employer wants to see my family tree, coworker hawks up snot in the kitchen every day, and more

by Alison Green on October 24, 2024

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

1. Should my employee provide any explanation for her repeated last-minute time off?

One of my employees, Ciera, has been regularly requesting her PTO at the last minute over the past few months. For example, she’ll submit a request over the weekend to have Monday off once or twice per month. Our request form has an optional comment box where Ciera can include a note to me, but she always leaves it empty. I don’t need a specific reason for why she’s requesting the day off, but given the repeated last-minute notice, is it unreasonable of me to want some kind of ballpark explanation for why it’s coming in so late (i.e., her waitlist for an appointment came through, she thought she put in the request earlier and forgot, a family emergency came up, etc.)?

While I can typically accommodate the request, it can sometimes strain our workload when we can’t plan in advance. Without any kind of explanation, these continual last-minute requests are starting to make me question her reliability in a way that I probably wouldn’t if I had some context. Am I off-base feeling this way? I don’t want to appear to be prying into her private life (I don’t need to know what the appointment is for or what the family emergency is), but I would like to come up with a solution that would allow her to request her PTO earlier if possible or at least get a heads up that she has A Thing going on that means these last-minute requests will probably continue and we need to put a plan in place to help us better prep for unexpected absences.

I don’t think you’re off-base. In jobs where coverage is needed or where an unexpected absence will cause a strain on other people, PTO normally comes with some expectation of advance notice unless the person is sick or has an emergency. In many jobs, last-minute requests can still be accommodated, but when it’s happening a lot with no context, it’s reasonable to wonder what’s going on and to want to make sure that you’re both on the same page about how time off is managed.

It’s also reasonable that you’d be more willing to shoulder whatever burden the last-minute requests cause if you understand that they are necessary rather than Ciera just, for example, feeling on Sunday that she’d rather not come in the next day.

The right next step is to talk to her and let her know it puts a strain on the team to accommodate frequent last-minute time-off and ask if she’s able to give you more advance notice. Include something like, “Unless you’re sick or have an unanticipated emergency, it’s easier on the team if we can get more advance notice. Thinking back to your recent time-off requests, does that seem like something you’d be able to do more often?”

She may not realize it matters either way, and just having this conversation might change how she approaches it.

Related:
my staff keeps requesting time off at the last minute, even though I keep asking for advance notice
how should I handle last-minute schedule change requests without being a jerk?

2. Coworker hawks up snot in the kitchen every day

Warning: if the headline didn’t alert you, this is gross.

About six months ago, we returned to the office three days a week. The building is new and there are pretty nice kitchens on each floor with sinks and fridges and places to eat lunch.

I eat my lunch earlier than most of my coworkers so I’m often the only person in there. Often, while I’m sitting and reading and eating my lunch, a person from another group whose name I don’t know comes in and performs what I can only describe as the most thorough evacuation of all the mucus in her sinuses and lungs I have ever had the misfortune to observe. For at least five minutes she cycles between deep, liquid throat-clearing and coughing, rich snorty snot-inhaling and sinus-clearing, and spitting the results into the sink or into napkins, which she then throws into the trash. She does this over the counter, next to the coffee mugs and tea, near the office fruit box and snack dispensers, right in there with food and utensils and everything.

It’s one of the most astonishingly disgusting experiences I’ve ever had at work, and I’ve worked at a university where the campus food service catered our meetings.

What can I even do about this? I don’t want to confront her, although she clearly has no self-awareness and isn’t self-conscious about it or she’d go in the bathrooms or outside or something instead of doing her stuff in the kitchen. Also, I’m a tallish man and she is a shortish woman, and I’m not sure how that would look,

Should I take this to HR? Put up a passive-aggressive sign? It’s incredibly gross and she does it almost every time I’m in there eating lunch. Maybe she does it more than once a day, even. Whatever, a shared kitchen isn’t the place to be clearing out ridiculous quantities of snot. Any advice you can offer would be welcome. I didn’t really want to go back to the office in the first place, but this makes it much much worse than I’d anticipated.

From what infernal pit of hell did your coworker ascend? Is there any chance you’re on a reality show and being punked? Because this is disgusting.

The next time it happens, you could just say to her, “Would you mind doing that in the bathroom?” Feel free to add, “There’s food and clean dishes right near you.”

I hear you on feeling weird about the gender dynamics, but she’s doing something truly gross and you’re allowed to ask her to take it to a more appropriate location.

I don’t think it rises to the level of HR … although I also don’t think it would be wildly out of line to ask them to handle it if you really don’t want to speak up yourself, given how unsanitary it is, which affects more people than just the lone unfortunate witness. (This is the kind of thing that makes HR people question their life choices, but that’s not your problem.) Don’t do the sign though, as much I enjoy imaging what it might say; this is something where someone needs to just have a direct conversation with this reprobate.

3. My employer wants to see my family tree

I work for my local county in the Human Resources department. Our county attorney is rewriting some polices, including nepotism, which will be retroactive once approved by the board. For background, I live rurally and my family was an original settler of the area in the 1800’s. The county is the largest employer in our area with over 500 employees. My family on both sides is quite large and the majority of us all still live locally.

I have two family members who work for the county. Both are distant cousins, a father and son in different departments. I didn’t know they were employed by the county when I applied or was hired. Of course, as soon I found out, I disclosed this to my manager. There was no problem mentioned at that time. Now, a year later, the new polices are being developed, and I’m being asked to submit a family tree to show exactly how distant the relationship is. It’s not only distant on the tree, it’s emotionally distant as well. I haven’t spent any real time with these people since I was a small child in the 1990’s. Others in my department seem to not have been asked for a family tree even though they have family employed by the county as well, which is made very clear and openly appear as a very close family relationship. They often discuss weekend plans together, family dinners, etc.

When I’ve asked how family is being defined, my manager isn’t able to give me a straight answer. I’m curious if you’ve heard of this before? How do I navigate potentially being asked to leave my job based on a policy that didn’t exist when I was hired (but I’ve been told will be retroactive, thus affecting my job directly) and doesn’t seem to affect others in my department?

It’s not unreasonable for them to want clarification on the exact relationship, but it’s unreasonable to only require it of you and not of others. Are you sure other people aren’t being asked similar questions? If they’re not, is there anything that could explain the difference in treatment, like that you’re in a position of authority or influence that they’re not in? Or that those relationships are already clear and don’t require more info?

Also, has anyone actually said you could be asked to leave your job over this, as opposed to simply wanting the info so they can put in place any necessary safeguards against conflicts of interest? I would assume it’s likely to be the latter unless something specific has made you think it’s the former.

If you do end up being asked to leave your job over a policy that isn’t applied to others who are similarly situated, you should push back on that — with a union if you have one, or with an attorney if you don’t. That said, government employers are normally fairly risk-averse about applying clear-cut policies to one person and not to others so, again, unless you have reason to think that will happen, there’s a good chance that’s not where this is going.

4. What should I do in meetings with someone on an improvement plan who’s not improving?

I have an employee with performance issues who is basically on an informal PIP because we don’t have enough documentation of the issues to put her on a formal PIP. I’ve clearly laid out my expectations for what she needs to do and by when, and she’s indicated that she understands. I’ve also told her that the consequences of not meeting these goals are that she will be put on a formal PIP. We’ve previously discussed her personal issues that may be contributing, and I’ve repeatedly offered her FMLA, accommodations, and the EAP, which she has not to my knowledge taken advantage of.

What do I do during my weekly check-in meetings with her? There are occasionally things where I need to ask her “did you do X?” but most of the time I am already aware of whether she has completed her tasks or not. Some weeks she’s doing well and meeting the goals, some weeks she’s not, so there’s no sustained improvement yet. It feels weird to go into that meeting like “you didn’t do the thing. Do the thing,” for the 20th time.

HR said we should document her performance and my communication with her through the end of the year in order to have enough info to get a PIP approved. What do I do in weekly meetings for the next three months where we both already know the status?

If you’re not seeing the sustained improvement you told her was needed and you’re having to repeatedly remind her to do things she’s not doing, you should tell HR you’ve seen enough to be ready to move to the formal PIP now rather than dragging this out.

But meanwhile, use the check-in meetings to give feedback on what you’re seeing and to flag that you’re not seeing the needed improvements: “I’m concerned that you haven’t done XYZ. This is an example of what we’ve discussed needed to improve. What happened?” It sounds like you’ll be repeating that a lot, and there’s no way around that.

5. How do I set goals at a job I don’t like?

Last fall, I was laid off from a job I really loved. Earlier this year, I started a new job I’ve always disliked. While the job is technically in the industry and field I want to be in, I’m not using the skills or knowledge I’ve worked hard to amass. I’m passionate about consumers, but we are firmly B2B. My boss isn’t particularly kind, and we’ve butted heads on lots of issues. I’ve continued looking for a new job since day 3, but I’m still here many months later.

Over the summer, my boss was supposed to conduct a mid-year performance review, but he never did. This would have included setting goals for the rest of the year, so those goals have never been set. He mentioned last week that soon, we’d start working on setting goals for 2025. But I can’t for the life of me figure out what good goals are for this job when my goal is to find a different job and get out of here.

What are generic professional goals I could be working towards in this position? Or how can I think about the goals differently to come up with things I’d like to work on?

Don’t think of this as being about goals for you personally; think of it as being about goals for the position, regardless of who’s in it. In other words, it’s about what needs to be done for the work; if you were replaced tomorrow, what would a successful 2025 look like for the person who took over? For example, if you work in online media, you might have goals around increasing click-through rate or adding email subscribers. If you work in finance, it might be about having a clean audit and lowering overhead costs by X%. If you work in IT, it might be implementing a new CMS and resolving the database errors that have been plaguing your team. And so on — they’re goals that anyone could inherit if you leave, and they describe what successful work or progress would look like for the position, not a specific person who happens to be in it.

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{ 291 comments }

{ 291 comments… read them below }

  1. Daria grace*

    #5, another option here is broad goals related to tools that will be useful in any job in your field. Eg I’d like to improve my skills at creating reports from excel data or learn basic python programming or take a public speaking class

    1. learnedthehardway*

      Just make sure that you relate the requested skills training to something about the role. eg. “I want to automate the monthly inventory report, so I would like advanced training in Excel and our inventory software. I know there are more capabilities we could use…”

      1. Another freelancer*

        Exactly! I would definitely come up with something. OP could be in this role for another six months before landing a better job so may as well get something out of the current role.

      2. Reluctant Mezzo*

        Automating any report was often my goal in life, and paid off well when I could pull it off.

  2. Nodramalama*

    I’m slightly focused by the situation in LW3, but if LW has disclosed that they have distant cousins working and the other people have closer relationships, isn’t it possible that those people haven’t been asked to show a family tree because it’s obvious what their relationship is? There’s no need for a family tree if the other person is their first cousin or sister-in-law. But a “distant” cousin could be anything.

    1. TheBunny*

      This was my take. I don’t need an explanation to understand someone is a nephew. But cousin twice removed on the side of my mother’s brother’s wife? I’m going to need a tree, a diagram, and 20 uninterrupted minutes.

      1. Cmdrshprd*

        “When I’ve asked how family is being defined, my manager isn’t able to give me a straight answer.”

        Further I wonder if OP is being asked for a family tree so the policy can be written in a way that makes OP and the cousins in the clear.

        e.g. they are OPs third cousins, so they will write the policy to count family/nepotism as 2nd cousins or less/closer, leaving OP and cousins in the clear.

        or they are 2nd cousins and they write it as family means 1st cousins and less/closer means family for sake of nepotism policy.

        I have a big family and get introduced to “new” second/third cousins /aunts/uncles at certain gatherings, often I just take people at their word, because I would need. a diagram to figure it out.

        1. Nodramalama*

          It might also be that they don’t HAVE a definition of family that would be useful. Especially if it’s to do with managing conflicts of interest and nepotism, saying “family is first cousins but not second cousins once removed” isn’t useful if someone’s second cousin once removed is also the person’s neighbour and works to them

          1. Emmy Noether*

            I don’t think there can be a useful and fair definition beyond direct-line relationships (those may be estranged, but they’re seldom neutral).

            Cousins of any degree may be best friends having grown up together like siblings, or they may be functionally strangers. And you can also have family that isn’t technically legally related. Like is your dad’s long-term-live-in-but-now-separated girlfriend that you still see weekly family? There’s no possible definition that will accurately reflect all that.

            1. A Simple Narwhal*

              This 100%. Family has such a wide definition – I have about 25 cousins, and my relationship with all of them ranges from “we’re the same age and we saw each other every week growing up and we still talk frequently” to “you live in a different state and were born when I was an adult, guess I’ll see you at the next wedding”. My favorite aunt is my uncle’s second wife, zero blood relation and I didn’t grow up knowing her. Meanwhile my husband barely talks to his immediate family and has a found family of friends he met in college.

              This reminds me of a question Alison answered a while ago about a restaurant manager wondering if they should/could ban relationships between staff. I think her answer was that you’re better off watching for/banning the problematic behavior that can happen in relationships, since they’re just as bound to happen in familial or platonic relationships as romantic ones. (I know it’s not quite the same when hierarchies come into play, just pointing out/agreeing that simply defining family isn’t going to be an easy solution to avoiding favoritism.)

            2. Baldrick*

              Amusingly, some places that require background checks ask about one’s spouse, parents, siblings, in-laws, and step parents, yet aren’t set up to deal with anything outside of this and therefore don’t want the info about one’s other polyamory partners. So, as an example, my coworker could be estranged from his abusive brother yet need to list him, whereas he can only list one of the two people he lives with (and, when this is mentioned to the background folks, they made it clear that they didn’t care). I mention this as it shows how problematic the rules become when family is narrowly defined, and it is much more about the relationships. Also, much more importantly in this context, did the family have any influence over the hiring choices? That’s what really stands out – the OP is worried about this, yet the family members were never involved in their hiring so the manager is presumably asking for info only to document who the family is, what jobs they have, and confirming that there is no overlap between them.

          2. MassMatt*

            This seems likely, the employer can’t answer the question because they have no definition of “family”.

            I am curious about Alison’s suggestion to look for an attorney if LW might lose their job over this. Wouldn’t this fall under the “It’s awful, but yes, it would be legal” category? Are family/relatives a protected class?

            1. Municipal Government Attorney*

              It’s not so much that family is a protected class as the employer is the government, and the government must apply policies consistently toward similarly-situated employees. Private employers can be as arbitrary as they like as long as they don’t discriminate against a protected class, but the government really does have to be consistent. It’s a general equal protection/rule of law issue rather than a question of employment discrimination law specifically.

            2. Elsewise*

              I read that as “IF this is being applied only to you, it might be because of an unrelated protected class”. So while “having second cousins” isn’t a protected class, if LW is the only gay person in the office and their second cousins are a problem while Joe Hetero’s dad isn’t, that’s something to make a stink over.

          3. Paint N Drip*

            Right, those titles and lines are blurred when family looks different for everyone! My husband has several first cousins he couldn’t pick out of a lineup, I’m closer to some of my second cousins and second cousins once removed than he is to some of his aunts/ uncles/ cousins. One of my childhood friends was my fourth cousin once removed. Maybe it says more about me than nepotism but I’d be way more likely to try to get jobs for my besties (and they aren’t on my family tree)

        2. Richard Hershberger*

          It seems to me what they need is a definition of nepotism. A relative working in a different department, especially where there was no involvement in the hiring process, is not what I understand to be nepotism. Go back far enough and we are all cousins. That isn’t the point.

          1. bamcheeks*

            Seems to me that nepotism or preferment based on consanguinity only works if you’ve got the kind of society where wealth is held in clans and broad extended families, and your child / nephew / third cousin-once-removed getting an advantage ultimately benefits you because your wealth and the clan’s are aligned. There are definitely pockets where that’s still true, but it’s just not how the majority of Western societies work any more! Cronyism / preferment based on friendship or shared class/race/gender interests are much bigger threats, and having a list of who is who’s third cousin isn’t going to help you much with that. It’s a solution for a problem that doesn’t really exist.

              1. bamcheeks*

                But not necessarily more than they like to give their best friend’s kid a leg-up. It doesn’t make sense to focus on extended family relationships in a context where most people are just as likely to support a friend or a colleague’s kid as they are a second-cousin once-removed kids.

                1. OrdinaryJoe*

                  Very good point! I know my friends’ kids much more than I know my cousins’ kids who live in other states and I may see once every 5 years at funerals or weddings.

              2. Lenora Rose*

                I think you’re confusing two different definitions of wealth. A clan based system of wealth doesn’t mean your clan is wealthy, it means what they do have benefits you, and what you make benefits them, even if you’re ultimately all middle – / working-class.

            2. MassMatt*

              I know anecdotes are not data, but I have seen many nepotism hires based on family ties, and we have seen many letters here about them also. It really isn’t limited to non-western societies.

              Your point about favoritism often being based on friendship or other similarities is definitely true, in the absence of processes and clear criteria people tend to hire and promote people like themselves.

              At a company I used to work for the executive pool drew heavily from a local religious/ethnic university. It was a respected university, but leadership was increasingly homogenous. Seeing this near monoculture talk about the value of diversity at company meetings was an illustration of cognitive disconnect. And this was a major company, publicly traded, not a mom and pop operation.

              1. bamcheeks*

                I think we’ve seen quite a lot of letters about problematic hires or favouritism based on pretty straight-forward relationships like partner/husband/wife, parent/child, auncle/niblet, stepparent/stepchild, maaaaybe cousins. But those are pretty easy to define, and don’t require any diagrams! I would be really surprised if there were many places where second-cousin or more distant were more likely to be causing problems than non-familial relationships.

                1. MigraineMonth*

                  Oh, you mean nepotism isn’t a big thing for *distant* family relationships. That might very well be the case, but nepotism is definitely alive and well for the close family relationships (by blood/marriage/possible future marriage). “I’m going to hire my kid/my sister’s kid/my kid’s deadbeat fiancé(e) who can’t get any other job” has a strong self-interest component to it, especially if you’d be loaning them money otherwise.

                2. MassMatt*

                  I think I agree in general, but in the case of my former employer, the closest thing to relation would likely be frat bros (literally).

                  And we see tons of “she hired her friend” letters, these relationships won’t fit in a family tree but can definitely sway hiring.

                  Maybe a more generalized “do you have any relationships with anyone influencing the hiring for this position” question needs to be asked of everyone being hired–and hiring.

                3. bamcheeks*

                  Yeah, that’s exactly what I mean. A definition of “nepotism” that would be captured by a family tree isn’t going to capture people hiring their friends, giving opportunities to their friend’s kids, preferring people from their church / university / fraternity, and so on. It wouldn’t necessarily capture step-relations or unformalised relationships like “my dad’s girlfriend’s kid” either.

                  Maybe they are using nepotism to include those things too, but the focus on a family tree to define distant cousin-ships makes it sound like they are prioritising consanguinity over lots of other things that are probably more pertinent!

            3. Reluctant Mezzo*

              I worked for a company which put the ‘nepo’ in nepotism. If you saw a certain last name, you knew what kind of treatment and promotions they were likely to get. There was only one time a relative crash landed and was wished well in future endeavors (‘far away from us’).

          2. RIP Pillowfort*

            That’s where I fall on this as well. They may still be developing the policy, but I think they’re going at it wrong as well. If you start getting into distant cousins- I think you’re way too invested in the family angle and not enough in the prevention of conflict of interest. Which is much easier to deal with.

            I work for a large state org and have a 1st cousin in another state org. There are tons of married couples who work in my org as well.

            Our definition in policy for nepotism requires the family members be in the same org, in the same reporting structure, etc. for it to really be evaluated. Example in my case- I couldn’t work for my 1st cousin’s org because he’s really high in management and I would by default be in his reporting structure. Conversely if a married couple works in the Office of Teapot Development and another in the Office of Shipping- that’s okay per policy even though they’re in the same parent org.

          3. doreen*

            That depends to a certain extent on what “different department” means – is it the type of organization where “different department” means HR vs IT in the same agency or the sort where “different departments ” means the fire department and the police department? But they definitely need a definition – my former employer’s definition of “close relative” is any person living in the same household, any person who is a direct descendant of your grandparents or the spouse of any descendant of your grandparents. Of course there are problems even so – the rule prohibits supervising or participating in decisions about hiring, promoting etc close relatives but that doesn’t do much about someone else deciding to promote a high ranking person’s sibling or hiring their child.

          4. Delta Delta*

            This was my thought, as well. If OP works in Vanilla Village in the building permits department, and her 3rd cousin who she barely knows works in Chocolate City in the road maintenance department, there’s likely no issue. It’s probably different if the cousin applies directly to OP’s same department and office. T

          5. Not Tom, Just Petty*

            I think what they need is a visual aid of familial relationships. First cousin/fifth cousin/once removed is complicated and picture will help. So they want OP to make them a functional and factual guide. But they can’t really say, “hey, do the leg work of our research for us.”

            1. Random Bystander*

              It doesn’t really need to be a visual picture. It’s basically a matter of “our family tree diverged at ___ ancestor”. Like when I moved back to the town where I was born, and come to find out that the insurance agent is my third cousin once removed–my greatx3-grandfather is his greatx2-grandfather–and we might not even have gotten onto the topic except that I had moved into my grandparents’ house.

              It’s not uncommon in smaller, rural America for people who’ve got long-standing ties to an area to be related in the 2nd or 3rd cousin degree. Especially when that third generation back consisted of families where six children was a small family.

        3. MBK*

          If they’re worried about a new policy negatively affecting existing employees, why not just explicitly grandfather (or third-cousin-once-removed) them in by having the policy only apply to employment decisions made after the policy goes into effect?

          Also, “relatives working for the same employer” isn’t what nepotism means. Beyond how close the relationship is, you’d think they could just note that OP is not in a situation where they might give these distant relations any kind of preferential treatment or vice versa.

        4. Quill*

          If I were required to disclose all my second cousins… I could definitely not. On one side my grandparents were great depression farm kids in 7 kid families, on the other ridiculous feuds and drama have lead to uncles who no one has spoken to for three decades cropping up to surprise me at funerals. In addition, my mother was born when her mom was almost 40, and her mom was one of the youngest in her family, so my mom’s “cousins” that she grew up with are actually mostly the children of her oldest first cousins!

          When going to a family reunion I don’t need a diagram, I need a historian.

      2. Dido*

        you actually don’t need a tree at all for that scenario because the relationship is so distant as to be irrelevant to nepotism concerns. EVERYONE is distantly related

      3. fhqwhgads*

        I would think if it’s complicated enough that you can’t understand it with just the name of the relationship, it’s distant enough to not need to fully understand just how distant it is? That’s what makes it weird that they’re asking.

    2. Not That Kind of Doctor*

      Given the history, I wonder if the real concern is more, “Wow, just how much of the local government does this extended family control and who else is LW related to that they might be forgetting about?”

      1. MsSolo (UK)*

        Yes, this has occurred to me – I couldn’t tell you where most of my relatives worked. If a first cousin in a different profession popped up in my organisation it could be years before I figured it out, like sure, I might know that cousin Mark is an accountant, but I didn’t realise he’d been hired as an external contractor to do the widget accounts. Especially with LW in HR, which means she has potential to be involved in issues across the whole organisation, rather than just her chain of command. I suspect there are concerns about the perception of nepotism as well as the potential for actual nepotism.

    3. Sneaky Squirrel*

      I agree, I suspect the employer is trying to understand what is meant by distant. I can never remember the difference between a “cousin twice removed” versus a “distant cousin” versus a “second cousin” personally. But in response, who is sitting on any kind of formalized family tree? I certainly don’t have any formal documentation that my cousins are my cousins, nor could I list out anyone beyond immediate family. LW could make up anything here, or omit information whether it be intentionally or inadvertently. I don’t see how requesting a family tree is helpful beyond trying to understand what LW means, and if I were LW then I would want to understand where the family tree information would be stored.

      1. dulcinea47*

        “distant cousin” doesn’t mean anything specific. If the relationships are so distant that people can’t understand them, it’s definitely not nepotism.

        1. Alton Brown's Evil Twin*

          My dad comes from a rural county with large families. He was one of 9, his parents both had double-digit siblings. Now extend that back to the 1800s, and he’s probably related to literally everybody in the county who didn’t move there from outside.

          I think the new county attorney is setting himself up for an impossible task.

        2. Sneaky Squirrel*

          I would personally think that, but I wonder if this was one of those things where because LW brought it up, it now can’t be left unchecked.

      2. MigraineMonth*

        My dad explained Nth cousins to me in the most math-nerd way possible, so it stuck with me and I feel the need to share with the world:

        N is the number of generations you need to go up to get to siblings. So you and your brother are technically zeroth-cousins. If your Mom and their Mom are sisters, you’re first cousins. If your grandfather and their grandmother are siblings, you’re second cousins, and so on.

        “N removed” is the number of generations difference. So if your first cousin has a child, the child is your first cousin once removed. If that child has a child, your first cousin’s grandchild is your first cousin twice removed.

        “Distant cousin” just means some sort of relation but you don’t feel like doing the math.

        Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk!

        1. Richard Hershberger*

          The traditional way to explain Nth cousin is how many generations back you have to go to a common ancestor, but that number is N+1. Going back to siblings is a bit indirect, but makes the math simpler.

        2. Hroethvitnir*

          Nice! I mostly haven’t cared enough to keep track of how this works, but that’s a nice explanation.

      3. Limmy*

        It’s really unlikely they’re asking for an actual family tree, they just want LW to clarify their nebulous statement about being “distant cousins,” Distant cousins could mean anything from fourth cousins, to “our fathers are brothers but we don’t talk.” If LW and this other employee are first cousins but consider themselves distant cousins because they’re not in contact, the company needs to know that.

        They don’t need a family tree from the other person because they already know that information.

    4. L.H. Puttgrass*

      It’s not that hard to pick a definition of family member. If nothing else, there’s a (U.S.) anti-nepotism law for federal employees that defines “relative” thusly:

      “relative” means, with respect to a public official, an individual who is related to the public official asfather, mother, son, daughter, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, first cousin, nephew, niece, husband, wife, father-in-law, mother-in-law, son-in-law, daughter-in-law, brother-in-law, sister-in-law, stepfather, stepmother, stepson, stepdaughter, stepbrother, stepsister, half brother, or half sister.

      5 U.S.C. § 3110(a)(3).

      That definition may not be perfect (and it’s interesting that it excludes grandparents and grand-children), but it seems perfectly workable, and it would avoid having to ask for family trees for cousins of the “wait, what’s the difference between an Nth cousin and a cousin Xth removed, again?” variety.

      1. Flor*

        The emphasis on first cousin actually makes me wonder if there’s confusion between OP and their manager, and the manager is asking for a family tree to confirm the father and son aren’t “first cousin and first cousin once removed, with a distant relationship” as opposed to, for instance, “a third cousin and a third cousin once removed”.

        Personally, I couldn’t even find my second cousins with a compass and a giant X on a map, let alone anything more distant than that.

  3. nnn*

    I’m not clear in #3 whether they’re being asked to map out their relationship to these distant cousins via the medium of family tree (i.e. draw a diagram that shows that it’s their mother’s father’s brother’s daughter’s son’s wife’s son) or whether they’re being asked to submit a comprehensive family tree because they’re related to other county employees.

    The first one you could sketch out with pencil and paper, the second one might take extensive research.

    1. amylynn*

      I noticed that LW3 said that they lived and worked in a rural area. As someone who worked in a rural area for about seven years and whose parents still live in that area, nepotism rules are not straightforward in these areas. Not to promulgate stereotypes but depending on how rural it may be the case that “everyone is related to everyone” and what in an more urban area would be impermissible nepotism might simply be “we wouldn’t have employees if we excluded all the managers’ cousins”. I would hope that someone explains that to the lawyers and they focus on actual inappropriate relationships; I would assume that’s what the family tree is about.

      1. MigraineMonth*

        The other thing about rural areas is that there may only be a few people in town who are qualified to do a specialized role. So it’s not great that Judy has to manage her sister, but her sister is literally the only qualified applicant within 50 miles.

    2. Hazel*

      There is no reason the OP should do all that work or provide personal information like a family tree that contains (presumably) names of people who don’t work there. The purpose of nepotism policies is to prevent preferential hiring, financial controls being in the hands of a few close people, or conflict of interest. The layer needs to focus on that. I am sure they can google any number of conflict of interest policies – which as Richard H pointed out, is the point – from other local governments as examples.

    3. Wilbur*

      It’s possible they don’t really know how it works out on a family tree. They parents/grandparents could have simplified it to “distant cousins” and never elaborated that it’s your Grandmas first husbands brothers grandkids. A lot of people just aren’t interested in knowing because you’ll never see that person again or really need to know. At least until your boss asks for your family tree.

  4. RPOhno*

    LW5, you could also go with my favorite kind of goal: thing you have to do anyway that is readily quantified. For me that’s frequently developing procedures or implementing new training requirements, but there are likely things you have to do anyway that fit into a SMART goal template.

    1. Nicosloanica*

      Hear hear. I’m not keen on goals that are about continuous improvement into infinity. They’re just not that realistic IMO.

    2. Pay no attention...*

      Yeah, I always add at least one “attend X conference to keep current on (industry thing).” I want to attend them anyway, but in addition to being easily achieved, having it formally on my performance eval also helps me defend that professional development time in the event that someone at work has an “emergency” and they think I should skip it. I can point to the goal and say this is a required part of my job not an optional fun day.

    3. Daisy-dog*

      And really, that’s what most of those goals are looking for. I was talking about goals with my Chief People Officer and she told me to put down what was essentially “Do My Job” as a goal. I did have 3 other goals tied to specific projects. I know calling them *goals* seems like they should be ambitious, but ultimately doing our job well is a great achievement.

  5. Coverage Associate*

    It’s a partial family tree, just to show the relationships at issue, not like your whole family tree on both your mother’s and father’s sides?

    If you want to comply, or explore what complying might look like, the first thing I would do is google “table of consanguinity.” This is the “family tree” form that lawyers use. It has 2 advantages here. First, sometimes it’s useful to have a form to fill in rather than just starting with a blank piece of paper. Second, you can easily fill in just enough to explain the relationships at issue, rather than a full family tree. Oh, and it will give you the proper terminology for the relationships (eg, second cousin or first cousin once removed). Really, having the relationships defined or properly named should be enough for the employer, rather than a chart.

    Oh oh, unlike how I was taught to do family trees in school or how I have seen them in museums’ information, the tables of consanguinity don’t mark for children born to married parents v not. In fact, they only have space for one parent for each person in the chart, so again just the bare minimum information to explain the relationships. (Again, even for yourself, if one relative was from your father’s side and one from your mother’s, you would have to fill out 2, but because they’re father and son, their relationship to each other and you will be clear on the table.)

    If you do want to consult a lawyer, or maybe just get a little more advice, some laws about collecting medical and genetic histories by employers have been applied to family history information at least adjacent to what’s being asked for here, so that could be something to explore as another reason the ask is improper.

    1. Delta Delta*

      I was thinking this, as well. My aunt was very into genealogy for a while and made an absolutely massive spiral-bound family tree for our family. Really nice, but way too much information. A table of consanguinity is easier to use (except for the things you mentioned) and gets more easily to the very close family relations, which is probably what the concern actually is here. The exercise of doing this could be helpful, as well, since it may turn out people aren’t actually related. There are loads of families where people are very close but not related, or where someone gets divorced but the divorced person remains part of the family and that can sort of blur the lines about if/how related. Families can be large and messy and not well-defined.

      1. Coverage Associate*

        The “family” that wasn’t actually family is legendary in my biological family. My father’s family had very clear distinctions between “family” and “friends.” For example, some parties were for “family” and some were for “friends.”

        Or so they thought.

        The first time my mom met them, she was in medical school and asked how everyone was related. I think she made a partial genealogy chart and realized that one part of the “family” wasn’t related at all. They had been in-laws, but the relevant married couple was deceased, so there was no present relationship by birth or marriage between the families.

        This came up again 35 years later when I read in the legal press that there was an estate dispute about someone with the relevant last name, and it was worth millions. We double checked for a “real” relationship then.

        There are lawyers who specialize in tracking down the distant relatives of deceased people and representing them as heirs.

  6. Mark*

    #LW3. Do they really want a family tree or just it written down for them to file away? Just simply stating in writing that Bob in accounts is my mothers first cousins husband and that Bobbie Junior in IT is his son should be sufficient. Ask your other work colleagues what was required of them, if they got a form to fill in, and then just do the same. Usually companies just want this stuff on file.

    If you feel you are being treated differently just ask. “I asked Miranda my cube neighbour what she did as her husband works in the parks dept and she filled out this form so here is my copy. She was not asked for a family tree so why am I being asked for something different?”

    Maybe you will find out that they were excited to hear you were from an original founding family and wanted to promote that in some way or they know that Lucinda in the canteen said you were her step sister and they want to figure out if there is some deep family secret you know nothing about?

    If you do feel you may be fired it does seem a very drastic step to single you out about so Alison’s advice is spot on

    1. Rebekah*

      Or as other people have pointed out “husband” is a very easy to understand relationship and it would be insane to ask someone to submit a family tree to help management understand what “husband” means. Step-second cousin three times removed could, however, bear with a little diagramming. And frankly if they’re as distant as all that accurately defining the relationship is probably in OPs best interest so that management can visually see how distant they are.

    2. Hannah Lee*

      As far as the “If you feel you ware being treated differently” aspect, I did chuckle a bit at this:

      “That said, government employers are normally fairly risk-averse about applying clear-cut policies to one person and not to others so, again, unless you have reason to think that will happen, there’s a good chance that’s not where this is going.”

      with a “oh my sweet summer child” smile. There are families, cultural groups, parishes, neighborhoods where I’m from in New England who have raised multi-generational feuding to an art form.

      If you were not from there, and didn’t know where the lines were drawn, you likely wouldn’t pick up what was going on. But someone in a town or county government role digging around in the family tree of someone they suspect might have distant family ties to someone from ‘the other side’, and using their official position for that purpose, then using what they find to orchestrate someone’s ouster/downfall is a thing has happened. (My extended family was part of one of the factions, and I remember gatherings I was at as a kid where some of the plotting went on.)

      That doesn’t change the advice Alison gave, which is great. But it’s just another perspective.

  7. Captain dddd-cccc-ddWdd*

    OP3 (family tree request) – I expect all the relationships are being documented as part of this compliance initiative, but they don’t all require a family tree e.g. “father” or “sister in law” etc are obvious without a family tree. As for why it needs to be documented in such detail for a distant cousin – I expect this is the typical “over-enforcement” that new initiatives often seem to get (you see this with many types of new policy). It doesn’t matter that you aren’t in close contact with them for the purposes of this policy – it just needs to get on the record that they are your grandparent’s sister’s son’s sister in law or whatever. I doubt you are in danger of losing your job over this although I can understand the anxiety.

    2. Cat*

      Although even commonly understood terms, e.g
      brother/sister in law, can be ambiguous; in this example, it could be your sibling’s spouse or your spouse’s sibling. Cousins x removed are also ambiguous even if you look up the definition; according to the chart I just Googled, e.g., a first cousin once removed could be a first cousin’s child (shared grandparent, 1 gen younger) or a great aunt/uncle/pibling’s child (shared great grandparent, 1 gen older)

      1. doreen*

        Or a brother-in-law might be your spouse’s sibling’s husband in some usages. Cousins X removed are somewhat ambiguous – a first cousin once removed might be either your parent’s first cousin or your first cousin’s child – but they are the same degree of relationship.

        1. MigraineMonth*

          I had a moment of shock when a friend said their brother-in-law and sister-in-law were expecting a baby. I was like, “What, with each other?”

          Fortunately, I did figure out that they meant brother-in-law and his wife before I said any of that out loud.

      2. Spencer Hastings*

        “a first cousin once removed could be a first cousin’s child (shared grandparent, 1 gen younger) or a great aunt/uncle/pibling’s child (shared great grandparent, 1 gen older)”

        Either I’m missing something, or this is just describing the same relationship from each person’s perspective (one of them is the child of the other’s first cousin; they have a shared ancestor who is person A’s great-grandparent and person B’s grandparent).

        1. MigraineMonth*

          Yes, but it’s notable because most different-generation relationships aren’t reciprocal like that. Take my sister’s daughter. She’s my niece, but I’m not *her* niece.

          When I say “niece”, I’m probably talking about someone younger than me. A first cousin once removed is from a different generation than me, but it’s unclear from the title whether I’m talking about an older generation or a younger one.

  8. Myrin*

    #2, this sounds absolutely terrible but I have to say that as an entirely uninvolved outsider, “It’s one of the most astonishingly disgusting experiences I’ve ever had at work” has me in stitches at shortly past 7 AM right now. You clearly have a way with words! I was just about to say that that doesn’t help you at all but actually, now that I think about it, it might actually help you for real – I reckon Alison’s proposed phrasing is excellent and I’m sure you can use it in a way that feels natural. Good luck!

    1. Formerly Ella Vader*

      and the contextual placement of “and I’ve worked at a university where the campus food service catered our meetings.” makes it even better.

          2. Hroethvitnir*

            My friend, good luck. I have a way, way higher tolerance for gross than average (I in fact work with bodily fluids, including sputum), and I am *horrified*.

            Just actually astounding, and I’m not saying that lightly. Up there with the boss(?) pouring piss in the work kitchen sink. O_o

        2. Sheworkshardforthemoney*

          I had a university meal this week and after one bite I wanted my money back. I understand that it’s hard to keep staff but that mystery dish should have never left the kitchen When it’s good it’s great when it’s bad it’s really bad

          1. NotBatman*

            YES. Overworked 18-year-old employees with 0 hours of training make for an exciting food service experience — you never know what you’ll get! Occasionally there’s an entire free meal because they can’t find the button for “hamburger” in the cash register; occasionally there’s food poisoning. Never a dull moment, in the 15-odd years I’ve been working in higher ed.

        3. not nice, don't care*

          The world should be offended *by* university catering. So gross and such a waste of food and money.

          1. Bruce*

            When I was an undergrad we had family style meals in a common dining room, the protein dishes were always known as either “slop” or “pucks”. “Slop” was any diced meat with sauce, like sweet & sour pork or chicken a la king. “Pucks” were “Salisbury Steak” patties in gravy. What it lacked in quality was made up for in quantity. My understanding is that it got worse after I graduated, they hired a local restaurant owner who had very low standards for sanitation and freshness. There was a cafeteria on campus, mainly for staff and grad students, it at least had choices in the menu but those of us on the meal plan got what was served in the dining room.

        4. MigraineMonth*

          I don’t remember college cafeteria being that bad, but for me the “freshman 20lb” ended up being the “freshman -10lb”.

          I also at one time wrote them a letter touting the many wonderful sources of vegetarian protein and requesting that they please include *any* of them in the vegetarian meal option.

          1. Philosophia*

            Ah, yes. I don’t often travel by plane, and perhaps that’s why I recall so vividly one such occasion decades ago, when the lunch served by the airline to this vegetarian consisted in its entirety of one (1) bunch of grapes.

      2. juliebulie*

        Well, we were warned that it was going to be disgusting. But I wasn’t ready for it to be this disgusting. (I remember university cafeteria food vividly. Ants and all.)

      3. Roja*

        Campus food service at my university was shockingly bad at times and this line made me laugh long and hard.

    2. not nice, don't care*

      Aside from loudly blurting out ‘OMG can’t you do that in the bathroom?!?’ I would feel compelled to jump up and throw paper towels or something similar over the clean counters & dishes in a very dramatic way.

    3. eeeek*

      For #2, this seems like an arena where lack of filters/impulse control could be useful. At least, when I walked into our community kitchen and discovered a coworker trimming his weirdly long fingernails at the kitchen sink (next to the coffee maker, near the dishes drying in the rack), it was helpful to B L U R T “What the HEK are you doing! That is a bathroom activity, preferably YOUR OWN bathroom. That is NOT A SHARED SINK IN THE COMMON ROOM WHERE WE EAT AND PREPARE FOOD AND WASH DISHES AT WORK ACTIVITY!!! STOP IT NOW!” He stopped; brain clicked in; left immediately.
      I may have been a bit terrifying. But honestly, I was possessed by the holy spirit of Hygeia, and could not contain myself.

  9. Artistic Impulses*

    LW #2, you must speak to the phlegm clearer immediately! I don’t care if you are 6’7″ and she is 5’1″, this really cannot go on. Not only is it totally disgusting, it is probably also a threat to the health of office at large.

    If you really cannot bring yourself to speak to her when she is doing it, please take Alison’s advice and go to HR. Run, don’t walk! Someone this clueless of the most basic office etiquette needs to be clued in ASAP.

    I am shaking my head at how appalling this is. What a mess, pun intended!

    1. DJ Abbott*

      Since it’s happening every day, it’s probably allergies or some other chronic medical condition that’s not contagious. But it still has to be addressed!
      Personally, I would go to HR because I think that would work better to confront this person. Saying something one on one could just lead to a conflict the offender thinks is personal.

      1. Nicosloanica*

        I admit, my mind did flick back to the last time I had a terrible allergy spell to make sure I never did such a thing in the kitchen. That it happens and that you sometimes urgently MUST clear your throat / sinuses is inevitable, that it’s really gross is unavoidable (it’s gross to me on the other side, too!) but you do control the setting and the bathroom is a more appropriate one than the kitchen. Although I understand the logic of “oh god it’s happening – sink, must get to sink!” And also I suspect any other unfortunate in the bathroom at the wrong time also finds it pretty gross.

        1. Jackalope*

          I get that logic too – sometimes you don’t have a choice about when and where the mucus will emerge. But the fact that this is happening on the regular tells me that she could plan for this at least to some extent. Going proactively to the bathroom at around The Mucus Time each day would make it considerably more likely that she’s in a more appropriate spot for this, and doing a quick nose blowing at her desk could tide her over enough to get herself to the bathroom if she’s caught by surprise.

          1. NotBatman*

            Yes, exactly. My weaktoast sinuses get irritated by dust, by pollen, by most cleaning products… which is why I always have a box of tissues and a bottle of hand sanitizer on my desk. I emit more phlegm than most people, which is why it’s my responsibility to keep the phlegm safely contained.

      2. Artistic Impulses*

        You are probably right that it is a chronic condition, rather than contagious, but it is still wildly unsanitary to do this around food, in a lunchroom. It is almost as bad as if she was actually spitting on the food and utensils.

        I cannot get over the fact that this woman would not at least go to the bathroom to do this. What can be going through her mind? If she saw someone else doing something this revolting near food, would she just shrug?

        1. Great Frogs of Literature*

          Also, while the CAUSE may not be contagious, she presumably gets sick at approximately the same rate as everyone else, and anything nasties she has in her system at any given time are now being shared with the whole kitchen.

          1. Silver Robin*

            I was going to point this out too – folks carry all sorts of germs without being affected themselves; bodily fluids are biohazards and generally viewed as gross when non-consensually shared (sneezing, whatever awfulness this is, etc.), even when they are from perfectly healthy individuals, for a reason.

    2. Hlao-roo*

      For the height differences part of the question that LW2 mentioned:

      You’re sitting down when the phlegm clearer enters the room, so I don’t think there are any bad optics about being a tall man looming over a short woman if you say “hey, would you mind doing that in the bathroom?” from your seated position.

      1. Paint N Drip*

        This is what I was thinking as well – just stay seated OP. As a short woman, that’s about as even as you can get us so that’s kosher to me

      2. snot-witnesser*

        That would be a pretty good idea, except it would require basically shouting across the room. I’d have to walk over and confront her.

        1. Hlao-roo*

          Just brainstorming a few ideas here:

          – are there places to sit that are closer to the sink/entrance than where you normally sit? If so, sit there until you overlap with her so you can talk to her while seated

          – if the above won’t work, walk over to where you’re about 4-5ft away from her so you can still comfortably talk to her but aren’t looming. Make sure you aren’t between her and the door so she doesn’t feel trapped.

          Maybe it would also help if you thought of it in terms of “I’m going to talk to her” or “I’m going to ask her to move that to the bathroom” instead of “I’m going to confront her”? It’s an internal change, but thinking of talking to her in language that is a little less adversarial may lead to some unconscious changes in your body language and tone of voice during the conversation.

          1. Nobby Nobbs*

            A faux-casual lean against the counter might look contrived, but it could also lessen the height difference/looming problem if he does it a few feet away.

        2. Honoria Lucasta*

          I was going to suggest staying seated, too… because that also makes it more “casual”. Like, you’re not going out of your way to go over to her, you’re just remarking from where you are on a thing that is happening near you.

          It does depend on the size of your breakroom, though. I wouldn’t want you to have to actually shout, but could you just “speak up”? Like you would if you were calling across the hallway to a colleague? I have a naturally loud voice, so a strong volume that carries across a distance doesn’t read as “shouty” coming from me; if you’re naturally a little quieter, it might feel egregious to raise your voice.

          If speaking up won’t work, then I would echo what others have suggested. Move near— but not into her personal bubble and not between her and the exit—and say something like “Elsa, would you please do that in the bathroom instead of the kitchen? We have clean dishes and food here.” I’m a short woman (5’4″ in heels) and while I wouldn’t want to be towered over, and I wouldn’t want to be cornered, if somebody came over and leaned casually against the counter then I would not feel threatened by the size difference. If your hands are in your pockets and you put most of your weight on one foot, or if you are leaning with one hand resting on a surface far away from her, it’s a less threatening posture (because it’s not a stance that is ready for swift action).

    3. Bear Expert*

      I appreciate the sensitivity to mass and power dynamics. The appropriate nod to respect that is to call over from your seat “Oh goodness, can you do that in the bathroom please! There’s food in here.” Rather than stand up and loom over the miscreant like you’re going to eat her or carry on like Calvin and Hobbes about how gross it is.

      Calling out uncivil behavior is a community good. Gross bodily functions go in the bathroom if at all possible.

      1. snot-witnesser*

        The kitchen is large enough that to call over from the tables loud enough to be heard would be enough to be heard in basically that end of the building. I’d rather walk over rather than holler at her about it, and that’s what I’ll do next time I witness it.

        2. Artistic Impulses*

          Hi, snot-witnesser (hilarious name, by the way).

          You could go over to Ms. Snot-Filled and sit nearby when you talk to her. You don’t have to sit right at her table, just in case she does have something catching that day. However, you can sit at a close table. That way, you don’t have to yell across the room, and you won’t tower over her.

          There is always a possibility that someone this clueless will not respond well, but then again, maybe she is just woefully unaware of basic etiquette norms and will readily comply with your request to go to the bathroom.

          If she does not comply, then you can go to HR to handle this situation. By the way, does she eat lunch after she has cleared away all her phlegm, or does she come into the lunchroom just to clear herself of snot? Either way, it is a beyond weird situation, but even weirder if she doesn’t have lunch after her horrible coughing performance.

  10. RLC*

    LW2’s coworker would have made quite a pair with a former colleague who 1) unrolled yards of toilet roll from bathroom 2) blew nose along length of paper 3) draped it on a makeshift drying line (piece of twine strung over his desk) to dry and reuse. Boss politely asked him to remove it, throw in bin; employee balked and accused boss of “asking him to waste resources”. Boss held firm and employee relented, whining about being told to waste paper. Some people can be so, so gross in their habits.

    1. The Prettiest Curse*

      This letter, plus this comment, should make the LW from a few weeks back who was unhappy that their colleague was blowing their nose while in their office and throwing it into that LW’s bin feel a bit less aggrieved. I’m very grateful that all the phlegm-y coughers I’ve ever worked with have kept their hacking out of the kitchen, because ewwwwwwww.

      1. I am Emily's failing memory*

        Obviously there’s no way of knowing for any one specific incident someone related on the Internet, but I’ve experienced or been close to someone who experienced no fewer than 3 separate instances of people with unaddressed mental health issues that manifested as an irrational preoccupation with “saving resources” – all of them were young adults and at least one was ultimately diagnosed with (and thankfully was able to enter treatment for) schizophrenia, which tends to show up in the early/mid 20s, often in people who did not previously have any signs of mental illness, making the people around them utterly unprepared for what can sometimes be a dramatic shift. The most extreme one was a young woman whose roommates I was friends with, who began defecating into a bag that she left on the back of the toilet, claiming it was to “save water” by not flushing as often. (The bathroom reportedly smelled exactly as bad as you would expect.) She even went so far as to call a house meeting to lecture her roommates about how they were wasting water by not doing the same as her!

        When people get to the point that they no longer observe basic hygiene or sanitation around bodily waste and fluids, whatever “rational”-but-irrational reasoning they offer is almost surely not the full story… there’s something deeper going on.

        1. Bear Expert*

          OMG I’ve seen this. Bad college dorm memory unlocked.

          I’m a relatively lax hippie, but I like flush toilets. I have friends who use compositing toilets on purpose, and I understand why and respect their choices for themselves. When it goes all the way over the edge, though, you can tell and its bad.

        2. Toots La'Rue*

          My mom walks this line for sure and she hasn’t been diagnosed with anything but definitely has some hoarding tendencies. I had to look after her for a few days after a surgery and she kept cutting her bandages into the smallest pieces and then trying to reuse them on her open wounds. One of the worst weekends of my life.

          1. I Have RBF*

            *cringe*

            I can understand cutting overly large non-stick pads to fit over wounds better, but you cut them in the wrapper, not reuse pieces of used bandage.

            My condolences on you having to deal with that.

    3. Emmy Noether*

      WHAT? I’ve been known to go to some lengths to conserve resources, but this… this is… WHAT?!

    4. allathian*

      Yuck!

      Before the pandemic, I sometimes put a used paper hankie in my jeans pocket to reuse later. Still do at home, but not at the office. And I wash my hands afterwards. I never leave used hankies in places where others might have to look at them, never mind risk having to touch them.

    5. Gamer Girl*

      Good gravy, I feel so vindicated and grossed out at the same time! My colleagues always think I’m mildly over the top for only using my personal cup/thermos from home, plus having a tupperware kit with a small cloth and soap to wash my lunch containers, so I only need to fill up the container with boiled water from the kettle, wash my dirty containers in it, then pour the rinsewater out in the sink and store everything in my tote bag to go in the dishwasher at home to be fully cleansed.

      I started this the day I saw a grown man take the scrubbing brush from the sink and use it to clean off pasta sauce he’d dropped on the top of his SHOE, then put back the brush without even rinsing it and walked away!

      And don’t get me started on the communal dishtowels some people seem to think double as floor wipes!

      2. I am Emily's failing memory*

        Yeah, I’ve learned you absolutely can’t trust that everyone understands the kitchen cleaning surfaces hierarchy. (Dishes > counters > floors. You can take a cleaning implement meant for a higher tier and use it on a lower tier, but no cleaning implement can ever be used on a higher-tier surface than the lowest-tier surface it’s ever touched, so as soon as you use a dish scrubber on the floor it becomes a floor scrubber!)

        Some people don’t have a concept of the hierarchy at all, but also a lot of people use different implements for different tiers, so to one person a sponge is obviously a counter cleaning implement that should not be used on dishes, while to someone else in the shared space, the sponge is the designated dish-tier implement at home so they don’t realize it’s a hierarchy violation to use the sponge on dishes at the office.

        1. Gamer Girl*

          Best explanation of the hierarchy! If I have to use a dishtowel on a lower hierarchy tier at home, then it is immediately done, no more dishes, no more space on the rack.

          The people I work with do not understand this at all, except for one young, loud, gym bro who is very into hygiene and calls people out on their disgusting habits in a no nonsense but not unkind way (“Yo! You just put half a plate of pasta in the dishwasher with your bowl, dude! Do you think the dishwasher is a magic box or something? It’s like wiping your a**, bro. Scrape it off, load it up. Now clean it up!”) Gym Bro also cleans the dishwasher and shared refrigerator every Friday afternoon since he realized that the cleaning service refuses to do it. Love him!

          But seriously, in what world is it ok to wipe up rainwater people tracked in on their shoes with the dishtowel, in a kitchen with people constantly wearing outside shoes not even house slippers, and then use it to wipe your dishes… and then hang it back up for people to use! I cannot.

          I only pre clean my dishes at all so that they don’t smell or make a mess. I take public transport and once one of my container lids broke on the way home, and the residual lunch juice got everywhere and stank! It was awful!

      3. Bear Expert*

        Nope. Noooope nope nope.

        My home kitchen towels can be fairly multi purpose because we have a billion of them, they are an obviously different color than any of the body/face cloths, and you use them for a single purpose and they go into the kitchen laundry which gets sanitized. (Bulk surgical cloths, blue, 100% cotton, lint free, and they like it when you boil them.) I don’t do conservation of dish towels.

        I don’t care what people use them for between the drawer and the laundry, but after you pull one from the drawer and use it on something, that’s it, its done. You want to do something else? grab another one. (though the one that got used for a nail polish spill we did retire from kitchen duties.) About as far as I will stretch it is the one to dry dishes gets wiped down the countertop on its way to the laundry bin.

      4. Always Tired*

        This is the only thing I like about our open office concept that has an open kitchen area. I can see all. There is no food theft and no sponge shenanigans. Also, I swap the sponges every week or two. They wanted to be green and get dishtowels, but we don’t have a washing machine on site, so we use paper towels and silicone oven mitts. Also I generally just wipe my containers out and take it home to toss in the dishwasher.

    6. Golden*

      That is absolutely foul! They can hang out with my former coworker too, who used to wash her dentures is the kitchen sink, but would regularly hold them in the same hand she operated the handle with and allow it to touch (without wiping down the handle afterwards). She would also rinse her mouth out but spit everything into the kitchen trashcan, although most would get on the wall behind the can. The wall was absolutely nasty (especially when the light hit it just right), and never got cleaned as long as I worked there.

      1. Debby*

        I was washing dished after a church fellowship, when a woman came and rinsed the mop she was using in my dish water. Then she went about continuing to mop.
        I immediately drained out the water and re-ran hot soapy water in order to continue washing dishes. Some there thought that I was being ridiculous, so it is nice to have it confirmed that I am not alone in thinking that floor should be last! Thank you!

    8. Juicebox Hero*

      What the actual what??

      Had this person never heard of handkerchiefs before??

      Thank goodness your boss stood his ground.

      It doesn’t even make sense from a practical standpoint. Toilet paper, especially institutional type, is made to break down quickly so it won’t clog pipes, so it doesn’t stand up to a good honk. On top of that, dried crusty boogers don’t feel good on your skin. Sheesh.

    9. I Have RBF*

      Ewwww!

      I will use TP instead of tissues, because it’s cheaper. But drying and reusing? That makes my stomach do backflips. I can’t even stand using a handkerchief, because you end up carrying a ball of snotted up cloth around and reusing it.

      Your boss was exactly right to put a stop to that BS.

  11. Hanna*

    OP2, as a person with frequent horrific phlegmy coughs (allergies, irritable airways, a poorly-shaped skull; it generates a lot of concern from others, but I’m really just Like This and there’s nothing to do about it) I have some thoughts:

    1. Horking up phlegm is BATHROOM ACTIVITY, and you are well within your rights to request that she do that elsewhere. A plain old, “Elsa, could I please ask you to do that in the bathroom? Thanks,” is fine.

    2. Entering a kitchen solely to cough is a strange and inconsiderate choice. Even though most of my coughing is not contagious (the occasional virus notwithstanding,) it still freaks people out and it’s best practice to shield other people from one’s bodily experiences even if you’re sure that you’re not contagious. So again, you’re well within your rights to ask her to be somewhere else.

    If the situation was different–if she was eating her lunch and happened to have a bad cough and took care to cough into her elbow and made a polite comment to reassure others that it’s not contagious–then yeah, sometimes bodies are just kind of gross and you have to accept it. But that is SO NOT the situation you’re in. Say your request in a calm, even tone of voice, from a seated position so that you’re not looming over her, and it should be fine.

    1. Nicosloanica*

      You are right. But I do also understand that “go to the women’s bathroom, where I won’t have to deal with you” may come out a lil more awkward since OP is male, so I suppose I see why OP might feel better having HR deliver the message, on the theory that it’s completely impartial. But that’s really not necessary IMO.

      1. Somehow I Manage*

        I think if OP starts with, “Would you please do that in the bathroom versus the kitchen? I’m eating.” And then escalates to HR if Elsa keeps doing it, it might end up landing better. Then OP could at least report to HR that he asked kindly first.

        I do think that being kind and polite in asking Elsa to knock it off would be difficult. If I’m eating and someone is doing what she’s doing, I’m going to probably stop eating, throw my food away, and walk out.

        1. Fitzie's chew toy*

          I have a friend who swims daily at a local gym. During Covid, a fellow swimmer evacuated his nose into the pool. My friend stood up in her lane and shouted at him, “We don’t do that here. It’s disgusting.” Then she reported him to the manager.
          I admire her guts.

    2. toolegittoresign*

      I guess I don’t understand why this morning snot clearing ritual has to happen at work at all. Through most of the fall and winter my sinuses are in a state but I get it all cleared out at home in my own bathroom. They ever have devices to help with this now. While going to the bathroom at work to do this is better than the kitchen, it will still be really disgusting for coworkers to see and hear this happening in the bathroom. People argue over whether people brushing their teeth and flossing in the bathrooms at work is “gross” so I can’t imagine this would go over well no matter where it was happening.

      1. Bear Expert*

        I think the same as teeth brushing, if someone is going to do it, the bathroom is the place for it. I believe teeth brushing is an intensely personal act and get the dry heaves if someone is doing it around me, but the bathroom is where gooey bodily functions and maintenance happen, so I deal.

        I don’t know why OP’s coworker does the great clean out at work, but presumably they have a reason and I don’t care to dig into it. I know my body does inconvenient crap that other people’s bodies don’t. Whatever is going on, they should be doing it in the gooey bodily function arena not the food place.

        1. Zap R.*

          My guess is that go somewhere communal they want people to see it and say “Oh, poor Snot Woman! Are you sickly, Snot Woman? What a brave snotty soul you are!”

          She could solve LW2’s problem by wearing a button that says “ASK ME ABOUT MY CHRONIC SINUSITIS.”

      2. snot-witnesser*

        If it builds up during the day, you’d have to evacuate it when it gets bad, I guess? I sort of want to hang out in the kitchen more and see if she does it more than once a day, just out of morbid curiosity.

    3. I am Emily's failing memory*

      You know, it’s pretty wild to reflect that the range of human diversity extends all the way from people who make barely-audible little sneezes and suppress even the tiniest burp around anyone they haven’t been married to for 7 years or more… to people who evacuate heroic volumes of mucus from their body in a shared space where food is prepared.

  12. Captain dddd-cccc-ddWdd*

    OP4 (informal PIP) – get documenting! Contrary to the answer, I don’t think OP should push for the PIP yet with HR, as they will likely just get rebuffed with “not enough documentation”.

    So start documenting these conversations. Yes, that means asking questions you already know the answer to like “what’s the status of the x project”. Ask how the employee thinks they have done against the expectation and why.

    Do you think she knows that she isn’t making a sustained improvement? Is it “good enough” in her mind? It does need to be made explicit if not already.

    You can use a variation of the “STAR” interview technique as a framework for this. What is the context (situation), what is the specific task/expectation, what actually happened, and what the impact is of that.

    1. English Rose*

      Yes, this is what I was thinking. Document and send the notes to the employee by email each week. “She’s indicated she understands” sounds a bit… uncertain. The employee may truly not be seeing the pattern clearly.

      I mean, my performance is confirmed as stellar, but even in a regular one-to-one, my manager always scans their hand-written notes to me afterwards so we know we’re on the same page on projects and priorities. It’s helpful to have that written record.

    2. M2*

      This. So many employers request 3-6 months of documentation before a PIP. I’m always surprised on here when the advice is if it’s that bad just put them on a PIP. HR needs protect the employer from lawsuits so you have months of documentation before the documented PIP.

      Once another department didn’t do the documentation correctly so they had to start over. The woman even after the PIP threatened to sue but thankfully they had all the documentation (and also proof of insane mismanagement of money).

      4- you memes go document everything in your meetings and work and send weekly emails to the employee and maybe even HR on copy so there’s documented proof they aren’t meeting the goals.

      1. Snow Globe*

        3+ months of conversations/documentation *before* the PIP even starts seems like way too much.

        1. OP4*

          I thought so too, but apparently my company has a board that reviews PIPs and terminations and has to approve them before they can be enacted. Problem is her last two performance reviews (one from me, one from the previous manager) softened the message too much in the part that’s recorded in the system. So we need more documentation that it’s an ongoing problem and not a blip. Learned my lesson there.

    3. Somehow I Manage*

      This is great advice. OP, I think I might even go a step further. While you can’t implement a formal PIP, treat the interim time as though you’ve got an informal PIP. What kinds of things would you be expecting of this employee if they’re put on a PIP. They’re going to have to be more clear about their understanding of projects, more thoughtful in their assessment of steps that are taken and outcomes delivered. So have the conversations now with that in mind. You’ll be able to document more and better.

      I do think it is a bit silly to have to do this song and dance for this long just to document whether a PIP is necessary. Because once you have the PIP in place, you’re going to be documenting more.

    4. OP4*

      This is a good point. She has responded with things like “I know I need to get my shit together,” “this is on nobody but me,” etc. so she knows it’s her fault. But she has made some comments that seem like she might not understand she needs to make progress NOW. Like “some day I’ll have a week with no lates” like, girl, you’re running out of some days!! And once she even suggested taking on additional responsibilities. I was like let’s focus on meeting your current goals first.

      I think your idea of asking her how she thinks it’s going is good. Then if she tells me she thinks she’s doing better, I can show her the metrics I’m keeping that show she is not.

      1. WantonSeedStitch*

        It’s good that you’ve been keeping metrics–that will be helpful in providing documentation to HR that a formal PIP should start now.

      2. Pastor Petty Labelle*

        When she says things like I know this on me and someday I’ll have a week with no lates — Follow up on that.

        The conversations need to be interactive, not just where are you on project X, oh you are behind, okay. It’s where are you on project X, you are behind, what are your plans to catch up? Its on you, okay what do you plan on doing to fix that? How do you envision getting to a week with no lates?

        Then document this. The next check in, you said to get to a week with no lates you would create a checklist of things to do, did you do that?

        Also if some weeks are better than others, probe that. What went well this week, how do you intend to sustain that? Why didn’t you follow the plan this week?

        You may find out she just can’t figure out how to improve and sustain it, which you can then take to HR. You can also explain to her that if she doesn’t its not just a formal PIP but that termination is a very real possibility. Or you might find out, this week was bad because my dad had a setback and I was up late at the hospital with him all week so I was really tired at work. Or some information you can work with.

        1. OP4*

          This is all great stuff, thanks! I will definitely use some of this.

          There are definitely complications with personal issues. She has a lot of personal problems and medical problems that are likely impacting her work, so that’s another thing HR wants to be careful about. But these things have been going on for a long time and she has not requested any leave or accommodations despite my repeated offering, so there’s not much more I can do there. She’s actually going to be out for surgery in a few weeks, so that’s also had an impact on timing with everything.

    5. MassMatt*

      The whole process at this company sounds exhausting. You basically need to do a pre-PIP for months in order then to do an actual PIP? Is this actually required by local laws or union rules, or is it a case of HR or legal department paranoia run amuck?

      A PIP process should not take several months to do.

    6. RIP Pillowfort*

      Yeah if this is someplace like where I work (state gov) they’re not going to start the formal PIP if they feel you haven’t met the documentation requirement.

      I would frankly talk about consequences which is you will be put on a PIP if we get through the documentation process with subpar results. The employee is running out of time to make improvement to prevent it. Just lay that out for them. They aren’t getting it.

    7. Bear Expert*

      I’m of the opinion that 1:1s and projects/deliverables should be documented all of the time anyway.

      Being able to refer to notes on at least the headlines of what was discussed in a 1:1 lets me make sure that I did cover that policy change 4 months ago, remember who covered X topic the last time it came up, and double check things like the last time I discussed career development, PTO planning, etc. When I’ve got decent notes it means I have a good place to go to find pointers to the write up on Y or the ticket on Z when it comes up later without having to go ask my direct for it.

      And that’s all with high performers. With people who are struggling, it makes sure that you’re doing the supports you can as a manager and gives a clear timeline and pattern for whether something is a momentary wobble or a long term issue – and can resolve a lot of things before they become long term.

      Week 1: Goal for next week on Project A, metrics on daily tasks B and C.
      Week 2: missed Project A goals, why? what’s needed to hit goals for next week? more time, more training?
      Week 3: Tried things from last week, still missing goals

      If you have notes from each 1:1 you can get through the troubleshooting and what’s been tried phases as they are happening and before anything gets lost in the shuffle.

    8. fhqwhgads*

      See, I disagree in the opposite direction. What they’re already doing sounds exactly like a PIP to me. Why do they need an informal PIP to implement a formal PIP. Do the PIP once. She fails, she fails. But this double-PIP situation to me is bizarre. The point is usually to have a firm deadline so the thing doesn’t drag on forever. The longer this informal process goes on the more dragged out the whole thing is.

  13. Tzz4lfe*

    LW1, did you ever ask her why she was requesting time off or ask her to fill in the comments field on the request form?

    In our time keeping system, we also have a comment field, but to my knowledge no one uses it and I’m not event sure if my manager would even read it.

    If you want something from your employees, ask them directly. Do not just expect them to take the hint.

    1. Chocolate Teapot*

      1 My work time off request system has a comment field but it specifically states that personal health information is not to be added.

    2. Nicosloanica*

      Yeah it doesn’t seem like OP has tried much yet. My work has a rule that PTO be submitted 2 weeks out, but I admit I dislike that rule. If it’s truly not an issue for your workplace, you could just ask for 48 hours in advance. But really just talk to this person.

      1. Snow Globe*

        I suspect, though, that the OP doesn’t want to make it a blanket policy. If someone has a one-time last minute request, they want to be able to honor that without asking for details. It’s just that this person is making last-minute requests all. the. time.

        1. jenny*

          Right. I can completely understand that asking for last minute time off twice a month is way too much. But asking for it twice a year is fine.

      2. SarahKay*

        For our annual vacation my workplace has a requirement that we should give *at a minimum* as much notice as the length of leave – so for a half day, we should ask half a day in advance, for two weeks (I’m in the UK) it’s got to be at least two weeks’ notice.
        The policy also gives room for manager discretion in approving requests at shorter notice.
        A couple of times I’ve taken a day’s vacation with no notice, and on those occasions I’ve apologised for the lack of notice and told my manager why it was happening – basically explaining why I was outside of policy.
        The thing is, we have that clear policy on how much notice to give – OP needs to set some sort of similar expectation, even if it’s only ‘Please give me at least one working day of notice unless it’s an emergency’

    3. Grith*

      Exactly my thought. This letter reads as “I have an issue and have written in to find out what my very first action should be”.

      Even if you come up with a really nice fair policy (requests must come in a week ahead of the date, if shorter notice than this a reason must be given), you’ll still need to communicate that policy to your employee at some point, which it doesn’t even sound like has been attempted yet?

    4. Librarian of Things*

      LW1 may also want to double-check their policies. Our employee handbook states that requests for vacation days must be made in writing at least 10 days in advance. Having any kind of policy about vacation day expectations makes it a lot easier to know what’s reasonable for your place of work, whether it’s a week’s notice or a month’s notice. And if it’s already in place, all the better; if not, sounds like a good time to start crafting one for the future.

    5. Ellis Bell*

      “Do you need this exact day off for some reason or can it wait? More notice is better usually.” I mean the employee could be under the impression that they know it’s a quietish day coming up, and you might actually prefer the date.

    6. OP1*

      OP1 here! I hadn’t asked at the time of writing in for a couple reasons. The first being that the pattern had only just started to emerge, and the second because I was concerned that I would be overstepping asking for the reason for the PTO request in the first place. I didn’t want to come across as judging Ciera’s PTO use, but was hoping to get some insight into whether or not it was a type of reason that could (and should) be planned for in advance. The next time it happened, I did sit down and talk with her about the pattern and its impact on the team. It turns out that the PTO requests are related to A Thing going on outside of work. I was already aware of The Thing, so she thought the reasons were obvious, but it isn’t something that I would normally associate with needing last-minute PTO, so it wasn’t obvious that they were related. Ciera did agree to provide me with a short status update on her active projects in the future when possible, which will significantly help with the coverage issues. She hasn’t made any requests since our conversation, so we’ll see how it goes.

  14. Irish Teacher.*

    LW5, I don’t think work goals are really about what you want to achieve so much as what the plan is for the job. It’s more about what you think needs to be completed in the next year in order to do the job well rather than what you’d like to see yourself doing in the next year.

  15. AskingForTimeOff*

    OP1, I’ve never worked in a job that needs coverage in the sense of X staff working each shift or similar and I’ve never had a job where it would be okay to request random time off (i.e. not illness or death in the family or similar unpredictable event) the day before, let alone over a weekend for that Monday off.

    Pre- pandemic I would ask for a week or so off with only a week or so advance notice once every 1-1.5 years because my dad couldn’t sort out his schedule to visit with more advance notice (sometimes I’d be able to give my boss a heads up I might be asking for the time off in the next few weeks). I assumed you were going to be complaining about something like this, as some folks were unhappy about only a week if so of advance notice. Requesting it over the weekend for Monday is crazy.

    At my current job I tentatively ask for a day or two off at a time, sometimes a week or so and sometimes a bit more in advance, and sometimes adjust to meet demands that pop up after the request. I just asked for a few extra days off in November, for example, and likely will do the same for December as we get closer.

    Do you ever say no to any time off requests? Because bosses do say no for a variety of reasons (mostly workload) at most of the places I’ve worked. It’s one of the reasons I’m opposed to so-called unlimited PTO – it too easily turns into no time off. If you never turn fine requests, though, I could see people getting lax and seeing it as a formality rather than a requirement. I would reiterate the necessity of requesting time off and remind people it’s not official unless/until it’s accepted, then put in some guidelines for expected time off (request at least 3 business days in advance or 1 week or whatever) and make exceptions as deemed appropriate.

    2. KateM*

      I was also wondering of OP approved the time-off requests even when it strained their workload. A couple times not approving saying that it would strain their workload too much when they can’t play in advance seems like something that could be a wake-up call.

    3. londonedit*

      I’m never sure what people mean by ‘PTO’ what with the difference between the way leave is handled in the US and UK – if we’re talking about holiday, then yes, requesting a day’s holiday for Monday over the weekend is crazy. I have very occasionally booked a day’s holiday with less than a week’s notice, in a situation where it’s like ‘My friend has just said she’s going to be in town for the day on Friday’ or ‘I’m away this weekend and have just been invited to a concert on Sunday night, so I’ll take Monday off and travel back then’. But generally we operate on the idea that you should book holiday with as much notice as possible. And I don’t work in a situation where we need constant coverage – I’m in charge of my own work and if I’m off then I just make sure things are off my desk or can wait until I’m back.

      Is this holiday, though, or sick time that Ciera is booking? If it’s sick time then of course that’s completely different, and if she feels ill over the weekend then she can’t really give much more notice than she is doing.

      1. Lexi Vipond*

        We’re asked to give double the amount of notice if we can – so a day’s notice for a half day, two weeks for a week. A lot of the time it would be fine if I asked on Friday if I could have Monday off on a whim, but it does have to be (fairly nominally) approved, so asking over the weekend when no one is working wouldn’t work.

        1. Nicosloanica*

          Oh, I like that much more than the mandatory 2 weeks I mentioned above. That seems much more reasonable.

      2. Hlao-roo*

        PTO is a little vague because it can mean either vacation time (holiday in UK) or sick time. Everywhere I have worked in the US has had different “buckets” of vacation and sick time, but I know there are some companies that just have one “bucket” of paid time off that is meant to be used for both vacation/holiday and for sick time.

        From context, I’m assuming PTO here means vacation/holiday because the manager is expecting advance notice and/or a bit of an explanation. If it is sick time, then I agree with you that the manager can’t expect advance notice from Ciera.

        1. Insert Clever Name Here*

          Yeah, when I worked at a company where leave was all in one bucket people said they were on “PTO” whether you were going to Italy for a week or sick with strep throat. My current company has separate buckets (vacation/holiday, sick, dependent care, personal day) and people either say the specific type of leave they’re taking (“I’m taking dependent care tomorrow”) or “PTO” as a catchall because except for perhaps your manager it doesn’t actually matter to Steve in AP what type of leave it is because what matters is he should talk to your coworker instead.

      3. doreen*

        PTO can mean either – but IME in a situation like the one described in the OP where unexpected absences cause a strain, people who are requesting time off at the last minute due to illness will almost always say something like ” I’m not feeling well” whether they are using dedicated sick leave or some other sort of time off. I occasionally had to disapprove last minute leave for coverage reasons and although it was not uncommon for people to ask for reconsideration, it was never because they were sick. One it was because of a car in the shop but usually it was for reasons that could have been planned in advance – the painters are coming this morning or I want to take my mother out today for her birthday are two I remember.

      4. Taketombo*

        We have a 2-week notice police for using vacation time. Managers can make exceptions, but it’s usually something like:

        (Thursday afternoon) Hey, the main software we used was DDoS’d and the company says it won’t be up until Sunday morning, can I use vacation for Friday? It’s lovely out.

      5. OP1*

        Our company lumps vacation and sick leave into one bucket, so there’s no distinction. The big issue was that the requests were often coming in on Saturday morning, so it seemed unlikely that Ciera would be sick on Saturday and know at that time that she would still be sick on Monday (and only Monday) so regularly. But it also left me wondering how she would know she needed time off on Saturday morning but didn’t ever seem to know it on Friday afternoon (which would’ve given me at least a little time to prep).

    4. abca*

      ” Requesting it over the weekend for Monday is crazy.”
      No there are many jobs where this is not a problem at all. It may not work for LW, and that is fair, but it is really strange to say that this is crazy as a general rule, just because it doesn’t fit with your very particular work experience. In my company (100,000+ employees), you get your work done, you have your PTO, nobody really cares otherwise. It really is just fine to take Monday off because you saw the weather forecast and realized this may be the last weekend of nice weather in a long time so you want to make it a long weekend. This is not an exception at all, all companies in my field are like this.

      1. Emmy Noether*

        Requesting over the weekend for Monday would have risky anywhere I’ve worked, because the supervisor wouldn’t see it until Monday morning at the earliest, so it couldn’t be approved before it started. You’d have to be very, very sure it will be approved, and you’d be in unapproved limbo for an hour or so on Monday morning, which is the potentially crazy part. And what if the supervisor is out sick on Monday? Now the request falls through the cracks of the system and you are unexcused absent.

        I’ve seen same-day PTO (not sick leave) approval, but it involved a phone call to the supervisor and was very exceptional.

        1. Adam*

          Not all companies require approval before taking PTO, and every place I’ve worked where we did have approval it was entirely performative for some HR process and nobody even looked at them before “approving”. Which I think was what abca was pointing out, different companies do things differently, so blanket rules don’t really exist for things like this.

          1. Emmy Noether*

            Sure, but the quote being discussed was specifically about “requesting PTO”, which implies needing approval. So it was a statement about that subset of companies where requests are a thing.

            If it was “putting PTO on the calendar is crazy” or somesuch, that would be a different discussion.

        2. Nicosloanica*

          Different workplaces, I guess. There’s no such charge as being “unexcused absent” at my job. At most, my calendar would be up to date and that’s really all that’s required.

      2. KateM*

        If Saturday and Sunday are not official working days then Ciera is not requesting PTO “last minute” but actually after that – OP may see the request only on Monday at the time Ciera is expected to be at work. That I would absolutely find crazy.

      3. londonedit*

        I don’t need anyone to cover my work if I’m off for a day, but even so, I don’t work over the weekend and my boss doesn’t work over the weekend, so I wouldn’t be able to get ‘official’ approval via the leave booking system we use. Unless I asked my boss to log in and approve it. Which I guess I could do, but I’d only ever do it if it was something so incredibly last-minute that I couldn’t possibly have known about it before Friday evening. Of course if I’m off sick, that works differently – I’d just send my boss a text on the morning I’m off, and then you log the sick day(s) when you’re back at your desk. But for holiday the latest I could realistically book in advance would be Friday afternoon for Monday morning.

      4. amoeba*

        Yup, same here. Now, I do prefer that my team let me know earlier if they know already that they will be taking the day – it makes planning a bit easier for me. But doing it last minute is also definitely not “crazy” or anything, just slightly less convenient (so we would actually probably say something like “sorry for the short notice”, but not worry beyond that.)

      5. Liz*

        Yup, normal to do that Friday and day of for emergencies at my work. Often for us it’s “if I’m caught up I’m taking the day off but I won’t know until Friday”

      7. Pescadero*

        Yep… it’d be perfectly normal in my job.

        My boss prefers a notice equal to the time off.

        Want a day off? One day notice preferred.
        Want a week off? One week notice preferred.

      8. Paint N Drip*

        I would love to know the industries and job titles for stuff like this – I want this kind of autonomy!!

        2. londonedit*

          Desk Editor at a book publisher. I work to the production schedule, and as long as I hit the key deadlines along the way, I can pretty much organise my work as I see fit (and to fit in with authors’ and freelancers’ availability).

      9. Bear Expert*

        I’ve been in companies that work both ways – ones where processes are in place, you are expected to manage your calendar and deliverables accordingly, and PTO “requests” for single days off are mostly so that your manager/team knows you’re not dead and about where this day off sits in the availability for emergencies. (If its a nice weather day, they’ll try not to call. But if my colleague is out for a wedding or a surgery, and the office needs someone, I’ll get called first)

        The other ones are where not being in your seat at 8 am sharp needs to have a Reason and been Approved, ideally with separate communications and reminders to everyone on the floor so no one passes your desk and gets the vapors that you may have gotten stuck in traffic without filling out the proper form.

        The latter also tend to be the ones where all of the process work is focused on making sure you don’t get a new pen until you’ve used all of the ink from the old one, and completely skip over having processes that support the business getting things done.

  16. Emmy Noether*

    Speaking of nepotism and complicated family relationships: I once got an internship through my great-aunt’s stepson’s best friend. And I got a family discount from my second cousin’s ex-husband’s sister, who is a dentist (the divorce was still fresh, and I think she felt bad about it?). Please note that I had never met these people before, or since.

    I could draw a family tree, but I’d need a big piece of paper, and I would have to research some names.

      1. NotBatman*

        I always call this the “Netflix effect!” Because my sister-in-law’s ex-husband’s daughter’s best friend uses our Netflix account, and I’ve never met this person. Thank goodness Netflix reversed its crackdown on password sharing; neither my husband nor I wanted to kick out this 10-year-old whose family can’t afford their own account.

        1. Nobby Nobbs*

          My mother’s new friend learned that my sister was struggling at her “llama grooming” job and called up her llama groomer, without ever having met her, to gush about this great young groomer that he just HAD to hire. She got the job! And contrary to what you might expect, both sister and employer are thrilled with the outcome.

    2. Ellis Bell*

      Yeah, I have a pretty clannish family who would extend favours to relatives they don’t particularly know all that well. I don’t think it’s a great idea, but I am not the person they ask.

  17. English Rose*

    #1 I was struck by the frequency of these requests being for a Monday. My mind immediately went to “this person is partying hard over the weekend”, but it could also be that they are deeply unhappy in the job and suffer Monday Blues really badly. Or it could be something else entirely.

    Either way, definitely worth exploring and emphasising the impact on the team.

    1. WS*

      Yeah, best to just ask her. I had a co-worker who sometimes took a Monday off on short notice, but that was because she was trying to patch together speech therapy appointments for her small child in a region with an 18-month waiting list, and there was a speech therapist who would call her on Sunday if there was a cancelled appointment on Monday, the only day she was in our region. So it was annoying and awkward but there was a good reason, and eventually the child got a regular appointment that her husband could take the child to.

    2. Ellis Bell*

      I just assumed it was nicer to have a three day weekend than a random day off mid-week, but everyone has a different preference.

      1. amoeba*

        Yeah, I definitely know people who decide last minute to go mountaineering/kite surfing/skiing for a long weekend if the weather turns out to be nice! Hard to plan this a lot in advance sometimes…

      2. doreen*

        I don’t think English Rose is talking about it being Monday as much as the fact that the request comes in over the weekend. I can do a lot more with a three day weekend if I know about it in advance so if I’m requesting Monday off over the weekend , it’s going to be for something I didn’t know about on Friday.

        1. HonorBox*

          I can see exactly what you’re saying here. It sounds like the LW here is pretty accommodating and willing to be flexible. But that it is happening as much as a couple times per month gives me pause. There’s the occasional ‘this just dropped into my lap for tomorrow’ kind of thing, which could honestly happen on any day of the week, and the regularity of these requests from Ciera.

  18. Retired Vulcan Raises 1 Grey Eyebrow*

    #2 I presume she didn’t exhibit her snot-spreading in her interview and none of her references mentioned it (maybe a traumatised HR will add snot etiquette to their future checks)

    Since this is a health hazard to coworkers, you must take action immediately – ask her directly to do this in the bathroom or if you feel too bashful, then make HR’s day and ask them to act.

    In particular, since you are the only other person there at this hour, everyone who arrives later would be unaware that this disgusting person has spat her snot in the sink.
    They’ll use the sink as normal for their mugs, cutlery etc, not realising that Snot Central should have hazmat suits.

  19. Keymaster of Gozer (She/Her)*

    2. As famously reticent as we Brits are there’s a wonderful sentence that can be used for any gender in situations like this:

    “Don’t do that in here mate!”

    (South London accent optional)

    Used to have a junior member of staff who liked to excavate his nostrils in meetings (and there was consumption involved) and used that phrase to good effect.

    1. snot-witnesser*

      Ah, if only my Belfast co-worker was around– it would be delightful to witness his full disgust unleashed.

      1. Keymaster of Gozer (she/her)*

        Nowt better than Irish to swear in! Although I’d avoid Welsh unless you wanna generate more flob than she does ;)

  20. D*

    LW 5: The comments so far indicate that this is apparently unusual, but every single time I’ve had to fill in “goals” for work purposes, they keep asking me how I want to develop career-wise.

    To be honest, I don’t, really. I’m very good at what I do, and I would like to keep doing primarily that until retirement. I have things I want to learn and do, but they’re not job-related. So I relate to the suffering here of “what do I even put down for development goals?” Lie? But I still have to put something down that I did to achieve…the…whatever it was, and management is probably going to push me to pursue that thing.

    It’s that time of year, I guess.

    1. MassMatt*

      This is a major issue with these sort of plans. They kind of assume you want to advance up the hierarchy, usually into management. Someone in sales or IT or teapot painting may not want to become a manager, nor are there enough slots available for all the employees to become managers.

      I had a guy on my team who was great at sales. He found his niche and was happy with it, he had a successful career. Prior managers had dinged him in reviews for not “growing”, yet he was consistently among the top 2-3 people out of 30 or 40 quarter after quarter.

      As he put it, there is so much in sales that no one can ever truly master it, his growth was to keep doing what he was doing and continue to get better at it. I changed the “goals” requirement’s focus from “get ready for a management job” to “get even better at the job you are doing” and he was happy, his production and other metrics even increased.

    2. Red Reader the Adulting Fairy*

      I have a whole team full of people who’s goal is always “continue to learn more in my current role” because they pretty much just want to log on, do their work and log off and make it to retirement, and some of them are like “Is that bad?!” I keep telling them no, it’s not bad at all, if everyone wanted to be a manager we’d be hosed – we need more people who are happy to do the work than we need people who want to be in charge.

    3. Bear Expert*

      I loved managing a team of high performing, mid to late career ICs. Basically none of them were interested in management. The next title, if there was one, was years off, and also possibly uninteresting.

      So goals got to be actual fun instead of copied off of some HR career map bracket. What technical areas do you want to research and grow in? Can we work on broadening influence and reputation, either in the company or in the field? Having one of the top known people in the field at our company does benefit the company.

      Expertise is delightful and powerful and having people who want to build that in a specialized area is highly beneficial to companies. What does expertise look like in this role?

      Are their processes or portions of how the company approaches this area that could be improved? Build a training package so the Junior Teapot painters stop screwing up their line work? Once you are an acclaimed expert, you get to tell people how the whole area should be done. So what annoys you about how your company handles your role? Make a goal for fixing it and tell your boss they get to help.

      Its not cookie cutter goal creation, but its honestly my favorite.

  21. flutter by*

    LW2 – given that this is happening regularly, I do wonder if it’s a health issue? (Cystic fibrosis came to mind, but I’m no expert.)

    That doesn’t make it appropriate to do in a kitchen while someone is eating, but it surprised me to see it assumed as solely a gross personal habit.

    1. KateM*

      The fact that she chooses to do hawk up snot in kitchen near food is solely a gross personal habit which has nothing to do with what exactly are the health reasons behind her coughing.

    2. metadata minion*

      I assume it’s a health issue since I don’t think most people can produce large amounts of snot on command as a leisure activity, but doing it in a communal kitchen is gross.

      1. Juicebox Hero*

        Yes, I have chronic sinus issues and can put on quite a performance in the snot department, but I do it in the bathroom, not in front of people and where there are food and clean dishes nearby.

      2. PhyllisB*

        “I don’t think most people can produce large amounts of snot on command as a leisure activity” has me cracking up. I’m reading this at the library and just got the side eye from the head librarian.
        Can you just imagine reading the hobbies and interests part of their resume (do people still add that? Haven’t done a resume in almost thirty years.) How would you phrase that?

    3. Serena*

      It’s a gross personal habit whether or not she has a health issue. That has no bearing on the fact that it’s an unacceptable thing to do in a communal space.

  22. WheresMyPen*

    LW2, I can’t believe you’d sit through 5 minutes of snot-clearing without saying something! After 30 seconds I’d have either walked out or said ‘Excuse me, do you mind not doing that in here while I’m eating?’ Even if you’re scared of sounding rude, you could say ‘Sorry to interrupt [your disgusting snot hacking], would you mind not doing that while I’m eating? Maybe the bathroom would be more private.’

    1. Poison I.V. drip*

      I don’t get the aversion to speaking up either. This person deserves no benefit of the doubt and their behavior is so off the chain there’s no amount of shaming that’s too much. The only precaution I’d take is to record the audio of the snot clearing (which should be legal because it’s not a conversation). Then stop recording and speak up! “That’s gross, could you not?” If she claims to HR that you were mean, you have the recording showing you were justified.

    2. Unkempt Flatware*

      I would have only been able to offer a shocked, “Hey hey HEY!” while shaking my head in absolute horror.

  23. Hendry*

    I don’t understand #3 at all. Why does a nepotism policy require a family tree? Aren’t standard policies on this things like you can’t work or give preferential treatment for relatives or close friends, etc? Or that you can’t be involved in hiring decisions with them?

    1. nerdgal*

      Nepotism policies often mention degrees of relationship, so for example you couldn’t supervise your child, but you could work with your second or third cousin. That’s where the consanguinity tables come in.

  24. bamcheeks*

    I applied for a job recently at Huge Local Employer and it asked something like, “Do you have a personal relationship with anyone working in this directorate?” I have NO IDEA. How close are we talking and which departments are in this directorate? How much background research are you expecting me to do here? Bananapants question.

    1. Aldvs*

      My assumption would be, if you have to do research, it’s not a close enough personal relationship. For personal relationships you would know if they work in that directorate. Or you can clarify what departments they’re asking about and if you don’t know anyone, that it’s not a close enough relationship.

      It’s… my best fried works in accounting vs. I scoured social media and it looks like Larry, the guy I dated in high school 30 years ago, may work n in your accounting department.

      1. bamcheeks*

        For personal relationships you would know if they work in that directorate

        That’s what I mean about how much research are they expecting me to do. I mean, even excluding everyone in the “we’re on each other’s Facebook / my partner sees you regularly but we personally haven’t met up for a couple of years”, that would still mean asking them to clarify which departments they mean and then going back to three or four friends and saying, “You’re HR right? But are you Business Processes HR or Staff Development and Culture HR?”

        1. Hendry*

          I agree, this is a strange ask. Tons of places have nepotism policies yet I’ve never heard of employees needing to provide a family tree. What do they do, compare the list every time there’s a new applicant?

    2. RagingADHD*

      If you aren’t comfortable saying “no” based on the fact that you don’t know of any , then the literal answer is “not that I know of,” which serves the same purpose.

    3. Serena*

      I mean…if you don’t know if you have a personal relationship with someone, then you don’t have a personal relationship with them. They’re just asking if you know anyone who works there.

      1. bamcheeks*

        It wasn’t just asking if I knew anyone who worked these, though, it was specifically whether I knew people in that directorate. I know at least a couple of dozen people who work there (it’s a huge employer, plus my partner has worked there for 20+ years, so lots of our friends are people she knows form work) — but that doesn’t mean I know which directorate their jobs fall under!

        1. bamcheeks*

          (Even my partner didn’t know which of her friends would fall under the same directorate as the job I was applying for. It’s huge!)

  25. restingbutchface*

    #2 – what. on. earth. I don’t know how OP sat there and watched it happen. I’m very accommodating of my coworkers and can overlook a lot but this is such a huge breach of the social contract! I like to think I would have said something that is still within my values but honestly, I would have just let out a shrill, “EWWW WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!”.

    There’s no way I could see/hear it twice. I have so many questions – is OP the only one to see this? If not, while I love a permissive culture, my god. Did we learn nothing from Covid, or actually, preschool? You don’t SPIT MUCUS in a work environment.

    The longer it has gone on unchecked, the more awkward it is to ask her to stop. The choices are, 1. Say something, 2. Find someone else to say something, 3. Live in hell. I agree with Alison re HR – if one of my team came to me with this my first question would be, have you asked her to stop? And passive aggressive signs are awful.

    It doesn’t have to be a confrontation, it’s a human request. “I should have said something earlier, but spitting in a communal sink really bothers me. Would you mind doing that in the bathroom? Thanks!”. Keep the tone light and I have a work question ready in case she gets stuck in a shame spiral. You’re not looking to shame her or bully her, you’re just talking person to person. Good luck OP.

  26. Not That Kind of Doctor*

    I possibly told this story here recently (I told it somewhere), but I used to work in an infectious disease lab with a guy who’d gather up his phlegm as described and spit it into the nearest red biohazard bag.

    The rest of us were torn between wanting to explain that one doesn’t do that (he was from another country and it seemed possible he just didn’t know) and a sense that the biohazardous waste was indeed the appropriate destination.

  27. Hendry*

    Next time it happens in #2, can you just say something like “Are you ok?” At least get her to acknowledge what she’s doing. I’d try something like that before going to HR which would be weird if nobody’s ever said anything to the hawker

    1. Name is required*

      No, don’t asked her that. there’s reasonable odds that she’s doing it in public for attention. My mom is a dramatic cough type(though she would never do something this gross) and she wants people to notice and ask if she’s ok

      I worked at a car wash where the GM had a serious medical issue that led to 20 minute coughing/hacking/retching/ routines with spitting and/or vomiting He always did it in the bathroom, always. We knew because it wasn’t soundproof but he shielded us the sight. if she’s a full grown adult doing it in public she clearly has a medical issue, could be CP could just be a smoker, but she has no excuse for not knowing better than to do it in a communal kitchen.

      I personally think they should go with a shocked “What on earth are you doing?!?! Do that in the bathroom!” or a gentle “Could you take that to the restroom, please?” honestly the second option is best, said as calmly as possible to minimize conflict risk and avoid giving her the attention she may be asking for.

  28. RHinCT*

    Regarding LW3 and the family tree, what struck me was that the new nepotism policy will be retroactive. It suggests to me the possibility that it is targeted at a specific individual, or a specific family, to get rid of one (or all but one) of them. It is also possible that those drawing up the policy are also trying to draw the line so that some specific people will NOT be included. As in, for the example of LW3, trying to make sure that LW3 is not impacted when all they are trying to do is deal with that father/son situation of the distant cousins. Those two will obviously be impacted by such a rule.

  29. I should really pick a name*

    #1
    In most jobs I’ve had, putting in a vacation request for Monday over the weekend would be pointless because there was no expectation that anyone would be checking email until Monday (and the request had to be approved).

    I think that a talk about providing more notice is the first step. There’s no indication in that letter that the employee has been told that providing such short notice is a problem.

    Where possible, it’s best to avoid being in a position where you’re evaluating if an employee’s reason for requesting time off is “good enough”.

  31. Not your typical admin*

    Being asked for a family tree in this situation would bother me, especially if they hadn’t defined exactly what they were going to consider nepotism. I grew up in a smallish town. My great grandparents and grandparents had large families and most stayed in the local area and farmed. That meant I went to school with a ton of “cousins”. I live about 40 minutes away now, but frequently visit my extended family in the area. My husband jokes we can’t go shopping or out to eat without running into someone I’m related to. Most of these people I wouldn’t consider myself close to at all. I would hate to think my job, or who I supervised could be in jeopardy because I have a large extended family tree. Nepotism and close family needs to be defined.

  32. HailRobonia*

    “It’s come to our attention that you as well as several other employees in the county are descendants of Genghis Khan…”

    1. Coffee*

      This. People who have family tree enthusiasts in their relatives can just lend them a copy of existing records starting from 1700 something. They should have some idea what exactly they are asking

  33. mbs001*

    OK, Managers just please manage your employees. You can’t run an office or department with employees coming and going as they please. Yes, be accommodating when you can . . . to a point. When you see an employee taking advantage, you rein them back in. If they persist, you remind them that their job depends on someone who can be there reliably, and ask them if they can fulfill that requirement. Then simply approve or deny the requests. If they continue to submit them or not show up to work, terminate their employment and hire someone who can fill the role.

  34. Sunny*

    Being asked for a family tree by my employer feels wildly intrusive to me. A simple ‘can you please explain exactly how you and Cousin A are related’ is sufficient, which would also allow the OP to point out that they aren’t close or what have you. My husband’s family has a tree, and of course, lots of relatives have copies of it. It would feel very weird to me to know that some second cousin’s boss has a copy of it in their desk, with my name and my kids’ names, etc.

    I get that familial relationships straddle the line between public and private, but this just feels like a very icky overreach.

    1. Shynosaur*

      Agreed. Maybe it’s because I’m a genealogist and I’m taking the request much more seriously than the people making it, but this horrified me as much as “give us your private medical records.” (It also feels a little feudal, like the scene in A Knight’s Tale where the tournament requires like six generations of nobility on both sides to enter…) I have my family tree online going back 15, even 20 generations in some places, but online family tree services automatically redact “Living” family members because this is extremely private information. Identity theft is too big a deal these days; I would never turn my family tree over if my job asked for it.

      So (recognizing that most people don’t have a detailed tree at the drop of a hat) I frantically assume the job is asking for just a quick diagram. But I would not be calm about this request because it’s a gross violation of privacy.

      1. doreen*

        The thing is , though, that depending on the relationship , there may be no simple way to describe the relationship between me and my cousin Donna without at least a simple diagram. It may not need to have anybody else’s actual name, but it might be difficult for someone to understand it by hearing orally that Donna’s grandmother was my grandfather’s sister – and that’s an easy one for my family. Let’s not get into Terry married Tom and her cousin Vinny married Tom’s sister so how are Terry and Vinny’s kids related.

        1. Hazel*

          But it doesn’t matter. That’s not a close enough relationship to be captured by a reasonable conflict of interest policy. A reasonable policy is based on financial dependence/benefit, and is usually only immediate family eg parent child sibling by blood or marriage. That’s all the county should be asking – do you have immediate family members or anyone financially dependant / you depend on working here. They aren’t entitled to an explanation of more, nor is it useful.

          1. doreen*

            That would be true – except that the LW disclosed that they had “distant cousins” working there. I’m not sure why exactly but they did – and it seems the employer wants to know exactly what “distant cousin” means now that the policy is being revised. Maybe to make sure the new policy doesn’t include that relationship – it seems to me that if the LW “disclosed” the relationship , they must have thought the old policy required it (whether it actually did or not).

        2. Nonym*

          Your examples are really not that complex nor are they hard to explain:

          – first one: “we are second cousins”, “our parents are cousins” and “we have the same great-grand parents”, are three one-sentence ways to explain this simple situation.

          – second one: These kids are cousins. That’s it. First cousins if you want to be more specific.

  35. HonorBox*

    I think the thing about Letter 1 that stands out is that there have been multiple requests over the weekend for Monday. It isn’t once. It is a couple times per month.

    OP, it sounds like you’re trying to be thoughtful and as accommodating as possible. And it also sounds like Ciera isn’t absolutely necessary for coverage of something. But you’re having to shuffle work around last minute a couple of times each month, and that can be a strain.

    Have a conversation with Ciera. Tell her that last-minute requests she’s making should be an outlier, not something happening as much as twice a month. And I’d consider asking her this: If you were in my shoes, were expecting someone to be in the office Monday morning and show up to find they’ve requested the day off over the weekend, and then have to shuffle work around, what would you do? And what would happen if I didn’t approve your request?

    You don’t want to paint her into a corner of now lying about being ill, but I think you do need to open her eyes to the idea that it is causing some stress because you’re not able to plan for her absence.

  36. Juicebox Hero*

    I suffer from lifelong and complicated sinus issues, and am fully capable of schnorking out things that belong in a Fright Night movie marathon… in the privacy of my own bathroom, or occasionally the office restroom. I’d never inflict that on anyone except my EMT and he voluntarily chose that specialty.

    #2’s coworker makes me want to barf. Several minutes of nasal gymnastics, with accompanying soundtrack, next to the clean dishes and food… oh hell no. I’m getting queasy just thinking about it.

  37. It Ain't Me Babe*

    #2 How far back do they want you to go? Three generations? Four? More? And how detailed? My first thought is that there are plenty of first generation Americans and people whose ancestors were not brought here of their own accord who would not feel comfortable disclosing this information. Or people who were not born here. Or people that were adopted. The list goes on.

    2. RagingADHD*

      They are specifically asking about known relatives who are known to work in the same local government.

      If someone lost connection to their ancestry or extended family, obviously they are not practicing nepotism with people who live in a different country or are not known to be related to each other. An adoptee’s adoptive family would be the ones considered under a nepotism policy, not their unidentified biological relatives.

    3. Nancy*

      They want to know the connection between LW3 and the known distant cousin that works in the same place, not their distant relatives in other countries or the unknown biological family members of adoptees.

    4. Red era*

      They only care about local relatives working in that local government. It ain’t that deep Bob.

  38. worker bee*

    On the other side of #1, I hope managers will allow flexible time off when work permits. My old boss wouldn’t let me take a few hours off on a nice Friday afternoon (which often are slow) because I didn’t give notice before that day. Other bosses in the same position have allowed it, with no ill effects.

    1. A Simple Narwhal*

      My manager works this way and it makes my life a lot easier. I do try and put my OOO on the calendar as soon as I know about it, but sometimes things happen – childcare falls through (whether it’s a random daycare closing or my parents decide they wanted to go away last minute), the contractor suddenly has an opening to come by, I forgot I had a dentist appointment, etc. And sometimes it’s just nice to give yourself a three-day weekend!

      I’ve worked at places that were a lot more draconian about requesting time off just for the sake of it, and it’s real morale-killer, plus it’s stressful! I’m juggling enough things right now in my life, knowing that I don’t have to be perfect with my PTO requests and can take time off when I need to (or just want to!) is a big help.

    2. doreen*

      “When work permits” is a big issue in some jobs. If your job involves absolutely no type of coverage at all, that’s one thing. But lots of jobs require coverage only in the sense that a certain number of people must be present during business hours and that was where I had problems – although it wouldn’t have been an issue if someone asked to leave early on Friday afternoon , it often was when I got a phone call in the morning. For example, four people are assigned to a particular role and I need at least two present on any given day. If Ivy is on vacation, and Irene took today off, I’m not going to approve a day off for Diana unless she’s sick because that will leave me with only one person working.

    3. Cat Lady in the Mountains*

      Yeah, from both the manager side and the staff member side I strongly agree with this. “Coverage issues” are often like, “It’s mildly inconvenient for you to be out with no notice today, but no earth-shaking consequences will occur if some work gets delayed until tomorrow.” It’s definitely a morale boost when managers are willing to deal with that mild inconvenience, and on the management side, it also isn’t that hard to do in many contexts.

      Not saying that matches LW’s context – maybe they need coverage at all times. But I think that coverage inconvenience should also be weighed against the massive retention benefits that come from being able to say “yes” to stuff like “the weather is nice today so I’m taking off.” It takes a lot longer to replace a staff member who wants more flexibility than it takes to cover 1-2 tasks for them when they’re unexpectedly out.

      Either way, the solution is just to spell out expectations. Either staff has to submit requests far enough in advance to ensure coverage, or last minute requests are possible only under XYZ conditions. I have a “minimum coverage policy” for my team so folks can’t take off last-minute unless we have minimum team coverage taking other folks’ planned requests into account, which is all visible through our HR system. And if folks make last-minute requests they’re expected to have prepped anything that absolutely has to happen that day in advance. That allows me to approve nearly all last-minute requests.

  39. TwoFluffy*

    LW #2

    I don’t have anything to add except to tell you I empathize. I worked with one of these for 7 years. For a long moment, I actually wondered if the woman I worked with was also your coworker; but my former colleague was taller and older—she’s probably retired by now. She used to do this multiple times a day into the trash by her desk. She was a heavy smoker and I presume that was the cause but it was so, so, so disgusting. I tried talking to her about it; but she said that it would waste too much time to have to go to the bathroom each time.

  40. government 5eva*

    I have worked in government for 7 years and can say confidently that LW3 wouldn’t be fired — at least not immediately. IF, and that’s a big IF, they really wanted to fire over it, it wouldn’t be for that reason on paper. It typically takes a lot to fire someone in government, and employees stay long after they should have been let go. Of course that’s a generalization and there are exceptions, but Alison is absolutely correct that government wants to avoid any risk whatsoever.

    I agree they probably just want to have it on file. Maybe they’re only asking LW3 because the relationship isn’t as clear in her case, whereas in the others, it’s obvious? For the record, it’s still weird, but county government, especially in small areas, is weird on its own.

  41. Eldritch Office Worker*

    “This is the kind of thing that makes HR people question their life choices, but that’s not your problem.”

    #2 – yes, yes it does, this is true, but I’d rather someone ask me to handle it than no one say anything because they’re too uncomfortable and have it go unchecked forever. Because this is gross and it is not in my interest as a steward of employee experience to let it continue. It’s the little things like this that pile up and make people hostile and unhappy.

  42. FL_FA*

    #1 We had an employee who kept taking off Mondays, even unpaid. We are WFH. He was pretty much MIA a lot of the other times. He ended up quitting after several months of this and we found out that he went to an employer who is hybrid and may have Mondays as their in-office in-person days.

    Hmmm. At least he is their problem now.

  43. SunnyShine*

    LW1 I would simply say “It is hard to fill these last minute requests. Would it be possible to give a heads up before the weekend? I understand that may not happen every single time.”

  44. Peanut Hamper*

    I find #4 confusing, because how can you be on a PIP but not on a PIP? I think the definition of PIP at this company and what constitutes “sufficient documentation” is probably a bit (or maybe a lot?) fuzzy. (Honestly, it sounds like Schrodinger’s HR department.)

    You’re either on a PIP or you’re not. I’m wondering how clear the HR requirements are here. I have just never heard of this.

    If I were this employee, I would be confused. And if I were their manager, I would also be confused.

  45. an infinite number of monkeys*

    Oh my gosh, LW2… We used to have a coworker who went every morning into the kitchenette area to break wind (I mean, it was, I guess, a “break” room, soooo…)

    He’d only do it if he was the only one in there, but we were in a large, open 5.5″ high cubicle farm without walls, so it really wasn’t private. He’d let it rip, then cough loudly to “cover it up.”

    We called him the Phantom Pharter. Since we were sitting at our desks, we couldn’t see and didn’t know for quite some time who was doing it, until another coworker finally mustered the courage to pop up and look.

  46. fat scientist*

    My last job actually had a sign over the kitchen sink that said something like “please don’t spit in this sink, use the bathroom”. I have no context for what exactly happened to cause this because it was already kind of old looking when I got there, but I never saw anyone spitting in that sink so it must have worked!

  47. Aspiring Chicken Lady*

    The PTO thing seems absolutely simple. It’s not a PTO “request” if it comes in after hours and with no time for management to either accept or deny.
    This becomes a “day of” sort of call-in. Where the employee needs to call and speak to their manager in the first hour of work and explain what’s going on. Like when you call in sick.

    So, manager sits the employee down and says the things about how it’s a disruption to workflow and should only be in unusual situations, and then makes it just that little bit more difficult to decide to just blow off a Monday.

  48. Grumpy Elder Millennial*

    LW4, one option is to tell that person that you’ve seen / are aware that [task] is incomplete and ask what’s up with it. If there’s a good reason that it’s behind, you can problem solve together. If there isn’t a good reason, you can tell her that this is a problem and she’s not meeting expectations.

  49. Bike Walk Barb*

    Seems to me the nepotism policy approach is grabbing the wrong end of the stick. Instead of LW3 being asked to produce a family tree, the policy should lay out a clear definition of nepotism, why it’s problematic, what absolutely can’t happen such as supervising a family member or romantic partner, and ask all employees to disclose any work relationships that may be in violation of the policy. Since it’s new *and* retroactive, which seems problematic to me but maybe a current situation is why they feel the need for the policy, they need to allow time for transfers to eliminate any violations, not just fire people. The policy can include consequences for failure to disclose.

    That’s broad and inclusive and will cover any new hires. I’m picturing them asking all new hires to provide their family tree or ancestry dot com log-in and banging my head on the table ever so softly.

    Maybe LW would be able to suggest this approach “to make sure the policy is being applied equitably to all employees and so there’s a process going forward for new hires”.

  50. MotherofaPickle*

    LW 3: If you feel uncomfortable or just don’t have time to submit a family tree (which is a strange ask, imo), refer your boss to the local state historical society. They are a wealth of information and, because your family settled the area, they either A) have all the info on file and easily attainable, or B) would love to dig into a project like this.

  51. Fíriel*

    I think LW3 needs more clarity (or we the commentariat need more clarity) on whether they’re being asked to visually illustrate the relationships to the existing family declarations (fine, if a little tedious) or whether they’re being asked to document every single person in their family going back an unknown number of years. The latter I think is significantly more concerning as a violation of privacy, and as an expectation to be asked of one employee when not asked of others. And if asked of everyone it may be inadvertently asking people to reveal even more significant information (a relative who died of a severe, genetic health condition, information about immigration history or status, a religious, ethnic or racial identity not otherwise apparent).

  52. MigraineMonth*

    Chuckling about the fact that one of the auto-generated links related to a post about a coworker who coughs up snot in the kitchen is “my coworker sent a snotty message about me on a Zoom call”.

      1. Macca*

        And all of the other linked posts included references to people being (figuratively) snotty to their co-workers. I love it!

  53. Dancing Otter*

    #3:
    I’d use a genealogy chart format, but I wouldn’t fill in any of the names except your own and the “distant cousins” in question. Just empty boxes and connecting lines.
    Your employer will see the nature of the link, e.g., great-grandparent’s sibling’s grandchild’s spouse’s sibling’s daughter. (I think that would be a second cousin once removed’s niece by marriage, but I managed to confuse even myself. And I’ve met such a relative.)
    They do not need to see the name of every person in between.

  54. Anne Shirley Blythe*

    LW#2 pleeaase update us, and I wish you the best. The intermittent snorters I once worked near now seem like a walk in the park.

    I am morbidly curious if the coworker first did this in her cube and was asked to go elsewhere. (I realize there is no logic to choosing a break room. With someone in it.) Let’s hope she will end up in the bathroom.

  55. ADHD brain monster*

    I was wrenching from the headline of that letter, I could even bring myself to read it.

    Just to validate you that yes, whatever precisely is happening, it is disgusting and needs addressing.

  56. CLC*

    Why do they need an entire family tree? Can’t the person just explain the relationship more specifically, like “X is my father’s second cousin, making him my second cousin once removed and making his son Y my third cousin.” Who even has a whole “official” family tree they could provide to an employer? Does that even exist?

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