March 2023

boss wants us to “disagree” over LGBTQ inclusion, professional styles for men with long hair, and more

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go… 1. Boss wants us to “disagree” over LGBTQ inclusion My big boss is currently obsessed with having “disagreements” despite being very hard to disagree with. She has recently posted on our internal website encouraging us to talk and disagree about our organization’s attitude to LGBTQ colleagues […]

Read the full article →

weekend open thread – March 4-5, 2023

This comment section is open for any non-work-related discussion you’d like to have with other readers, by popular demand. Here are the rules for the weekend posts. Book recommendation of the week: Happy All the Time, by Laurie Colwin. Best friends each fall in love and navigate courtship and marriage alongside each other. Funny and […]

Read the full article →

it’s your Friday good news

It’s your Friday good news! 1.  “I’ve been reading your blog for the last year solidly and learnt a huge amount. With that in mind, I recently interviewed for an IT support role supporting over 200 users as a team of 2 people. The initial interview went well enough that I was offered the job, […]

Read the full article →

open thread – March 3-4, 2023

It’s the Friday open thread! The comment section on this post is open for discussion with other readers on any work-related questions that you want to talk about (that includes school). If you want an answer from me, emailing me is still your best bet*, but this is a chance to take your questions to […]

Read the full article →

my manager and coworker are secretly dating, boss will never give “exceeds expectations” because he has “high standards,” and more

It’s four answers to four questions. Here we go… 1. My manager and coworker are divorcing their spouses and secretly dating My coworker, Frank (who is above me in the chain of command, but only occasionally acts as my supervisor), just confided in me that he is dating my manager, Lauren (who is also HIS […]

Read the full article →

update: I supervise a manager who falsified an employee write-up … but I don’t think she should be fired

Remember the letter-writer who supervised a manager who falsified an employee write-up but didn’t think she should be fired? Here’s the update. Thanks for answering my letter. I saw some questions that came up in the comments so wanted to give more information about what happened. First, Jason choosing to work on-site did not mean […]

Read the full article →

my entry-level employee gave me a bunch of off-base criticism

A reader writes: I have a junior staff person (who has been on my team less than two years) who recently took it upon themself to give me some “constructive criticism” about my management, none of which was relevant or constructive (I did consider it and discussed it with others, and they were all confused […]

Read the full article →