my former manager is trash-talking my new manager, knowing everyone’s salary, and more

by Alison Green on October 15, 2015

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

1. My former manager is trash-talking my new manager

Until three months ago, I had major problems with my manager, who in my opinion bullied me. After taking the issue to her manager and to HR, I was assigned the same manager as she has, which was communicated as a reorganization. This has also meant that she has had product responsibility removed, although she is still managing a smaller team. Two more coworkers have been removed from her and now report to a different person. She did not like these changes and no longer speaks to me or makes eye contact.

Since then, she has started undermining her (and now my) manager behind his back, but very openly in an open plan office. She would gossip about his apparent lack of competence, etc. to one of her direct reports, another peer, and people from other teams. I do not engage in this and see our manager as a strong leader. With her unprofessional behavior, she is creating a divide in the office between her followers, mainly recent graduates who listen and engage in the gossip, and those who do not. Just today they were discussing his “motives.” Due to the bad experience I had with her, I can see where this will go and worry that she may take her gossip to a higher level, tell lies, and somehow convince senior management about the apparent lack of skills of my manager. It happened to me and it took me a long time to realize this has been going on. Luckily my complaints were taken seriously and changes were made.

How should I behave? I do not want to witness this kind of unprofessional behavior from someone who manages a team and is one of the most senior people in our office, and I wonder whether there is anything I can do to make her or someone else aware of this behavior and get it to stop. I am not friends with everyone in this office but strongly believe it should be possible to work together in a safe environment.

I’d give your mutual manager a discreet heads-up: “Hey, I feel awkward raising this, but I feel like this has the potential to be harmful to you and you’d want to know. I regularly hear Lucinda complaining about you and your work to Jane, Fergus, and other teams, and my sense is that she’s trying to stir up animosity toward you. I think you’re a great manager and her assessment is way off-base, and I’ve heard it enough from her now that I felt like I need to mention it to you before it goes further.”

2. We can all figure out each other’s salaries

I work at a consulting firm where our billing rates can be seen by all staff. For the majority of staff, the billing rates are tied to our salaries using a multiplier. Basically this means that by doing a simple calculation, you can see, within a few thousand dollars, what everyone’s salaries are.

I feel so awkward having people know my salary. Obviously those who advocate for themselves and asking for raises are going to have higher salaries and therefore higher billing rates. This leads to questions and snide comments from others (our office tends to be catty) about why some people get paid more and “don’t deserve it.” When someone rises in billing rate quickly, they’re seen as spoiled and entitled. When someone has a low billing rate, they’re seen as unintelligent, lazy, or not progressing. And everyone knows!

How can I handle this part of my job? I feel very exposed having everyone know my salary.

The issue isn’t the pay transparency; it’s your coworkers’ immature reactions to it.

Lots of organizations make salary public (pretty much all government agencies, for example) and it works out just fine and without this kind of pettiness and backbiting. In fact, a lot of people would like to see more employers moving to transparent pay because it makes it much easier to spot patterns of discrimination based on things like gender or race. It also allows you to see how your company values different positions and performance, which is a good thing … and can give you lots of insight when you’re thinking about asking for a raise, applying for a promotion, or job searching somewhere else.

Your company’s management is dropping the ball here by not addressing this more openly and clearly and putting a stop to the crappy remarks.

3. Making a complaint about another store in the franchise that I work for

I am employed part time by a franchise with coffee shops all over my country (Ireland). I am currently employed in a store in my home town, but there is also a store near my college, which is in another city. I have been to the coffee shop next to my college three times in the last two months, and each time that I have been there I have been appalled by the apathetic customer service, the level of uncleanliness and the general low standard of the coffees and other beverages being made and served. While other members of the public may be okay with the service that they are receiving from these employees, I am aware that they are not operating both to the standards that the company expects, or to the standards of the national health authorities of the country.

Were I an ordinary customer, I would lodge a complaint with the company, but given that I am an employee, I am unsure of how to proceed. Would it be inappropriate to complain? Could it negatively affect my own position?

I really love this company, I feel that they value their employees and they treat them well, and were I not studying a completely different area in college, I would be satisfied to continue working for them my whole life. To see other employees completely disregarding the standards of the company and delivering such poor service has really annoyed me, and I would like to lodge a complaint. Would you agree? How should I proceed?

This is actually something I’d mention to your manager — as in, “I keep noticing X and Y when I visit store Z. I know we’d never do that here, and I wondered if it’s worth mentioning to anyone?” If your manager agrees, ideally she’d then pass the message along to whoever’s appropriate to tell (since she has more standing to do it through official channels than you do).

4. Invited for a second meeting but haven’t heard anything about scheduling it

I was recently recruited (poached) for an interview through LinkedIn, and after the first interview with three partners, I am really excited about the opportunity of joining the company. I sent personal thank-you emails to all who attended the lunch meeting. The director of operations responded a couple days later, saying they enjoyed meeting me and wanted to invite me for a follow-up meeting for either lunch or after hours at a local restaurant. Considering the tone of our first interview and their overly generous comments about how well a fit I would be in the company, I felt very confident this was probably going to be when they gave me an offer. I politely responded suggesting a couple times this week and have not heard back. It has only technically been a couple days without response but I’m very curious about what is going on. Should I send an email checking in on the meeting time/date? Not sure what my best plan of action is and am a little stumped considering this is not a job I actively sought out but am now highly interested in.

I wouldn’t assume that the request for a second meeting was to make you an offer; it could be that, but it also could simply be a second interview.

The delay could be because they’re working out questions about the position or people’s conflicting schedules, or zeroing in on another candidate, or dealing with totally unrelated things that are a higher priority. They might get back to you to schedule, or they might do the rude but common thing of just never getting back to you because they’ve decided to move forward with other candidates.

It would be fine to check back (I’d wait a week after the last contact though), but also keep in mind that if they’re interested, they’ll reach out eventually.

5. Employees have to make up vacation time by working on the weekends

Employee (traveling salesperson) has four weeks paid vacation. Employer said he has to make up all four weeks by working weekends or he will be fired. Many weekend remodeling plans and family events are now cancelled due to this. He said only sick days and holidays will not have to be made up and the first person to complain is out the door. Can he do this?

We’re in New Hampshire but the employer is in Michigan (owned by an international German company).

This is governed by the laws of the state where you’re working, so New Hampshire laws apply. Like other states, New Hampshire doesn’t require employers to provide vacation time — but if employers promise vacation time (such as through written policies like employee handbooks or in offer letters), in most cases they’re legally bound to provide it. I’m not a lawyer and you’d need to consult with one to tell you for sure, but I’d think that what this employer is doing flies in the face of that.

Regardless, though, this employer sucks in a big way and its employees should be competing to be the first out the door, rather than taking that as a threat.

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{ 272 comments }

{ 272 comments… read them below }

  1. A Dispatcher*

    #5 Oh my god, how ridiculous. 4 weeks is very generous (in the US) but certainly not if the time has to be made up. That’s not at all paid vacation, rather just a really kind of crappy system of flex time. I’m curious, is there more to the story here… is there a new manager/owner who all of the sudden is coming in and changing policies? Is the employee new, took the vacation time without knowing about this “payback” policy and was only told after the fact?

    1. The Artist Formally Known As UKAnon*

      But apparently sick days and holidays don’t have to be made up, so I guess this is more people taking a day here or there that they’re trying to stop…?

      All very odd. I think that I would just be “going away” if I wanted time off without paying it back, and not mention that that means travelling from the bed to the sofa. Or a job interview.

      1. A Dispatcher*

        Holiday in this sense would be in terms of things like Christmas/new years etc, not in the sense of travelling or going away. So it sounds like unless the time is sick leave or a day the business is shut down for the holiday, any time taken off, be it a single day or weeks of travel, would need to be paid back.

        1. KH*

          I assume “going away” means quitting without notice to get as far away as possible from such an unreasonable employer.

      2. AcademiaNut*

        I assumed “holidays” refers to statutory holidays, like Christmas or New Year’s (which they actually get off), but if they take other non-sick leave, it has to be made up on weekends.

        1. Victoria Nonprofit (USA)*

          Yup, in the US “holiday” means a celebratory day (in this case, when the office is closed), like Christmas or Independence Day. It doesn’t mean travel or individual time away from work.

    2. Jeanne*

      I’m curious if anyone has tried to fight back, even to the extent of calmly saying “No thank you. I’ll use my vacation as vacation not flex time.” Has no one dared to do it? This policy is so abnormal that it seems someone would say no.

      1. MK*

        If the consequences of complaining is to get fired, I imagine anyone simply taking time off and not making it up will get fired too.

        This sounds bizarre, but I don’t understand what you are suggecting either. That people refuse to comply with this company policy?

        1. Jeanne*

          Yes. I am suggesting that sometimes when ridiculous people are called out on being ridiculous it can make a difference. Or to just say you’ll make it up later and never get to it. It’s very odd that a company with this many locations is doing this. I bet there’s a disconnect and not all locations or employees have to make up the time.

          Yes, you could get fired. But he alternative is absolute complete hell? Someone can afford to walk away and that person should test it.

    3. Graciosa*

      It sounds like this is a multi-national employer at some level, and hopefully of a decent size with a decent HR department. This sounds to me like a classic case of a rogue individual behaving very badly in a way that some higher ups would find appalling.

      I would absolutely find another job, but I would also be collecting evidence (emails are great, but starting your own written record of the leader’s statements with dates and times can also work) and taking it to someone in HR who reports through separate channels. I have a hard time imagining that anyone else in leadership thinks this is a great way to treat your workers.

      1. LBK*

        This is another time where I have to chime in and say I don’t understand the point of documenting this situation, especially if there’s already emails you can just easily forward to an HR rep asking for clarification. It doesn’t seem like this is a scenario where proving a pattern would be remotely necessary – if you’re so inclined, one instance of stating you basically can’t take vacation would be sufficient to go to HR immediately and say “Bob outlined our policy as X, can you confirm?”

        1. Graciosa*

          I suggested the log as an alternative to emails – sometimes the type of people who do this know enough not to put something this wrong in email – but yes, the OP could submit the question directly.

          The reason I suggested the log is that the kind of weasel who does this sort of thing is not unlikely to try to lie about it if called out. “I never said that” can be countered persuasively with a log.

          It sounds like the OP is actually afraid of losing the job, and having HR copy Bob in response to an email query may not help the situation. If the OP waits until he or she is leaving, there will probably be enough of a track record at that point to merit a log. “You say that all the time” is not as persuasive as a list with dates and times.

          Personally, I would like to leave this as a nice parting gift for Bob on my way out the door, but I absolutely support the OP standing up to Bob now if willing to do so.

          1. LBK*

            “I never said that” can be countered persuasively with a log.

            I think this is something that seems like it should happen in theory but is rarely true in practice. What’s to stop them from countering “Actually, you said it on 10/15 at 9:41AM” by just saying “No, I didn’t” again? It’s he said/she said either way because a log you write down yourself isn’t an official record.

            I think what makes a report like this believable isn’t details but demeanor and tone during the conversation. Frankly, the kind of employees I’ve dealt with in the past who were documenters were the kind with huge chips on their shoulders looking for retribution and with a habit of blowing small things way out of proportion to suit their narrative. The ones who were believable were the ones who could unemotionally describe a general situation to me because they came at it from the perspective of a problem that needed to be solved, not a demon boss who needed to be slain.

            1. LBK*

              And particularly if you do it as you’re leaving, it’s going to look like you don’t care about getting the problem fixed but that you just want revenge because the issue won’t be affecting you anymore.

            2. Stranger than fiction*

              I don’t think people mean log literally. When people say to document, it’s usually printing off of emails and policies from the employee handbook or database and things like that, to have at the ready if needed.

              1. LBK*

                Really? The times I’ve discussed it here previously, people are pretty explicit that they mean recording dates and exact wording of things that are said, because they expect to be able to use that to say “Actually, you said X on day Y” (just as in Graciosa’s example). I’m not sure how an employee handbook would be used to combat a manager claiming they never said something.

                1. Elizabeth West*

                  They could try to document by sending the manager an email like, “Hi Bob, just wanted to clarify what we talked about earlier, when you indicated I’m supposed to make up all my holiday time over the next 2498716897 weekends. Are we on the same page here?

                  If Bob says, “Yes, that’s what I meant,” or even “Yes,” then there’s your official documentation. But the Bobs of this world aren’t always so stupidly straightforward in writing. If something pretty egregious is going on, it’s helpful to make a note of it–“10/15/15: Spoke with Bob this morning re holiday policy. He indicated we need to make that time up by working weekends or we will be terminated.”

                  It’s not an official record, but it helps you remember just what Bob said, so you can review it before that unemotional conversation, which might take place weeks or even months later. And the conversation might not be with Bob–it could be with Bob’s manager or HR, etc.

                  I’m not advocating people be petty about it. Obviously you worked with some petty little immature jerks, but just because they used a log to be dicks doesn’t mean everyone does. Especially in cases of harassment, where most of the unwelcome contact would not be via email, a log can be useful in showing how often the contact took place.

                2. LBK*

                  I’ve definitely used the email trap, but that’s a completely different thing from making your own notes IMO – it’s straight from the horse’s mouth, so the whole conversation can proceed differently than if you’re just describing your own account of the situation.

                  Harassment is one of the few cases where I would agree that documentation is justified and often specifically requested because showing there was a pattern of behavior is part of the legal standard of making a claim (although even then, I don’t believe a personally created log is considered conclusive proof, but it may at least be enough to get an investigation going).

                  I also just can’t picture that for something as egregious as being forced to work to make up vacation time is something you’d be able to forget, and I’m a wildly forgetful person whose desk is covered in sticky note reminders. I sure remember the crappy stuff my manager from 5 years ago did that I tried to get him fired for.

                3. Stranger than fiction*

                  Oh I see, I guess I just don’t get how that would hold up in court, I just always imagine an employee being dismissed and then not having access to their computer this the saved hard copies.

                5. HM in Atlanta*

                  It’s all about helping you remember what happened exactly and when – for when you are talking to that senior leader that can make changes. It lets you talk in the facts – as you know them – not generalities. It’s the difference between matter-of-factly saying, “At our staff meeting on 10/14, Joan said anyone who complained about having to make up vacation time will be fired”
                  and saying “Joan won’t let us take vacation time!”. It’s not that the person listening has to immediately believe the statement, but if they have facts the person can talk to other people (and, oddly enough, people often will confess when presented with the facts – they usually have their explanation, but if the facts are true they might believe you already know that it happened)

            3. Miss Betty*

              Yes; I kept a log at one job where my supervisor had a habit of “forgetting” things she’d told me or claiming I didn’t do things when I absolutely had. I kept a daily log to cover my butt – which did nothing to help me when she decided to fire me. She basically sat in our final meeting and lied to my face about the very things I’d kept records of. Logging will help if your manager is a decent, reasonable person, but if she’s a malicious liar (I was her secretary and knew she lied about all kinds of things regarding many of her employees; horrible individual!) or even just living in her own unique reality, the log won’t help. It was such a relief to be fired!

            4. JB (not in Houston)*

              I guess I’ve just had bad luck then because I’ve worked with a number of people who have pulled the “I never said that” tactic. We learned to keep detailed notes, and those notes came in pretty handy on more than one occasion.

              1. LBK*

                Did these people back down once you were able to cite the log, though? I just can’t envision that someone who’s going to lie about saying something will concede if you’re able to cite a date and time.

                At most, I can see it being helpful as a sanity check for your own purposes that, for example, a pattern is as persistent as it seems in your head. But I wouldn’t try to use it in a conversation with someone else.

                1. Anna*

                  Frequently it’s not about backing down, it’s about them knowing they can’t take it any further. For one, if they dispute unemployment benefits and it goes to mediation, that’s in your back pocket and you can bring it up and that might mean the difference between receiving and not receiving benefits. It might also mean they can’t go over your head. There are benefits to it, even if it’s not “going to save my job or change this horrible person.”

            6. doreen*

              It’s not so much that the details make the report believable so much as that a lack of them doesn’t give the person it’s being reported much of a starting point. (you wouldn’t ever be using the log in a conversation with the person you are complaining about) and also that there are going to be details you won’t remember if you don’t write them down. For example, it may not be “On 10/15 at 9:41 am, Bob said we have to make up vacation time by working weekends” but ” On 10/15 at a meeting where Fergus and Percival were also present, Bob said we have to make up vacation time by working weekends” . I’ll surely remember what Bob said for a long time- but I might not remember that Percival and Fergus were there for nearly as long. Or I might remember others were there, but not who. In this particular case , I don’t think a log matters but that’s because I don’t see a reason to wait for a pattern before complaining.

    4. MashaKasha*

      So assuming the place has five-day work weeks, it would take ten weeks to make up a 4-week vacation.

      20 weeks if they have six work weeks or if the employee still wants to take a day off every week (understandably). That’s the same as telling your employees not to take vacation. I agree with Allison’s comment about them needing to compete for being the first one out the door. That’s crazy.

    5. Miles*

      I don’t know how relevant this is but this reminds me of a company my brother used to work for. He would take his vacation time as it became available to just take a day off & relax (Which is to say, he got one day every few weeks, and he would get permission from his boss so he could take the day on the same schedule). This wasn’t the sort of place where being one person short for one day would cause major problems but it was the sort of company that hired exclusively non-protected-class minorities because they knew those people wouldn’t have as many alternatives for finding a better work-environment (Or whatever reason, I don’t know what all the factors were that went into the hiring decisions).

      I’ve spoken to my brother’s boss & he had nothing but praise about my brother’s work ethic and said he was fun to work with and so on… Anyway on one of those vacation days my brother getting a phone call from boss’s boss and gets chewed out how he was taking far too many days off and some vague threats of being fired, and so on. Nobody reported them or anything but I don’t think the company is around any more.

    6. Joa*

      I also wonder if there is more to #5.

      I go out of my way to let employees have the vacation times that they want. However, my organization has a public service component that has to be consistently staffed during certain hours. I’ve had (rare) situations where someone requested vacation on at a time where being short a person would cause major problems. In an effort to accommodate personal lives and preferences, I have worked with those individuals to shift swaps with other employees. That way they would get a day off that they really wanted, and we would have the staff in the office that we needed. But their request not be approved as vacation time. Since the other option would be to completely deny the time off, I think this is a reasonable compromise.

      In an environment with poor communication or a disgruntled employee, I could imagine a scenario like that being twisted and described similar to #5.

  2. Tex*

    #5 – There has to be a miscommunication somewhere. First of all, that’s a ridiculous workaround (why not just say there is no paid vacation?).

    Secondly, most european companies, especially German ones, take time off very seriously – when you are on vacation, you are cut off from the office to relax. A person in Germany working for a large international firm would probably have a minimum of 4 weeks off and no expectation of having to make it up. Is there a local HR person to ask? Maybe call the Michigan office just to (benignly) get clarification?

    2. De (Germany)*

      Legal minimum for someone working a 5-day-week in Germany is 21 days. At least white-collar workers usually get at least 26.

    3. Julia*

      I was gonna say the same thing. Germans take their vacation time VERY seriously.
      Maybe there’s a reason this employer moved its offices somewhere else…

      Could you maybe all talk and raise the issue together? I doubt they can afford to replace every employee at once.

        1. Aunt Jamesina*

          I’ve seen European companies with international presence approach this two ways… one is that some tend to be more European-style in their leave and vacation policies, but there are also companies that seem to get greedy and think “great, now we don’t have to provide as much time off!”. I don’t know that being a subsidiary of a German company has all that much to do with this letter, sadly. Most companies will have completely different HR policies in each country, since laws are so different everywhere.

      2. Aim Away From face*

        “… the employer is in Michigan (owned by an international German company).”

        That’s what.

      3. Apollo Warbucks*

        De and Aim Away From face, I think the point that MK was making that if the employee is working in the US, any German employment law is unlikely to apply.

        1. LBK*

          I don’t think it’s about the employment law but rather the cultural expectation – that presumably someone from a country where vacation is treated to seriously would apply that frame of mind elsewhere even if it weren’t legally required. I don’t know if that’s a reasonable assumption in this case, though, because a foreign owner doesn’t usually have much influence over the culture of their branches abroad; those usually default to the local culture unless they make a specific effort to extend their home culture.

          1. Ad Astra*

            I’m also not sure that’s a reasonable assumption, but it’s an interesting thought. Without knowing more about the company, it’s hard to assess how much influence the German owners have on the U.S. branches of the company.

            It is likely, though, that OP’s manager is not handling vacation time as instructed. In the U.S., four weeks of vacation is generous enough to be a pretty good recruitment and retention tool; if employees have to “make up” their vacation, the recruiting and retention value of that policy is out the window.

          2. Anna*

            But I would argue the reason there’s 4 weeks to start with is because of cultural expectation of your parent company. I doubt very seriously that if the company were NOT owned by a German company, there’s no way in hell they’d offer that generous a vacation package. So they’re adopting some of the cultural expectations but none of the actual requirements of letting employees take that time off?

              2. Witty Nickname*

                Yep. My company starts at about 3.5 weeks per year. I’ve been here almost 9 years, and am up to 5.5 weeks. (And I’m in CA so I don’t lose my time at the end of the year. We have a cap on accrual, and I get enough time now that I have to keep an eye on how many hours I have so I can make sure I don’t hit my accrual limit).

                Even with a couple days off between now and Christmas, and then two weeks off for Christmas and New Years, I’ll still start next year with over 200 hours of pto.

        2. Allison*

          True, but if it’s a German company, they’d probably want all their employees to get adequate time off, including employees in the US.

            1. LBK*

              I’d agree, particularly if the company was bought after already being established in the US. My company’s parent company is Canadian and that has basically no influence on our workplace culture.

            2. Elizabeth West*

              I have to agree with this. A former workplace of mine was owned by a global company based in Sweden, and although they set broad HR policies, their attitude toward management of the companies they owned was pretty hands-off.

              We wouldn’t have gotten the same perks as any of the European companies. But I doubt that the US corporate office would have looked kindly on a policy like this one, either. It might be worth bringing it to their attention.

        3. De (Germany)*

          Of course it doesn’t. I’d even say that the company being owned by a German company probably has no effect on how vacation time is handled.

          1. hbc*

            It probably depends. Large multi-national, they may have opened up locations in the US specifically to take advantage of our terrible labor system.

            On the other hand, I work in the US at a Dutch family-owned company, and we get two paid week-long shutdowns plus 12 days right at signing on. The Dutch don’t exactly have the reputation for wasting money, but they can’t imagine stiffing people in this particular way.

          2. KR*

            The company I work for is owned by a Belgium-based parent company, and while anyone who works an average of at least 20 hrs accrues vacation time quarterly, it is nowhere near the paid month off that most people in Belgium enjoy (according to Huffington Post).

      4. Anna*

        Because as De (Germany) noted the company is owned by a German company, and even it weren’t sometimes it’s helpful to know how other countries approach this stuff.

  3. Apollo Warbucks*

    #5 I’m confused by this, the OP says that all the time must be made up but then says sickness and holidays are allowed without making the time up.

    If the policy is that if an employee wants to take an odd day off in the week they have to make the day up later but could still take week of to go on vacation without making the time up, that’s still bad but not as bad.

    I’ve never heard of that sort of restriction on taking PTO and have always been able to book half days at a minimum and I think it’s unreasonable of the company to not permit booking a day or half day.

    2. Ask a Manager* Post author

      It’s holidays in the American sense, not the British one — so meaning federal holidays like Thanksgiving, Christmas, Memorial Day, etc. In other words, they don’t have to make up those days (which the whole office gets off) or sick days, but any vacation days have to be made up.

      1. The Artist Formally Known As UKAnon*

        Ah, OK, ignore my comment above then. Sorry!

        Wouldn’t you be tempted just to “be ill” and oh look happened to go on family holiday while I was recovering from the flu? At least until you can escape the madness.

        1. A Dispatcher*

          My guess is in a company that treats vacation like this, sick time us probably pretty heavily scrutinized as well (not a lot of days, Dr’s note required, etc).

          Also my apologies for repeating Alison above, hadn’t scrolled down far enough to see she also clarified the holiday thing.

    3. Polka Dot Bird*

      #5 I was also confused – perhaps time off on *public* holidays doesn’t have to be made up for?

      Why on earth would you let someone go on leave for four weeks and only then tell them no? This situation is weird and shows very poor management and I would be looking to change jobs, frankly.

    4. Apollo Warbucks*

      Thank you for clearing that up for me. In the UK bank holidays are not normally included in employess own allowance and are given on top (so 25 days plus 8 bank holidays)

      That is completey crazy, so employees at this company are not being offered any PTO at all, that’s appalling and I really hope the stupid policy is explained before people start working there as otherwise it’s a complete bait and switch, especially as 4 weeks sounds like a pretty generous allowance.

      1. Quirk*

        Legal minimum in the UK is 28 days including bank holidays – i.e. 20 days plus 8 public. Depending on the field, bank holidays and personal allowance may be lumped in together and you may have the option to work on bank holidays – this is pretty common in software in my experience. Given it’s the legal minimum, 4 weeks doesn’t sound so very generous to my British ears, but I’m aware Americans don’t like spending quite so much time off.

        However, it’s still 28 days even if you’re working a 6-day week (not sure how common this is, there may be one or two fields in which working 48 hours over 6 days is usual but I haven’t encountered them personally) and this would be worse than the deal OP #5 is getting here. I’d expect a policy like this to make employee retention difficult though.

        1. blackcat*

          “… but I’m aware Americans don’t like spending quite so much time off….”

          It’s not that we don’t like spending time off, it’s that there are no laws guaranteeing time off. Some states have additional rules, but this basically means that different industries have totally different standards. Low-wage workers in most states get absolutely no paid vacation and sick time and often will be fired for taking unpaid time (including sick days), too.

          1. K.*

            I’m American and based in the US, but worked for two European companies. I have been spoiled by having 4-5 weeks’ PTO in the past. (One company offered 4 weeks AND the company was closed at Christmas.) I’m looking for a new job due to a layoff and am terrified about potentially going back to a company that only offers a week or two.

            1. Kyrielle*

              Remember that you can negotiate vacation, at least in some cases, as well as looking for companies with a generous policy initially. They do exist. :)

            2. Just another techie*

              I have fairly generous leave (15 days vacation, unlimited sick leave, and 10 fixed holidays) and I still don’t travel for more than about 8-9 days at a time, because I find I get sick of living in hostels and eating restaurant food every day. Even if I’m staying at a friend or relative’s home, I still get homesick.

          2. MashaKasha*

            I once emailed an old college friend in my home country with an update on our life – “we took a vacation, went to the Dominican for a week with the kids”. She writes back, “that’s cool, but what did you do during the rest of your vacation?” I didn’t know how to explain to her that the rest of my vacation was 1-2 more weeks PTO that I had to save for things like family emergencies, kids’ doctor appointments and school events, a day here and there to unwind…

          4. Retail Lifer*

            I would LIKE to take more time off, but since I don’t get sick days I have to make sure I have extra vacation days to use as sick time. Plus, in my field you can’t take time off if there’s no one to cover you, and that’s often the case. So I can take one week of vacation, but I need to save the other 5 days for emergencies and I probably wouldn’t have the coverage for another full week in a row anyway.

            The concept of legally mandated vacation time in some of the above-mentioned Europoean countries just blows my mind.

          5. Elizabeth West*

            I would kill for four weeks plus bank holidays. That sounds like heaven. It’s enough to make me move to Europe. We don’t take time off because we don’t get time off, not because we don’t want it.

            A few years ago in my chat room, I was talking to a friend who lives in Paris–she was planning a hiking trip to the Swiss Alps. We asked her, “Didn’t you just go on holiday?” She said yes but we get X days, etc. All the Americans were freaking out. When we told her we only got a week or two, she said, “That’s barbaric!”

            1. Lily in NYC*

              My ridiculous vacation time is the main reason I’ve been working at the same place for so long. I get 5 weeks plus holidays and an extra 4 floating holidays. AND, the best part is that they let us sell back up to 10 days at the end of the year. I just don’t know how I could give that up and go back to 3 weeks (I wouldn’t take a job if it only had two weeks). I consider my vacation time to be golden handcuffs.

              1. MashaKasha*

                Ohhh I’d put up with so much in exchange for being able to take three weeks PTO (plus four floating holidays) AND sell two weeks back!

                My current job had zero days PTO, zero personal, and two sick days for the first six months. One week PTO and two personal for the next six months. They later changed their policies to be more competitive. But my first year here was painful. That also happened to be the year when I had to take kid #2 on college visits. There was a lot of shuffling time around and borrowing PTO from a year ahead to make things work.

            2. MashaKasha*

              My “European friend” story is actually about a friend of an ex, who was visiting here from Marseilles, he took her to NYC for a week and I tagged along (that was before we became exes.) One morning, he was accompanying her on an errand she had, it was the morning rush and the subway was packed. Ex’s friend asked what were all those people doing taking a train this early in the day. Ex replies that they’re going to work, friend goes into shock and asks, “But why are they going to work? It’s SUMMER!” Do people really get the whole summer off in France or was she messing with us?

              1. Chocolate Teapot*

                I have worked with some French people who take a block of 3 weeks off in the summer, and traditionally everything shuts down in July-August. Good old “Conges Annuels”!

              2. Marcela*

                In Spain, the city I lived almost completely stopped in August. Most government offices were opened just half day, the university was closed and only restaurants and souvenir shops were open full time, since it was the crazy season for anybody in tourism. We truly miss that.

        2. Aim Away From face*

          “… I’m aware Americans don’t like spending quite so much time off.”

          I’m not American, but even I know that’s crap. *Everybody* likes taking time off, but their godawful work culture often makes it very, very difficult.

          1. Sans*

            Yes, this, exactly.

            I have 22 PTO days plus 10 holidays. Which isn’t bad, but my last job gave me 28 days and 11 holidays. However, I’ve never been able to negotiate vacation days when changing companies. I do realize, however, that for the U.S., I’m doing better than most. I would LOVE to have another week or two off — but I’m not holding my breath.

            1. Ad Astra*

              “More than half of Americans, 56%, have not taken a vacation in the last year, according to the insurance company Allianz Global Assistance . The survey defined vacation as a week off from work during which those surveyed traveled at least 100 miles away from home.”

              Well heck, I’ve only ever taken one vacation in my 5 years as a full-time professional.

        3. Apollo Warbucks*

          I know the minimum is 20 days but a lot of places offer a little bit more and the last two jobs I’ve had offer 25 days as a minimum and I was just using it as an example of how I’ve seen holiday entitlement expressed

          I’ve never seen bank holidays lumped in with regular holidays (even in retail when I worked most of them), but I guess that’s down to how the employer decides to handle it.

          I’m not sure how a 28 day allowance a year for working 6 days a week would be a worse deal than the OP is getting, at least that’s 4.6 weeks of holiday (which is 1 week less than someone working 5 days a week ) It’s way better than only getting the public holidays.

          And I’m sure plenty of Americans would like more time off than they get, just the law doesn’t force it so people go without.

          1. Ad Astra*

            Since the law doesn’t force time off, there’s an incentive to skip vacations in order to get ahead. That’s why so many Americans take less than their allotted PTO each year. And for companies, there’s a real incentive to offering less PTO — because it means you can get away with hiring fewer people. A good vacation package will help a company compete for the best and brightest employees, but there’s no need to bother in fields with a glut of eager talent.

            Honestly, though, I think there’d be some real resistance if someone tried to change the laws.

            1. Jax*

              Oh, absolutely! Politicians would be screaming about the potential crash and burn of small businesses–Ma and Pa Corner Store, Murica!–because the owners can’t afford paid time off for their employees.

              (See also: maternity leave in the US.)

                1. Anna*

                  Portland, OR is made paid sick leave mandatory for all businesses. Before the city council passed it, one of the small businesses I support and generally like made a post asking for people to consider them and what it will do to their business and were soundly called out by their fans and customers. The owners’ argument was that they couldn’t afford to give sick leave, but they make up for it by being cool employers and other shows of thanks (paraphrasing). If you’d like to know how horribly it turned out for them, they started as a food cart and within two years of that ordinance being passed became brick and mortar. Maybe it pushed back their timeline, but it certainly didn’t spell their doom.

                2. Sparkly Librarian*

                  Ugh, Anna, they were in food service but made their employees work while sick? Not a good — though hardly unusual — situation. I’m surprised they admitted that in public.

                3. Anonyby*

                  Anna–California recently put a similar law into effect (started July this year). My job was generous in giving me the full amount required–three full days, rather than three of the part-days that are on my schedule.

        4. Sunshine Brite*

          Taking time off is so hard. I took 3 days last week and am actually making up a lot of the time this week trying to catch back up. It probably would’ve been easier just to work.

          1. MK*

            When your work is project based, time off is a relative concept. There approximately 8 days per month and 15 each summer that I have to come in at work; for the rest I am just assigned work to do by a certain deadline. Theoretically I could not work for two weeks each month, but I wouldn’t call that time off, since I will have to do the work anyway at some time.

        5. Bend & Snap*

          Americans definitely like time off. Our policies are crappy here.

          I went from 6 weeks vacation and 14 paid holidays to 3 weeks vacation and 8 paid holidays when I changed jobs. It blows.

        6. KR*

          I agree with the others that the statement that Americans not liking time off isn’t accurate. America simply doesn’t have the protections in place that many European countries do to guarantee a work-life balance. No mandatory maternity leave, other than FMLA which is unpaid, and no mandatory vacation time. Furthermore, because of the way our health care system is set up, it is very costly for businesses to hire someone for more than 29 hour a week so finding full time work can be very difficult. Part time work almost never offers a good benefit package.

        7. Creag an Tuire*

          I’d also add that because the time off isn’t mandatory, even people who have enough voluntary PTO to take lengthy vacations are often very nervous about using it. There’s a pervasive attitude of “if they find out they can get along without you for a whole month, they might decide they don’t need you at all”.

      2. Ad Astra*

        FWIW, U.S. bank/state/federal holidays are generally not included in PTO, either. Generally, you have one pool for vacation, one pool for sick days, and anywhere from 6 to 10 predetermined holidays. Some companies lump vacation and sick days into the same pool, but holidays (in the American sense of the word) are almost always separate. So at my company, I get 5 vacation days (lol seriously), something like 8 sick days, and 9-10 holidays each year.

        1. Stranger than fiction*

          We used to have all our vacation and sick time in one pool of PTO, but some law just changed and they had to separate sick and vacation. Good ol’ California.

          1. neverjaunty*

            California doesn’t require PTO to be separated out into sick and vacation time. It’s perfectly legal here to have a pool of PTO and require employees to use that for any time off. What law are they telling you changed?

            1. F.*

              The are probably referring to the mandatory sick pay laws. I am struggling with how to become compliant to one that will soon be enforced in our city. We currently have a bucket of PTO, starting at 8 days and working up to 13 days at two full years of employment (pathetic, but that is another rant). We will be required to offer 7 days of sick leave. If we go back to segregating sick leave from vacation/personal, in order to track it, then people will get only *1* day of vacation during each of their first two years. Or we have to require a reason to take PTO every single time someone wants off so we can determine whether it is “sick leave” as required by law (which covers a whole lot more than just an ill employee) or vacation. A manager’s nightmare brought on by well-meaning non-managers who can’t see beyond first stage consequences.

              1. neverjaunty*

                This particular nightmare is actually brought on by not-so-well-meaning businesses that don’t give sick leave, especially if you’re in the city I think you’re referring to.

                I sympathize that tracking this is a PITA, but I don’t see this as separate from your rant, either. Your company apparently has already built in the idea that people get no more than 1-2 weeks of time off for ANY reason. There’s no reason they have to decide ‘fine, if we have to give a week of sick leave, you all get one day off vacation, nyeah’. And couldn’t you just ask the employees to state whether PTO is sick leave y/n, and if it is, then it comes off the mandated sick leave period before dipping into PTO?

              2. Stranger than fiction*

                Yeah, my employer just ended up separating out 3 of our 21 days for sick knowing that most people need more vacay since it can technically be used for either. The only bummed people were those that never ever get sick but they pointed out they can use it for dr and dentist appointment too.

        2. LBK*

          This distinction always makes me wonder if the disparity in US vs. European vacation policies isn’t actually as huge as it sounds, since my understanding is that (for example) having “30 days of vacation” in Europe includes the 10 or so days where the office is closed, but in the US it doesn’t. So having 1 week of vacation in the US and having 3 weeks in Europe would actually mean the exact same thing.

          1. Ask a Manager* Post author

            I was wondering the exact same thing last night. Two weeks vacation in the U.S. (which is sort of the stingiest, lowest level in most professional jobs) plus the paid 10 holidays is the equivalent of four weeks off. Many people in the U.S. get three or four weeks off, or more, which along with the 10 holidays is the equivalent of five or six weeks off. Which probably doesn’t sound quite as terrible to the Europeans, I’d guess

            1. Ad Astra*

              Of course, 10 paid holidays is on the high end for most U.S. companies. Columbus Day and Veterans Day are work days in most industries. (And I would happily trade my Columbus/Veterans days for two more days of PTO, but that’s just me.)

              1. LBK*

                I think most people probably get a minimum of 7: MLK Day, Memorial Day, July 4th, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years. President’s Day and Good Friday are in the mix sometimes, too (they’re stock market holidays, so many companies in the finance world will be closed). That’s still over an extra week of “vacation,” per the standard used in the UK and possibly elsewhere.

                1. Ad Astra*

                  Yeah, I think 7 is probably the most common. And lots of businesses offer a “floating” holiday. I had one company that gave us a holiday for our birthday — which I liked, because I hate working on my birthday.

            2. neverjaunty*

              1) Lots of people in the US don’t have ‘professional jobs’, though, and two weeks’ time off != two weeks paid vacation.

              2) Private businesses aren’t actually required to be closed on what Europeans call bank holidays. When your local Safeway or Whole Foods is open a half day on Thanksgiving, people are working there. (They may or may not get extra pay for that work.) And people in professional jobs may very well find themselves working on holidays as well.

              3) There’s no special legal accommodation for people whose religious observances don’t match the mainstream.

              1. Ask a Manager* Post author

                Of course. But I think people from other countries often get a distorted picture of what’s typical in professional jobs here and think everyone is stuck at two weeks vacation, which is very much not the case.

              2. LBK*

                I don’t know the nuances of the laws, but I’d imagine plenty of service industry locations are open on European holidays as well – that doesn’t seem like it would be something unique to the US. Furthermore, many “non-professional” jobs in the US do offer paid vacation time for full-time employees – the two large, well-known retail/food service companies I worked for both did. If you’re part-time, arguably part of the trade off is that you have schedule flexibility built into your role. You could take a 4-day vacation without having to use time off just by arranging your schedule accordingly, which isn’t an option for someone who has to work 5 days a week to make up a full-time schedule.

                1. Hiring Mgr*

                  However you slice it, the average European gets far more time off/vacation than the average American. It’s just part of the culture there (except for Bulgaria of course)

                2. neverjaunty*

                  I’m not following the assumption that part-time jobs and the freedom to set one’s own schedule so as to have a de facto vacation go hand-in-hand. Whether a part-timer gets to freely rearrange their own hours depends very much on the job (and as you note, is unlikely to be something that can be achieved with PTO). Large national companies often give retail/service workers PTO, but that’s not mandated. San Francisco recently passed a very minimal sick-leave law because it’s SOP for restaurants in that tourism-heavy city to give no sick leave, and if you’re making minimum wage that you don’t get if you don’t work…

                  And sure, it wouldn’t surprise me to hear that European countries don’t completely shut down on holidays; I was just observing that “counting” bank holidays as some kind of official PTO is misleading, since there’s not actually a requirement that private businesses close on those days or treat them as PTO.

                4. LBK*

                  All I’m saying is yes, there are plenty of places in the US that have awful PTO policies, but there are also plenty that have good ones, too. The absence of a law mandating a minimum doesn’t mean every company in the country feels free to screw over their employees as much as they can because they recognize its importance in attracting talent, retaining good people, not having employees burn out, etc.

                  Such a law would certainly be nice for those who are stuck in jobs like the OP’s, but let’s also not act like every single US company is grinding their employees down until they keel over and die at their desk, which is often what the attitude feels like around here when it comes to discussing US labor laws. I’m sure there’s also a contingent of companies every country that does have more strict labor laws where bad managers still find ways to circumvent them or find other ways to generally be horrible to their employees.

                  It just feels sometimes like a running theme any time US vs the rest of the world comes up here is “the US is a uniformly awful place to work and Europe is the best!”

                5. neverjaunty*

                  You’re doing that thing where you take an argument, alter it so that it’s a much more extreme position than was actually presented, and then attack the extreme-position-nobody-actually-argued.

                  Nobody has said that every single company in the US screws over its employees. Nobody has said that every single employee in America is worse off than every single employee in the EU. But it is absolutely true that even taking into account the variations across states (and some states are pretty awful), US workers have no guarantee of paid vacation or even sick days, and while we can talk a lot about ‘professional norms’, people who are not so lucky as to have professional jobs are much worse off. If you work in food service for a large chain like Starbucks that wants a good corporate image, you may well have access to reasonable treatment and PTO. If you work at Bob’s Fine Foods, maybe not so much.

                6. Ask a Manager* Post author

                  I understand what LBK is saying. It’s actually the same point I was trying to make: Many European commenters here sound like they think everyone in the U.S. has really stingy PTO, and don’t realize that it’s not at all uncommon for people to have pretty decent PTO (at least more than said commenters seem to be envisioning). That’s not saying that everyone has great PTO in the U.S. or that there’s a legal guarantee of it (and certainly those things matter), but it’s saying “hey, your perception of how this works for a lot of people may be off and this might be interesting info for you.”

            4. De (Germany)*

              The 21 day minimum in Germany (which is usually 28 days) is on top of New Year’s Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, Reunification Day, two days of Christmas, and between three and seven (I think?) other holidays, depending on what state you live in.

              1. De (Germany)*

                Forgot Labor Day and the Monday after Whitsunday. I live on one of the states with the least holidays now and it works out to 10 days that aren’t a Sunday anyway (Easter Sunday and Whitsunday also being public holidays).

                We don’t have the “bank holiday” concept, so Reunification Day or All Saints Day or Labor Day etc falling on a weekend doesn’t mean we have Monday off.

                (yes, most of our holidays are Christian holidays…)

            5. Quirk*

              Well, 28 days is the legal minimum in UK, and seen as somewhat stingy. My friend working in an investment bank has 39, which is generous; more normal would be low-to-mid 30s. Six weeks off would be within the bounds of acceptability here, provided sick leave didn’t come out of that, as that’s treated separately.

          2. M*

            I can’t speak for all of Europe, but in Scandinavia you would not count holidays as part of your vacation. They are just a bonus :)

            1. Merry and Bright*

              It’s the same in the UK. A minimum of 20 leave days + the 8 statutory public holidays. Until about 20 years or so ago it was 20 days which could include the 8 public holidays but the government straightened this out to separate the 8 from the rest.

              I know some British people complain that we don’t get as many public holidays as some European countries. However, I believe that in some European countries if a public holiday (e.g. Christmas Day) falls on a Saturday or Sunday then that’s it. But in the UK we get the Monday or Tuesday as a statutory holiday instead.

              2. De (Germany)*

                Germany is like that. This year sucked because Labor Day and Reunification Day were on weekends.

            2. Marcela*

              In Spain vacation days are completely independent of the country’s holidays. If you have N days, that’s not counting any of the holidays, and you can take them together in just one go. Which is something many people do, in summer.

  4. Jeanne*

    #3, I don’t think I agree with the advice. You are a paying customer at the other location. You are not just picking on petty stuff. There are serious issues. I think you should use the online complaint form or the phone number. Stick to complaints that any paying customer would have, not things like following company procedures. You can remain anonymous for these complaints.

    If it is that bad though, why do you keep going back? If it is really that bad then maybe you want to shop elsewhere.

    1. nofelix*

      You never know how anonymous these things are. I feel it’s generally safe to assume you’re not anonymous for anything job-related and act appropriately. If you are uncovered as the source of a complaint, “I thought it was anonymous” doesn’t stop people being vindictive.

      That’s not to say one should be silent, but just speak up through the appropriate channels as Alison suggested and there’s less to worry about.

      1. Retail Lifer*

        My ex worked for an oil change place, who didsomething wrong when he got his own oil changed there. He complained to the manager, who didn’t care and refused to fix the situation, so he filled out an online complaint form. He actually got fired for that.

        If I were the OP, I’d find a complaint number and say something, but do it anonymously. There are some real issues that need to be resolved, but nevere trust anyone to handle things correctly when it’s something that gets them in trouble.

    2. MK*

      Three times in two months is the same as the OP becoming a regular. And there are a lot of reasons for going to a coffeeshop you are disatisfied with, location being the first that comes to mind. I have frequented subpar places when I was a student, simply because I didn’t have time between classes to go to better ones that were further away.

      In fact, a location that provides a “captive” clientele (in the sense that it would be very inconvenient for people to go elsewhere) can lead to bad quality service, because the clients keep coming, so the bussiness sees no reason to improve. When you have seven coffee shops within 100 meters of eachother, they are usually all excellent.

      2. nofelix*

        Yeah, universities often have this issue of limited choice if they’re not city campuses, and resulting lack of competition and quality.

        1. KR*

          I know what you mean. The cafe at our school was run by an outside vendor and the service there was terrible sometimes, especially if you wanted to grab something really quickly before class because there would only be one employee running the sub shop and the burrito bar and one register open with a ten minute wait in line to get rung up (or sometimes the attendant was in the back doing whatever and you had to try to flag them down to pay). They finally passed out a survey for the students, and soon after they began having a second cash register open during busy periods and having more employees on but it didn’t matter that the service was lousy because they were the only cafe on campus and all others were a ten minute drive away.

      3. Anony-Moose*

        Totally. There is only one coffee shop of a major US chain by my office and I’ll go there for specific foods or to take a bit of a walk (versus the indie coffee shop next door). This particular branch of the chain…isn’t great. Messy, slow, brusque. Not on brand. I keep meaning to write to the manager or headquarters but I also keep going there because of what it offers and the fact that it’s the only one I can walk to from my office.

    3. LQ*

      I think that speaking up through the supervisor might get more attention than an anon complaint online. Not saying that you couldn’t also do the anon complaint thing, but if that just goes to that store manager and that store manager already has shown they don’t care then it might not matter. But if you have a manager of another store going up to a regional supervisor that might draw more attention.

    4. Paige Turner*

      I worked for a certain large coffee chain for years. Most likely, everyone (within the company and outside it) knows that this is the “bad” store. Ask your manager about it, but I’m guessing she already knows.

    5. Stranger than fiction*

      I recently decided to use an online complaint form for a regional fast-food chain here. And it was absolutely ridiculous the hoops I had to jump through. First a code from my receipt (ok understandable), then a predetermined multiple choice most of which didn’t apply to my complaint, then finally after like 20 steps, the very last part I got to write in a free text box what my complaint was. I’m assuming this is purposeful to deter the number of online complaints.

  5. Cat H (UK)*

    Is it really poaching if it’s from Linked In?

    I think of poaching like you work with another company as part of your job, they liked you and so they “poached” you from the company you’re working for.

    2. nofelix*

      I think ‘poaching’ means the new hire wasn’t looking to change jobs, but were persuaded by a better offer. Some people seem to think it’s unethical for some reason, thus the pejorative.

      2. LBK*

        I think it’s usually only considered unethical if it plays on an existing relationship – ie, a manager gets a new job and takes members of their old team with them. Recruiting someone randomly on LinkedIn wouldn’t meet that standard.

      3. Stranger than fiction*

        I always thought poaching specifically when a competing company or client your company does business with recruits you. Not just an unrelated company recruiting your through linkedin.

    3. MK*

      Yes, I don’t understand why the OP is using this word; poaching to me suggests being approached and hired either by a competitor or a bussiness associate of your employer. I think the OP us placing too much importance on the fact that the company approached her without her expressing interest; it’s a sign that they are interested, not a guarantee of any kind.

      1. The Other Alice*

        Well, I think it depends a little. If a recruiter approached them then it probably means almost nothing, if HR did then not much, but if the hiring manager did? I would see that as being more significant, personally. It’s obviously not a guarantee of anything but it would indicate more interest than normal to me.

    4. Miles*

      I think ‘headhunted’ would have been a clearer way to phrase that but on the other hand, I also think we all get the meaning anyway so all’s well that ends well for this particular case.

  6. Buttonhole*

    #2 I used to work in consultancy too, and billing rates were not that open. When we prepared bidding documents I had to go to great lengths to figure out people’s rates. But I was relatively junior. Is it really true that people with low rates are perceived to be unintelligent and lazy? It could be your perception. But if others are implying that as well then you are working in a toxic work environment. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt! Problem is consultancy tends to be cut-throat especially when there isn’t enough projects for all- hope that isn’t the case in your industry. There isn’t much you can do. All you can change is your perception and behaviour. First, stop caring what others may say if you are promoted. Second, don’t make yourself guilty of this same immature behaviour by gossiping with others about this topic. Doing so will just add to the fire. And third, focus on doing your best right now regardless of rates. And when the time comes, you leave to work in a more mature environment.

    1. Stranger than fiction*

      Yes, well put. It sounds like it’s just this company’s culture, as the Op does say they’re very catty. Sounds easier said than done, but try to rise above and be the one who doesn’t participate and make it known why you don’t participate and perhaps at least some of the coworkers will follow suit and change their attitude.

      1. Engineer2*

        Poster of #2 here! You are right. The lazy thing is being implied by many. It’s really uncomfortable. I think I know deep down the problem is the company culture which lets these terrible comments continue. Im ashamed to say that sometimes I’m dragged into the gossip too. I’m going to make a more serious effort not to engage anymore.

        1. SCR*

          I’m really confused by this though… I’ve worked at a digital agency and a consultancy and our rates were determined by level, not by pay rate. Which is not the same thing. So someone with a lower rate isn’t lazy, they are more junior.

          And I was making like 35% of my rate. I was exempt and paid x for salary and if you really went and divided it out by a standard hours per week of 40 over 52 week then that hourly was nowhere near what clients paid for my time. And I always worked more than 40 hours. This was pretty across the board.

          As an Account Director, I know everyone’s rates. I have to to do estimates, but their rate doesn’t directly correlate to their salary, which is how the company makes money — there’s a margin. I’m really confused why rate would ever lead you to exact salary. To figure out my margins on projects I get a average actual rate from Finance — which also includes operational staff and overhead and that determines my profit.

          Your company sounds like it’s doing billable very differently I guess, and how is that at all profitable?

          1. SCR*

            There’s bands of course by level so I could make an intelligent guess on what everyone makes, but that’s really standard. For example a Sr. Associate could make 50k to 65k depending on numerous factors but my rate for them would always be $150 an hour.

          2. Bonnie*

            At my firm billing rates are total salary divided by number of client chargeable hours expected from the employee times 3 for overheads and margins. Now like your firm we did it by position where we totaled the salaries and the expected hours for everyone at the same level and then multiplied by 3. But there would no reason why we couldn’t have a rate for each individual person. We just don’t because our contracts are standardized and have the same rate for each level is easier. So if you know the formula and they decide to create billing rates by individual, it would be easy to determine someone’s salary.

  7. Argh!*

    I have to admit, since finding out that my boss makes twice what I do, I’ve become a bit resentful. I wish now that I didn’t know.

    1. LBK*

      Well…they’re the boss. Presumably you knew they were making at least some amount more than you, and if you ever got promoted, you’d want to be making a lot more than you make now, right?

        1. Ad Astra*

          For me, that would depend on the actual numbers. If I’m making $30K, it doesn’t seem inappropriate that my boss is making $60K. But if I’m making $60k, I wouldn’t love the idea of my boss making $120k.

          Really, though, I’d be more interested to know how my salary compares to my peers who do similar work.

          1. LBK*

            I suspect the $60k/$120k split actually exists on my team because a few of my coworkers report directly to our VP, who I would expect to be making a minimum of six figures for her level of responsibility.

            Just like with any job, manager salaries are about the worth you bring and the expectations for the role. I can see the inclination to think of theirs as a multiple of yours, but that’s not really how they’re approached when being set, nor do I think it should be. If you were moving into a management position, I assume you would want to be paid your worth for the work you’d be doing just like anyone else – not paid a relative multiplier to the average salaries of your team just for their vague emotional protection.

            Can you identify what about that even makes you uncomfortable/angry?

            1. Koko*

              Exactly – salaries are more or less determined by basic supply and demand. At entry level, you are competing with a huge pool of other job-seekers with little to no job experience. That competition drives the price of hiring you down.

              As you move up the ladder and gain more experience and more accomplishments, you have less and less competition from other candidates who are equally well-qualified as you are. The scarce supply of accomplished candidates with experience as a high-level manager drives up the price of hiring one.

              A company that decided to pay its top executives less out of a sense of fairness would in all likelihood be forced to hire significantly less competent, or at least less experienced and less proven, candidates because all the good candidates could easily accept another offer from a company that pays the market rate for their skills.

              3. Ad Astra*

                I think an employee’s views on this will be colored by how highly they think of their boss and how much value they think he/she brings to the company. In a lot of cases, people think their bosses are ineffective and are mostly getting by on the efforts of their lower-paid employees. Sometimes this is accurate, and sometimes it stems from a lack of understanding about what management does in that organization. Am I qualified to be CEO of my company? No, probably not. But what makes my company’s actual CEO qualified? I have no idea.

                Sometimes the market rewards people and skills in a way that doesn’t seem fair. Chemical engineers usually make more money than social workers and firefighters, but that doesn’t mean chemical engineers are more important to our society than social workers and firefighters. If market forces are rewarding your jerk boss for being good at math while he can barely string together coherent instructions for his team, you might resent that he makes so much more money.

                And, of course, if you’re struggling to pay your rent while your boss drives a Porsche to the office, that stings enough to cause some resentment. If you feel you’re fairly compensated, even an overpaid boss won’t bother you too much.

                A great boss who’s knowledgeable about her field and excellent at managing direct reports? Well, she deserves twice my salary. But she’s a rarity in many people’s experiences.

              1. LBK*

                Neither do plenty of non-managers. I don’t see how that should dictate market rates or salary expectations for people who do actually do their jobs.

                1. Not Karen*

                  Exactly. People who don’t do any work shouldn’t get to keep their job but get paid less; they should be fired because they aren’t doing their job.

      2. Laurel Gray*

        My (great) boss BETTER make more than twice what I make, she’s worth every penny. If I had her job I would be writing into AAM on a biweekly basis and in the Friday Open thread within the first 30 minutes of it being posted.

      3. Kai*

        I think those feelings are valid, though. I’m glad I don’t know my bosses’ salary–they’re great and I’m sure they earn every penny, but I’d still rather not know.

        1. Mabel*

          It’s worse when you find out that you make less than the people who report to you. This wasn’t me, but I have seen it in a few situations.

    2. MashaKasha*

      I’d be fine with my boss making twice what I do, since his job is also three times the PITA that mine is.

      I did however have a similar reaction at OldJob, after finding out that the CEO made something like a hundred times what I did, plus a 100% bonus. They sent us a booklet once a year in the mail with that information. I only looked at the first one; the next ones all went straight into the trash. I just don’t want to know.

    3. MAB*

      I recently found out my employee makes almost 1.5x what I do (with overtime). I am not resentful in the slightest.

    4. MK*

      It depends. When I first started my current work, my supervisor had 20 years seniority and was responsible for our whole department; I would have been fine with them making double my salary. Now my supervisor has only about 8 years seniority and not the same responsibility, so I would think the pay discrepancy unfair.

    5. Lia*

      This is one of the hazards of working for government. Salaries are public, but it still stings to see your boss making 100K more than you do, or finding out you’re the lowest paid employee in your department, and a high school grad makes more than you do, when you have a master’s.

      I did get a (small) raise, and am now the second lowest paid staffer. I make a decent living, but I try not to think “that person makes more than my partner and I combined!”.

      1. chumpwithadegree*

        On the other hand, the State of California’s promotions are about 5 to 10% more for a supervisor, who is not entitled to overtime, so it is not unusual for employees to be paid more than their supervisors.

  8. Mimi*

    On #3, I was in Ireland in March and frequented a chain that was exactly as the OP described. The shop in Cork was dreadful. The shop in Dublin was wonderful. I wondered how they could be so different and figured they were franchises, privately managed. I did come away with a less-than-stellar opinion of the chain, unfortunately.

  9. Sarah in DC*

    #5, is this changing the terms of work enough that the LW could apply for unemployment if they decided to leave without another job lined up? (Can’t remember what the official term is for that concept) Or does that not apply to a benefits changes?
    Note: I’m not suggesting that the LW should quit without something lined up over this, just curious what the impact would be if they did.

      1. Sarah in DC*

        I think so, although based on a quick google it sounds like that doesn’t apply here since in the US there seems to be a pretty high bar for what would cause a reasonable person to be compelled to resign. Is there a concept that considers that this workplace is essentially changing the terms of the work (similar to reducing a salary)? I know that a reduction in salary isn’t illegal, but could you claim unemployment for a dramatic change in the terms of your employment?

        1. Apollo Warbucks*

          From the little I know about US employment law I doubt there’s any such protection as nearly all employees are at will. However Wikipedia tells me that unemployment can be denied for the following reasons:

          The worker is unavailable for work
          The worker quit his or her job
          The worker was fired
          Refusing suitable work
          Unemployment resulting from a labor dispute

          I guess if the terms and conditions of employment were changed and then rejected by an employee they would have to argue about what defined “suitable work” and the company could argue that the employee quit or the unemployment is due to a labor dispute.

          1. LQ*

            This varies from state to state. (Some states most fired workers get unemployment for example.)

            I know in some states you can be eligible for unemployment if the terms of your employment change dramatically, but I doubt this would qualify for that. (Usually it’s a drastic cut in pay to qualify.) It is generally a very high bar.

            1. neverjaunty*

              Yeah, I would not be relying on Wikipedia for ‘do I get employment if I quit/get fired’ – there are too many variables even *within* a state.

              OP #5 should talk to an employment lawyer ASAP.

              1. Apollo Warbucks*

                I didn’t mean to suggest that OP should rely on Wikipedia to find out if they got unemployment or not. I was only meaning to show the grounds for refusal, when it comes to the law the words suitable and reasonable have very particular meanings and they are so subjective depending on the individual circumstances.

              2. LQ*

                If the OP can’t afford to talk to an employment lawyer* then they could try calling their local unemployment office to see what the state laws are.

                *I don’t know why talk to a lawyer is so quickly recommended, does everyone else have the money to go hiring a lawyer for every question they have. They are so expensive. And for something like this you are so unlikely to get more money in any way than you would spend on a lawyer I just don’t understand it. If you got unemployment (even in MA) would that be enough to make up for the cost of the lawyer? I guess it could be if you got the full amount and were unemployed for the full amount of time to get benefits.

                1. neverjaunty*

                  In the US, it’s most common for lawyers in certain areas of practice (including those who represent employees in labor and employment disputes) to be paid on a contingency fee basis, which means that their money is a percentage of any eventual recovery – there are not up-front or hourly fees. As a result an initial meeting with a lawyer in that area is usually free or very low-cost, because they want the business.

                  Also, in the US, many state and local bar associations keep ‘referral lists’ of lawyers (who again, want your business) and will offer a very inexpensive half hour or hour meeting. So in my state, you could call your county bar association, and they’d send you to a lawyer specializing in (say) employment law who’ll talk to you for $50.

          2. KR*

            New Hampshire is a hire-at-will state (or however you phrase it) so you don’t have to provide a reason that you want to fire an employee.

            1. LQ*

              You can fire someone and still have them eligible for unemployment. There is a difference between unemployment and going through the courts for being wrongfully fired.

          3. ThatGirl*

            Can be, maybe, but won’t necessarily be.

            I was fired from a job over a dumb mistake, and as things were proceeding I was told by the HR woman that I should file for unemployment right away. I did have to do a phone interview about why I was let go, but I did get the unemployment.

      2. hermit crab*

        I have nothing to add, but I am enjoying that typo! I’m picturing a big boa constrictor getting handed a pink slip. :)

    2. fposte*

      I would tend to doubt it, but unemployment varies from state to state, so it would depend on New Hampshire’s UI policy. And in general with unemployment you apply and let the board figure it out; you don’t shoot yourself in the foot by not applying.

      1. LQ*

        Agree. I don’t believe any state punishes you for applying (I’d make a joke about a state here but that doesn’t seem appropriate) and you are always better off trying to apply and seeing if you qualify. That said, don’t quit your job assuming you will qualify for benefits.

  10. YourUnfriendlyPhlebotomist*

    #5- This is the way I understand it- employee takes vacation paid vacation, then months later is told that they have to work weekends to make it up? Isn’t that making them work for free? They didn’t work with the understanding that they were to be paid and they were paid, now it seems similar to cutting previous wages. If my boss were to call me and say hey Ang, ya know that vacation you took in July? were going to need you to make that up because we’ve changed our minds – I’d certainly think that were illegal- not “is it legal questions are silly but this one …. were missing info or something.

    1. YourUnfriendlyPhlebotomist*

      it says sale, I wonder is the boss is feeling the end of year crunch and is looking for ways to boost sales with out paying more $$$???

    2. LQ*

      If it is months later then it very well could be illegal. If they are salaried it might not be?

      If they are an hourly nonexempt employee and they work they need to be paid for that work. You could just not pay them/give them vacation. But if they work they have to be paid for the work.

      This is a really good point.

      1. YourUnfriendlyPhlebotomist*

        It makes me think this was hugely a surprise because this guy has weekend plans for weeks that now need to be canceled. if he hadn’t already taken it he wouldn’t have to make it up and I doubt he took all 4 weeks together- that’s just not common. and now that the company is saying no one can make a huf about it or their fired? no this company knows they’re doing something wrong OR the employees misunderstood/made up their own vacation rules. but its all too strange. we need the OP to pipe up.

      2. fposte*

        If they’re exempt, it’s legal to make them work weekends for no extra pay.

        Sales can involve commissions and weird inside/outside differentiations that are outside of my ken, so I don’t know how likely this person is to be exempt.

        1. LQ*

          The only thing I’m wondering about with exempt is that if they didn’t work it and the employer tried to dock that week when vacation had been taken’s pay that might not be legal. Though it sounded more like you’d get fired if you tried to not do it rather than get docked pay if you tried to not do it.

          They can certainly just make an exempt employee work more hours.

        2. neverjaunty*

          It is, but not if it’s a pretext for violating other laws, like giving PTO that’s accumulated and is owed, or as a punishment for taking leave under FMLA.

    3. Neverah*

      #5

      I had a house fire last March and needed a few days to take off afterwards because-house in ruins, me and pets displaced, burns and smoke inhalation for everyone. My sister called her job to let them know not to schedule her for the next few days (we live together) on account of all this and they just said, very reluctantly, “Well, we’ll take it day by day.”

      Eventually someone realized how much of an asshole management was being about it and gave her a gift card because we lost all our pet food and supplies (she worked at a pet store) but my sister couldn’t believe how unreasonable management was and how put out they acted when she needed a few days and still hasn’t gotten over it.

      On my end, my job gave me three days paid no problem to take care of things in the immediate aftermath and I thought everything was cool. Then a few months ago my boss must have been going over my attendance thingy, because he saw those three days and said I needed to make them up and he’d take my last few days of vacation time (time I had burned solely meeting with architects and engineers and the like) to do it. I was this close to going off on him and exiting in a blaze of righteous glory, but the assistant manager spoke with him so he backed off.

      Sorry for the essay, but this is why I can totally see something crazy like “make up your vacation time” happening.

      Can we have a crazy vacation/time off/two days a year stories post, Alison?

      1. Case of the Mondays*

        I took a friend to the hospital with what appeared to be appendicitis. The ER was talking about emergency surgery. He was scheduled to work not the next day but the day after. He called his supervisor to give him a heads up that he would likely be out a few days. The guy said, “well, you don’t actually know yet and you are really supposed to only call in sick within 24 hours of your shift.” He was like, “ugh, I’m currently in the hospital, I might be unconscious most of the day tomorrow so I’m letting you know now.” Boss said, “call me when you know more.” Turned out it was something else but he was still hospitalized for 3 days and had to keep calling each day with updates in order to be excused for the day after. Ridiculous. It should have just been “call me when you know when you will be back.”

        1. Elizabeth West*

          This is why I’ve always hated not having someone around who could provide an update if I were unconscious! My boss now would NEVER do that, but I’ve had bosses who do and it sucks.

          1. Merry and Bright*

            Me too! And the rule didn’t apply to themselves or their peers. It’s tough at the top!

    4. Stranger than fiction*

      That’s what they’re doing and I think it would be illegal if the employees have documentation stating otherwise, which is what Alison mentioned. If they’re super shady, they may not have it written anywhere that they get paid vacation.

    5. Rachel*

      The way the OP phrased it, though, is that the employee _has_ four weeks paid vacation, not that the employee actually took all four of those weeks of vacation. I read it as if the employer requires employees to work enough weekend days to offset all four weeks of vacation, whether the employee actually takes that time or not. If that is the case, that’s a really, really awful policy!

  11. Not Karen*

    #2 *Why* do you not want people to know each other’s salary? Shouldn’t you be proud of what you’re making? You should be compensated in line with your work quality. Shouldn’t you be proud of your work quality?

    1. MashaKasha*

      I think I tend to agree. Yeah people will talk, because that’s what they do. But who cares what people say, especially the kind of people who tend to pick you apart and make far-reaching conclusions about you based on your hourly pay – we all know that most sane and rational adults won’t engage in this behavior.

      At my first job out of college, in Eastern Europe, everyone knew everyone else’s salary, and I was told when I started there that the policy was to pay all the women the same amount. The management’s reasoning was “if we give one of you 5% more, the rest of you will peck her to death.” I thought it was horribly sexist and unfair. Then I got two raises in a row, and sure enough, very soon I overheard coworkers talking behind my back. So what? Big deal. Anyway, it was only one or two people “pecking me to death”. The rest either didn’t care what I was making, or said the raises were justified, or both. As I would react myself in this situation.

    2. Ad Astra*

      My company strongly discourages us from discussing salary with other employees and it actually bugs me. If my company is low-balling me because I’m a woman, for instance, I’d have no way of knowing. These biases are more likely to be subtle, or even unintentional, which is why salary transparency is a good thing. It’s not usually “Eh, let’s give her $40k because she’s a girl and give him $80k because he’s a dude and I strongly prefer dudes.” It’s typically something like “Maureen isn’t much of a team player because she never participates in pot-lucks and she can be kind of abrasive, so I don’t think she deserves the full 5% raise this year.”

      Knowing that your employees could easily notice a discrepancy forces you to think about exactly why you’re offering whatever it is you’re offering.

      1. Anon for this comment*

        At OldJob, a bunch of us gave notices at around the same time and the department suddenly found themselves extremely shortstaffed, to the point where they finally decided to post job openings and start hiring. (prior to that, whenever someone left, they were never replaced – the rest of us would just take one for the team.)

        My boss that I had at the time was, to put it kindly, not the brightest. Somehow the dept management decided to hold a late-night meeting in his office to discuss the new positions, base pay, bonuses, etc. They wrote it all on his dry-erase board which he was supposed to erase, but forgot. Next day, he called me into his office to say good-bye, he’ll miss me and such and actually told me about the meeting and pointed at the board that still had all the numbers on it. That was how I found out that our replacements’ base pay was going to be 30% higher than ours was, for the exact same work, except that we had years of experience doing that work and our replacements didn’t.

        Needless to say, I was a bit upset. He begged me not to say anything to anyone, because he was supposed to have erased the numbers. So, ahem. I only told two people that I could trust and made sure to tell them it was a secret. They told everyone else within two weeks, never naming me as their source. As I hoped they would. I was gone from OldJob by then, but I heard the masses had g0tten restless and they had to call an all-hands meeting to calm them down and explain how no one is really being underpaid if you take a good look at all the numbers. Sadly, not much else came out of this, except maybe a few more people realized that they were being severely underpaid, and left too. But hey, I tried. I just thought it was such a ridiculous situation that I had to get the word out.

        1. Anon for this comment*

          I don’t know what the point of this story is. Probably that, as used as we are to not knowing anyone else’s pay, a little transparency probably won’t hurt.

      2. neverjaunty*

        If your company is in the US, it’s illegal to discourage you from discussing salary with other employees for precisely the reasons you mentioned. (In California, it’s also a violation of the Labor Code.) And you are 100% right about why this is so important.

        1. Ad Astra*

          I think I’ve maybe brought this up in the comments before and it was determined that companies can’t forbid you from discussing wages as they relate to working conditions, but it’s generally legal to say “We don’t talk about salary here, unless it’s a function of your job.”

          I may be misunderstanding, but I think my company’s policy is legal but icky.

          1. bridget*

            Yeah, you’re right. Often companies can stay just barely on the right side of the line by making a policy of confidential salaries, as long as when push comes to shove they don’t enforce it. If someone disobeys it, they can’t discipline or fire the person for talking about their salary. But the general policy statement and expectation will deter most people anyway, because money is a taboo topic in the first place and people are really only likely to discuss it if everybody else is.

          2. neverjaunty*

            …but your wages ARE part of your working conditions, and a blanket “we don’t talk about salary here” would absolutely run head-on into the NLRA, because for example it would prohibit employees from discussing whether they would make more or less money if they unionized.

            Yes, there are some situations where they can forbid talking about salary (usually related to confidentiality), but it’s not true that as a blanket matter employers can just say ‘don’t tell anyone how much you make’ – especially as state laws may also apply.

            https://www.dol.gov/wb/media/pay_secrecy.pdf

        2. Tau*

          Out of curiosity, anyone know what the law on this is in the UK? I’m relatively sure I was told I was forbidden to discuss my salary with other employees and, knowing the US laws, have been wondering if that is quite kosher ever since.

      3. BananaPants*

        Here it’s not considered acceptable to ask. You hear about it if the bonuses are cut (because only managers and a handful of technical employees are bonus-eligible) but it would be viewed very negatively if I went to my coworker Bob and said, “So, what’s your salary?” or “What percentage did you get for your merit increase this year?” You can vent about not getting a promotion or about getting a lower-than-average merit increase, but no one talks numbers. It would be viewed with alarm and be considered unprofessional by one’s manager.

        A manager in the past said that to me privately that I earned less than coworkers at the same level, even those with less education and experience – those coworkers are all male. I suspect I still earn less than male coworkers but I could never prove it.

        HR has mixed up merit increase and promotion letters and emails them out without checking first, so in a handful of cases we’ve found out what various employees in the organization earn – Bob accidentally gets Jane’s merit increase letter because they have the same last name or whatever. It’s awkward and HR asks the affected employees to not share the information, but it ALWAYS gets out.

        1. neverjaunty*

          I know I’m a broken record on this: you may want to talk to a lawyer. (Talking to a lawyer doesn’t mean running out and filing a lawsuit, of course.)

    3. Rock*

      I think the issue here is that co-workers ARE inferring work quality with compensation, which (although it would be great if it lined up perfectly) doesn’t always… equate. I would be upset if people were calling me lazy behind my back because I made $1.50 less an hour than Lucinda and equating my pay to my work ethic. I think that’s the issue.
      Generally speaking I think salaries should be way more open book than they are, I just think that being automatically proud of your work and *therefore* your paycheck isn’t the right frame of mind.

      1. Not Karen*

        But if you’re making less than Lucinda then either a) your work quality *is* less than hers or b) you have grounds to ask your manager for a raise compensatory to your work quality. What’s the problem here?

        1. Rock*

          Or maybe Lucinda is overpaid? Or maybe a manager is unfair? Who knows! No one knows. It’s a great opportunity to bring up ones own merit, but it’s NOT an automatic reflection of a person’s value.
          What you’re saying isn’t *wrong* but it does strike me as a little tone deaf.

        2. Windchime*

          It’s not really always A or B, though. At OldJob, I started out under manager Jon, who always started people out at rock-bottom salary no matter what your previous experience or education was. Period. And then you progress through the steps and levels with no options for breaking out unless you get a promotion. Then Jon left and Theon became manager. Theon would start people higher than rock bottom if they had experience. So it would often happen that people had been working for OldJob for 5 years, and someone new with 3 years experience would be hired at a higher rate than the person who had put in 5 years. There was no flexibility to even out pay, or so we were told. Until Theon finally left and Arya came in, thought everyone was underpaid, and not only leveled out the pay to make it fair, but also got everyone a bump of about $1 an hour. It might not sound like a lot to some people, but at the time it made the difference between being able to buy milk for the kids or not.

    4. Stranger than fiction*

      I think it’s been a long-time ingrained in people’s heads that salaries are not to be discussed between employees, even though it’s illegal to require this now.

    5. fposte*

      I work for the state, and my salary is public info. Which is fine by me, but it doesn’t mean I’m proud of what I’m making. (See “I work for the state.”)

      1. Elizabeth West*

        Heh.

        I was offered a county job I wanted, but it paid so little I would have had $14 left at the end of the month. With the added insecurity of positions being dependent on election results, that was a reluctant nope.

    6. Engineer2*

      After reading Alison’s reply I think the issue is about people’s reactions to knowing other peoples salaries. It’s hard to be proud of your salary when the side effect is catty remarks.

  12. Hlyssande*

    #5 –

    They can’t call it paid vacation if employees have to make it up. It’s unpaid vacation with mandatory flexing of the time. If the benefits specifically say paid vacation and it was logged as vacation time, then it’s a serious problem that the boss is trying to force the employee(s) to make up that time.

    I agree with Allison – a lawyer could definitely give you some good advice on that front. This also sounds like a good time to familiarize yourself with the employee handbook to see exactly what it says about vacation and benefits.

  13. BethRA*

    For #1, it might also be worth mentioning that Lucinda’s behavior is creating a divide among other team members. Speaking for myself, I would be more concerned about someone creating a toxic environment than just gossiping about me.

    1. J.B.*

      I want to give #1 some attention. WTH is former manager thinking? She’s pretty much been demoted, unless she’s bulletproof mouthing off is just crazy. And who do she think will support her anyway, her former employees?

      1. hbc*

        I kind of get it. From her distorted point of view, her manager just rearranged the structure in a way that makes no sense. OP is going to fail without her benevolent oversight, and those two other people need tight reins too! Since she’s clearly not the one at fault, her manager must be threatened by her awesomeness or trying to force her out because he knows she sees through his web of lies or…something. He’s grouping his forces for an offensive against her, so she’s got to rally her own troops.

        Some people take a hit like this and reassess, and some people double down on the crazy.

        1. #1 OP*

          Her thinking exactly. My manager travels a lot and just after the changes were announced she said: how does he want to manage them (me and the others) when he is never here? Truth is I am much more motivated and energized since the changes as I have nobody breathing through my neck and no constant fault finding from her part. She clearly is in denial. Some good suggestions here – I need to think how to go about this.

  14. Rat Racer*

    #1: Shifting the scenario slightly to ask a question to Alison and the AAM community: if you were the OP’s manager, and the OP came to you to tell you that one of your directs is trash-talking you, what would your response be?

    Would you (a) confront Lucinda directly, even though it is based on hearsay? Or (b) would you use this intel to start a conversation with her along the lines of “how are things going? I know this transition has been challenging – how is it working for you? Anything you want to talk about?”

    If I were the OP’s manager, I might lean toward option B if Lucinda has a clean slate with me – I’m inferring from the OP’s note though, that she probably doesn’t. The OP’s new manager is probably aware of why Lucinda lost half her team.

    Option A though… I just can’t see how this plays out in conversation. What is the desired outcome with Lucinda (a reprimand? a clearing of air?) and how does New Manager work with Lucinda on undoing whatever damage has already been done?

    2. Kyrielle*

      Given that it’s an open plan office, I think I’d try to be there unexpectedly (perhaps not in view if possible) at various times and see if I could hear any of the same and ask on it first-hand. But this might be Lucinda’s last straw, if I could hear any of it….

    3. Ask a Manager* Post author

      I’d default to B, but I’d also weigh what I know about Lucinda and what I know about the OP’s credibility and objectiveness, and if it fit in with concerns I already had about Lucinda, that would certainly color the conversation.

      1. Rat Racer*

        Would you drop any hints that you have heard or suspect that she’s “poisoning the well?” Maybe it would be better to focus on the positive and remind Lucinda that in times of transition, you need all leaders on your team to reinforce a “We’re all in this together,” message.

        Or maybe this is just information to file away and a wake up call to watch Lucinda’s behavior more closely?

        1. #1 OP*

          OP here: thanks for the comments. Just yesterday she went on about it again: she indicated how silly it was that some just move people around to elevate themselves. She was clearly referring to the recent changes and our manager.

  15. The IT Manager*

    For #2, I understand that you have absorbed the notion that salaries should be private/secret. As Alison states that is often better for the company but IMO transparency is better for employees.

    That said your problem is NOT that your co-workers can figure out each other’s salaries. The problem is you work in a toxic environment with back-biting, pettiness, cattiness. Management should be doing something about this “culture” of negativity and dragging each other down, but if they’re not trying to stop it, you should just start looking to get out. It sounds horrible honestly. It also sounds like elementary school.

    1. Laurel Gray*

      I completely agree and strongly believe that if salary transparency existed among workers, companies would be less likely to lowball or play “the game” when negotiating salary. The OP should be happy that salary info is available like this. It may prove to be very useful when she is interviewing at other companies to get out of this toxic place.

    2. LBK*

      I agree to an extent; however, I do wonder if there’s merit to any of the complaints people are making, even if they aren’t being made in a constructive way. If we want to say that the advantage of pay transparency is that it minimizes discrepancies and allows patterns to be identifiable, we can’t then shut people down when they point out those discrepancies. If it seems apparent to Jane’s coworkers that her work isn’t worth 50% more than theirs, maybe that’s a genuine cause for concern.

      I think the company can certainly take steps to provide avenues for inquiry if there are genuine concerns about differences in pay, especially by opening up management culture so that it’s easier to ask for merit raises if you think you deserve to be paid as much as your coworker. But you can’t publish everyone’s pay and then say “Don’t talk about it and don’t expect it to change”. That defeats the purpose.

      1. Laurel Gray*

        I got the sense that OP’s letter was more about perception of quality of work and embarrassment of knowing salaries and not any possibility of discrimination and inequality. I worked in a consulting firm where people had varying billing rates. They also had varying educational backgrounds as well as experience in the field and with previous projects. That could be the case with OP’s company too. If you’ve been in the game for 7+ years and worked on major projects, I would expect your billing rate to be high. What I wouldn’t expect was for you to look down on colleagues who aren’t billing at your rate yet. I think management is dropping the ball on this (if they are aware of the gossip going on).

        1. LBK*

          I wasn’t referring specifically to discrimination since I don’t see evidence of that from the OP’s letter either, but just more generally that if someone thinks they’re underpaid (because they didn’t negotiate or the boss has a favorite or whatever) and is able to see the standards by which other people doing the same work at the same quality are being paid, the company should be open to having those discussions. Basically, instead of just whining that Jane makes twice as much when they do the same job, someone should be able to go to their manager and have a conversation about why that is and/or what they need to do to get paid the same as Jane.

          The condescension towards those who are paid less is definitely unwarranted, though.

          1. Engineer2*

            I should add in that the people who make the crappy remarks have openly mentioned that they have never asked for a raise. I agree that having open rates is a great way to discuss compensation (I use it in my bargaining process). But at my workplace is just seems to be another thing to complain about instead of using it positively. Which is why I feel so uncomfortable with the whole thing.

            Thanks everyone so much for your insights!

      2. Ad Astra*

        Ideally, pay transparency would include clear-cut standards for determining compensation, but it sounds like that’s not happening in this case. But if someone’s concerned that they’re underpaid, they should bring it up with management, rather than suggesting that a higher-paid colleague doesn’t deserve her wage.

        1. LBK*

          I totally agree. All I’m saying is that if management is going to address the toxicity going around, I think they should also be looking at the pay rates to address any potentially legitimate concerns. You can tell someone to stop being openly rude to their coworkers, but you can’t force them to not feel miffed that they don’t make as much as a coworker who produces the same work they do. You can only change that by fixing the problem.

          Ideally, I think if a company is going to go transparent with pay, they should do a pay review across the board and ensure everything looks right before they publish. That probably could’ve prevented a lot of the nastiness that’s occurring.

    4. Engineer2*

      It completely feels like primary school. I’m so relieved that all the comments are saying basically the same thing, which is that being catty over billing rates is a sign of a toxic working environment. I couldn’t believe that this is just something that happens in consultancies. There must be places to work where staff don’t act this way! Or at least management does not stand for it.

  17. Anon for this*

    #2 – I always prefer to keep my salary private from most of my coworkers and I understand that my boss, payroll and HR would have access to the salary information.
    I don’t have any advice to offer to assist with what is going on at your company, I just wanted to say that I agree with you.
    Years ago when I worked for a very large government contractor, the company laid off 1500 employees. This was a very difficult time since we did not know who was going to be laid off. We were glad to hear that our office was not affected (since we were a small satellite office with just a handful of employees). After the lay offs, I got a copy of the financial report and I looked up the salary of the CEO, I almost fell off my chair since it was $30 million! I think that did not include his bonus for the year!

    1. LQ*

      I want to understand this better.
      You don’t want others (boss/payroll/hr excluded) to know your salary. But was it a benefit to you knowing that the CEO earned $30 million or not? If that information had been hidden would you have felt better about the layoffs?

      1. Anon for this*

        In this case, it was not a benefit to know the salary of the CEO.
        After I found out the salary of the CEO I felt a lot of anger towards management at the company since at the time I thought (not saying I was correct! It was just my feelings at that time) that the company should have kept the employees (especially the ones that were needed but let go, and since this created more work with no pay increase for the employees that were still working) and maybe the CEO should have taken less pay that year so that the company could retain all the employees.

  18. Dr. Pepper Addict*

    Question #5 brings up a question I have. A friend of mine works for a place that when you turn in your notice, they immediately escort you off the premises and do not pay you for any vacation time you have accrued, only your wages. Is this legal? I know they can’t withhold your wages, but I thought since vacation days are something you have earned/accrued, even though it’s not wages you are still entitled to compensation for it if you don’t use it. Thoughts?

    2. Retail Lifer*

      Some states require you to be paid your vacation time when you quit, but not all do. My state doesn’t, but most companies I’ve worked for paid it out anyway.

      1. Retail Lifer*

        Looks like I just repeated what she said, but I swear it wasn’t there yet when I started typing! :)

    3. The Cosmic Avenger*

      Even when it’s legal, it’s incredibly stupid, as it just encourages employees to use up all of their vacation time before giving notice. Plus, they don’t give employees who quit time to train anyone else, or even give them a status update on their ongoing work?

      RUN! RUN AWAY!

      1. Retail Lifer*

        Seriously. That’s a pretty dramatic reaction and makes it look like you got fired. I’d probably just stop showing up once I found another job.

        1. Windchime*

          Yep. I would use up my vacation days to job search, and then leave once they’re used up (and I found a job). That employer is just shooting themselves in the foot by treating people this way.

  19. BTW*

    #1 – You and 2 other employees have had to be removed from under this person and she continues to trash talk just about anyone she can. I’m surprised that your company hasn’t shown her the door yet!

  20. StillLAH*

    #3, is the store by your college run by the campus food service? When I was in school, the Starbucks locations on campus were definitely not the same product as off-campus and I heard that it was because Aramark (or whoever the on-campus food service was) ran it, Starbucks just leased out their name, logo, recipes, etc. I just took it as the price of the convenience of not having to leave campus.

  21. RMRIC0*

    In RE: LW1

    I’m sure your manager doesn’t have much to worry about from higher-ups, since this person is already a documented PITA (which is why they’ve taken you and other responsibilities off her plate). These waves will probably blow right back into her face.

  22. Lou*

    #2 if this is the coffee chain i worked for then just leave negative feedback on costa feedback lol.

  23. Miles*

    #2: The first step to combating wage discrimination is making sure everyone knows where they stand in comparison to other employees right?

  24. infj*

    I’m late but here goes. Years ago in my office someone had the same complaints that OP#2 has about people being able to figure out salaries based on billable hour rates. My boss’s genius response? Project managers are not allowed to know the billable rates of the staff who are working on their projects. We have a general sense and know, generally, who is more or less than others. But don’t know the actual rates. And only get lump sum numbers on spending. If I really really really wanted to figure it out, I probably could. But it’s hard to care when the bosses work so hard to tie your hands and prevent you from doing your job effectively.

  25. Norman w Rymel*

    I live at a senior apartment the manager is a joke her boy friend Drinks with resident on her paito they even climb over the paito fence we can’t smoke on the property but he smokes and walks around with and open container of beer but doesn’t say anything to her boyfriend

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