can I tell my intern she laughs too much?

by Alison Green on August 28, 2024

A reader writes:

I manage an intern who tends to respond with short bursts of laughter at incongruous times, like when I am explaining something to her or when I am giving her directions (and I’m not trying to be funny!). It can be pretty jarring. I noticed it during her interview, but chalked it up to nerves and hoped it would subside as she became more comfortable. One month in, I don’t think it has decreased. I am concerned that clients and colleagues will think she is mocking them or not taking them seriously. I also hate the idea of being the laughter police! How should I approach this?

I answer this question — and three others — over at Inc. today, where I’m revisiting letters that have been buried in the archives here from years ago (and sometimes updating/expanding my answers to them). You can read it here.

Other questions I’m answering there today include:

  • I accidentally shared a list of my personal debts with my team
  • Is saying “my staff” demeaning?
  • My client wants to do professional development with me
You may also like:
{ 97 comments }

{ 97 comments… read them below }

  1. Bruce*

    I recently gave the intern I manage some advice about professional behavior, I wrapped it in a sandwich of praise for the good work they’ve done and suggestions for things to work on during the last stretch of their internship. I agree that gentle coaching on this sort of thing is part of managing interns!

      1. TheBunny*

        While it’s true people still hear the negative, I still think this is a good technique as it does at least give the positive and negative in one place.

      2. KateM*

        I found it confusing enough to be pointless and anxiety-inducing – I never knew which part was the true feedback and which one was the filler. And as that’s the way corporate had decided the feedback must be given, asking wouldn’t have helped.

      1. Scarletb*

        I think there’s a lot of cultural variance in this one – I work in a very large govt department in NZ and in ours at least one would be pretty out of step in a typical group-of-people-reporting-to-a-manager for the manager to call their direct reports their “staff”. It could fly for a senior govt official who has an ‘office’ team specifically to manage their workload and comms etc, but even then it would probably be an unusual choice and it would sound either old-fashioned or over-emphasising the heirarchy in a ‘not the expected culture’ kind of way. Not something we hear a lot from our senior leadership… the organisation has staff, which is all of us, but the people in it have teams. Even if you’re leading, you are working with those people, so ‘team’ would be more typical. He waka eke noa, etc – we’re all in this together.

        1. Insufficient Sausage Explainer*

          He waka eke noa has a certain ring of nostalgia about it in Aotearoa these days, alas. Here’s hoping for brighter days again in the next cycle…

    2. Antilles*

      I don’t really see a difference personally. To me, “my team”, “my staff”, and “my department” are all more or less synonyms. None of them would be the least bit noticeable unless (like with Banella), the person is awful in other ways.

      2. Antilles*

        To be clear, there can be minor differences in usage (e.g., a team can include people outside the department), but in terms of how it comes across, I don’t view any of them as demeaning or insulting or anything of that nature.
        By comparison, if someone makes a big deal out of saying “my subordinates”, that comes across a little differently to me, like you’re trying to emphasize the power difference.

      3. LateRiser*

        To me “staff” feels weird to describe a team, like it’s for a bigger collective than that. Not that it seems rude or anything, but it feels like saying “my lunch” to refer exclusively to the bread in your sandwich.

      4. Red Reader the Adulting Fairy*

        “Staff” feels like someone who works personally for me, to help me out. Like, if I had an assistant or a secretary, they might register as “staff”. But my team — they report to me, and they do the work I direct them to do, but they aren’t doing stuff for me personally, we’re all working for the organization. I don’t know if that makes sense. (And my department includes both of my teams plus another team.)

        1. WantonSeedStitch*

          Yeah, I do tend to think of a person’s staff meaning people whose role it is to support that person, whether it’s their executive assistant, personal assistant, driver, or whatever. I don’t think that’s a hard and fast definition, but it’s my own connotation. I don’t think it’s *demeaning* to refer to “my staff” when you’re talking about the people who report to you in non-support roles, but that’s probably the reason I don’t use that terminology when referring to my own reports and instead call them “my team.”

        2. Rook Thomas*

          This is my approach, as well — I refer to my team (the group of people who report to me) and if it’s someone at my same level in the organization, I say “my colleague.” But we all work for the organization so I consider us all part of the same big team.

          I had a boss once who criticized me using “team” for my group of staff. She said it came across like a sports analogy and made people competitive. So, while I worked for her, I said “staff” and then went back to “team” when I started working for someone else. ” In my experience, “team” can make people in the group feel . . . like part of the group and not people in a hierarchy. But this can really depend on the organizational culture and a range of other factors, too.

        3. amoeba*

          Yeah, that’s how it’s typically used in my field at least – staff positions work, for instance, for a VP or whatever, but very clearly *for that person*. Like, kind of an EA but also additional project involvement, going to meetings in that person’s place or with them, etc. It tends to be a position people do for a while to get to know the business and then pursue a career in management themselves!

          It’s a pretty different relationship than the usual team lead thing. I really cannot imagine my line manager (who is very clear on the fact that we don’t work for him at all, we work for the company!) calling us his “staff”. It would be weird and not really fit with our roles.

    3. Unkempt Flatware*

      Man, I really am bummed I missed a comment that elicited such a response from Alison.

      1. Sola Lingua Bona Lingua Mortua Est*

        Don’t be bummed. Just face-roll the keyboard and it’ll make about as much sense as what was removed.

      3. Peanut Hamper*

        I’m still bummed we haven’t figured out the zucchini thing. I guess it’ll always be a mystery, like those big heads on Easter Island.

        1. Unkempt Flatware*

          You know, I saw the original question on that one and I don’t recall there being anything about zucchini! I remember someone asked what to wear to work in the weekend thread but I still scratch my head about the zucchini remark because I don’t recall it being there!

        2. Myrin*

          I can’t believe I’m out of the loop on AAM lore – what zucchini thing are we talking about?!

          1. Unkempt Flatware*

            Oh good! It was beginning to feel like a Mandela effect…I swear there was no zucchini in that question!

          2. Mostly Managing*

            In at least one other forum I’m part of, if someone starts an inappropriate thread or if the poster is suspected of being a troll, we immediately jump to recipes.

            Given that Ask A Manager is frequently cited in the other group, I wonder if a few of them (not me, in this case) just handled it the “standard” way!

  3. Medium Sized Manager*

    I still struggle with referring to my direct reports as well, direct reports, because an ex manager told me it was rude to call them anything but a colleague. I would accept it if I was saying it for funsies, but I was writing them up for performance issues! That’s not a colleague thing!

    1. Dust Bunny*

      They’re your direct report. And I say that as someone who has always been a direct report. It’s fine. My boss might refer to me as her colleague in very informal work settings but we both know who’s in charge (as we should).

    2. Earlk*

      I refer to mine as colleagues if I’m introducing one directly and my team if it’s general. I also include my manager under the team banner if it’s general.

    3. Another Kristin*

      It’s certainly weird the first time someone refers to you as “my boss”, isn’t it? I personally find it a bit weird to call the people you manage “my staff”, but not necessarily “my team”. To me:

      My team: EITHER same or similar-level colleagues as myself who work on similar tasks in the same area of work; we all share the same manager
      OR the team of which I am the manager. If it weren’t clear from the context of the conversation that I am the manager of this team, I would probably say “the team I manage” or something like that.

      My staff: people who support me directly, i.e. executive assistants or other support personnel. I do not actually HAVE this, though there is someone in my org who for some reason has two EAs.

      Anyway, words.

  4. CubeFarmer*

    Our president always says “the staff” as a way, I think, to establish that we don’t work for her, that we all work for the organization.

  5. Isben Takes Tea*

    I think the use of “my staff” is more a tone/attitude thing. There are definitely ways to say it that are dismissive/diminishing, and there’s plenty of ways to say it neutrally or positively. If you’ve been subjected to it in a condescending or rude way, I can see how it would turn you off of the phrase entirely, but I would argue the phrase itself isn’t rude.

    1. Some Words*

      I really think you’re right.

      I’m at the lowest rung on our corporate hierarchy and I’m fine with that. If my manager or supervisor refers to me as their employee or staff it’s fine. That’s what I am. But they use the terms in very matter of fact ways. If they made it sound even a little like a put-down my reaction would be very very different. Tone is everything.

    2. Arglebarglor*

      As an RN, I always disliked it when a doctor would refer to nurses as “my nurses” or “my nurse,” even when they were defending us (“Don’t talk to my nurses like that”) because it felt demeaning. I prefer “the nurses” or “the nursing staff.” And now that I’m an NP, I never refer to the ancillary staff as “mine.” I refer to the nurse assigned to me as “the nurse I’m working with” or similar.

      1. Radioactive Cyborg Llama*

        It seems like nurses would be a shared group and not report to one doctor (assuming a practice with more than one doctor). In that instance, it seems like “our nurses” or “the nurses” would be more apt.

      2. Ellis Bell*

        That does seem inappropriate because I thought doctors were on a different dotted line of management and nurses reported not to doctors, but to more senior nurses?

    3. Chirpy*

      This, the words “my staff” are fine and normal, it’s only when the tone shifts to mean “my peons” that it’s condescending.

      1. Allonge*

        This.

        There are reasons one starts thinking about why my/our/the staff is better/worse than team/colleagues/besties and it’s rarely the love of English language.

    4. Goldenrod*

      I sometimes do a similar thing but in reverse – I am an EA who often emails other assistants to find out about their executives’ calendars.

      So I will write “your executive” in the email. Sometimes it can feel weird to me, writing it that way, but I still do it because it’s the clearest way to phrase it.

    5. Annie*

      I never did like “my staff” but one of my managers awhile back had been in the military, so “staff” was the way he had referred to teams. I think it was more of a military thing.
      Generally I think “team” is a better approach. That is what my current manager uses and it feels more like we are all working together, even though we know she is the boss.

  6. WorkplaceSurvivor*

    Aw man, I relate to OP 1. There’s a laugher at my office right now. She’s sweet but randomly laughs to herself to the point where multiple team members have mentioned it as stressing them out (open floor plan). We’re a small office and our admin has kindly pointed it out to her before, but it seems to be a totally subconscious habit. She’s pretty sensitive as well.

    If anyone has ever been able to find a solution to this, I’d love suggestions!

    1. Ultimate Facepalm*

      There was a woman who worked at my former doctor’s office. They literally forgot I was there for like 45 minutes and went to lunch (only part of the reason why I don’t go there anymore). When I expressed my frustration, the woman literally laughed in my face. Pissed me right off.
      The doctor had to explain that she laughs and smiles when she’s nervou, so that was at least a little better.
      But this is something you have to squash if you interact with people – especially in a customer service capacity.

      1. Orv*

        When I was in elementary school I went through a period where I smiled when I was criticized or punished. I don’t know, but I remember not being able to control it, and being disciplined for it because it seemed like I wasn’t taking the punishment seriously. As an adult I’m much better at policing my facial expressions and, if anything, I grimace too much instead.

        2. Paint N Drip*

          Ugh same. This response has gotten me nearly arrested more than once.
          I guess it’s kinda ‘fawn’ response? Doesn’t go over well with 5-0 regardless

    2. Resume please*

      I’d also like suggestions. My group has a laugher too (we’recall remote.) It seems to be a nervous or just an awkward reaction. The laughter (and the plethora of laugh emojis…) can be perceived as inappropriate and misplaced sometimes. Of course, when someone actually said something legitimately funny on our message system the other week, it was crickets from her, which is kind of funny in and of itself

      1. Ultimate Facepalm*

        Like when Michael Scott forgot to say ‘That’s what she said’ at the best possible moment. Complete silence. Jim looks over at him and says, ‘really? nothing?’ :D

    3. Nusuth*

      Agreed, I wish Alison had a magic answer on this one. My small team’s most recent hire is a compulsive laugher – it seems completely out of control, and he seems to not even notice he’s doing it. He’ll chuckle while saying things that in no universe are jokes or funny, like making a suggestion about formatting in a newsletter. It’s gotten to the point that it’s grating and I know there’s absolutely nothing I can say about it.

    4. Scoody Boo*

      Yeah, we had a compulsive laugher join a different team in an open floor plan a couple months ago and it was painful. I think they were new to the workplace and it quieted down recently, but those first few weeks HURT.

  7. Bloopbloop*

    I say “my team” not to imply that I own the team (I’m not a manager) but to mean “the team I’m on with my peers.” I think that’s pretty common, at least in my field. “My staff,” though, implies that you are in charge of that group.

  10. Red Reader the Adulting Fairy*

    Letter 2 – I feel like it’s weird that the team member emailed someone’s clearly-personal information to the whole team all “Hey, anybody know who’s this is?” I’m not sure I have a better suggestion, other than to just quietly delete it and let the author deal with the fact that it’s no longer there, but “hey everyone take a look at this personal information that was saved to the team drive, keep it if it’s yours (but hey now we all have it anyway)” doesn’t really make me super comfortable. I think I’d be happier with “Hey, someone saved something personal in the Widgets folder last night, if you think it might’ve been you heads up, if it’s still there at noon I’m going to delete it.”

    I recently had to delete whole folders full of personal info (medical records, credit reports, all kinds of stuff) that people saved (not always accidentally) in our public network drives – in my case, the person’s full name was in the folder name, plus they retired four months previously, so I just nuked it all from orbit.

    1. JustKnope*

      I agree with this!! It was a weird choice to email the file to the whole team. It could have been handled more subtly, as you note.

    3. Samwise*

      An easy solution is just to email around: Hey, I found what looks like someone’s personal spreadsheet on the shared drive. I deleted it just to be safe.

    4. Apex Mountain*

      It sounds like there was no identifying information in the file, and if it’s just some entries with numbers and dates it may not be clear that it’s someone’s debt, or even that it’s a personal file.

    5. Allonge*

      How is sending the file / link to the file different from sending a message about where the file is? I assume whatever folder name they would mention would be just as accessible to everyone (yes, maybe three more clicks but it’s still shared…)

      Also, the emailer probably wanted to give an opportunity for whoever the file owner is to retrieve it – what if there is no backup copy?

      1. Red Reader the Adulting Fairy*

        Personally speaking, if I got an email that someone’s personal info was on the drive, I’d go “Yikes,” but not go look unless I had a solid reason to think it was mine. I also wouldn’t look at the file if it was emailed to me, though I know some folks would. In general, I’d be more comfortable if the nosy parkers had to take extra steps to go search up the personal info, under the possibly misguided and overly optimistic hope that if they had to work to go find it, they’d decide it wasn’t worthwhile and not go nosy-ing.

      2. LSM*

        OP2 says that the person emailed “a copy” of the file, which sounds like they attached it to an email. I think a link to the shared drive would be fine, but if they physically attached it to the email, then it means people would still have access to it even once it’s deleted off the shared drive.

    6. Ellis Bell*

      Yeah, if it was me, I would have just described something vague but specific the contents of the file “seems like a list of bill payments including Company”, without mentioning where it was, plus an offer to delete it/identify the location to the owner. But I think OP should very much take heart attack this person’s decision anyway! Sending it out means it didn’t look terribly personal or embarrassing to them which is why they didn’t consider it as such.

  11. Some Words*

    I worked with someone who giggled uncontrollably. And I do mean uncontrollably. She couldn’t stop a giggle fit once it was under way. She really tried. It often happened at really unexpected and awkward times.

    It turned out she was trying to manage some mental health issues & the ensuing roller coaster of medication trials & errors. Getting the right drug cocktail can take years to figure out. Uncontrollable/inappropriate laughter was a symptom. She was an excellent worker and a very nice person so we cut her a lot of slack.

    I’m not saying that’s what’s going on here, but it’s food for thought.

    2. Former Tech Industry*

      Another weird reason – it might be a tic or a learned behavior. I have been trying to rid myself of a short laugh at the end of almost every sentence I say for years. I developed this weird habit because I worked in a male dominated space where it was required that I be friendly and smiling at all times. I would get in trouble if I didn’t smile or laugh in every single interaction. It had nothing to do with my job, they were just aggressively and openly sexist.

      1. Bike Walk Barb*

        I have a coworker who does this. I’m also in a male-dominated industry and we’re at the same somewhat senior level. I want to suggest that she start noticing this and try to stop because it feels like it diminishes her authority, but then that would be sort of a mirror image of “smile more” in telling a woman how to manage their face.

        I went through some leadership coaching a while back. In the course of that someone gave me the gift of noticing my version of laughter, which was to say something pretty clear and direct and then step on my own punch line by throwing in a soft jest. I was undercutting my own knowledge and authority. I realized it’s likely because I grew up in a large family as one of the younger siblings and wouldn’t have gotten with telling the “big kids” what I knew and what to do. I learned to use humor as a soft weapon/defense to get away with saying The Things. I also enjoy making people laugh and having them think I’m funny/amusing, but that isn’t necessarily a great look for work.

  12. Peanut Hamper*

    For what it’s worth, on most servers it’s pretty easy to just right-click on a file and see who owns/created it.

    I do that all the time on our servers when cleaning up shortcuts, so I know who to provide gentle reminders to delete your shortcuts once once you’ve copied them to your desktop.

    1. Orv*

      Also it’s usually safe to just delete it and let them recover it from the version history and/or trash if they really wanted it.

  13. Samwise*

    OP 3. Using “my” does not indicate anything about owning, controlling, or disrespecting anyone or anything. In the situation described here, this is a completely normal usage and in fact clearly does NOT connote possession, control, disrespect, hierarchy, etc etc etc … Unless the speaker is using A Tone.

    My friends.
    My town.
    My cardiologist.
    My chemistry class.
    My employer.
    My staff
    My team
    My coworkers
    My boss

    Sounds more to me like someone in OP 3’s office is stirring up trouble. Hope it is not the OP…

  14. Peanut Hamper*

    Oof, was there ever an update to #3? Because this sounds like 25% LW is being overly-sensitive and 75% “this coworker really bugs the crap out of me, and I’m not sure why, but this is the one thing I can actually put my finger on.”

  15. Sugarholic Teacher*

    #1, are we sure it’s not a tic or stim or something? She may not be able to fully control it.

    1. Allonge*

      It’s impossible to be sure, but that does not mean OP should not bring it up.

      If you read the suggested way to do this, there is not even a gentle request to try and stop it.

  16. Statler von Waldorf*

    This could be one of those differences around labor laws between the US and Canada, but I don’t see anything legally problematic about #4. I’ve seen real-life labor contracts that include provisions about professional development requirements for contractors, and the legal people have never flagged any of those clauses as potentially problematic.

    Now if LW#4 just doesn’t want to do it, Alison’s advice will probably fly as an excuse. But I’ve been a contractor, and this looks like free money to me, and I’d take it if I didn’t have other paid work already booked.

    Because of course they are offering to pay the LW their regular rates for this, right? If not, the reason you’re not doing it is that a smart contractor never works for free. No need to risk souring the relationship by getting IRS regulations involved.

    1. Lady Danbury*

      Non-US lawyer here (not Canadian but fellow common law jurisdiction). If I was reviewing a contract that had professional development requirements such as maintaining a certain level of CLEs or whatever the equivalent training/licensing standard is, I wouldn’t even bat an eyelash. Those requirements are directly linked to their qualifications to provide the services that we’re hiring them for. The type of questions asked in the letter would not be the norm and I would definitely push back if one of my procurement people [letter 3 alert, lol] said that they wanted to include that type of professional development. If I was advising the contractor, I’d still suggest pushing back on this. You don’t want to set a precedent of blurring boundaries because the next inappropriate request may not be so (seemingly) benign and it’s much harder to extricate yourself once you’ve already started down that path.

      1. Statler von Waldorf*

        That is the exact kind of reasonable yet conservative advice that I would expect to hear from a lawyer. I don’t think the slope is quite as slippery as you seem to, but it’s a very reasonable position to take.

        This just might my blue collar experience showing, as all of the contractors I know have a very practiced ability to tell their customers no when they push too hard, and a love for billing their customers for sitting on their butts doing nothing instead of doing actual work.

  17. Hamster Manager*

    #2 maybe I’m just paranoid, but I would really recommend you don’t use your work computer for personal things, especially financial ones. A lot of people (IT, HR) could probably rummage around in your machine whenever they want. It’s like people who use their work computers to watch spicy videos, just…wtf why. Don’t. Total separation AKA different hardware between work and anything you want privacy for is my standard. I don’t even surf or watch YouTube on my work machine.

    1. Orv*

      This is the best advice.

      A lot of companies have a policy of allowing de minimus personal use of company property, but that doesn’t make it a good idea.

  18. anonymouse*

    “Your co-workers were probably profoundly uninterested” is true of SO many things that we worry about.

  19. Giggling Gertie*

    When I was younger/newer to the work world I would giggle whenever I was nervous. It happened a lot in interviews and really anytime I had to speak in public. A kind senior coworker just pointed it out to me one day in a “did you ever notice you giggle when you’re nervous?” way and I was temporarily mortified but thought about it and then worked to consciously stop it.

    Now my job involves giving regular presentations to groups and representing my department in meetings with higher ups, and while a giggle will still escape occasionally, I’m mostly over it. Despite the initial awkwardness I’m eternally grateful to that coworker for letting me know about the giggling. My advice is just kindly name what you’re seeing and while they may be embarrassed in the long run it’s very helpful.

  20. Matt*

    The “Maria” song … now I have Tony Christie in my head:
    “Sunrise, this ist the worst sh… that I’ll ever see … out in the office they’re ready for me … but I’ll go to my boss with no fear …”

  21. DivergentStitches*

    Inappropriate laughter can be a mental symptom of something, it’s called pseudobulbar affect: ” PBA is often associated with neurological conditions or injuries that affect the brain’s ability to control emotions.”

    Not to say the manager shouldn’t mention it to the intern, just saying to proceed with caution as it can be related to a disability.

  23. Anony8383*

    #2 If the file is in Excel, sometimes you can go to File, then click Info tab and see the author if you are signed into the account. Make sure your alias isn’t there. Also another reason to never use your work pc as your personal.

  24. Kat828*

    #1
    I have been told that I blush or smirk when I get nervous, but it’s me trying to be friendly in a social setting. I’m embarrassed by this completely and been trying to work on it

    1. allathian*

      I used to do that when I was a teen and in my early 20s. Now that I’m officially An Old and in my (largely internal) IDGAF phase, it’s no longer a problem. It’s really amazing what IDGAF can do for your confidence. I can be very friendly in social settings now that I’m no longer constantly worrying about making a great impression on people. Obviously I want them to think good things about me, but my friendly demeanor feels more natural to me now. When I was younger I undoubtedly came across as a tryhard in social settings.

      The only problem with IDGAF is that you can’t magic it into existence. Some people never get there, but those who do usually gain it by simply getting older.

      What I’m trying to say is that it’s a vicious circle, and when you’re no longer embarrassed by those reactions, they’ll probably go away because the embarrassment is making them worse. Easily said than done, of course, and I hope you find something that helps your confidence in the meantime.

  25. PropJoe*

    #3

    I agree that context & tone of voice are relevant to whether or not saying “my staff” is inappropriate. I’ve never been in an environment where saying it would be considered inappropriate no matter what, but I’ve also spent the better part of two decades combined in military & blue collar industrial situations where the f word (or equivalents in other languages) were used profligately. Luckily I have no aspirations of being in management so that’s one rake I’m not too worried about stepping on.

    What this reminds me of most, is a personal situation I experienced in college. The first person I ever dated hated it when I referred to her as my girlfriend. She hated it almost as much as she hated being called the b word or the c word (which is odd because she didn’t bat an eye at using those words to hurt others). She insisted that I refer to her as “the woman I’m dating.” Thankfully it didn’t last very long with her.

    1. allathian*

      It depends on individual preferences, of course, but I haven’t been a girl for more than 30 years. The first young man I ever dated was my boyfriend and I was his girlfriend. But after that relationship ended when I was 25, I don’t think I would’ve been comfortable with the term girlfriend in an exclusive relationship, either. Lady friend/gentleman friend sound very Miss Manners, but I think I’d prefer those to boyfriend/girlfriend for subsequent serious relationships. I think girlfriend/boyfriend sound especially ridiculous when referring to people who are old enough to be grandparents.

      When you’re talking about adults past the young adult stage, girlfriend/boyfriend to me implies a relationship that isn’t necessarily either exclusive or committed. My husband and I were exclusive from the second date, and we were SOs/partners pretty much from the start.

      I have an irrational dislike for mass nouns for employees. My team is okay, especially when it includes the speaker, but I don’t like my staff (unless it refers to a physical object like Gandalf’s staff). I don’t have an issue with a manager saying my reports or peers talking about their teammates or their coworkers. That said, staff seems to be more common in fairly hierarchical organizations (military, rescue services) and in education.

      1. amoeba*

        Interesting! For me (mid 30s, six years committed relationship) “boyfriend” or the German “Freund/Freundin” is still very much the normal term. Saying “partner” or the German version of “life partner” (Lebensgefährte) or whatever always sounds really… stilted to me? Like, I’d use it when talking to somebody official, maybe, like, I don’t know, the immigration office, when trying to sound extra serious. But I always find it weird in normal conversations with colleagues or friends. Maybe it’s more common here than in other languages? But then there are obviously people who still do prefer the more “serious” terms, even in German…
        Might also have to do with the fact that commitment without marriage is much more common here than in the US, from what I see from media etc. at least! So no need to clarify you’re actually serious and not “just dating”, people don’t really question that when you mention your boyfriend. (Also, you definitely don’t call somebody your boyfriend/girlfriend until you’ve had “the relationship talk”! “The guy I’m dating” would accurately describe the phase before that – “boyfriend” label implies commitment and exclusivity, unless agreed otherwise…)

  26. Roscoe da Cat*

    I work with someone who often sounds like he is chuckling but it is a breathing issue. He speaks a sentence and then goes ‘heh, heh’ Took me a while to realize that was what was happening.

    Also, this is my second post on breathing in one day…

  27. I went to school with only 1 Jennifer*

    > short bursts of laughter at incongruous times

    That used to be me. It’s the ADHD giving me a weird sense of humor because my brain will throw up juxtaposed ideas for fun. (When I was tested, one of the questions was, essentially, do you think things are funny that other people don’t, and I realized my response was ‘YES, because they ARE funny”.) When I realized that it was, in fact, the adhd, that explained to me a lot of why other people never saw the joke. And it allowed me to keep my reaction internal a lot more.

    Dunno if this also applies to the intern in question, but boy howdy did it ever ring a bell.

  28. Zee*

    #3 – I don’t feel as strongly as the LW does, but I do agree that somehow “my staff” feels like it’s meant to put your ‘subordinates’ in their place… but “my team” feels totally neutral to me.

Comments are closed.