most popular posts of 2013 by Alison Green on December 31, 2013 Ask a Manager’s traffic nearly doubled this year, with 5.6 million unique visitors, 9.5 million visits, and more than 15.8 million page views. Thanks for your part in that! Here are the posts that interested people the most this year, via two lists: the most commented on posts and the most viewed posts. Interestingly, there’s no […] Read the full article →
what are the best questions to ask in a job interview, as either the interviewer or the candidate? by Alison Green on December 31, 2013 We’ve got two questions about interview questions, from different sides of the interview table. First, an interviewer asks: I’ve hired for junior-level positions before, but for the first time, I need to interview candidates for a manager role. What questions should I be asking candidates at this level? When interviewing candidates for any role, the […] Read the full article →
how to avoid freaking people out when summoning them to HR, a smaller bonus than expected, and more by Alison Green on December 31, 2013 It’s five short answers to five short questions. Here we go… 1. How to avoid freaking people out when summoning them to HR Our HR office often needs to call employees in (we are a large educational institution and have several unions, so employees also bring representatives to these meetings). We typically do this with […] Read the full article →
my favorite posts of 2013 by Alison Green on December 30, 2013 We had more posts here in 2013 than ever before — 1,118 this year so far — so it was particularly hard to pick my favorites. But here’s a stab at it anyway. 10. Stop thinking you’re applying for your dream job Because I hear way too many people say it, and it gets old […] Read the full article →
7 new year’s resolutions for a stronger career in 2014 by Alison Green on December 30, 2013 If you’re making new year’s resolutions this year — or even if you’re not — I’ve got seven choices to pick from for your career. 1. Set one or two big goals – and create plans to meet them. If you’ve spent this month wondering where the year went and what you have to show for […] Read the full article →
my boss opened a personal package that was addressed to me by Alison Green on December 30, 2013 This was originally published on August 19, 2010. A reader writes: My own postman is unreliable, so I often have book orders from amazon, half.com and ebay sent to me at work. The other day, my boss opened a package addressed to me and was offended. He wasn’t offended that I had something mailed to […] Read the full article →
the worst boss of 2013 is… by Alison Green on December 30, 2013 We have a winner! 1,975 votes are in, and the worst boss of the year is the manager who fired a receptionist after another employee asked him to reimburse her business expenses … with 42% of the vote. Congratulations, terrible manager of the year! You suck. The four runners-up, who managed to be pretty terrible in their own […] Read the full article →
the least popular posts of 2013 by Alison Green on December 29, 2013 As part of our best-of lists for the end of the year, I decided to take a look at the posts that garnered the least discussion in 2013 (excluding updates, housekeeping-type posts, and posts that just linked to my articles somewhere else). (This is no reflection on the question-askers! All of these questions are actually […] Read the full article →
update: my boss gave me a choice of offices but is punishing me for the one I chose by Alison Green on December 29, 2013 Remember the reader whose boss gave her a choice of offices — and then punished her for the one she chose? Here’s her update. I’m afraid this update isn’t an extremely happy one. Not too long after I got some responses from my original question, I went to my manager and asked if there was […] Read the full article →
update from the reader applying for a job with someone she’d previously worked for by Alison Green on December 28, 2013 Remember the reader back in January who asked about writing a cover letter to someone who you’d previously worked for (#6 at the link)? Here’s her update. First of all, I would just like to thank you from the bottom of my heart for your fantastic blog. Without the wonderful and extremely helpful advice from you […] Read the full article →