an a-hole being an a-hole. (He’s also terrible at networking.)
I’d sure as hell want to know if a rep whose company I was considering doing business with behaved like that, and if I were Gertrude’s manager, I’d expect her to tell me … and if she didn’t and we hired this guy’s firm and then I found out about it later, I’d question her judgment in not telling me. It was a business dinner, and this is business-relevant information. She should tell her manager what happened — not framed as “obviously we will never speak to these people again” but as “I thought I should share this with you.”
2. My boss keeps asking about candidates’ ages
As a recruiter, whenever I’m discussing a promising candidate with my boss, he always asks for their age first. He then checks their resume and work experience.
This rubbed me the wrong way from the beginning, because I feel like that is ageist and the thing he should be asking is, “How many years of relevant job experience do they have?” When discussing salary for a candidate, he also comes back to age instead of work experience (saying things like, “Well, he’s already 45, we cannot offer him the salary of a junior” even if the person has the same level of experience as a junior working for us).
I brought it up a few days ago (not phrased in the best way, to be honest) and he got very defensive and angry, saying he only uses age as the first assessment to see how mature a candidate is and he feels like it serves the same purpose as asking how much work experience they have. (He went as far as telling me to go work for a different company that doesn’t ask people’s ages.) I eventually let it go but I still feel like he goes about it the wrong way. Am I in the wrong? Or what arguments are there to have him see what he is doing is ageist? Or should I let it go?
No, you’re not in the wrong; in fact, your boss is breaking the law. Federal age discrimination law (which protects people aged 40 and up) makes what your boss is doing explicitly illegal. Legally, you can’t hold a candidate’s age (if over 40) against them, which includes things like rejecting a candidate because you assume their age means you can’t afford them.
If anything is going to convince your boss, it would presumably be that he’s exposing your company to legal liability … but given that he got angry when you brought it up and told you to work somewhere else if you don’t like how he operates, I’m not optimistic that he will be open to hearing that, and it might just produce more blowback on you. If you wanted to try again anyway, you could frame it as, “I looked into this more and found that we’re risking a lawsuit because of the federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act, which makes it illegal to consider candidates’ ages” … but I’m skeptical that he’ll change.
But also, the law aside and even ageism aside, it sounds like he’s bad at hiring if this is how he assesses people! Are you really getting great mentorship or skill development from this guy? I’d take this as impetus to think about other jobs.
3. Should I not have shared my mental health struggles with my managers?
I’m having an argument with my mother about workplace norms I’d love your take on. I suffer with an anxiety disorder that’s been exacerbated lately by a change in medication and an unbelievably stressful systems migration that’s left all of us completely clueless about how to do our jobs.
In the last week, I shared with my line manager and our shared manager that I’m struggling. While I’m not asking for specific accommodations at the moment, I wanted them to be aware of how the increased work pressure and chaos was affecting my health and how I was working on it (mostly taking advantage of the mental health services our workplace offers) and to prepare them for the fact that I might need some time for appointments/a little bit of grace while I get back to equilibrium.
I think this was the right thing to do, and the conversation went well. My mum thinks I’ve killed any chance of getting high-profile assignments or promotion in the future by giving them a reason to doubt my ability to cope and that I should’ve kept quiet and faked a stomach bug if I needed to slow down. Who’s right? Is mental health awareness still so dire in the modern workplace that I’m likely to have damaged my reputation by admitting I suffer from a mental illness?
I’d love to say your mom is definitely wrong and you are definitely right, but in truth it varies by workplace and by manager. There are many managers and workplaces where what you shared would be perfectly fine and not come back to bite you in any way. There are many others where, unfortunately, it would. I can’t say which you’re working for — although you probably have a better sense of it than your mom does! But yes, in some workplaces and with some managers, there’s still a stigma that can lead to you being seen as “not able to handle” the stress of a high-profile project or promotion, even among managers who think they’re being supportive.
In general I don’t recommend sharing mental health struggles with managers unless you’re asking for a specific accommodation — because otherwise there’s a risk that they’ll assume you’re telling them because you want them to do something differently and if they’re not hearing a specific request from you, they may decide on their own what they think would help (and those won’t necessarily be things you would ever want).
4. How should I acknowledge my employee’s improvement after a serious conversation?
I recently had a “this is not okay, what’s going on?” conversation with my most senior team member about a lot of balls that she was dropping. Since then she has been doing much better, so my question is about where I go from here. Obviously as a manager I want to encourage my team members and tell them they’re doing a great job if they are, but I don’t want to come across as condescending or like I need to thank people for doing the bare minimum.
I think a large reason why I feel weird about this is because when I was growing up, if my mom asked me to do something and I forgot or didn’t do it right away, when I did do it, she would make a big production of sarcastically thanking me and acting like I had done her a huge favor. So what is a good level of “I see that you’re doing this and I appreciate it”? I feel fake and gross being overly effusive but I still want to acknowledge the progress.
I’ve normally said it this way: “Since we talked last month, I’ve noticed you really doing a great job with X and Y, and I appreciate you taking our conversation seriously and making changes.” You could add, “I think we’re in a much better spot now” or similar.
5. Job rejection before interview even started
Yesterday I had an interview for a position that is a new role/field but somewhat related to my previous jobs. Right before the interview, I got a separate email from someone else at the company asking me to interview with them too.
I can admit that I did not do my best on the first interview. Part of it was that the person I was talking to was not enthusiastic from the very start. I kind of feed off energy and it’s hard to be excited when the person on the other end sounds bored. Part of it was that I wasn’t as prepared as I should have been.
At the end of the interview, I asked my questions, and also asked the person I was talking to about the email I got, if it was an error. She said that it was someone else in the company and she could schedule me for some time if I wanted. I agreed, thinking I’d get another chance, and she scheduled me for the next morning.
I did a decent amount of prep work for that next one, some of which I admit should have done for the first interview. But I felt much more confident going into this one.
About 15 minutes before the interview was supposed to start, I checked my email and saw that I’d been rejected from the second job (the email was sent at like 2 am). But the interview hadn’t been cancelled.
I forwarded the rejection email to the people I was supposed to be meeting with, explaining that I wouldn’t be at the interview that was starting in like 10 minutes and thanking them for their time. I haven’t gotten a response back from either of them, which is fine. But now I’m wondering if I should have still tried to attend the interview, or not sent the email. What say you?
It was reasonable to assume that the interview wasn’t happening once you saw you’d been rejected for that job. That said, sometimes mistakes happen, and it’s possible the rejection was intended for the first job rather than the second. So ideally you would have confirmed before assuming — like with an email saying, “I received a rejection for this role late last night so I am assuming that our 10 am interview this morning is not still on, but if I’m wrong about that, please let me know.” That way if the rejection was supposed to be for the first job, it would clear up what had happened — whereas the email you sent could have left your interviewer thinking you were simply canceling.
I don’t think what you did was unreasonable; this would just be about covering all your bases.
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
A reader writes:
I have a strong working relationship with my boss, the owner of the company I work at. We clicked instantly in my initial interview, get along well, and he is consistently impressed by my work. Most importantly, I think he values me because I’m not afraid of difficult conversations, and I’m the only person in company leadership willing to tell him when I disagree with him or when I think he’s making a mistake.
As one of the few women in leadership in a very male-dominated industry, I’m used to weirdness in my relationships with male bosses. Typically, they will take credit for my work, or publicly treat me like a secretary or assistant while privately relying on me to do the majority of their role. My current boss has never done anything like this, although he often seeks my advice. It’s probably one of the healthier and more functional working relationships I’ve ever had with a manager.
But I do have one odd problem. Sometimes I will initiate a conversation with my boss that is difficult or fraught — stuff like one of the other senior managers interfering in a project and refusing to let go, or explaining that my boss made a decision that has negatively impacted the company and needs a different resolution. These conversations usually go well, although he is always saddened to hear he’s done something that people found frustrating or hurtful, and he definitely does not enjoy giving his senior leadership negative feedback. And if any of these situations affect me, it impacts him even more because of how much he values me. I’m good at keeping these conversations productive and professional, but at the end of really difficult ones he has a habit of telling me he loves me as part of saying goodbye (we all work remotely, and these meetings are virtual).
I am not someone who uses the “L-Word” liberally! I say it to my close family members and two or three close friends. I do not think my boss is attracted to me or means it in even a slightly romantic way when he tells me he loves me. Instead, I think he feels emotionally vulnerable: I get the sense I might be the only person in his whole career who’s been comfortable giving him direct and constructive critical feedback, and he’s seeking validation that our relationship is still strong in spite of the difficult conversation. As such, if I were to say “That’s weird” or “Please stop telling me you love me” in the moment, I’m concerned it would negatively impact our relationship and cause him to feel even more vulnerable and sad. But if I bring it up out of the blue, it feels like making a weirdly big deal out of something that could conceivably be a slip of the tongue (three or four times now).
Should I just let this weird quirk go? What do I say in return? He’s never pressed the issue. So far he’s always said something like “Have a great afternoon! Love you!” and I’ve just ignored the second part and gone with a cheerful but awkward-feeling “You too!”
Some people are more free with the L-word, even in a business context. It sounds like he trusts you to take it in the spirit he intends it in — not as “I like you romantically” or “at any moment I may make a pass at you” or “you are dearer to me than my wife” but as “you are very important to me professionally and as a fellow human and I appreciate and value you.”
But it’s unusual for a work context … and ideally he would have noticed your discomfort the first time and not repeated it.
As for what to do: If you’re not terribly bothered by it, it’s fine to just let it go. You can convert it in your head to “I appreciate and value you” and shrug it off as a weird, even amusing quirk from someone you have a strong relationship with.
But if it does bother you, it’s okay to say something! I hear you on not wanting to make him feel bad, but the next time he says it, you could take that as an opening to say, “I know you mean that in a completely professional sense, but I don’t toss that word around much and it makes me feel a little awkward. Maybe just say you appreciate me!” That way you’re not calling him weird or saying he’s out of line or that he can never express that he values you, but you’re conveying, “Here’s where my boundaries are and here’s what would make me comfortable.”
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. Wearing luxury clothes as a public defender
After law school I started work as a corporate attorney and hated it. The office culture was cutthroat and aggressive and the work was unfulfilling, but the money was incredible. I’ve always loved fashion, and I bought a lot of second-hand designer clothes while I was there.
I am now a public defender in dependency and drug court. I love it! Client relationship-heavy work has always been my strength, I’m passionate about it, and it’s rewarding. Because of the nature of the work that I do, I’m in court a lot, and I still have all my old work clothes. I always tried not to buy things with logos, but inevitably some things are recognizable (Louboutins, etc.) There is something that feels incredibly out of touch and icky to me about wearing designer clothes to court while representing clients who literally could pay two months rent with the retail cost of my outfit.
Part of me wants to only pull out the expensive stuff for dates and happy hours and build up a more affordable court-appropriate wardrobe over time, but the other part of me figures that as long as I don’t wear the clothes with logos I’m probably fine? I just don’t want to alienate my clients or make them feel bad because they are going through the hardest parts of their lives, and the last thing they need is to feel like I’m holding something over them. But maybe I’m overthinking it and that’s unfair to them and shows my own bias?
I suspect other public defenders will give you the best, most field-specific advice on this, but my take is: yes, clothes send messages! I don’t think you need to avoid wearing every designer item you have, but it does make sense when working with financially struggling clients to avoid items that will be easily recognized as extremely expensive luxury — Louboutins being a good example since their red soles are so well known. (Of course, not everyone would be bothered by that; some people like it when their lawyers look expensively clad since they figure it’s a sign that they’re good at what they do. But enough people will feel weird about it — as might your colleagues since public defenders are so underpaid — that I’d avoid the really obvious symbols.)
2. I don’t want to attend a training that’s hostile to LGBTIQA+ people
I am the newest middle manager at my institution, and in the past, all manager-level staff have been required to attend the county’s leadership training, which consists of a full-day workshop once a month for nine months. It costs my institution a fair amount of money to send people to this training, and now it is my turn.
I am one of only a handful of openly queer people at my workplace, and we are in an extremely conservative county in a very conservative state. I already have to deal with fellow staff not using the correct pronouns for me, as well as customers that will likely never acknowledge my gender identity. I stay because it is important to me to be a shield for my queer staff members and customers and to make our institution as much of a safe place as possible.
One of my staff (the final person besides me who has not attended this training) was sent this past year, and her descriptions of the training make me concerned for my safety. I am certain my pronouns will not be honored. I am highly doubtful there will be a gender-neutral or family-style restroom for me to use. I will have to sit through many hours of extreme political talk that aligns with people who truly wish I did not exist. It doesn’t sound like any leadership traits are actually taught, so I’m not certain what I’m supposed to be learning through this nearly year-long, expensive training.
I have mentioned to my boss that this doesn’t feel safe for me and that I’d prefer not to go if that’s possible, but she laughs it off like it’s some rite of passage that everyone must endure. I am fine with training in leadership, and I understand that, as an introvert, I will likely not enjoy any meeting with a bunch of team-building activities, but this is not merely discomfort I’m worried about.
Do you have a script I can use for attempting to speak with her about this again, or do I need to suck it up and go to this training since everyone else has done it? Or is there a third option I’m not seeing?
If you think she’s not taking you seriously, address it from that angle: “When I’ve brought this up before, you’ve laughed it off almost as if it’s a rite of passage, so I wanted to be clearer: My concern with going is with my safety as a queer person. My understanding from others who have attended is that I’m likely to be repeatedly misgendered and need to sit through hours of discriminatory talk, and there will be no safe bathroom for me to use. I’m formally requesting to be exempted from the training because it’s hostile to queer people. Can you exempt me from it?”
It’s possible she’ll tell you it’s an absolutely inflexible, unwaivable requirement — but spell it out this explicitly and see.
3. Mixing suggestive swimwear photos with work links on Instagram
I may be old (and possibly prudish), but is it a good idea for a young person to include their work hashtags and work profile links in their Instagram account, if this account is entirely photos of them in suggestive swimwear shots? I was reading an article about science in the newspaper and was curious about the author. So I googled the author, and their Instagram account was the second result. Clicked on it and was floored. Am I out of touch or is this normal behavior now?
No, it’s still a bad idea. There’s nothing inherently objectionable about suggestive swimsuit shots in a vacuum, but it’s not a good idea to tie them to your work profile. Work and sexually provocative photos don’t mix (in most fields, at least). What you saw isn’t a new norm; it’s just one person making a bad decision.
4. Resigning while an employee is on medical leave
I currently serve as a director of a small office (three employees total). For a variety of reasons, I am searching for new job opportunities. One of my direct reports is currently out on medical leave (she has exhausted FMLA for the year, but is on unpaid leave).
I’ve been a finalist for two positions I’m really excited about and am waiting to hear back. If I accept a new role, how should I or should I notify my employee on leave? HR has been very strict about what I can and cannot say to my employee (I was berated for checking in on how she is doing) but I also don’t want her to come back to that surprise, or text me asking about returning to work when I’m not there anymore. She really struggled with initially taking off the time she needed to recover, so I have been trying to give her so much space from work.
From a legal perspective, it should be okay to let her know you’re leaving once you have an end date. What the law prohibits is what’s called “FMLA interference,” which is where you ask an employee on FMLA to do work — but it specifically exempts very minor questions like “where’s the key to the supply room?” as long as they’re infrequent. In this case, she’s not on FMLA anymore anyway. You shouldn’t contact her about actual work since she’s not being paid, but contacting her to say goodbye wouldn’t generally trigger a pay requirement.
That said, you should follow HR’s rules regardless. Your company might have stricter rules, or there might be something specific to your employee’s particular situation that makes them not want you to contact her. (One thing that comes to mind is that is that since she struggled to take the time in the first place, hearing that you’re leaving might trigger her thinking about/worrying about work in a way that isn’t conducive to her recovery.) So ask HR before doing anything. If they say not to contact her until she’s back, you can always wait and then explain once she returns (even if it’s after you left) that they told you not to contact her.
All that said, totally aside from the law and company rules, I’d strongly consider not bothering her right now anyway. Let her stay completely free of work thoughts while she’s on leave. She’s undoubtedly aware that if/when she returns, people might have come and gone during her absence. Two circumstances that would alter my advice: (a) if you’re very close and you know for a fact that she’d be upset you didn’t tell her in real time or (b) if there’s some specific logistical thing she might want from you before you go.
5. Resume section headings
I’m re-writing my resume, and I’ve realized I need a third section that’s not Experience or Education, but I can’t figure out what to put. The things I want to list are all different but seem important — for example, a business award nomination, participation in a competitive mentoring program, and a volunteering stint related to prior work experience. What heading do these go under? Or should I put multiple headings even if each one only has a single bullet point?
You could do a section called Other Achievements. If “achievements” doesn’t quite fit everything, it’s perfectly fine to just call it Other, or even Additional Information. Really, you can use any heading that sounds reasonably professional and fits the purpose. I think you’re feeling like there’s only a limited menu of appropriate headings to pick from, but there is not!
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
A reader writes:
My first job after university was at a horrible company on a particularly toxic site in a traditionally problematic industry. Long hours, most people working away from their families, and there was a “work hard play hard” mentality that crossed so many HR lines it wasn’t funny. Sexism, racism, and homophobia were rife.
My team was a lovely island of (relatively) sensible people who actively pushed back against the most egregious examples and were vocal positive influences on the overall culture. I learned so much from that team and the pay was really good so I stuck around slightly longer than I should have.
Being yelled at by senior management was a regular thing and there were nose-to-nose screaming matches in the halls almost weekly (rumor was that these were sometimes sorted out with fists after hours but I never saw confirmation). To counter this, my team strived for bubbly friendliness or calm sympathy. We never rose to the bait when someone was yelling and did a lot of active listening — “I hear that you aren’t happy with having to attend legally mandated safety training. I hear that you think that this is a waste of your very valuable time.” We also openly discussed strategies for defusing these situations. At the time I thought it was really positive but, now that I have left, I am starting to wonder if it actually normalized the behavior and sharing these tips was actually a negative thing.
For example, I remember one of my team advising me to sit down when I was being yelled at. She had noticed that when the (40-year-old, six foot manager) was leaning over and shouting at her (a five foot, 20-something woman) he eventually seemed to notice that the optics weren’t great … and would sit down himself and calm down. I tried it and it was exactly as effective as she said — if he didn’t notice, then generally someone on his team would join the “conversation” and defuse it. This became a key strategy for our team and we openly shared it with newcomers or any other allies we made who were pushing back against the toxicity. Looking back now though … ugh! I am shocked that I was comfortable having strategies around this kind of behavior rather than just quitting on the spot.
The way we presented it to new starters was “when” you get yelled at for no reason rather than “if,” and I am worried that our calm acceptance suggested that it was okay or a minor annoyance. On the other hand, given that this was happening, was it better to arm them with a strategy and reassure them that it wasn’t their fault? It was all presented in the calm, matter-of-fact way that you often promote on this site and there was always an “if you need to walk away, you won’t be judged” and “feel free to send them to (higher level team member) if it gets too much.”
The scary thing is, I didn’t even notice how horrible it was until I had a new grad working under me. I started to explain how to deal with toxic people and the look of horror on her face was a reality check. I no longer have to deal with the particular toxicity but, well, the industry I work in is fairly notorious for being awful and, though it is getting better, it is likely that grads will end up dealing with people like this at some point in their careers. Am I being helpful by arming them with the tools … or am I normalizing something horrible by suggesting that they should have strategies (beyond going straight to HR)?
It’s so, so normal to share survival strategies when you’re working in a dysfunctional environment!
Because the thing is, unless you and your coworkers are quitting on the spot, you need ways to make the environmental safer and more bearable. There’s nothing wrong with sharing those strategies with other people who are stuck there with you.
But you’re right to worry that how you do it can have the effect of normalizing behavior that shouldn’t be normalized.
They key is to pair your advice with a clear and unequivocal statement that the thing your strategies seek to mitigate is Not Okay.
If you just tell a new person, “Jane is going to scream at you, but it’ll be better if you do X,” then yes, you’re risking training junior people that this is normal / acceptable / not something they should find problematic. You can avoid that if you instead say, “There’s a lot of yelling in this office. That’s not okay, it’s really toxic, and it’s not something any of us should have to put up with, but since it’s happening, what we’ve found is most effective to deal with it is X.”
Obviously after a certain point, you don’t need to give that disclaimer every time. If both people in the conversation have worked there for years and have already acknowledged to each other how messed up your working conditions are, it’s fine to just skip ahead to the relevant thing you want to convey. Even then, though, it’s still useful to give each other periodic reality checks — like “I can’t believe I’m having to recommend this” or even an explicit “let’s remember this is not normal or okay so we don’t get used to it.”
Also, don’t beat yourself up about not quitting on the spot. Most people can’t afford to do that … and there really is a “frog in the pot” effect when you work in a toxic place, where things that would shock you if you were dropped in out of nowhere don’t feel as shocking when you’ve grown used to them over time. Plus, you were in your 20s, a time when most people are still figuring out professional norms and what is and isn’t okay from an employer. You’re doing the exact right thing by interrogating that experience now — but do it with an eye toward deciding how you want to navigate work in the future, without blaming yourself for not doing it perfectly at the time.
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
A reader writes:
I have an intern who is book smart and a very hard worker. But there’s one big problem: he’s bad at things he thinks he’s a superstar with. A few examples:
– He thinks he’s an amazing writer, but his writing is awful. He misspells words, leaves out words, has no organization, and generally writes in an unprofessional manner.
– He thinks he’s great at public speaking. In reality, his presentations are disorganized. He speaks very quickly and loudly and uses a lot of insider language that most other people don’t understand. He’s also completely clueless about when he’s lost his audience.
– He thinks he’s good at digital. In reality, the social media posts he’s written are cringe-worthy. His attempts to edit websites have often resulted in me spending hours fixing his work. His photos and videos are blurry, have bad lighting, and aren’t framed well.
I’ve tried talking to him about slowing down and being more thorough with his work. I’ve also gone through all the changes I’ve done to his work so he understands why they were necessary. I’ve put him on different types of projects that he claims to be brilliant at so I could find his strengths and make sure that he is lightening my workload instead of doubling it (which is what is happening now). It’s not working.
Even worse, he’s applied for a full-time job with my company and is convinced he’s going to get it, but his interview was awful and he failed his writing test.
I work in a creative industry. I think he has a lot of potential. But I fear he’s just not a good fit for our industry. Any suggestions on how to manage him for the rest of his internship? Is there a tactful way to let him know I think he’s great, but he’s just not good at this work?
I answer this question over at Inc. today, where I’m revisiting letters that have been buried in the archives here from years ago (and sometimes updating/expanding my answers to them). You can read it here.
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