September 2024

I got fired for attending a conference that I wasn’t invited to

I’m off today, so here’s an older post from the archives. This was originally published in 2017. A reader writes: I started working at my job eight months ago, not long after I completed college (thanks in part to your write-ups about cover letters, resumes, interview questions and job searching). A few months ago in […]

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I’m intensely jealous of my coworker

A reader writes: I am extremely jealous of my coworker, and I have no idea what to do about it. My coworker, let’s call her Lacy, and I started in the same entry-level position around the same time (Lacy started a few months before me). We’re similar in age and, while Lacy graduated from a […]

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my coworker was penalized for things I never said, junior employee keeps interrupting me, and more

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go… 1. My coworker was penalized for feedback from me, but I never said those things Recently, during my coworker Wendy’s performance review with her management team, she was denied a raise and demoted on paperwork to someone “still developing” instead of being listed as “meets/exceeds expectations.” […]

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this one weird trick cured my burn-out

In last week’s question about burning out doing work that you love, I wrote this: I used to think the cure for burn-out was lots of downtime and relaxation — and sometimes it is — but what’s worked better for me personally is regularly using my brain for something completely different. Otherwise you’re just wearing […]

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no one likes corporate team-building

A corporate “hiking retreat” made headlines last month when a participant was left stranded overnight on a 14,230-foot mountain. The employee was on a day-long “team-building” hike, and he was left behind after the rest of his colleagues made it down the mountain safely. Emergency responders found him stranded in a gully the next day. […]

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