giving notice when boss is an abusive jerk, vendors keep sending unhealthy food, and more

by Alison Green on October 28, 2024

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

1. Do I have to give notice when my boss is an abusive jerk?

I have worked at my current job over three years. I am in the legal field and, because of the small geographic area, most of the people in this field know each other. My employer has had a very high turnover rate for such a small office. I am now the only paralegal left. My boss is so toxic and plays so many games that most quit. I have developed hives (I break out every Sunday from stress before going into work on Monday) and an ulcer. I keep up with the old paralegals and one has been diagnosed with PTSD from being there six months. Another has tremors now. We formed a prior and current employee support group with two more paralegals to help people get through the experience. Whenever there is a new hire, we try to pull them aside and give them the tools to just survive. We can’t warn people ahead of time to not apply because we signed a non-disclosure agreement.

My manager has already threatened to fire me several times. She gives the same canned speech to all of the employees whether you have made a mistake or are doing spectacularly well under the circumstances because she likes to see people cry and be flustered. It’s a game to her. She also hides items that are needed like client files, changes dates on the calendar without telling anyone, changes passwords that we need and says she hasn’t, and gaslights like you wouldn’t believe.

When the other staff quit one by one, once they gave notice she treated them even worse for that two weeks (as if that was possible). I don’t want to go through that. I am also hesitant because this woman belongs to all of these legal committees and organizations and volunteers her time to legal charities (this is all a mask to generate business, not because she is a good person), and I am sure she will drag my name through the mud in legal circles. I have finally secured another job and can now escape. But I am not sure what to do about notice given her behavior. I also don’t know if I can take any more abuse, especially an added layer because I tell her I am quitting.

You don’t need to stay the two weeks. You can have a health condition that you need to attend to immediately that unfortunately makes it impossible for you work your notice period. (This sounds like it wouldn’t even be untrue.)

I hear you that you’re worried that she’ll badmouth you in your small field — but isn’t she going to do that no matter what? If she’s going to trash-talk you either way, there’s no point in staying and being abused for two more weeks. If I’m wrong about that and she doesn’t trash people once they’re gone as long as they leave professionally … well, you still don’t need to work your notice period. You can still have a health issue that makes it impossible for you to stay, or if she’s abusive you can tell her that today will be your last day if that continues. Or maybe you’re someone who can handle a final two weeks since you know that you’ll be gone at the end of them and can let her bad behavior roll off you because she’ll never have access to you again. If so, great. But if not, then really, skip the notice period and cite a health emergency; you’re sorry but need to leave immediately to attend to it.

And then run that non-disclosure agreement by a lawyer because there’s a decent chance it’s written in a way that would be unenforceable in regard to the specific things you’d want to share with others.

Related:
can I leave before my notice period is up if my boss is being a jerk?

2. Vendors keep sending unhealthy food

I’m writing on behalf of my brother, who works at a small in-patient healthcare facility. Based on the nature of the facility, they have a lot of vendors, other organizations looking for them to make referrals to their patients, etc. Because of this, they get a lot of people “courting” them with little branded swag gifts, as well as bags of candy, meals, cookies, donuts, etc. While it would personally annoy me to have so many pens and pads of paper and coffee cups floating around, the bags of swag gifts are not that big of a concern. But what he and some of his coworkers are starting to have an issue with is the pretty constant barrage of unhealthy treats. This week alone they’ve gotten three big boxes of cookies for the office, smaller individual boxes of cookies for each manager, several bags of candy, and a catered breakfast.

My brother has been struggling with some pretty severe health issues including trying to lose a significant amount of weight. While it’s obviously not anyone else’s responsibility to help him with that, he is not the only employee who is finding the constant presence of sweets and food to be hard to resist. Do you have any advice for how they could ask for healthier options or to politely decline them altogether? Although at least a few of his coworkers have expressed the same sentiments that my brother has, he also doesn’t want to disrupt something that some people may be perfectly happy with.

Having had similar issues in the past, I know that these vendor companies have budgets for this type of thing and their higher-ups are expecting that they spend the money and spread the goodwill. None of them have any objections to the occasional treat coming their way but it is almost every day at this point.

If all of his coworkers want to put a stop to it,  whoever’s in contact with the vendors could say to them, “Thanks so much for thinking of us with the bin of candy you sent over. We’ve got a lot of people here trying to eat healthier so if you can put us on a no-sweets list, we’d all be grateful.” They could add, “No obligation to send anything at all, of course, but if you’re looking for something the staff would love, fruit or veggies would be a huge hit.” This is a little awkward because you normally shouldn’t dictate what gift someone gives you — but this is business, they have a budget to spend courting your facility, and they’d probably appreciate knowing what would help them generate more good will rather than less.

But if other people there enjoy the gifts, your brother can’t really do that. In that case, he could look for ways to manage temptation once the food arrives — like asking to store it all in a designated area he doesn’t go in often but which other people know to check if they want it.

3. My colleague has no poker face

You’ve answered questions from people who don’t have a poker face, but my issue is with a colleague who doesn’t have a poker face.

She’s very good at controlling her expressions in meetings with clients or managers, but outside of that … all of her emotions are on full display. We work very closely and have a warm rapport, so I think it’s great that she feels comfortable with me. But, whenever I say anything she disagrees with, she visibly grimaces. The nature of our work involves a lot of dialogue and reconciling of different points of view and competing priorities. I absolutely expect and welcome push back. Once I’m done speaking and she shares her perspective, we’re always able to quickly reach a solution without drama. But the grimaces really irritate me. They throw me off when I’m talking, and I find myself pivoting in the middle of a sentence because I worry that I must sound very incompetent to provoke such a strong reaction. Lately, I’ve found myself speaking up less in meetings when she is present.

When she’s grimacing at me, should I pretend I don’t see it? Call it out on the spot? (If I’m leading a team meeting, I’ll call on her to share her opinion when I see a grimace.) Avoid looking at her entirely? Or is it on me to reframe the situation in my mind?

I’m a fan of naming it on the spot because (a) people don’t always realize how visible it is, (b) calling it out can convey “you are doing something noticeable enough that people are thrown off by it,” which in turn can limit how often she does it, and (c) she’s being rude and you’re not obligated to pretend you don’t see it. She is deliberately communicating something with her face (or at least deliberately not stopping it as she does with others) and it’s okay to respond to that.

So the next time she grimaces: “You grimaced when I said that. What’s up?” or “Your face looks like you really disagree.” Say that a few times and see if she starts doing it less frequently. If not and you have to work with her a lot, at some point it might be worth saying, “I don’t know if you realize how often you grimace when I say something you disagree with. You don’t do it around managers or clients so I’m guessing it’s not uncontrollable, and it really throws me off when I see it.”

4. Is it normal to ask your current manager for a reference?

A few years ago, I had a coworker reach out to me in a panic to ask if I could give a reference for a job she was applying for. She said she was asking me because she’d already asked our manager and our HR director (also a partner in our small company), and they had freaked out. Apparently, they were blindsided because she hadn’t said anything about being unhappy at work or job hunting, they called her disloyal, how dare she, etc. They both refused to give references.

When she told me all this, I was shocked. I would never ever ask someone at my current employer for a reference outside a few very, very specific cases (e.g., a trusted same-level coworker). The risk is too high! Case in point: in my coworker’s case, now our manager and HR were mad at her, and if she didn’t get the job, they might make her life difficult or fire her. Luckily, she did get the job.

When I mentioned to her that asking a current employer for a reference was a very unusual thing to do, my coworker said she’d done it before and her family members hadn’t seen an issue when she asked them. Is this any way this is a thing that’s considered normal, maybe in certain industries? Or was I right in being baffled?

No, it’s not normally done! A decent manager won’t freak out at someone for job-searching, but (a) not all managers are decent — yours being a case in point and (b) even when a manager doesn’t freak out, it’s not in your interest to tip your hand that you’re searching until you’ve accepted another job and are ready to give notice. Otherwise you risk being moved off of high-profile projects that would help your resume or even pushed out earlier than you wanted to go (which doesn’t necessarily need to be malicious — it can just be something like they need to cut two roles from the team and figure you’ve got one foot out the door already anyway).

There are exceptions to this like times when you trust your boss to know you’re looking without having any repercussions, but those are the exception to the rule.

Related:
my interviewer wants a reference from my current boss

5. How to get better at double-checking my work

I just had my first performance review at my new job and overall it was good, but there was one criticism: I need to doublecheck my work more. This is something I have heard before but the thing is, I do doublecheck! I reread and reread but it’s like my brain and eyes refuse to see the errors, it just fills in with what’s supposed to be there. It’s easier to spot errors in other people’s work, or if I can take a break for a few hours, but that’s usually not possible. I have been criticized for taking too long doublechecking things before as well. What are some effective and efficient methods of checking one’s own work?

Things that often work for people:

1. Read your work out loud to yourself. The function that makes your brain gloss over errors doesn’t seem to kick in as much when you’re reading out loud.
2. Change the font. This is weird, but when the work doesn’t look as familiar to you, your brain may read it as more “new” than when it looks identical.
3. Hold a piece of paper up to your screen so you can only see one line at a time. This can slow down your brain and make sure you’re seeing what’s really there.
4. Print it out. If you’re used to reviewing work on a computer screen, printing it out can help you spot errors.
5. Look at past errors and see if you can find patterns in them. If you realize that you frequently miss X or miscalculate Y, you can build in a check for those things in particular.

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{ 466 comments }

{ 466 comments… read them below }

  1. Daria grace*

    #5 when I was doing a lot of entering long numbers off scanned forms for financial transactions that really really couldn’t be wrong, one thing I often did was copy the number I was entering into a small notepad window and drag it right above/below the number on the scan to compare. Sounds clunky but really wasn’t when I was in the rhythm.

    I haven’t done it so much but I’ve heard others swear by reading the document from bottom to top to spot stuff that’s wrong

    1. Abogado Avocado*

      In journalism school before SpellCheck, we were taught to read our work from the bottom up (last sentence first) to find errors. It works because you are reading your work out of context and your brain is less likely to gloss over errors.

      1. Hansfel*

        Came here to recommend the same! I am a lawyer, and this really helped me catch things when I was more junior and asked to do a lot of proofing.

            1. Edwina*

              My job requires copying a lot of files from one place to another, and some of the filenames are very similar, so when I double check, I use the Notepad method as well – from Daria grace’s comment:

              copy the number I was entering into a small notepad window and drag it right above/below the number on the scan to compare

            2. Jules*

              Another vote for reading it backwards! I’m an editor and a writer, and this is part of my editing process. When I taught writing, this was what I suggested that my students do and it worked for many of them.

      4. Nethwen*

        Came here to suggest something similar, except I understood it as reading from last word to first. So, “The cat ate the bat” would be proofread as “bat the ate cat The.” It really slows down your brain and you do catch spelling and grammar errors, but not thought-connection errors, at least in my experience.

      5. toolegittoresign*

        I was coming here to recommend reading it backwards. I took a copyediting course and this is the thing that most helps me catch errors.

      6. Filicophyta*

        Yess, I was taught this too (reading from bottom to top), by a professional editor when I worked at a publishing house. It forces you to focus on mechanics, rather that global meaning.

      7. Lydia*

        I used to do this! It’s helpful to find misspellings, missing or extra words, or sentences that just don’t make sense.

    2. Indolent Libertine*

      I’ve also proofed things by reading truly backwards, meaning starting with the last word of a sentence. This *only* catches misspellings and typos, of course – you can’t be reading for whether it makes sense using this method – but for finding keyboarding errors it’s great because it really removes all context and leaves you just looking a series of words and completely short-circuits the process where your brain fills in what you know you meant to write.

      1. Quinalla*

        Yup, reading backwards or turning something upside down or sideways, both of these help to keep my brain from filling in gaps – our brains are AMAZING at filling in gaps.

        1. A Simple Narwhal*

          They really are! That’s why when I’m making a presentation I like to give it first to someone who doesn’t know about the topic, it’s a great way to figure out where the gaps are. Your brain is going to think some things are obvious and don’t need further explanation but another person won’t make those leaps and will be left with questions.

    3. Clementine*

      If it’s stuff like misspelling, grammar and typos, why not try running it through an AI writing program and asking it to highlight or correct them? It will take the computer seconds to pick up stuff you might be poring over for ages.

      1. Alz*

        This! It has been a game changer for me- make sure you ask it to highlight what it changes so that it doesn’t go imagining things.

        I also used to use google translate English > English and then get it to read it to me. I have a habit of run on sentences and it really highlights it when you feel like the computer is going to run out of breath

        1. Radioactive Cyborg Llama*

          I use the “read aloud” option in Word for that, also. Hearing it read out loud is especially good for missing words or if a sentence doesn’t make sense the way you thought it did.

          1. Asloanico*

            +1 Read Aloud – this is the only thing that works for me, and I find it much less unpleasant than reading it from the end backwards or reading the whole thing aloud myself. I set the robot voice to talking and go make myself a tea while I’m listening. It even has helped me catch homophones before due to the slight difference in the way it “pronounces” certain types of words, including “its/it’s.” I’m a novelist so I’ve tried everything and this is my best trick.

          2. JB (not in Houston)*

            Yes, i was going to suggest this as well. I don’t catch everything using this feature, but it helps a lot

            1. Sleeve McQueen*

              Count me as another read-aloud enthusiast! Although often my work involves compiling cutting and pasting from different documents, so it can be a bit jarring when it switches accents from American to English to Australian. Especially when the Australian accent is pretty broad.

              One trick I often play on myself if I am not using this is to set myself fake KPIs eg there are five mistakes in the article, see if you can find them.

      2. musical chairs*

        Check your company/contractor policy before you do something like this. I know that I’m not allowed to put any proprietary information or enter the name of my company into any non-enterprise AI tools. Everyone should be more careful about this stuff. Understand the programs that you use before you use them.

        1. amoeba*

          Yeah, this, but a lot of big companies do have their own company versions, which you could use for that. There are otherwise also ways to set up local versions of LLMs on your machine, but I guess this would probably be overkill here!

        2. kiri*

          THIS. Anything that gets fed into AI tools is going to be fair game to be farmed for future AI content – everyone should be wayyy more careful and thoughtful about how they’re using AI. (Not to mention the absolutely devastating environmental impact of it…)

          I sometimes feel like Old Man Yelling At Cloud around AI, but I just think we’re leaping headlong into using it without understanding it, regulating it, or reckoning with any of the potential consequences.

            1. Religious Nutter*

              This is exactly how ChatGPT works. Read the Terms of Service.

              Also, if you think ChatGPT can help you with spelling? Ask it how many Ns are in the word “banana”. Large Language Models are very good at being confident because it makes them convincing. They’re not very good at being correct.

            2. kiri*

              From Open AI’s help site: “When you use our services for individuals such as ChatGPT or DALL•E, we may use your content to train our models.”

              Option to opt out is there, but this is in fact how it operates.

      3. Emmy Noether*

        Is an external AI writing program any better at this than spellcheckers integrated in whatever program the text is being written in in the first place (Word or whatever)? I guess theoretically, it could better spot typos where the mistyped word is a real word, just not the one you wanted to write. Does it?

        1. Coverage Associate*

          I haven’t used them, but I understand that there are AI systems that are better than Word’s spelling and grammar checks. The ones I have heard about are programmed for certain industries, so it will ignore unusual usages that are common in your industry and can catch if you have left out information that is typical for your industry.

      4. Nina*

        Unfortunately, for a lot of people, this is ‘take your employer’s confidential files and feed them to a black-box server stored who-knows-where and owned by who-knows-who’. It’s a massive no-no for a lot of applications and in all my previous workplaces ‘run it through an AI’ would get you fired on the spot.
        AI spellcheckers are also often not that great and can actually introduce errors that weren’t there before, especially if your field (like most fields) uses a lot of specialized terminology.

        1. Nonsense*

          Yup. AI spellcheckers don’t use a dictionary; since they’re LLMs, they use the most frequent spellings they’ve scraped from the internet. And as it turns out, people misspell a lot of words, which is why they turn to a spellchecker in the first place!

        2. Tacky Halloween Decor*

          AI tends to also be trained on very specific datasets, too.

          I’m going to see if I can find the video again but I recently watched one where a writer fed her middle/high school writings to an AI (she chose those specifically because they weren’t exactly great because yanno…First attempts at something rarely are) to see what it would offer as improvements.

          One that stuck with me was a scene where a character thinks he caused his sister’s death and specifically refers to it as “basically murdered his sister”. The AI suggested not to use the word “murder” because of its strong connotations – which would be decent advice for a social media post, but really not for the emotion that scene was trying to convey.

          So yeah, if your AI is trained on social media posts and you have to write grant proposals…That is not a good combo.

        3. Another Kristin*

          and are usually trained on American English and will flag Canadian or British spellings and idioms as errors

      5. Antilles*

        This really depends on the kind of double-checking that OP needs to do. If it’s simple typos, yes, AI can help with that. But in my experience, when someone isn’t doing enough double-checking, the concern is practically never just minor wrds bring misspelld, because even Microsoft Word’s automatic spell/grammar checker catches that. Instead, it’s the sort of things which could be correct but aren’t, so it needs a knowledgeable set of human eyes to identify.
        Forgetting to change the client’s name in a header. Using the wrong version of a template. Failing to capitalize words that are proper nouns in this particular context but are also normal words so software won’t catch it. Typos in numbers, where your proposal lists a cost of $10,000 not $100,000. Forgetting a step in a calculation so the end number appears reasonable but isn’t. Copy-paste errors from another document/report. Etc..

        1. Freya*

          In one set of financial reports that I needed to sign off on for the family superannuation fund, I was the last person to check it, and the only person to pick up on the fact that they said both that I was employed and that I had had no employer pay legally-required super into the fund that financial year. My employer super had been misclassified as personal super contributions, and I was getting hassled to sign off on something that said I was going to be claiming a tax deduction for those personal super contributions… So, yeah, as the fourth or fifth set of hands this paperwork had gone through, almost all of whom had some finance background, I was the only one who spotted that the paperwork was asking me to falsely admit to committing a crime.

      6. AnonInCanada*

        Grammarly would work in this case as well. Those green lines underscoring missteps will draw your attention to typos, grammar/spelling errors etc. It works for me when proofing emails for tone and structure before sending them out. Not to mention run-on sentences. I was terrible with that in the past as well.

      7. TSS*

        Please do not use AI for this. Non-AI spelling and grammar programs use *so much less energy* than AI-ones (in addition to all of the security / IP worries about AI).

    4. The Prettiest Curse*

      I proofread much better on printed documents than on screen, so my method is to cover all but one line of the printed document with a ruler or another piece of paper, then move slowly downwards one line at a time. Especially useful if you read fast.

      1. Not Australian*

        100% endorse this. However it’s always difficult to justify printing stuff out, maybe multiple times, in an environment where they’re striving to be paperless/mindful of waste, and that means there may be awkward conversations to be had.

        1. The Prettiest Curse*

          Fortunately, I only need to print out something for proofing purposes once every few weeks at most. But hopefully this OP will find a mixture of different techniques that work for them – and if they do get pushback for printing, they can point out that it helps them with double-checking their work, as they were requested to do.

        2. Sharpie*

          I’ve done the exact same thing on the computer screen – cover everything below the line I’m reading with a piece of paper and go through a document line by line, without printing it out.

    5. Miko*

      Also if it’s strictly something written (document, article, long email), not only change the font but the font size. Copy it into a new word or google document and set it to something ridiculous like 30 or 36. Fewer words on the screen really helps me see left out words or clunky phrases. For creative writing I even try to open it on a different device. Something I typed on a laptop, it’s easier to see mistakes when I look at it on my phone.

      1. General von Klinkerhoffen*

        Changing the size also changes line breaks – this feeds into Alison’s suggestion for making it look unfamiliar.

      2. Harper the Other One*

        Yes, large font is super helpful for me! I also like to change the font colour from black to blue, or highlight it, and change it back as I edit.

        1. Louise*

          An old lecturer used to mark essays by putting them in word and using accessibility settings to narrate the essays audibly. He picked up errors that sounded off to his ears that way.

      3. Alexander Graham Yell*

        I always, ALWAYS catch errors when I turn something into a PDF. At this point it’s standard practice for me to think I’m done with something, PDF it, and then go through it again with a notepad to write down all the errors I find and what I need to correct. And then I re-PDF and do it again. I don’t know what it is about it, but it works (for me) every time.

        2. Philosophia*

          I’ve also found errors (and infelicities) in a PDF version that I hadn’t caught in the Word version. Back in the days of galley proofs, after all, errors were known to creep into printed books.

          1. elansha*

            Agreed! I always find it weird that I see things differently (and therefore can catch a bunch of errors) when it has been made into a PDF (which is pretty much identical to my word documents?) but I DO!

    6. Cat Tree*

      I find it helpful, when time allows, to draft a document and then wait a day to proofread. Or at least a few hours while me brain does something completely different.

      1. Uranus Wars*

        This is what I do and its amazing the difference in the amount of things I catch, even after just a few hours.

      2. But what to call me?*

        I call that ‘letting it marinate’. Write it, let it sit for a while, then revise and edit.

        Now if only I could get better at leaving myself enough time for that to happen.

    7. Hastily Blessed Fritos*

      Bottom to top is a great tip for text; it makes you actually read what’s there rather than what you think is there. A lot of these tips are designed to get at that sort of thing.

    8. NJ editor*

      As a professional editor, I find that a program’s Speak option works really well so I can hear what is missing or incorrect in a document. I read along silently to catch errors as the program reads to me, and the reading speed can be adjusted slower if needed. Headphones can be used if in an open office.

      1. EngineeringFun*

        Yep! Word reads it out loud. You can control the speed. This is how I check long documents. I also take a break before editing. Even a 10 min break clears my mind enough! As for math equations I do them by hand and then put them in excel. That catches things.

      2. Cupcake*

        If using Word, there is a Read Aloud button in the Review tab. The computer voice reads the text. I like this for proofreading as the computer voice does not sound like me! It will help you pick up mistakes that spell check can overlook.

    9. Smelter*

      From someone who did in-house proofreading as my job for a few years, I swore by checklists and making several targeted passes of the document.

      It will depend on the document, but for example: one pass to check headers, one pass to check figures, one pass to check tables, one pass to check bullet points and alignment, one pass to check key terms that should or shouldn’t be capitalised according to the company style.

    10. Lady Danbury*

      Having a checklist makes a huge difference for me. Certain things are standard across many types of documents, but I’ll also add individual things that I want to check as I’m drafting/reviewing (such as making sure that all instances of a defined term are capitalized).

    11. llamasandteapots*

      Ooh this is exactly my bag. I am a professional editor (excuse any errors or typos here, I’m not being paid for this) and I have ADHD, so I’ve had to come up with a lot of workarounds. It’s not totally clear what kind of material you’re working with, so here’s a variety:

      1. Boilerplate. If you are responding to the same kinds of emails/queries over and over, having a Word document with common boilerplate that you know is error-free can be lifesaving. If there are parts that need to be edited before sending each time (for instance, business names, contact names, etc), you can bold and highlight stop holders in the document. Make them super obvious so you don’t forget to fill them in (think all caps, add multiple square brackets, etc).

      2. Checklists. If you’re compiling information where certain information is required and some items keep getting left out, make a checklist. Make one for every workflow/email type/ document type if you need to.

      3. For typos/grammar, I would personally avoid AI like ChatGPT or Grammarly in my work if it’s higher-level/contains any sort of proprietary information, but for things like basic documents/emails, they’re a decent fallback. Not a replacement for a good old fashioned proofread though.

      4. If you’re missing key steps in a multi-step process, develop a protocol (like a more detailed checklist) that lists out step-by-step what needs to be done.

      You might think these are a little time consuming, and I’ll admit they are, but I’ve found taking more time up front saves a lot of time on the back end.

      1. Jackalope*

        One possible tweak on the first suggestion: if there are specific fields that need to be filled in for a standard document, have the stand-in word(s) be something unique, like FILL-IN, or REPLACE, or whatever works for you. At the end do a Ctrl + F to make sure you’ve gotten all of them.

        1. Agent Diane*

          Put the placeholder text in square brackets. You can then do CTRL+F for [ – that brings up all the placeholder texts. Make sure to do a pass at the end for any orphan [ or ]!

          I’d echo other people on using whatever proofreading tools your work system has and do NOT use unauthorised third-party tools. The Microsoft Editor function can be set to pick up grammar as well as punctuation.

          If you have a word you cannot help but misspell as another real word? Do CTRL+F on the wrong word. I had one where the wrong word was one I would never use in a specific job, so I set it up to autocorrect!

          Autocorrect can also be your friend on specific phrases you need to get right. Programme it with a three letter acronym that expands into the right phrase. Then you type the phrase and autocorrect puts the right phrase in once you hit space.

          If your organisation has a house style, follow it. If the guide says to not put full stops at the end of bullet points then you need to follow that, even if you automatically put them in. As others have said, learn what your blind spots are so you can checklist them at the end.

          Proofing is my profession.

      2. Freya*

        Re: boilerplate, there’s a bunch of emails I need to send so often at my work that I’ve created signatures for each of the subjects that just keeps coming up. As an example, I have one labelled “EOFY Payroll” that all I have to do is make sure the recipient is correct and the financial year was updated at some point in the lead up to EOFY, and then I just send it to each of my clients as and when their EOFY payroll stuff is done. It’s basically the same email every year.

        Similarly, I have one with all the common responses to questions from clients’ employees about superannuation that I can cut and paste the bits that are relevant this time, and various ones for other questions that come up on a regular basis. Once I’ve done the work to create a well-turned phrase that gets the point across clearly without overstepping legal boundaries, I’m always going to reuse that work so I don’t have to do it again from scratch!

    12. a clockwork lemon*

      I do a lot of last-minute edits where approvals are done back and forth via Teams and WITHOUT FAIL every single time I copy something from my word document into the chat window I notice some stupid typo I didn’t catch the first 47 times I looked at something.

      I assume it’s just something about switching to a new window that makes something look “new” to my brain because it’s definitely not changing fonts or anything like that but for me it’s kind of like the digital equivalent of walking into a room and suddenly remembering something you needed to do.

    13. Strive to Excel*

      Adding some general tips for finance and math proofreading:
      * If you need to add math to a text document, do it in Excel/sheets first, then either embed a chart or copy/paste it over. You might have to fix formatting but not the core data. This lets you do correctness checks first.
      * Automate as much as you possibly can. This includes having built-in checksums or conditional formatting so you can spot if there’s issues.
      * Build in checkpoints/show your work. If you’re adding five to three and then subtracting two (to simplify), have each of those as separate steps. That way, if it starts showing the result is negative four, you can backtrack and figure out where things went wrong.
      * Set yourself general expectations. If you’re adding a column of round numbers you shouldn’t have decimals when you’re done. If you’re recording sales numbers for a small coffee shop you wouldn’t expect it to go to eight figures. That will let you narrow your search for errors.

    14. Bespoke Okapi*

      If you’re working in Word, there’s a feature on the Review tab that can read your text aloud to you. (I’d guess there are tools for other settings too, but I know it’s built in in Word.) Works similarly to the reading aloud trick but it’s helpful in a quiet office environment, and is essentially a “third party” reading it with a different way of parsing the words than I might have in mind.

      1. Bespoke Okapi*

        clarification re: “helpful in a quiet office environment” — the idea being you’re using headphones of course!

  2. Observer*

    #3 – Coworker who grimaces.

    The problem is not that she doesn’t have a poker face, it’s that she doesn’t think she needs to be polite to you. We know this because she *is* capable of not grimacing, and she controls herself when she is talking to customers or managers. Which means that she is making a choice to not control herself when dealing with you – and it’s a choice that she is making specifically for you / non-management people.

    She’d probably claim that she just “doesn’t play games” or some excuse about being “an open book” or the like. But the thing is that this would not be ok, even if she did this to everyone. It’s just worse when she is *choosing* to only be this way with *some* people.

    I’m not trying to demonize her. It’s just that you should feel very comfortable calling her on it, and I think that Alison’s wording is good. Just don’t let her fluff around. You notice it, and it’s legitimately throwing you off.

    2. allathian*

      Thank goodness for remote work! It’s so much easier for me when I don’t have to school my face all the time, only in video meetings.

      I essentially work in two modes, either I’m aggressively neutral, or I’m showing all my emotions on my face. I’m a fairly negative person by nature, so most of those emotions are going to be negative even when I’m working in an organization whose values I share, doing tasks I mostly enjoy, and working with people I like. Sure, I can and do smile at work, but it’s nearly always intentional rather than an instinctive reaction to something pleasant happening. The only exception I can think of is when someone smiles at me and I smile in instinctive response.

      Maybe the LW should follow her own suggestion and try to school her own reactions to the grimaces. By all accounts the grimacing coworker isn’t grimacing at her. If the coworker showed open dislike towards the LW as a person, that obviously wouldn’t be okay. Sounds to me like she feels safe and comfortable enough with the LW that she doesn’t think she needs to wear her work mask around her.

      So yes, the LW can ask the coworker to stop grimacing around her, but then she should also be prepared for the coworker to be less warm with her. Masking takes mental energy, and the LW is essentially telling the coworker that she isn’t a safe person to show negative emotions to at work, and is thus relegating the relationship to a purely professional one. Which is okay, but the LW isn’t allowed to be annoyed if she can’t have it both ways. Figure which you value more, a completely professional demeanor at all times, or a warm relationship with your coworker. You probably can’t have both, and even if you told her later that you miss the warm relationship and would be willing to take her grimaces if that’s what it takes, she’s unlikely to trust you again, LW.

      1. Stardust*

        You are painting this as a really extreme and somewhat dramatic (“safe person”, “unlikely to trust you again”, “can’t have both”) binary when it’s equally possible that it wouldn’t take much effort or thought at all for the coworker to change this.

        1. Red era*

          Word to all of this. And I’ll be honest, the fact that Allathian bookended their advice with “I’m a generally negative person” is making me take said advice with A LOT of salt. Maybe I’ve just worked at too many workplaces where it only takes 1 of those “generally negative” personalities to permanently kill the morale of a whole department (and drive off everyone else to greener pastures).

      2. SnackAttack*

        There’s a healthy medium between constantly masking and being outwardly negative all the time. Don’t get me wrong, I hate forced positivity, but continuous negativity from others can get exhausting as well. It would be one thing if LW were asking her coworker to always be grinning, but she’s not – she’s asking for some basic decency.

      4. pocket microscope*

        This is dramatising the situation enormously. One person has a quirk that another person finds a bit unnerving. Yes, the quirk probably naturally comes out more around LW because she’s not a senior colleague or client, so her coworker feels less inhibited. That really does not mean LW can’t say anything without becoming unsafe, unfriendly and untrustworthy.

        Most people can be flexible to this extent. Most people can understand another person’s perspective and meet them halfway without feeling unsafe and without causing permanent damage to the relationship. My goodness.

        1. meggus*

          Seriously. my therapist would tell me to engage coping skills and work to make it not about myself. I am baffled that anyone thinks policing someone’s facial expressions like this is acceptable. It’s not affecting the job or the work, LW confirmed. the ablism is not lost on me.

      5. Falling Diphthong*

        There’s a difference between the negative emotions “I am angry at the printer” “I am frustrated that the client keeps changing their mind about the style” and something that conveys “I find you really stupid and irritating at this moment.”

        1. ecnaseener*

          Bingo. Grimacing at your coworker’s idea is plain rude. Yes, it takes some effort to avoid being rude, but…too bad, you gotta do it. The typical “warm coworker” relationship is nowhere near the level of “we’re so comfortable with each other we don’t have to be polite anymore.”

        2. allathian*

          Oh yes, absolutely! Quoting myself here: “If the coworker showed open dislike towards the LW as a person, that obviously wouldn’t be okay.” I’d count rolling their eyes at a comment the LW made, or grimacing and pointedly looking away from them as unacceptable mean behavior. But I also wouldn’t describe my relationship with a person who did that as otherwise warm, either.

          For me there’s a clear disconnect there, if the grimaces are directed at the LW rather than at things happening around them, management being stupid or uncooperative equipment, how can the relationship be described as warm?

      6. Asloanico*

        “By all accounts the grimacing coworker isn’t grimacing at her.” – if she’s grimacing in direct response to OP’s comments, that IS grimacing at her.

      7. Paint N Drip*

        Whoa you’re getting a lot of pushback on this but although I’m overidentifying with the coworker I agree with you. OP even notes that they feel that the coworker trusts them enough to unmask, without saying that exactly. The unfortunate result of saying ‘hey the way you do this thing bothers me’ is likely to be coworker buttoning back up – OP loses the grimaces, but probably also the closeness.

      8. a clockwork lemon*

        This seems extreme. I’m on a team of big personalities and we’re not much in the habit of maintaining poker faces internally when we don’t have to, and this whole problem is solved on our team by saying in the moment, “Alright I see your grimace, where did I lose you?” or something similar. There’s either a real problem, at which point we’ve made space to address it, or the answer is “I have reservations about X but keep going and we’ll see if it actually matters”

        These are not high-stakes interactions and it’s not reasonable to frame them in terms of “safe” or “unsafe.” It is reasonable to expect a degree of emotional self-regulation at work. That includes not making faces at your coworkers in meetings when you disagree with them, especially when the point of the meeting is to resolve the disagreement.

      9. meggus*

        “Maybe the LW should follow her own suggestion and try to school her own reactions to the grimaces.”

        THIS. We can CHOOSE to keep our locus of control with ourselves vs. externalizing it and placing it all in the hands of other people. We can CHOOSE to respond and not react. This isn’t affecting the work or the job at all. this is what coping skills are for.

        2. Dahlia*

          It is not a normal part of conversation for people to grimace when you talk. That is not a “coping skills” problem.

      10. Ceanothus*

        I agree with a lot of this.

        My frown of concentration can look a lot like a frown of disapproval — I often make it when people bring up something I hadn’t thought about and I need to consider it for a minute. The LW might have some success asking if it’s a thinking frown instead of a disapproving frown — it will, at a minimum, be a neutral point for discussion.

        When people push back on the shape my face makes when I’m trying to solve problems with them, I say “Oh I’m sorry, that’s just my thinking face” a few times. Eventually though, our relationship is going to be less warm, because they interpret “figuring out logistics” as disapproval and I need to leave the room to solve their problems.

      11. But what to call me?*

        Can we please stop conflating considering what your nonverbal communication says to other people with masking? Yes, it’s harder for those of us who aren’t neurotypical, but the solution to that isn’t that everyone else (including other ND folks who don’t want to be grimaced at whenever we disagree with someone) is obligated to pretend nonverbal communication doesn’t exist. There’s a difference between hiding everything atypical about yourself and taking responsibility for controlling your own reactions to things.

      12. WeinerDog*

        There is nothing in the letter that indicates LWs coworker has autism or is neurospicy in any way.
        On one hand, yes, masking is exhausting and it’s hard to make sure your face is doing the right thing all day long.

        On the other hand, if I’m constantly making a stink face at someone I want to know about it so I can try and stop or at least explain that my face can do stuff on its own sometimes and I’m not always aware I’m doing it.

    3. Sally McSalamander*

      I don’t know about that. I have a tragically expressive face, so I work really hard in important meetings to keep it “still”, which is EXHAUSTING. I will often miss parts of the meeting because I’m focused on not emoting too obviously. And so with coworkers I like and trust or when I’m really focused on the conversation I’m having, I often forget to control my face. I’m not choosing to be expressive at that person, its that I’m forgetting to not be expressive. It is not malice, I do often make a small face when I disagree with someone, but that’s more because I’m either nervous about talking it out with the person or confused how they got to that conclusion. I’ve had coworkers comment on my face and I do try to remember to be less expressive around them, but sometimes I forget.

      Maybe #3’s coworker is being a jerk, but ascribing malice where there probably isn’t any seems like a sad and unproductive way of going through life.

      1. Kisa*

        Similar to me. Also being expressive is how i listen. when i get really invested in what the other person is saying, my face just lives its own life. and i do the happy faces as well!

        i too have to be able to control my face daily with clients, and it takes a lot of consentration.

        but yeah, with familiar coworkers i truly hope they A can deal with my face as i deal with their annoying traits or habits or B are able to tell me if they truly find it unbearable.

      2. Grey Coder*

        Agree, I can imagine the grimace might mean, “oh, good point, why didn’t I think of that” or “hmm, we might have to change the plan” rather than, “you are stupid and wrong”. A straightforward conversation should help resolve this. It might still be hard for OP to change their interpretation! But knowing there isn’t malice might help.

        2. Caramel & Cheddar*

          Yes, this! I noted elsewhere here that LW seems to be taking the grimaces really far in the other direction — she says that she must be coming across incompetent in meetings when the coworker grimaces, which just does not follow? The grimace isn’t “you are stupid and wrong and thus incompetent” the grimace is just a grimace and could mean any one of a million different things to the coworker making the face.

        3. Tiger Snake*

          It can even just be a ‘thinking hard’ face. “Wait that made sense out loud but not in my head. I don’t need to pause or question, I just need to go through that mentally again.”

      3. Smithy*

        I don’t want to discount that those being very expressive do have to work to hold that back – however I do think of this a bit more like why people will start brainstorming sessions with “there are no bad ideas”.

        Responding to a colleague speaking/sharing ideas with a grimace will shut down that kind of working relationship on both sides. This isn’t the OP requesting their colleague have a neutral expression when sharing their cube, but I do think in the spirit of working together both ways – someone should want to find ways to adjust or mask more if it’s reducing the positive ability to work with a colleague who’s sharing their work/ideas.

        And while this might reduce some of the closeness/familiarity with the coworker – that may not be the worst thing in the world. Part of the pushback around a workplace being like family, is that we are expected to put in more effort to be polite than we would with friends/family.

      4. Alpacas Are Not Dairy Animals*

        Yeah, I find that most formulations along the lines of “if they control it around someone else, they could control it around you” neglect to take into account that all forms of control take effort. There are times – as when an abusive person chooses to kiss up and kick down – that how they spend the effort is still an ethical issue! But for something along the lines of “I can perceive that someone doesn’t agree with me/they’re stimming in a way I find weird/they’re a little short by the end of the day” sometimes it’s kinder to remember that people get tired.

      5. CommanderBanana*

        This. I have literally gotten half of my face frozen with Botox since, when you are a woman and you have a face, someone will have a problems with literally everything you do with that face.

        I am really, really not a fan of telling women at work to fix their faces. I think the LW can ask her coworker what’s up if she starts grimacing, and if the coworker is as good as masking as she seems to be, she’ll get the message. But unless we’re talking about blatant eye rolls or scowls, just being a woman and having a face that makes expressions is not wrong.

    4. Luna*

      #3 The LW says they work together just fine once discussion starts. This falls squarely into the same category as someone insisting another “smile!”. You don’t get to police another person’s face. The work is what matters, at work. Be annoyed, it’s going to be ok.

      1. Grimace Shake*

        Yeah, I agree with you. It’s normal for people to react to what someone is saying. I don’t get why this bothers LW3 so much.

        1. Myrin*

          I mean, OP explains why it bothers her right here: “They [the grimaces] throw me off when I’m talking, and I find myself pivoting in the middle of a sentence because I worry that I must sound very incompetent to provoke such a strong reaction.”

          I have a coworker (who’s also become a friendly acquaintance outside of work) who, as soon as you open your mouth to talk to her about anything, starts nodding incessantly, and really vigorously, too. You would not believe how incredibly distracting it is (to the point of making me lose my train of thought), and it’s especially jarring when she then doesn’t actually agree with you.

          It’s certainly not something she does intentionally, she possibly isn’t even aware of it, but good lord am I glad that my ADHD makes it so that I’ve always automatically looked just to the side of someone’s face when talking to them so at least I only see her bobbing up and down in my peripheral vision. And that’s with a gesture which – contrary to grimaces – is generally interpreted as “positive”!

          1. RabbitRabbit*

            I had a friend who would also say “uh-huh uh-huh” or “yup yup” along with vigorous nodding and it was so jarring to deal with.

          2. Red era*

            “They [the grimaces] throw me off when I’m talking, and I find myself pivoting in the middle of a sentence because I worry that I must sound very incompetent to provoke such a strong reaction.”

            TBH, that sounds like an LW problem. Either call the coworker out EVERY time (and not only risk never getting anything done but also being the Office Weirdo who obsesses over people’s facial expressions), or just train yourself to get over the “grimacing” and keep talking, and that if the coworker really had a problem with whatever you’re saying, they can be a grown adult and say so with words.

          3. CommanderBanana*

            That sounds like an LW problem, though. Part of working with humans is that we all (and I mean all) have some tic or quirk or characteristic that is going to annoy someone at some point, whether it’s an annoying laugh or a stutter or a habit of nodding.

      2. nnn*

        Someone scowling at something you said isn’t the same as being ordered to smile. A change in expression communicates a message and most human brains respond to that.

        1. Boof*

          Without seeing the face in question, my first thought is it’s pretty normal human interactions to use our face as part of conveying our thoughts – not sure why OP doesn’t like the heads up that their colleague is disagreeing with them. If they’re disagreeing too vehemently that’s one thing but we’re not talking about dismissive eyerolls here, just a frown – it seems a bit much to call that rude to me.
          That being said if it’s throwing the OP way off I guess they could bring it up once but yeah, I’m another person who would have a very hard time not showing any expressions when I’m really engaged with something and it’s not me being rude, it’s me being engaged.

          1. Theon, Theon, it rhymes with neon*

            Okay, so it’s not just me. To me, grimacing/not grimacing is a matter of formality, not politeness. In some contexts, you wear a suit and tie and censor yourself a lot, to be on the safe side, maybe even use last names instead of first names. Just because you’re capable of doing that, is it rude not to always wear a suit and tie, always exercise maximum self-censorship, and address someone by their first name?

            If I’m not grimacing, I’m probably also polite-smiling and polite-laughing on cue, because I’m not relaxed enough to spontaneously laugh or smile, and I’m definitely treating it like a situation where I’m not supposed to. So the possibility of the relationship becoming less warm is very real.

            If it were me and grimacing bothered me a *lot*, I would frame it as a “it’s not you, it’s me,” and treat it basically as a “Can you make this change as a favor to me?” situation. But I would extend some grace, because in the grimacer’s shoes, I’d definitely be having to constantly remember to code switch from a mostly informal relationship to a formal mode of interacting on this one point.

            I *can* do this, because my partner’s anxiety disorder means she parses any negative emotion as anger at her, but it’s definitely been a case of meeting in the middle. Sometimes she just has to ask, and I have to clarify, “Sorry, that’s my confused look, not my mad-at-you look.” Because never showing confusion to your partner is *exhausting*. It means always being on guard.

            And I have checked with coworkers and friends to ask if I’m coming across as angry and she’s the only one comfortable telling me… but the consensus seems to be that no, I come across as confused when I’m confused. People indicate that it’s normal and fine to do that, and they decline my offer to try to censor it away. It really does seem to be a case of my partner growing up in a family where the safest bet was assuming that, when in doubt, people were mad and needed to be appeased.

            (By the way, it helped a lot when we figured out that was what was going on. Because I didn’t understand why she always thought I was mad at her, when that’s vanishingly rare!)

            1. Theon, Theon, it rhymes with neon*

              “is it rude not to always wear a suit and tie, always exercise maximum self-censorship, and address someone by their first name?”

              The way that sentence is constructed, “not always exercise maximum self-censorship” is more clear: I meant the “not” to cover the second clause too, but then I added a third that it doesn’t cover.

            2. allathian*

              It wouldn’t be fair to expect the grimacer to code switch on this one point, either she’d be informal and warm with grimaces or more formal with less warmth without grimaces. The LW really can’t have it both ways.

              1. Allonge*

                Ok, but maybe let’s let LW clarify that coworker has this issue to this degree? We are going into fanfiction here based on the commenters experiences.

                If it’s very difficult for her, it’s fine to tell LW they may need to deal with it, but for most people it’s not a binary of ‘smile painted on, zero human emotions’ and ‘all I feel will be in your face’. And it’s really not a huge expectation that people signal their disagreement in business-friendly ways.

                I agree that it’s likely not intentional rudeness and there is no need to assume it’s targeted at LW.

                1. Boof*

                  Yes without knowing the whole relationship the way the LW does, their colleague may much prefer the heads up; of course, if LW has been extra in a lot of ways that could be the last straw. If they have a good relationship tho it’s probably worth an ask, but I think the lowest key version “ooh, it looks like you’re frowning, what’s up?” when in a one to one talk would be the best way to point it out/ask about it. I don’t love the “your face looks like you really disagree” for some reason.

            3. CommanderBanana*

              I had a former boss who spent all of her time complaining about how she was being treated, instead of doing her work, because one of her ways of misdirecting her higher-ups from the fact that she wasn’t actually doing any work was to spend all her time complaining about how we were “rolling our eyes” and “making faces” during meetings with her, when literally all we were doing was blinking, or, you know, having a human face that moves.

        2. ASD always*

          The comparison isn’t “someone scowling” vs “being ordered to smile”, it’s “being told not to scowl” vs “being told to smile”.

          1. Boof*

            It’s not even scowling by the letter, it’s grimacing… I think a scowl as a much more angry/severe grimace/frown.

        3. Widget*

          Ordering someone to change their facial expression because you find it uncomfortable is the same whether you’re commanding them to smile or to stop grimacing. Policing people’s faces is gross.

          And if the message is accurate, you can just deal with it. It doesn’t sound like the coworker is pulling faces that miscommunicate what they think, just that they aren’t hiding what they think, and they work fine on handling that disagreement according to the OP. So the issue is how the OP reacts to the expressions, and that should be on them.

          1. Allonge*

            I really, really disagree.

            It’s context-dependent. It’s also inappropriate to police what someone wears, except in a lot of cases we need to wear certain kinds of clothes and not wear others. It’s inappropriate to police how someone speaks, except in a lot of cases there will be a lot of expectations for the language you. Why are facial expressions different?

            In all these cases, there are good (including medical) reasons not to hold some people to the same standard. But ‘of, it’s difficult for some people therefore nobody can be expected to do it’ is way over the line.

            1. ASD always*

              One huge difference is that facial expressions are instinctive and broadly universal to our species while language and clothing are not.

              1. Allonge*

                That’s a good point.

                The thing is – if facial expressions are instinctive, so are the reactions to them. If someone looks angry/annoyed, people will think they are angry or annoyed.

              2. Filthy Vulgar Mercenary*

                Because they’re universal, they also are often used to communicate range – im thinking the difference between a teeny bit eye-rolly at OP’s silly suggestion, and incredulousness at the ridiculousness of OP’s suggestion. Those would be different faces.

                If the coworker truly just means to communicate they think the suggestion is silly but are giving OP the incredulous face, that’s a mismatch just as talking too loudly or standing too close for your workplace culture would be (and of course that’s even before you bring in cultural differences to volume and personal space).

                It’s worth checking in on, and if it’s just something the coworker does without thinking about it, maybe it can at least become a game between them.

                Depending on OP’s personality, I’ve had success with just naming it in a kind of relaxed way. OP can have a funny response to it like make a face right back, or say “dang you seem to be having a strong response, should I stop talking to let you let it out before it hurts you or can I finish my sentence?”

                1. meggus*

                  A) They’re NOT universal. at all. different cultures exist and they’re not. B) it’s not affecting the job or the work. They can have polite discussion about it and/or engage coping skills. Emotional maturity means knowing YOU are responsible for your own reactions, and policing someone’s *facial expressions* solely because they make you feel weird and NOT because it’s about some personality clash in the office is not ok. It’s also ableist because there are a number of conditions where *facial expressions are an issue*. As adults, we should be managing our own emotions and internal experience, because we can’t expect the world to cater to us. it’s not causing any problems with the job, so it’s LW’s responsibility to learn to cope with and manage their own reactions. Period. And any mental health professional would say the same about this situation, honestly.

              3. Grey Coder*

                Are they really universal? I have been told my normal smile looks like a smirk. Is that just my face or was it an interpretation on someone else’s part?

                1. Not That Kind of Doctor*

                  I had a school/work acquaintance for years who I thought had kind of a nasty smirk/sneer going on almost all the time. It hit me one day that it was some kind of facial tic, and I felt terrible for low-key disliking him for so long because of it.

                2. Allonge*

                  They are a lot more universal than languages or dress codes, but that does not mean all people will consistently interpret them the same way!

          2. CommanderBanana*

            I once sat through a Zoom call with 2 coworkers with a pleasant, neutral half-smile on my face the entire time and, when the call ended, one of the coworkers burst into my office to demand to know why I was “laughing at her” during the meeting.

            She was a very insecure new hire with a GIANT chip on her shoulder and quickly got a reputation as someone to avoid because every interaction with her, no matter how benign, ended up with her being upset by it.

          1. Observer*

            No. Asking someone not to grimace at you is asking them to not convey non-verbally that they think you are being stupid, inept or otherwise problematic.

            The person who started this whole sub-thread admits that they are a very negative person and their default response to stuff is negativity. I get that it takes a lot of effort not to dump that on people all the time, but it’s just not unreasonable to have to not dump on people.

            Most reasonable people don’t want to work people who are relentlessly positive and upbeat no matter what is going on. But they *also* have a legitimate issue with people whose default is negativity. And they also have a legitimate problem with people who telegraph that there is something wrong with you / what you are saying on a regular basis.

            1. meggus*

              no, it’s externalizing your locus of control instead of managing your own internal reactions like an emotionally mature and responsible adult. It doesn’t affect the job, the work, or anything but LW’s feelings. Have the conversation, lean into coping skills. We are responsible for managing our internal experience, not the rest of the world. Period. it’s basic EQ. There’s so many ways to manage this respectfully. And this is absolutely common among people with a wide number of conditions, so it’s ableist as well.

              1. Allonge*

                So if you boss rolled her eyes every time you spoke, would that be also something you need to deal with? Or frowned, or gleefully smiled?

                1. CommanderBanana*

                  You can stop and ask them if they have something they’d like to contribute, or if they want to pause and address what you’ve said. Addressing the behavior as it’s happening is the best way to make someone aware of what they’re doing.

                  I’d be willing to bet half a stale break-room donut that the LW’s coworker doesn’t even realize they’re doing it, she’s probably just less on guard / less masked because she feels comfortable with the LW.

                  I’ve had coworkers who would sit and nod at everything you said, but they weren’t agreeing, and a coworker who would nervously giggle constantly, but didn’t actually think what you were saying was funny. They just had unconscious tics and yes, they were annoying or could be confusing, but this is just part of being human and having a brain and a face that doesn’t always do what we want it to do, or does stuff we’re not even aware of.

                  You also don’t need to set up BUT WHAT IF THIS?!?? scenarios here. The LW wrote in about a coworker, not a boss, and she’s not rolling her eyes or smiling, she’s making a not-neutral face that the LW is choosing to interpret in a certain way that might not even be an accurate representation of what the LW thinks she’s thinking, and there’s no way for the LW to address this without Using Their Words.

                2. Allonge*

                  CommanderBanana, I was not objecting to having the discussion. I am objecting to taking “We are responsible for managing our internal experience, not the rest of the world.” to every extreme. Even though I agree with the principle of it.

                  People will read others’ expressions because that is a huge part of human communication. If I look angry, most people will think I am angry. It’s really not out of line to think that people are responsible for their behavior. Which is why it’s ok for LW to have this discussion, instead of what a lot of people seem to be suggesting (shutting up and dealing).

      3. JSPA*

        Besides,

        1. a grimace can mean, “dang, I failed to anticipate that fact” or “oh dear, there go my projections” or “good point, but you keep using a word that’s cringe for me” or “I totally get it, you can stop explaining… please?” or “ugh, getting that material organized that must have been a lot of work, I feel for you.” Or any of a dozen other things that do NOT mean, “you’re an idiot and your point is stupid.”

        2. There are huge cultural and regional differences in whether poker face is positive or cold / fake / impersonal between coworkers! Holding someone to (e.g.) “midwest nice” is like expecting everyone to speak in the same accent. Let people who are broadly kind, competent and professional, retain their (frankly very minor) differences.

        3. We also, individually, do thinking-in-parallel-with-listening differently. Some people are having expressions “to communicate.” Plenty of others are having, “my face does things as I think.” In a client meeting, you can “pre-think or re-think”–anticipate all reasonable questions, defer unexpected questions until later, and squelch all personal reactions. But you can’t do that with an entire workday! It basically doubles the time required, to do actual thinking and problem solving. The fact that this person is super good at resolving and discussing? That’s likely not separable from how they’re using active listening while you’re talking… and having the expressions that accompany their thoughts.

      4. Nodramalama*

        Someone grimacing or scowling at you is not the same thing as asking someone to smile. A scowl is not a neutral expression. It is a negative one. So either LWs coworker needs to voice their issue, or work on being polite. Because frankly, grimacing at someone as they’re talking is not polite.

        1. ASD always*

          They do voice their issue once it’s their turn to speak, though. You can’t fault the coworker for not interrupting LW when they disagree.

          1. Allonge*

            But that is not the issue. Noticable, constant grimaces are not appropriate in most office cultures.

            If coworker cannot regulate this, that is one thing, but obviously they can, because they do in some cases. It’s not out of line for LW to wonder if they can ask that it’s done also for their interactions.

            1. ASD always*

              “Constant” isn’t evident from the letter; LW hasn’t thus far accused their coworker of being only negative or having a bad attitude, only of not policing their facial expressions among people they have warm, friendly relationships with. An office culture that is hostile to natural facial expressions is one that can’t expect warm collegial relationships like the one LW currently appreciates from their colleague.

              1. Allonge*

                I should have written frequent instead of constant, apologies. (LW writes “She’s very good at controlling her expressions in meetings with clients or managers, but outside of that … all of her emotions are on full display.”, so it does not read like a once or twice thing to me).

                It’s not a bad attitude, it’s communication – quite possibly involuntary, but still communication – that has an impact.

                I understand from the comments that for some people it’s really a binary of ‘full face / behavior control, no emotions’ and ‘you see all my emotions’. But not for everyone. I don’t think it’s inappropriate for LW to flag that this is an issue to coworker.

          2. Nodramalama*

            But they essentially are interrupting. With their facial expressions. We take in faces when we talk.

              1. ecnaseener*

                If you ignore the meaning, sure. If you don’t ignore the meaning, nodding communicates “I’m following you so far, keep talking,” while grimacing conveys “yikes, I don’t like what you’re saying.” It’s new information and it’s certainly not a signal to keep talking.

                2. Gloaming*

                  I don’t think that it’s wrong to indicate when you have disagreement. Maybe it’s because I’m too new out of school, but I’ve had professors tell me explicitly that they like to watch me in class because they can see when I have a problem & go over something in more detail.

                  When the goal is to come to some kind of agreement, nonverbally communicating in realtime ‘I’m not totally sold on what you’re saying right now’ seems like a pretty reasonable thing to do.

                3. ecnaseener*

                  Trout: polite disagreement after the person has finished speaking is fine! That’s nothing to do with whether sending disruptive and potentially insulting signals while the person is still speaking counts as an interruption.

                  Gloaming: I agree with that, and maybe we’re picturing different things as a “grimace.” Grimace to me means distaste. I wouldn’t describe a polite “hmm, I’m not totally sold but keep talking so I can hear your full argument” face as a grimace — the polite way to convey that would probably be raised eyebrows, or slightly furrowed eyebrows, slightly pursed lips, etc.

            2. Baela Targaryen*

              Lack of understanding/inability to mask/poor social skills don’t make the behavior any less rude.

              It’s like the example of standing on my foot — I don’t care that you have an issue that makes it difficult to tell you’re on my foot, get off my goddamn foot!

            3. Tiger Snake*

              You’re playing No True Scotsmen now.

              Interrupting means you stop someone from speaking. A facial expression does not do that. It is a silent visual cue that you are reacting to the information you have been told. It means you are LISTENING and distinctly NOT interrupting. One could in fact argue that it means that grimacing is much MORE polite, because again it shows that you are in fact listening.

              If we were not allowed to use facial expressions in a conversation, everyone would be given a blank face mask to wear whenever they participate in a debate or go to court.

              A facial expression is not an interruption, and it is very silly to try and argue it is.

              1. N*

                I mean, by this logic rolling your eyes and bringing your hand up to do the Yap Yap Yap motion when someone you work with is suggesting an idea, is totally fine and dandy to do. Or perhaps fully turning away and going back to reading AAM at work. It’s not a verbal interruption, after all, but I wouldn’t hesitate to say that most people speaking are going to stop (and be rather miffed) because of what you’re doing!

    5. Higgs Bison*

      I mostly agree, with the caveat that some variation of masking emotions is sometimes necessary. There are some circumstances (autism is the one I’m most familiar with) where being “on” for more than a handful of hours a day can be exhausting and lead to burnout or seemingly sudden outbursts. That’s not to say that the coworker doesn’t need to figure it out but rather that it may not be as simple as “you can do it in the highest priority situation, so you can do it in this slightly lower priority situation.”

    6. metadata minion*

      It’s also possible that this is just what her thinking face looks like, and she knows it comes off as angry or disapproving and so controls it around clients and important meetings, but is hoping that coworkers will be able to tell that it’s just what her face does.

      But either way, talk to her! It might be easier to get used to if you know that yep, Susan’s face just looks like that when she’s reacting to something.

      1. Pizza Rat*

        The way I’ve coped with this in the past when I’m talking or presenting is to ask point-blank. “Alex, you look like you just thought of something relevant. What is it?” Or, “I see a variety of facial expressions in the group, does anyone want to comment?”

    7. fine-tipped pen aficionado*

      I think you’re jumping to conclusions about why the coworker is making these faces and I don’t think it’s really helpful at all to guess about that. LW3 needs to have a conversation with the coworker and they need to approach that conversation with curiosity and believing the best in the coworker until they have real reason to think otherwise. It will make it harder to solve the problem if LW3 goes into it with a story in their head about what these expressions mean and why they’re happening.

      Most things people do that bother us are not directed at us at all and most people are willing to make some small adjustments to get along better with the people around them. Sharing space with others can be hard and weird. It doesn’t make it easier to start off from an adversarial position. (For example: Your use of language like “calling her on it” and “control herself” sounds adversarial to me, but someone else might not think it is!)

    8. learnedthehardway*

      I’m quite expressive. It’s a lot easier in client meetings to be poker faced, because most of them are remote and I can see myself onscreen. With team members on projects, it’s a lot easier to forget that I’m expressing myself visually.

      The best thing to do is to not assume the person is being deliberately rude. Rather, let them know that they are expressing themselves more than they think.

      1. Space Needlepoint*

        Thank you! Someone mentioned above, this could be a “thinking face,” and I tend to agree.

        I’m someone who constantly gets told to smile, or asked if I’m angry when as far as I’m concerned (and what I see in the mirror) is a neutral expression. I usually reply with some version of, “I am not frowning, this is my face.” I try to quirk a tiny smile when on camera, but it’s tiring to mask when I’d rather spend the energy paying attention.

    9. PhyllisB*

      I don’t have a poker face either, and my husband used to scold me constantly for my facial expressions. All it did was make me horribly self- conscious so I either totally shut down or I just turned where he couldn’t see my expressions.
      I don’t grimace, but something in my expressions must convey my feelings even when I’m not trying to.
      I think the main thing to consider is how is she responding? Is she having respectful discourse with you or is she arguing and nitpicking every disagreement? if you’re managing to work things out I would try to overlook it. Bring it up once and see what she says then try to ignore it. If it’s really throwing you off. maybe just don’t don’t look at her while you’re talking.

    10. WillowSunstar*

      It’s possible she also trusts you not to get her into trouble for not having a poker face. Sometimes it is hard to learn those rules, that you have to do it *all the time* and not just *some of the time*, and save your real emotions for at home or friends outside of work.

    11. kanada*

      it’s worrying how many people in the thread think “grimacing when someone says something you disagree with, but otherwise engaging in respectful discussion” rises to the level of rudeness.

      1. Dahlia*

        I’m surprised how many people think that making faces at someone when they’re talking isn’t rude!

        1. kanada*

          Oh come on now. OP’s coworker isn’t sticking their tongue out or rolling their eyes. Especially for someone who they otherwise work well with, an occasional grimace falls well within the category of “mind your own business.”

          2. Joron Twiner*

            OP’s coworker knows it’s inappropriate to grimace when talking with managers and clients. It’s also inappropriate when talking with your coworkers. The coworker does it so often that it’s affecting her working relationships.

    12. Full-Time Fabulous*

      The letter on “poker face” and the comments have been really interesting to read. I have a very expressive face and have been bullied by family members and my current boss about it. I can’t wait to one day have a job somewhere that I can be more of myself. I don’t think I walk around grimacing all day long, but I do have facial reactions often and I feel very self-conscious and as though I have to be someone I’m not. I even Googled “how to stop making facial expressions at work” one night and after all the tips I found there was a comment that “someone who makes you feel that you cannot be yourself doesn’t accept you for who you are.”

      1. Stay Curious*

        It’s fascinating to me how people are jumping to the conclusion that grimacing = rudeness. I’ve received feedback from a previous boss that I’m very readable with my facial expressions/reactions (positive and negative and in-between). I don’t think this is a bad trait to possess! If people are curious about why I’m reacting a certain way, just ask. A grimace is not necessarily me slighting the other person and their ideas, it often just means I am actively listening but then got confused or thought of something that conflicts with what I’m listening to and am non-verbally reacting in the moment. Is that rude?

        I also think people (myself included) broadly tend to notice negative feedback more acutely, and with more sensitivity, than positive feedback. It can be really difficult to work through those feelings if you’re not used to being challenged. The answer should not be that everyone police their own faces all the time in order to appease everyone around them, because that is: a) exhausting to control 100% of the time, especially with a colleague you work closely with, b) an inauthentic way to communicate which I consider a disservice to people I am close with, and c) an overall red flag that constructive criticism/challenging the status quo is not welcome which can be a slippery slope for chaos and ego-tripping.

        1. Joron Twiner*

          I think it depends on exactly what facial expression we’re talking about. Most people, when explaining something to a coworker, would interpret a frown, eyebrows scrunched together, pursed lips, that sort of thing as possibly a thoughtful expression. Some people even frown and do a slow nod!

          A “grimace” however is more severe. I picture it as pinching back the mouth with a deep frown and lowered eyebrows. >:C
          This might be someone’s thinking face. But the severity does read as disapproval to most people. And as social primates, we often interpret disapproval, even just of work topics, to mean social disapproval, which we feel negatively.

          The solution is not a binary “police your face all the time or communicate authentically”. It is to recognize that we are a social species, and communicate messages with our bodies as well as our words. We should work to communicate effectively whenever possible. So OP’s coworker should try to stop grimacing so much, and OP should clarify directly, so they both work to resolve the miscommunication.

  3. Chris too*

    It’s normal to get a reference from a current manager if you’re in the public service, at least where I am.

    1. Scottish Beanie*

      Very true but, even in public roles, there are ways to circumvent your current manager if you believe they’ll try to sabotage your prospects.

      1. allathian*

        This. That said, managers in my government agency are rated on whether they are willing to advance their reports’ careers, even if it means them going to work for someone else. They’d get dinged in their performance evaluation if they tried to sabotage a report’s efforts to find another job. People also tend to work quite long stretches, I’ve been here for 17 years. I’d easily get a reference from my former manager and my grandboss who used to be my direct manager before her promotion who are still here, if I needed one. If I needed three, I’d have to ask my current manager.

    2. Baffled Teacher*

      Yes, it’s very normal in education as well! It’s common to tell your principal in the spring if you’ll be leaving in June; if you’re looking for another teaching job it would actually be a huge red flag if they couldn’t contact your current district.

      1. Selina Luna*

        That’s also true for me, though in my experience, principals, assistant principals, academic/instructional coaches, and department heads work equally well in giving recommendations. You know. If you and your principal happened to butt heads because you believe that not every parent is right.

      2. But what to call me?*

        I think the reason it works in education is that they’re very unlikely to want to push you out early unless there’s some kind of major conflict going on. Most teachers have contracts until the end of the school year, so they would have to break the contract to push you out early, and then they would have to find a replacement who wants to take over a class in March or April when most of the replacements they might hire are either finishing the year at their previous school or still finishing their own education. It’s hard to think of a way anyone benefits from not letting a teacher finish the school year just because they don’t plan to return for the next school year. I have trouble remembering that most jobs don’t work like that.

        Of course, the downside of that hiring cycle is that it’s hard pick up and leave when you want to and still keep a decent professional reputation. Two weeks notice doesn’t do you much good if you leave your school in September when there may not be anyone to replace you until next year. Sometimes that’s just what you’ve got to do, but it will definitely make future schools more wary of hiring you.

    3. anonymous anteater*

      It’s pretty normal for academia, where 100% of the first positions after college are 2 or 3 year contracts, so it’s a given that you are hunting for your next job.

      1. LW4*

        Aha, I knew there would be industry exceptions! Makes perfect sense if it’s contract based work for sure. In this case it is very much not A Thing for my industry in my experience, except in one case when I had an especially chill team lead explicitly tell my whole team they would serve as a reference if we ever wanted to move on. But without that reassurance I would not have asked for a reference from them for fear of losing my job with nothing lined up.

        1. Theon, Theon, it rhymes with neon*

          Yeah, I tell my team this, because my best boss told me this and I was favorably impressed, but I also tell them that you shouldn’t do this with every boss you have!

        2. Quinalla*

          Very interesting on the industry exceptions yes. Folks definitely NEVER get current manager references in my industry. It is understood that keeping things a secret from current manager/job is the norm, if you are leaving your first “real” job, they will sometimes ask if you can have a trusted peer provide a reference, but not your manager.

          And yes, there are some exceptions to this with awesome managers, but definitely not the norm.

        3. But what to call me?*

          I used to be really confused by the ‘can we contact this manager’ box on applications because I’d only ever worked at jobs where it was normal for your current manager to know you were leaving. I assumed that hiring managers always contacted current managers so I couldn’t think of a reason why they would need my permission. Actually, I think I only learned otherwise by reading AAM.

      2. Rock Prof*

        Definitely agree here. I feel like a huge chunk of time in a post doc (a short-term research position) is generally spent doing things purely in service of finding a new job.
        Even when I left my first faculty position, I used my former department chair as a reference, granted a chair is not a real position of power as it generally rotated through us (I was actually chair when I left).

    4. Pandas*

      Yeah, I was thinking that as someone also in the public sector. All my previous managers have been references, if you have a good relationship with your boss its pretty normal I think. I think that’s because to retaliate in the ways described (firing, eliminating a role, demotion) would take a ton of work and time, and there’s generally so much work because governments are chronically understaffed that they could never afford to take you off of projects even if they wanted to. And all places I’ve worked, layoffs were contractually by senority so that’s not a factor either.

    5. Nodramalama*

      Yeah I think its very industry dependent. Public servants where I am are definitely expected to give the name of their current manager

      1. Ran*

        This was one of the ones where I was immediately ‘Americans have such odd norms around work’; it would never occur to me to avoid asking current manager.

      2. I'm great at doing stuff*

        Obviously I don’t know the details, but NDAs are usually about intellectual property and trade secrets, not if your boss is a raging a**hole. I would encourage prospective employees to candidly talk to current ones about her.

    6. Allonge*

      Yes – on the other side of this, I have seen a question in application-for-jobs form about whether the current manager can be contacted or not for a reference. Lots of people say yes – e.g. their contract is ending, which their manager would know, or for similar reasons the problems brought up by LW are not applicable.

      In a way the question is a bit misleading – asking the current manager to be a reference is normal, it just may be inadvisable in a bunch of cases.

    7. Empress Ki*

      Practically every job I applied for asked for reference of current manager. I work for a local authority. My previous jobs were in charities.

    9. londonedit*

      It’s normal to have a reference from your current manager here in the UK, too (or at least it is in my experience of the publishing industry) because the way it works is that references are checked after an offer is made and agreed. You take the job, then you let your boss know, and then you tell the new company that it’s fine to contact your referees. Most people don’t put reference info on their CV – you give the information when you accept the job. In my industry we don’t have background checks or employment verification – you just list a couple of references and the new company contacts them to verify that you worked for them and maybe ask if they would give you a good reference. It’s basically a formality – I’ve never known anyone actually lose a job because of a bad reference (and if you knew that was going to happen, you wouldn’t put that person down!) But employers definitely assume they’ll be able to contact your current manager for a reference.

      1. Duckling*

        yes – I’m also in the UK, and I’ve seen applications that allow you to say whether each reference can be contacted before a formal offer is accepted. That way they can talk to previous managers without alerting your current one until there is a definite appointment underway.
        I have known offers be withdrawn, but usually only because of something serious that the applicant didn’t declare. Some of the big employers are so risk averse about references they will only confirm job title, dates employed, and any formal actions against the employee. So if you get one with a very different title or saying they were subject to disciplinary action it’s a big deal. (Also really unhelpful when you want to recommend someone good – I’ve been allowed to get round that by supplying a additional, separate reference stating that it’s solely a character reference based on my personal opinion and sending it from a personal email.)

      2. Media Monkey*

        yep, same. however the likelihood is that someone could just look for mutual contacts on linked in and ask them about you – or someone in the new company will have worked with you in the past! it’s a pretty small industry

        1. londonedit*

          Yep – never piss off people in publishing jobs, because you’ll meet them again eventually!

      3. Lady Danbury*

        I’m in a former UK territory and here the reference check happens before the offer is made, so it’s normal not to include your current manager (at least in private sector). Candidates aren’t expected to include references with their CV but at the later stages employers will ask short listed candidates for references. The reference info can definitely factor into the final decision.

      4. ReferencesMatter*

        Ah, see, here if they check references (most people don’t, even when they say they will) it’s before an offer. I know people who were removed from consideration because of something a reference said; if folks bother to check it’s rarely just a formality.

    10. Lady Danbury*

      It’s absolutely not the norm to get a current manager reference where I live (not the US or UK, but former UK territory), at least not in the private sector, for all of the reasons suggested by Alison above. Instead, most people will do a current coworker, client, etc. or immediate past manager. For my current role, I used a client and grandboss because I knew that I could trust my grandboss more than my manager.

    11. fine-tipped pen aficionado*

      I’ve had the same experience at the local level of government in the southeast US. I would still probably conceal my job search from a really bad manager just so they wouldn’t actively try to make my work life miserable while I searched, but I’d have little fear of being terminated. It’s just more work than most people, no matter how awful, are willing to do.

      In fact, all the jobs I’ve applied for in local government have been recommended to me by my current managers. Opportunities for advancement can be rare since a lot of gov’t workers stay in their jobs for like 30 years and non-federal jobs are pretty bad at having clear paths for wage growth and advancement (like Stormwater Engineer I vs Stormwater Engineer III, or a Stormwater Analyst to Stormwater Manager pipeline) so we’re all pretty understanding and supportive of folks looking at other teams/departments/orgs for that advancement.

    12. Spacewoman Spiff*

      Yeah, in my experience of higher ed staff positions this has been the norm, they won’t make an offer without the current manager reference. Years ago I was able to request the verbal offer before providing them my manager’s contact information, so I would know if the offer was strong enough for me to accept. It was…but it was still incredibly nerve wracking to go to my manager with the request.

      1. Lily Rowan*

        Yes, I had a similar experience in US higher ed as well — I actually did get a contingent offer in writing, but it was contingent upon my current manager’s reference. Still nerve wracking! And not anything I’ve experience in any other nonprofit sector.

    13. namuh*

      I work at a state university and for internal transfers we are required to have a current manager reference check, but I’ve always requested that we negotiate offer prior to them conducting the reference check so I don’t have to tell my manager if I’m not actually going to take the job.

      I applied for a job at another state entity and they asked for three references, and I gave my current manager because my last manager couldn’t be trusted to respond to a reference check and the one prior to that works closely with my current manager, so he would have found out anyway. I just gave my current manager a heads up the next day (and told him not to worry too much). It ended up working in my favor because I didn’t get the job (I didn’t really want it) and my boss is more attentive to making sure I’m happy where I’m at.

    14. Blue Pen*

      I’ve found it to be normal in higher ed, as well. I was *aghast* when I was an external candidate and first came across this, though, so I don’t think many people know it’s a thing in this industry.

      I will say that the hiring manager mentioned to me that they wouldn’t be asking for this information if I weren’t The One and seconds away from receiving an offer from them (and I got that in writing), and luckily my manager at the time was phenomenal, but I can easily see that being a real issue for someone who wasn’t so lucky with their manager. It’s a very odd practice.

    15. Tiger Snake*

      I was surprised to find out that there are apparently industries where it’s not considered normal. Scenarios where you have to avoid it because you can’t trust your boss, sure, but I expected those to be exceptions because of bad bosses rather than the rules for entire industries.

      Like; I’m going to want to hire someone who will hopefully fill the role for multiple years in a row. So, I’m going to consider how long the candidate has been in other roles. That’s why cautioning people about job hopping is a thing.
      But working in the same role for multiple years at a time means that your N-1 manager’s experience with you is going to be from quite a number of years ago, and may not be accurate anymore. A reference from the person who’s managing you now; it seems obvious that of course they’re who I want to to start with and will consider the most.

  4. coffee*

    LW1, do you know if she has dragged past employees through the mud? I just wonder because, strategically, it would be in your boss’s best interests to keep quiet about what’s going on with her employees. If it’s a small field then after a while the people she’s talking to will start to notice the high turnover and that will reflect on her. (But of course not everyone has the self-awareness needed to realise that.)

    Anyway, I’m so glad you have another job now! If you’re breaking out in hives then you could possibly get a doctor’s note saying you’re too sick to work the remaining two weeks, if you needed. That’s a clear health issue.

    1. Ellie*

      Yes, I’d go the doctor’s note too. Almost anyone can contact a doctor, plead stress, and get two weeks off of work as a result. With the litany of issues you’ve cited, you shouldn’t have to speak to more than one or two. Also, are you able to work from home at all? That could be a way to make the final two weeks a bit more palatable.

      Did everyone before you work out their notice? It seems odd if they did.

      1. WillowSunstar*

        Especially since you have hives, if you’re not seeing a dermatologist, please see one at least once. I got stress hives in a previous job from a toxic manager and co-worker and had to learn what to do to control them.

      2. OP 1*

        Some gave the two week notice, but were dragged during the two weeks. Some refused and just walked out because they couldn’t stand another moment. She threatens to fire, but I think the MO is just to make people miserable so that they quit honestly. Then she doesn’t have to pay unemployment.

        1. Ellie*

          Ah ok, well if unemployment is a concern for you then I’d see a doctor and at least reduce that 2 week period down to a single week with a week of stress leave. A few extra days strategically placed in the middle of it would at least be something as well. If there’s any chance of a doctor being able to tell you to work from home during the period, that would also be a good way to go. Then you just don’t answer the phone and communicate via email only.

          If you can afford it though, I’d just give notice on the day you plan to leave, and then walk out. If other people have done it before you, then it’s unlikely that you doing so will stand out.

    2. ecnaseener*

      I guess the doctor’s note would be helpful if LW wanted to technically give two weeks notice but use paid sick time for the notice period? But if not — LW doesn’t need anyone’s permission to just resign without notice, so I don’t think they need to (or should) offer any doctor’s note or entertain any requests for documentation. Once you resign, you don’t work there anymore, their policies don’t cover you and they’re certainly not entitled to any personal or medical information!

      1. Smithy*

        You’re absolutely correct – but I do think that when leaving a particularly problematic employer, sometimes having that concrete thing to say on repeat is really helpful.

        The one really difficult boss I had to give notice to, it was also a situation where I was leaving that country and returning to the US – and I basically clung to the reason that it was because I wanted to be closer to my dad who had health issues. Was that perhaps part of the reason? Sure – but it was hardly the bigger reasons. However, those reasons I did not want to share with my boss (including how nutty it was to work for her), and so this was that thing I could say on repeat to her and anyone else in our small sector who might ask. It essentially worked as that security blanket excuse.

        For better or worse, saying “I left a place with no notice because it was wildly toxic” always risks making the person in question look bad. But I do think these are moments that can help the OP save some face in future without having to share why a former workplace was problematic.

        1. Ellie*

          Yes particularly as she really does have hives, and its a stressful environment. It’s not even a lie. It’s unlikely to satisfy her boss of course, because almost nothing would, but it gives her something concrete and drama-free to say, as well as being something that she can tell to HR, legal, and future employers if it comes to it.

      2. Kevin Sours*

        It is potentially useful to be able to say in a future interview that you didn’t give your two weeks due to medical advice.

    3. learnedthehardway*

      I guarantee that with the track record of not holding onto staff like this person has, that it is WELL known in the industry that she’s the problem. I wouldn’t lose sleep over the manager potentially badmouthing the OP in the industry. Some people might look at that as a badge of honour.

      There’s an actual support group that former employees have formed to help people out (which is admirable of you all – wish someone had done that for me in my first real job out of school). These people now work in a variety of different companies. Believe me – word has gotten around about the owner/manager.

      I wouldn’t worry about giving notice. The OP already has another job lined up. If the manager is abusive, walk out. Deliver some home truths on the way out, too.

      1. Mellie Bellie*

        This. Lawyer in a small field here. Trust me, we all know who the assholes are and if your boss is this nasty to the people she relies upon for support, you can bet she’s equally nasty, if not worse, to opposing counsel, their staff and – shockingly enough – judicial staff. Sweet as all get out to the judges though. (Of course, they talk to their staff and other judges and they know, too.)

        1. OP 1*

          The mask is carefully cultivated. Most people think this person is great (and sociopaths are very charming). They care a great deal about what things look like (as opposed to how they actually are). For instance, She kept many staff at work really late but didn’t want any emails or calls to be answered or go out because “someone may think we‘ve
          made you all stay late” (never mind the truth). This person works very hard to maintain the Veneer.

          1. Ellie*

            In that case, the doctor’s note has a good chance of success because she won’t want other people to know that she forced you to come in when you were sick. She’s likely to make the time she has left alone with you horrible, but she can’t badmouth you if you’re away sick for some of it, without looking like an ogre.

      2. Sneaky Squirrel*

        This is my thought too – a small area where everyone knows everyone and this is a person who has a track record of losing staff, hiding files, changing calendar dates and passwords, and threatening to fire people? It’s likely this person’s reputation isn’t going to hold much water even if they do badmouth LW.

      3. Helen Waite*

        Some bosses’ reputations are so bad that if you have ever worked for them, it counts as points in your favor for being able to deal with it and come out the other side. Leona Helmsley comes to mind. People who quit jobs working for her were snapped up.

        As an aside, I can’t imagine how you could properly serve your clients if your boss changes meetings on you – imagining external, not just internal meetings, or hides needed client files.

        1. OP 1*

          The Calendar gets changed or the files get hidden so that this person can accuse staff of not calendaring or being careless. Of course they magically “catch the mistake” themselves in time to put it back on the calendar correctly or find the file before the meeting. Things are just moved long enough to have an excuse to yell at someone.

          1. Ellie*

            Oh wow, that’s really evil. What’s your covid policy look like? You could fake a positive test, give notice, then when it gets really bad, send the photo through and call out sick for the last week/week and a half.

          2. goddessoftransitory*

            OMG, OP, quit tomorrow. There is no time period short enough to continue in this lunatic’s presence.

      4. CityMouse*

        I’m lawyer and we’re generally extremely protective of our paralegals and legal secretaries and generally aware of those who are not. Judges tend to be the same. There are exceptions, of course.

      5. Annie2*

        I agree with other lawyers in this subthread. I suspect it is abundantly clear to the small legal community you’re part of that this woman sucks. Firstly, she’s probably horrible to opposing counsel, too. Secondly, we know what it means when someone can’t keep an assistant (and we can tell when the lawyer is always cc-ing someone new on communications). Thirdly, trash-talking a paralegal or assistant is in and of itself a big red flag.

        1. goddessoftransitory*

          Exactly. They probably don’t know everything she does (all the garbage she pulls in office for the fun of it and so on) and how insane it must be to work there, but the fact that she cannot keep staff employed would speak for itself.

          And while anyone can have one bad hire, when every single person who dropped her flat is “the worst employee ever” in discussion? It’s pretty obvious SOMEONE’S the worst here but it’s not her ex-employees.

      6. MassMatt*

        I would hope someone this awful wouldn’t be able to keep it secret, but once had a terrible manager (not nearly THIS bad, but nasty to her subordinates, and not very competent, either) and it seemed upper management couldn’t praise her enough. Her team had terrible turnover and poor productivity yet she was always getting “recognition” awards for… we could never figure out what.

        I came to ask her a question and she was in the process of writing a thank-you note to her (in-office!) manager. Sometimes people can compartmentalize their behavior quite well, and those that are getting the kiss-up remain oblivious to all those getting the kick-down.

      7. Elara Harper*

        Absolutely we (long time paralegal hiring manager) know which attorneys in our area are difficult to work with and completely understand short term employment and not working out notice for known offenders. LW 1, my advice is to give notice but leave early if your attorney’s behavior becomes worse. You can enjoy some time off, or call your new employer who will most likely be happy to adjust your start date.

      8. Grimalkin*

        I’m a paralegal in a somewhat small legal community myself, and I’m agreeing with all the lawyers who are posting here: if the community’s small enough that badmouthing someone could actually impact someone’s career in any substantial way, it’s small enough that most players already know who the jerks are and not to take any badmouthing that those jerks do too seriously. It actually came up for me not too long ago (albeit in a very different way!) that we already have a sense of who in our field is doing right by their staff and their clients, and who… isn’t so much, and we take that into account as needed for hiring and the like. Having a short, tumultuous stint at Jerkwad Law LLC doesn’t mean we’re going to listen to Jerkwad’s badmouthing and look down on you, but it might mean we’ll make that much more of an effort to show you how a functional law firm should work, because we know Jerkwad Law LLC wouldn’t be the best role model to work off of for that.

    4. Destra N.*

      Honestly, given how high the churn rate is and how small the industry is, I would think that everyone already knows exactly how nasty this person is.

    5. goddessoftransitory*

      This is just what I was thinking! If she is this wretched, I doubt she’s covering as well as she thinks she is, NDA or no NDA. People are going to notice that level of turnover.

      And frankly, LW, I personally might just leave for lunch and not come back. But I get you wanting to be professional, so tell her exactly what Allison said. NO job is worth hives, ulcers and PTSD!

  5. AnonyChick*

    For LW#5 (help with self-proofreading), do you have access to any sort of text-reading software? If so, I suggest having it read your work out loud. It’ll sound clunky as heck, because it has no idea what it’s reading, and that can help just by slowing you down and forcing you to focus on what it’s saying, but it’ll also help you catch those things your eyes and brain gloss over: reversed words, missing words, misspelled-in-a-way-that’s-accidentally-another-word words, etc.

    (NOTE: I am NOT recommending that you use any type of AI software! I’m thinking more along the lines of Word’s “Read Aloud” feature.)

    1. Honoria Lucasta*

      yes! any kind of built -in accessibility tool that would read the screen for you is a great proofing tool! I’ve had my papers “read” back to me at 2x speed and I could definitely hear where the errors were when I might have missed them visually.

    2. nnn*

      Yes, this is the MVP! Catches errors like “pubic health” and “and the and the” and “wit hit” when it should really be “with it”.

      (And, as an added bonus, you don’t have to do the work of maintaining visual or mental focus – the software reads to you at a steady rate of speed, keeping you on-task, and all you have to do is listen)

      If you’re checking numbers against each other, you can read one set of numbers with your eyes while the read aloud reads the other set of number out loud.

    3. Allonge*

      Also, for common (and common-to-you) typos: use the autocorrect features.

      For whatever reason, I tend to type ‘het’ instead of ‘the’. I set this up as an autocorrect and so it gets corrected as I type. Same for tricky names, words I use often (I have the same autocorrect for the name of the company I work for).

      1. ecnaseener*

        Double-edged sword though — you then need to go through and make sure it didn’t autocorrect anything to the wrong word!

    4. Green great dragon*

      Yeh, the read aloud feature really helps. The other thing I do is read once for sense and once for syntax and spelling. If I try to do them all together I’m more likely to miss a misspelling because I’m focused on sense or vice versa.

    6. Merricat*

      I use Google translate for this in a pinch– just copy-paste the text and click the “listen” (speaker) icon.

    7. Typity*

      Yes. I’ve been a copy editor since roughly the dawn of time, and I use a screen reader at the proofreading stage of almost every job (I work entirely onscreen; nothing is ever printed out).

      Getting in the habit of using a reader — and learning to *listen( to the reader; this doesn’t work if you space out — has been a great help, and more so over time. I no longer miss fixes even in material I’m thoroughly sick of.

    8. Zeus*

      +1 for Read Aloud, I used that function a lot when writing memos and reports at my last job. It was always a bit funny hearing it stumble over the pronunciation of Māori words and phrases.

      One thing that did annoy me is that it always reads dates the American way, no matter how it was written down (ie I would type “29 October 2024”, it would say “October 29th, 2024”). It was a weird little cultural difference that I hadn’t even noticed until then. Not a big deal at all, just something to remember if you’re using non-American English.

  6. Thepuppiesareok*

    OP#5 what works best for me is either reading it line by line or word by word. block the rest so your brain doesn’t try skipping ahead. If everything starts to blur step away for a few minutes. Engage in something else like a bathroom break or making yourself a cup of coffee. It’s not always possible to wait a few hours to review, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how effective stepping away for a minutes and engaging in another task is. It’s like my brain is forced to reset itself.

    1. Dahlia*

      When I was proofing an essay recently, I actually covered part of my screen as I did my final read so I could only see like 2 lines at a time.

    2. skunky_x*

      Yes absolutely! I used to write Wills, and wherever possible I’d draft it last thing and then first thing in the morning proof read. Gave me space that it didn’t all look familiar, but still close enough to when I took instructions that I could recall nuance.

    3. MassMatt*

      Taking a pause and proofreading later is very useful to me. It’s not always possible, but I find longer pauses—as in, several hours, or overnight, are especially good; that’s when I tend to catch not just simple mistakes or typos but awkward phrases and other stylistic issues.

    4. Colorado Winters*

      YES to stepping away. It allows you to come at whatever you’re writing/reviewing with fresh eyes. It’s particularly helpful for someone like me who does not have anyone to edit/proofread their work.

  7. Dumb lady, phd*

    OP#5:

    See if you can define explicit cross check parameters for your work. As an over simplified example, if you have a spreadsheet that ends with billings, bookings, and backlog, make sure the three numbers add up. The more intermediate sanity checks you can identify, the better.

    1. Little Pig*

      Yes – checklists. Number in title matches numbers elsewhere in presentation. All comments completed and cleared off presentation. Ctrl-F for TBD. When something gets flagged to you, add it to the list.

  8. Aphrodite*

    OP#5, I do two things: (1) Print it out and take it to an entirely different area of where I worked on it such as outside so the surroundings are dissimilar; and/or (2) read it backwards, word by word.

    1. Ellie*

      Changing your surroundings really does help. I work from the office some days and at home on others. If something is important, I’ll write it in one location and then review it from the other. It’s weird but I find far more issues that way.

      The other thing that helps is time. If at all possible, write the document, leave it alone for a couple of days (a week is best), then go back and re-read it. Your brain will pick up far more errors. But its not always possible to do that!

      1. EllenD*

        I found leaving written work for 24-hours before reviewing and I could spot more errors. However, a couple of days was better. The real problem when proof-reading is the omission of ‘not’ or ‘un’, as the sentence still reads correctly, but the meaning is the opposite of intended. I learnt this 40 years ago when proof-reading papers that had been typeset by the printers (rather than using an electronic copy).

    2. BW*

      I second “printing it out.” Things I don’t catch on screen, I catch on paper.

      My biggest problem with proofreading, is that AUTOCORRECT changes the correct words I type to incorrect words. I’m a very good typist, but AUTOCORRECT (yes, I’m screaming at it) doesn’t understand the jargon I use for my work. I’m amazed when I read back through something I typed to see the words that are actually there. I’ve tried turning AC off, but somehow it always comes back on.

      1. RandomNameAllocated*

        Autocrumpet – if its going to change perfectly good words to nonsensical ones, well, two can play at that game!

      2. Tacky Halloween Decor*

        I call it AutoCorrupt for this exact reason.

        And other specialised software isn’t necessarily better – hoooo boy the nonsense Grammarly sometimes dares to spout is an adventure on its own – but at least they just annoy you by underlining it, instead of automatically changing the word three times and finally accepting that you meant to write what you wrote on the fourth try if you’re lucky.

    5. Gatomon*

      I don’t read backwards word by word, just sentence by sentence. It helps me catch places where I’ve jumped from one thought to the next without a transition, or missed a crucial point. It’s how I got a journalism degree with undiagnosed ADHD. ;)

  9. Pop*

    OP2, my town has a food gleaning organization that takes donations six days a week. You can donate most food, including leftover catering. It might be worth looking into if there’s anywhere similar in your town and then have the office decide occasionally to donate catering or untouched trays of sweets.

    1. Sweet Tooth*

      LW 2 – I work in a similar field and our break room always has sweets. Some love, some hate. We have a group of high school volunteers who come once a week and we have them take everything that isn’t eaten at that point to whoever/whatever. So it’s cleared at least once a week. That being said, if it’s not 100% unliked I’m not sure you can even do that.

    2. Former Lab Rat*

      Yes, I was going to ask if some of the goodies could be donated to a senior living facility, shelter, food bank or some other organization.

    3. Venus*

      I’m surprised that no one has suggested asking for healthy options in addition to the sweets. I don’t think it’s feasible to ask for no sweets, because some coworkers are going to enjoy occasional cookies. I think it’s reasonable to ask for something healthy too, like a veggie tray or nuts half the time. I think it would be best to find suggestions because otherwise companies won’t know what you would consider healthy and they might hesitate.

      I host a quarterly meeting and brought cookies at first. I noticed the older crowd wasn’t eating them, so I doubled my budget (it’s a small group so it went from $5 to $10 – the point is that it was easy financially) and got a veggie tray too.

      1. HowRude*

        Because it’s rude to ask for gifts. Because many of these companies outsource and use a service that sends the same thing to everyone on some type of schedule. If the company wants healthy food available, the company can buy healthy food for its employees.

        1. Pastor Petty Labelle*

          It’s a healthcare company. Honestly I would think healthy food would be an obvious idea instead of junk food.

          Letting vendors know what works and what doesn’t is all part of the relationship. They want to give stuff that will make the company think positively of them. They don’t want the reaction to be Ugh, cookies again.

          1. Owl-a-roo*

            Many years ago, I worked for a niche healthcare clinic that courted a LOT of pharmaceutical reps. Our owner (a psychiatrist) regularly cycled through health and diet fads, so he often made it well known that he’d prefer for the reps to bring us healthier food. I once witnessed him throw entire catered trays of Chik Fil A in the garbage, and about once every four to six months he’d come back to the medical assistant area and clean out our junk food stash. The reps knew he’d prefer they bring healthier food (the man threw actual tantrums about it), and they brought cookies and junk anyway.

            2. goddessoftransitory*

              I’d bet they had contracts with those companies for the catering–they’d see it as advertising as well. Which does not make throwing away good food and tantrums acceptable at all!

          2. Hroethvitnir*

            Working in healthcare does not preclude liking sweets. And the major reason “healthy” foods are less common? Fresh foods do not keep well, and in practice far less people eat them.

            I’d say I like fruit more than sweets overall, but I’m super picky about texture and sensitive to smells from fresh foods being transported, so I seldom eat fruit and vegetables in this context.

            Unless it’s truly ridiculous quantities of treats, I think it’s just not a big deal to not eat it if you don’t want it. (Totally fair to ask for no pressure/having them out of sight though.)

        2. Lady Danbury*

          In this case, they’re not gifts, they’re business development. They aren’t being sent out of the goodness of the sender’s heart or because of a personal relationship but because the sender hopes that they will influence a business decision. They would be doing the sender a favor to give feedback on the types of products that would actually invoke a positive reaction.

          1. Annie2*

            Yeah, this isn’t really a true gift. I’ve been on both sides of these relationships, and I don’t think it would be totally out of line for the giftee (the client being wooed) to say something like “hey, we always appreciate the treats you send over. If there’s ever an option in your gifting regimen to select something like a veggie tray, I know the staff would appreciate it! We seem to get a lot of cookies somehow…” It may or may not actually be feasible (as others have said, it might be that they send the same cookie box to the same 18 clients on a monthly basis or whatever) but they’d probably appreciate the feedback.

        3. CityMouse*

          In this context not so much. They’ve cracked down significantly but medical staff basically used to order their preferred lunch from the drug reps.

      2. Camp Staff*

        If you are providing it for your own meeting and know it will be eaten that day, or know that you have access to a refrigerator, that is a great idea. However, an outsider sending gifts doesn’t necessarily have that info. Cookies and candy need no refrigeration or specialized serving tools, and can be eaten at a later date. Nuts and dried fruit would work, but people are (understandably and appropriately) wary of nut allergies, so I can totally see candy and cookies being thought of as the safest option.
        Also, if this is multiple vendors, they don’t know what the others are sending, so an individual who sends cookies once a month might be very surprised by an email asking them to send fewer sweets.

      3. CommanderBanana*

        These are vendor gifts – you may luck out and get a fruit basket every now and again, but mostly it’s going to be shelf-stable stuff, which usually means candy, cookies, or those summer sausage samplers. Especially now when a lot of offices are still not 100% in-office, you don’t want to send a basket of fruit and have it sit in reception for 3 days and rot.

        If this were office-provided snacks or catering, I think it would be totally fine to ask for other options, but these are gifts and they’re generic by design. We had one vendor who would send us a portal where we could pick from a few things, which was great, but otherwise, anything that came in got stuck in the break room for everyone else to enjoy, or not, as they chose. I once got an entire giant frozen Thanksgiving dinner, except I don’t celebrate Thanksgiving, I live alone, and I don’t eat meat, so I took it to the shelter where I volunteered and it was awesome, everyone got to defrost something they wanted.

        There is no one gift that makes everyone happy. If you don’t want the sweets, don’t eat them.

    4. RedinSC*

      If the cookies or donuts or whatever are just fresh that day, in boxes, the local food bank probably can’t take it, but local places that do daily meal distributions probably can.

  10. Matt*

    #1 Do you have any way of filing an anonymous ethics complaint with your state bar association? It sounds like there’d be a lot of things for them to look into.

    1. Water Everywhere*

      Everyone in the support group needs to do this if possible! I would bet that the NDA is just another trick the boss came up with to mess with her staff, no way that has any actual legal weight.

    2. OP 1*

      I am not sure. Hadn’t thought about it. This person has their mask so perfectly crafted, I am not sure I would be believed.

      1. goddessoftransitory*

        Perfect is as perfect does; I’m sure she’s good at her deceptions, but that doesn’t mean she controls reality. Especially with that NDA (which I would have an outside attorney scrutinize carefully for legality!)

      2. Disappointing Aussie Office Gumby*

        If all of you submit complaints as a group action and (worst case) nothing happens, you’re no worse off than where you are.

        But the thing is, even if it appears “nothing happened”, something actually does happen: the complaints go on record.

        Are you the first to complain? You have no idea. For all you know, someone has complained before, “nothing happened” except a record of the complaint was made… until now, when a second (or maybe third) complaint–made by you guys–comes along. Maybe your complaint is the one that nudges the ethics committee to start looking into something they’ve suspected all along but haven’t been able to action yet.

        Sometimes people expect complaints to be fully acted upon and the whole drama movie plot to unfold and the bad person loses their job in the end and receives their comeuppance, and unless this happens, it’s not worth complaining… But that’s not how it works. It’s not an all-or-nothing scenario.

        You lose nothing by making a complaint. But you might make the one move that makes something start happening, the one thing that might initiate some investigation or some change or the ‘me too’ that gives the strength to another complain and kicks something into action.

        Believe me, this person doesn’t have everyone as fooled as you think they do. Stop giving in to that gaslighting.

  11. Retired @ last*

    Re: LW#5
    I listened to a webinar on writing earlier today. The instructor said that he doesn’t particularly like the “print it out” method for environmental reasons, but the reason it works is that you’re looking at the work in a different format. So he suggested looking at it in any different format, such as on a different screen – maybe switch to a tablet or phone – the spacing, etc. will be different enough to enable you to spot errors. I think even changing fonts or other appearances. (even temporarily) might help – so you’re not looking at the exact same text you’ve been staring at for hours.

    1. Observer*

      It’s not like any of these other formats are cost-free, environmentally speaking. And a lot of people don’t have another place to look at a document that makes sense.

      For a document where you need to check things like numbers, spelling, and punctuation, most phones are just not good enough. They absolutely amplify the brain’s tendency to fill in gaps because the text is just too small to deal with in that way, without it turning into a literal headache. And that assumes that the LW has a work phone or is allowed to load their documents on their own phone.

      And in a typical office set up, most people don’t have a second computer or a tablet that they can use. Sure, if the LW knew for sure that this would work, they might be able to request that and make the case for it. But “let’s spend a few hundred dollars on something that might – or might not- work” is not a great starting point.

  12. Nodramalama*

    For lw5 I second changing the size and font. I think it’s because when you’re re-reading something your brain processes what you think you’ve said, but changing the font can trick your brain that you’re reading something new

  13. NoDramaMamaLlama*

    I’m not sure if this is possible for you, OP#5, but I always recommend having a colleague or someone in a different department read it over. They’ve presumably never seen the document, and can better suss out mistakes and errors. That can be helpful for typos, spelling errors, grammar, etc.

    For content errors, I always cross-check numbers and dates. Often I will highlight facts and figures while writing, so I know to then double-check those areas when proofing. Hope this helps!

    1. nerak*

      I was going to suggest the same thing in your first paragraph–I have a coworker who’s in my department who I frequently ask to review things for me and vice versa. That’s dependent on having a trusted colleague who can help with this, but it doesn’t usually take her more than 10 minutes to go over the document and point out any errors/suggest changes. It’s just nice to have someone take a look at it with fresh eyes if possible.

    2. Data Nerd*

      I was also going to recommend having someone else review it whenever possible. My team has a quarterly spreadsheet process that is a beast, and it used to go out with some error every quarter. 3 of us now review it and we haven’t had any issues since we started that process.

  14. tommy*

    LW #2 – vendors sending sweet treats as gifts

    Do you have any advice for how they could ask for healthier options

    i agree with alison that your brother should be sure that everyone dislikes (or doesn’t want to receive) the sweet foods before he tries to prevent them coming. some people may want them to keep coming.

    some people may want the sweets for pleasure rather than health, while others may want them for health. “unhealthy food” and “healthier options” aren’t terms that can be applied universally, not even if we’re doing round numbers and thinking just about general majority . those sweet foods are actually healthy for some people. people have different bodies, different food preferences, and most importantly, different food ethics and philosophies.

      1. Alpacas Are Not Dairy Animals*

        Well, just off the top of my head, someone with low blood sugar might find simple, palatable, easily absorbed sugary foods healthier than any other option in that moment.

      2. Wendy Darling*

        How about let’s just not police the value of various foods and let people eat what they want. If you’re not their doctor it’s none of your business.

      3. Dahlia*

        Source: Me, who finds it healthier to not restrict my food intake because eating disorders are bad for me.

      4. CommanderBanana*

        I have hypoglycemia and an abrupt blood sugar drop makes me get cold, sweaty, shaky, disoriented, and I will pass out if I don’t shove a handful of chocolate or something high in sugar in my mouth.

        I would hate for someone to decide to snatch the candy out of my hands because it’s “unhealthy.”

        1. Food anon*

          Absolutely. Calory-dense food can help me prepare for a migraine and a blood sugar drop is not something I need in the middle of that. They tend to take a lot out of me and unrestricted, regular eating does help cut down on the frequency and intensity at least in part.

      5. Sillysaurus*

        I run ultramarathons and run about 65-75 miles a week typically. My body needs so many calories to be healthy, and it especially needs carbs! And you should see what us ultra runners eat while running. Straight sugar, basically. You have to replace the glycogen so you can keep going for 30, 50, or 100 miles. Context is everything!

        1. Georgia Carolyn Mason*

          Yeah, anyone who thinks they can say there’s one diet or number of calories that’s the limit for ‘healthy” for everyone — meet most of the folks participating in the Olympics!

    2. CommanderBanana*

      ^^ This. Healthy is in the eye of the beholder. I think the brother would be better off appreciating the spirit of the gift, not eating it if he doesn’t want it, and buying his own fruit, or whatever it is he actually does want.

  15. Retired Vulcan Raises 1 Grey Eyebrow*

    #5 Can you find a “check buddy” in your group, i.e. you check each other’s work.

    So much easier to spot someone else’s mistake and a coworker doing the same type of work is often more likely to realise something is wrong than someone from a different field.

    1. pocket microscope*

      This is how I try to run checks if I possibly can. Checking your own work, especially without taking a break between completing it and checking it, is notoriously difficult. If I have to check my own then I read out loud – but getting a fresh pair of eyes on it is always my first choice by a mile.

  16. Boop*

    I think LW 3 just needs to ignore the grimace. I’d be incredibly confused and annoyed if someone told me to stop making a particular expression.

    Part of life is dealing with other people’s harmless quirks. In thus case, the colleague makes weird faces, but they otherwise have a good working relationship. Telling her to stop making grimaces is a sure way to ruin that.

    1. SnackAttack*

      I wouldn’t really call it a harmless quirk, though. It can be incredibly distracting and discouraging to have people viscerally reacting negatively to everything you’re saying. There have been letters here about people who are smiley and peppy 24/7 and commenters call it annoying – I don’t see how this is any better.

    2. pocket microscope*

      I really think the two of them can have a conversation and meet each other halfway.

      LW doesn’t have to go in angrily ordering her coworker to stop grimacing or else. She can say ‘hey, I don’t know if you realise but you sometimes look really pained when I say something you disagree with! It’s a bit unnerving – it always makes me worry that I’ve said something wrong.’ Then coworker will probably a) reassure her that she’s not feeling as strongly as her face would suggest and b) be a bit more conscious of what her face is doing during conversations. And LW will probably feel better just from the reassurance, which will make it easier to ignore the quirk.

      It doesn’t have to be all or nothing!

      1. fine-tipped pen aficionado*

        Agreed! There could be any number of reasons this is happening and any number of things both coworker & LW3 could try to reduce the impact it’s having on LW3. Maybe LW3 does need to get a little thicker skin and not be so put off by evidence that someone disagrees with them. Maybe LW3 also needs to make an effort to mask a little better in most internal meetings.

        Curiosity is the best approach here. We don’t have enough information to think it’s deliberate rudeness like some people are suggesting. LW3 & their coworker literally just need to talk and the best way to make that successful is to approach it with openness and assuming the best intentions in the other person until you have actual evidence that it’s not.

      2. Boof*

        This is the best way – from what is described I just don’t think it’s right to call the colleague rude for what the LW seems to be describing as more expressive

      4. Food anon*

        I like this approach and fully agree.
        Thanks to a tendency for migraines my expression might slip more than I’d like at times. A pained expression would most likely be because I’m literally in pain and spending my remaining energy to follow a conversation as best as possible.
        There is a reason I focus on non-customer facing roles and have a preference for remote, but that’s not always up to me.

    3. Asloanico*

      Usually I might agree, but OP has already said they’ve started avoiding meetings with this person and speaking up less often, so it’s really not working. Presumably, the coworker would like to know if they’re doing something causing such a reaction. If OP brings it up kindly and the coworker says “I can’t change it, it’s my face,” I would have suggestions for OP to avoid being affected – turn off the zoom screen, make less eye contact in meetings, begin making your own faces back, I don’t know – but it’s reasonable to start with a calm, direct request.

      1. CommanderBanana*

        OP has already said they’ve started avoiding meetings with this person and speaking up less often, so it’s really not working.

        Which is an interesting decision to make before they’ve even, you know, said something to their coworker, who probably has no idea this is even happening in the LW’s head.

    4. Transatlantic*

      I understand the issue here are active facial expressions, but it’s a slippery slope about policing people’s faces. I have resting blah face (mildly negative), and if I don’t actively remember to smile slightly, I get comments on it. Yes, I’m a woman, usually the only one in a meeting, and my face is no more negative than the men’s, but I’m held to a different standard.

      When objecting to facial expressions, let’s think about whose faces we are objecting to and why. Especially if we are objecting to a woman’s face, or someone who is a minority or somehow not conforming to the local norm (usually white male), think about whether you’d object if it were someone else.

      1. Lauren Ipsum*

        I am often the only women in the meeting as well, and am frequently interrupted and spoken over. It’s frustrating, and delicate to address. So sometimes the way I convey my opinion is to make a facial expression. It sucks that I have to use this as a tactic, but it’s been effective. Not saying that is what is happening here, but since I noticed that I do it I’ve thought a lot about it, and I see it as just another way that as a woman I’ve had to adapt to a very male workplace.

  17. magpiesblack*

    I find your response to #4 interesting! Not in America, and I work in a sector that actively requests current managers as references as part of the application process. There’s a growing trend where Good Managers are seen as ones who encourage their staff if they want to try for new opportunities – I love it when my team asks if I can be a reference because (aside from demonstrating that we have a positive work relationship) it identifies that they are looking to grow, or have realised the job isn’t right for them – and that’s ok!

    1. Varthema*

      I would agree with this globally and would give any reports of mine a glowing reference (provided they merited it of course!) BUT it still doesn’t quite get past the issue of the non-malicious prioritization that could happen if the jobseeker had the bad luck of having layoffs happen after said reference. If you have to do layoffs and have no obvious weak links, knowing that someone is actively looking and getting to advanced stages in interviews, wouldn’t you, all things being equal, be inclined to cut loose the person who seems to have options? Or by contrast, if you and a coworker share a role and one of you needs to be laid off and you’re committed to staying while everybody knows that your coworker is looking to quit… wouldn’t you also feel like that would be the better option?

      There are obviously lots of other data points in play, and in some cases it would make more business sense to keep a certain person even knowing they’re looking to quit, but sometimes layoffs have to happen and there are no obvious good choices and being humans, we seize on any data points available to our brains. especially if we can say to ourselves, “oh well, at least that person wanted to leave anyway.”

      So yes, on the one hand as a manager I agree with you, but on the other hand, as an employee, I would not stick out my neck by asking my current employer for a reference unless I was *extremely* committed to leaving. Certainly not if I’m just passively interested in other offers.

      1. amoeba*

        Not only layoffs – I’d also be worried people would be less considered for trainings, exciting projects, etc. There doesn’t need to be any maliciousness involved – I mean, if I knew one of my team was actively looking to leave soon, I’d probably rather not give them the super important project that will last six months and it would be hard on everybody if the lead left half way. Or if I only had one spot in a leadership training available and needed to decide whom to give it to. Etc. Honestly, I really wouldn’t like to know as it would be so hard to ignore that information altogether and treat them exactly the same as everybody else, even if I was 0% upset/angry and wished them only the best!

    2. Blanked on my AAM posting name*

      I was going to comment the same thing: I’m in England, where not having a reference from your current employer is generally seen as a red flag for the prospective new employer. References are generally the very last stage of the interview process here, though: they are generally only requested when an organisation is sure they want to employ someone, so it will only be a problem if the employer reference is bad.

    3. Hastily Blessed Fritos*

      This all makes sense, but it’s important not to penalize job seekers for not having one of the Good Managers! Which means not giving any special weight to a reference from the current manager, or having it be a negative if the candidate won’t provide the current manager as a potential reference.

      1. Edwina*

        I agree! It seems that this issue is industry dependent, but the only time I gave a prospective employer references from my current employer (client really because I was a contractor the entire >15 years I worked there) was when the current employer was being very candid about laying off all of the contractors. We had already passed the first deadline they gave without my getting laid off, so I was definitely looking for another job, and everyone knew and no one was surprised. My current and previous managers at the company were very happy with my work, so they were glad to give me good references.

        In an earlier career, when I gave my notice, my manager said, “why didn’t you tell me you wanted to go into technical training?” – like he could have offered that to me. It was a 2-person operation: me and him. So…??? I don’t know what he was thinking. Maybe he wished I would stay? But I only ever got feedback when something needed to be improved, so I had no idea if he was satisfied with my work.

      2. Lemon Chiffon*

        Heartily agree! In my state, public school districts generally require a reference from your current supervisor before they will extend an offer of employment (including for administrative roles not in schools). This is… unhelpful, especially in an at will state and if you are trying to leave a bad work environment. I wish they would make some kind of provision for that situation!

  18. musical chairs*

    Lw#5, you don’t see what your industry is or what your work product typically looks like so I would add a few things if you’re expected to produce analytical, project-based, design-type work rather than just reports or written materials. I work in a field where the advice given here would help me essentially on emails only, which is only about 10% of my work product, so I thought I could be helpful if you’re like me.

    I am a chronic mistake maker and I work in a technical field where our final product needs to be essentially spotless as its usefulness is fully dependent on its clarity to contractors, stakeholders and the public. Additionally, I take personal legal responsibility for it’s accuracy and completeness for the rest of my life or the life of the project.

    This is what I tell my junior staff/what works for me:
    -Create a plan on how you’re gonna perform the work and spend a little time up front organizing your time effort around what you think the end result is supposed to look like and how you’re going to do it
    -Make yourself a checklist of things related to the project/task goals, previous instruction, industry standards, company-specific quality standards and use that in your own review of your work
    -Frequently do gut checks while creating work product, not just at the end. Knowing what the end product is going to be is helpful but also find ways to confirm the plane is gonna fly while you’re building it
    -Ask the person leading your work (like a PM) or a more experienced team member what things they look for when reviewing and review your work through their eyes.

    Don’t know what kind of work you do, so hopefully that’s helpful to you or someone else! I don’t have a ton of experience with other industries, for example: work where your labor is more manual if it’s more in-person care focused rather than outcome-focused but maybe others in the comments might if that’s what you need!

    1. musical chairs*

      Ah, I failed to see the “read and re-read” line, so this above wouldn’t apply. Ignore me!

  19. Luna*

    I work in a field with a constant stream of provided food. LW’s brother just has to learn to ignore it. Others may like it. It’s a choice to eat it or not and the choice has to be that of each individual.

    1. WheresMyPen*

      True, though I have friends who work in hospitals where patients and family are constantly bringing chocolates, cake etc. which is lovely and thoughtful but when it’s in your eyeline all the time, and especially if you’re tired, it’s very hard to resist ultra-processed, sugary or fatty foods. In my old office the snack shelf was at the end of my row of desks and I would be thinking about it all the time, walking past it constantly and it was so hard to resist. It would be a good idea to ask if there’s a space away from the main traffic areas where it can be kept so it’s out of sight and hopefully therefore out of mind.

      1. DifferentStrokes*

        That’s still a you problem and part of the job. I personally consider the availability of free food of any sort a benefit because it’s often hard for me to get food at work. Would I prefer a wider range of options? Yes, but I’d take cookies over nothing.

        If not having copious free food available is important to you, screen for it during your job search. I screen for the opposite.

      2. Alicent*

        I think keeping it out of sight is the best solution. I worked for a guy who was trying to lose weight while the rest of the staff had no issues with the goodies client brought in and we really looked forward to them. This guy just started dumping them in the garbage on arrival right in front of us. His lack of will power led to a massive loss of morale. This included a cake a client brought in and was being stored on MY desk.

        1. i like hound dogs*

          How unbelievably rude of him! I’ve had my struggles with food, but I can’t imagine doing this in a million years.

        2. I Have RBF*

          I hate the food police that think that their diet is binding on everyone else around them. It’s not your coworkers job to be deprived just because you lack “won’t-power”.

          That guy was a jackass.

        3. CommanderBanana*

          That is a total dick move.

          I know that a large percentage of the commentariat here gets really mad whenever someone mentions that personal responsibility is a thing, and I would have no problem with someone asking for things they have a hard time resisting not to be brought to meetings or offered to them, but at a certain point? You’re an adult. If you literally cannot control your reaction to food to the point where you are taking food away from other people and throwing it away, you need to seek some professional help to figure out what’s going on.

          By and large, the onus is on us to control our own behavior.

        4. goddessoftransitory*

          I agree. There should be a designated “treat space” that is accessible but not right in everyone’s faces. Out of sight, out of mind is a thing!

          This is basically the opposite strategy that your glassbowl colleague was employing, which is more “how to make your entire office detest you.”

    2. Gumby*

      Especially now because I guarantee that it will be worse in the next couple of months.

      My sister used to work in building management in a high rise and their office was overrun with gifts from vendors in November and December. And they’ll take your sugary treats and raise you an alcoholic drink. Between the fancy dinners, lunches with alcohol, happy hours, random galas, conferences, and charity golf tournaments (I don’t know, it was a thing) at one point we mused about whether she could legitimately claim to be a professional drinker. There was a run of a few months where it seemed like 3 events per week minimum. The alcohol tended to be mainly the office staff. At least the cookies and chocolates could be shared out to building maintenance, security, etc.

    1. Retired Vulcan Raises 1 Grey Eyebrow*

      She is presumably also processing information when she talks with higher-ups – without any grimaces.

    2. mcdonalds grimace*

      I came here to ask this!

      Maybe my situation is different, but if I feel I’m on good terms with my colleagues I have a bit of a habitual frown/brows pressed together thing that I’ll stop trying to constantly turn into a neutral/pleasant expression if I’m thinking. So if someone is presenting me with information that challenges what I think (its not about disagreeing its about ‘that doesn’t match what I know, so now I’m trying to remember where I learned that from’) and I thought we were on good terms, I probably wont try to hide my thinking face.

      I don’t do it around people who don’t know me very well or people/upper managers who expect me to have instant answers for everything (the type of people that I prepare/ready myself to talk to). But that’s really exhausting and I feel a bit sad to think that even the colleagues closest to me assume I’m being unfriendly by just… thinking/taking them seriously. I’m always really positive & upbeat as a rule, its just that I will absolutely be doing my thinking face.

      Maybe I’m too neurodiverse for this, but I don’t know why controlling someone else’s expression is important to the letter writer? Maybe its a really deeply meaningful grimace? To me, it would have to be a really extreme facial reaction to genuinely distract me from the work that we are there to discuss.

      1. Ceanothus*

        Bless, I tried to express this elsewhere but I think you communicated it in a really useful way.

  21. call me wheels*

    #5 – I use word’s text to speech function to read through my work to check for errors, and find that more useful than reading it out myself.

  22. Helvetica*

    Similar to LW#5 – homophones. If I am in a rush or can’t concentrate fully, I may make mistakes such as using “right” instead of “write” or “knight” instead of “night” – though weirdly enough never have that problem with “their/there/they’re” – and spellcheck doesn’t catch it because it is not a typo.
    Does anyone have good tricks for catching those types of mistakes? I kind of have learned with which words it happens the most often but other than slowing down, I got no program to help me really.

    1. Emmy Noether*

      The funny thing about homophone-switch mistakes is that native speakers (or, more generally, people who learned a language only orally at first) are much more likely to make them. They really jump out at me in my second languages, because I process the words more visually, having learned the spelling at the same time as the pronunciation (my native German doesn’t have as many homophones as English anyway).

      So, I guess… get it proofread by someone who is more likely to spot them (second language and/or visual learner)? If there are specific homophones that occur frequently in the texts you write, you can also try searching for them once the text is done and checking each instance.

      1. Asloanico*

        I would agree, I happen to not be afflicted with this kind of error very often – I make other types of errors – and this would be a very quick one for me to scan through someone else’s work and find pretty quickly and easily. So if it’s an option, perhaps a coworker is happy to serve as the person to check for these. Personally I would find it satisfying!

      2. amoeba*

        Haha, yeah, that’s definitely a thing. I used to be *so confused* how that kind of mistake even happens – but the different way of learning as a non-native speaker explains everything!

        1. Emmy Noether*

          My husband – who otherwise is an excellent speller – frequently mixes up the -er, -ez an -é verb endings in French. At the beginning I could NOT understand how he could confuse them. Then I realized that I see them written in my head when I say them, and he does not. On the other hand, I sometimes mix up è and é, which should not sound alike.

      3. Helvetica*

        Haha, English is my second language, actually!
        I think the problem may be that in my native language words are pronounced exactly as they are written, so there are no real homophones (a word can have multiple meanings, of course), and I’d guess that is why my brain substitutes them from time to time.

    3. Hlao-roo*

      Make a list of the words you mix up most often, and then when you’re at the proofreading/checking stage, you can use the “search” function (ctrl + f on windows, I think maybe command + f on Mac?) and search for all uses of “right” and “write,” “knight” and “night,” etc. Read the sentence that the word appears in to check if it should be “right” or “write.” That way you don’t have to try to hold all of the homophones in your head as you’re re-reading the whole document. The computer can bring you directly to the words you want to check.

  23. Artemesia*

    #4. “family members think it is fine.” I think more career damaging advice has been given by family members than any other source. From gumption to ‘don’t let them do you like that, your boss telling you what to do’ to ask your manager for a reference while job searching. Virtually everyone would be better off to assume family members are useless in this regard unless they have reason to believe they are particularly experienced and savy.

    For someone making lots of mistakes, having a partner on the job who will check your stuff can be very helpful. Ideally you find someone you can trade that favor with. If that is not feasible then reading aloud is a good technique for catching typos. And always check charts and diagrams and headlines — it is easy to overlook mistakes in those. I can think of several examples I have encountered one which was disastrous because it went out and the other that got caught in galleys that almost went into print in a major publication.

  24. pocket microscope*

    LW3 – I’m also blessed/cursed with a very expressive face, and I probably automatically rein it in more around senior staff/clients because, well, everyone’s more inhibited in situations like that. It’s not particularly conscious, it just kicks in. So I wouldn’t assume she’s actively choosing not to bother being polite around you, or anything like that.

    But if I was making it hard for a coworker to communicate openly with me, I would 100% want to know so I could try to do something about it! Or at least reassure them that my face just does acrobatics when I’m thinking and they shouldn’t read too much into it.

    Talk to her. I bet it’ll be fine.

  25. WheresMyPen*

    #4: Whenever I’ve applied for jobs I’ve put my current manager but there’s often a box to check that says ‘Can we contact this person during the application process?’ meaning can they contact them straight away or should they wait until they offer you the job. If there’s a way to make sure they only contact that reference once they’ve offered you the job then there’s no problem as you’d presumably be leaving anyway.

  26. Richard Hershberger*

    LW1: You are me, about sixteen years ago. Like you, I lasted three years. The only potential difference is that everyone in the industry knew this guy was a jerk. Indeed, a few years after I left him he got disbarred for being a jerk: not officially, of course, but that was the subtext. I recently learned that the judicial opinion upholding the disbarment is taught in the state’s law schools as an example of how to get disbarred without financial shenanigans. I used lasting three years with him as a selling point, and I can’t tell you how many lawyers were fascinated to hear about working for him.

    So what I wonder with LW1 is her actual reputation. She may be the sort of sociopath who can consistently present a public face of sweetness and light and civic commitment. But it may be less sterling than that.

    1. Asloanico*

      Yeah, I don’t want to derail, but I just finished reading “Sociopath: a Memoir” and the author talked about how having “missing” emotions caused her to try and act out, because the absence was almost painful (like a buzzing or a pressure, she described it) – and causing strong emotion in others, like with stealing/violence/some kind of social violation literally made her feel better. She talked about going to funerals where she didn’t know anyone because the strong collective grief satisfied an emotional void in her. The boss may literally be a sociopath and making the staff cry is an emotional fix for her! Or not. I just found it fascinating. I doubt it would help OP feel better day to day.

    2. Sola Lingua Bona Lingua Mortua Est*

      I can tell a similar tale after leaving a role. You’d expect to hear “why did you only last 18 months?”, but once the reputation starts to spread, those questions becomes “how did you last 18 months?”

      I didn’t last 3 years. Half of that nearly drove me from Programming as a vocation.

    3. Career Hiking*

      I agree with Alison’s point that OP1’s manager will most likely badmouth them anyway and when I had to work for a total creep of a boss, he was lucky I gave him 2 days notice. I was only there for a few months and when my next job asked me during the interview why I was there for such a short amount of time I said the job ended up not being what I was looking for long-term (which was true because I didn’t want to be harassed long-term).

      My industry is also small and word gets around so it came out that my boss couldn’t keep anyone longer than 1 year and his whole department got transferred to a different agency and all my new coworkers know about the place’s bad reputation. So even if OPs ex boss tries to smack-talk OP, there’s a good chance it will make the ex boss look like a lunatic to the outside person.

      1. Sloanicota*

        Yeah, there’s got to be diminishing returns if this boss badmouths *everybody* AND it becomes evident that none of the staff is able to stay much past a year. By the third time I’m getting whispers about how much so-and-so is a bad employee I’m going to notice the pattern and suspect it’s the boss. Unless it’s an Anna Wintour-level opportunity, I don’t think OP is losing out.

        1. goddessoftransitory*

          I mean, the BEST case scenario for this boss reputation wise is that she is either the most incompetent interviewer/hirer ever and gets every rotten apple from every barrel around, or she was cursed by an angry djinn to never ever be able to retain staff.

    4. CityMouse*

      I always do the state disciplinary board’s CLE every year because a) free ethics CLE and b) it inevitably ends with stories about the dumb stuff attorneys have done.

  27. Jennifleur*

    LW3 – they DO have a poker face, because they can use it with the higher ups. They’re just choosing not to expend the effort elsewhere. Which could be fine, except that it’s hurting you and doubtless others too, so Alisons advice is good. But yeah, they need to be made aware that they need to mask better.

  28. Tacky Halloween Decor*

    LW5, if it’s mainly text it might also help to have the computer read it to you. Your brain reads what it thinks is there, but the robot voice reads what’s actually there. The weird cadence that most built-in reading software uses can also be helpful because it sounds so off you pick up errors more easily in my opinion.

  29. Cat Tree*

    LW5, here’s another idea. Start by highlighting all the text yellow (Ctrl + A to select all). Then only un-highlight each sentence after you proofread it.

  30. Anon. Scientist*

    #4: I was interviewing someone who was proving to be someone I didn’t want to hire. They announced that their manager was cool but that their grandboss was a giant jerk. I told them directly that I wouldn’t reach out to their management for a reference (I would use someone else) and that they shouldn’t tell their management. I was very direct about this.

    Two days later they were fired on the spot when they told their “cool” manager they had an interview and that manager felt obligated to tell the jerky boss that the applicant was job hunting.

    1. Paint N Drip*

      Oof. Good for you trying to impart some sense in them, sounds like they were determined to make their own life harder

    2. Bossy*

      Interesting! It is amusing? odd? when just because someone’s cool you tell them stuff. There’s a thing called privacy which so many people these days don’t seem to want. People have ramped up “displaying “ so much about our lives all along with the need to comment on others when it’s none of their business. Of course social media has made people think all this is ok. I literally told someone- nicely in tone – that their opinion doesn’t matter here. She kinda gasped but to her credit recovered quickly. Not always looking for a weigh in or your thoughts, thanks.

  31. Katie S*

    #5- Word has a read a loud function that I have found very helpful especially when my brain is really tired.

  32. DJ Abbott*

    #2, could your brother bring his own healthy snacks and eat those instead of the treats sent by vendors?
    I have food allergies and sensitive digestion that require me to make all my food, and I work in an office where people like to bring in treats I can’t have. Bringing my lunch and snacks helps because I eat my snacks and then I’m not hungry, so I’m not tempted by the treats. If I was hungry, I would eat them anyway and get sick.
    The snacks your brother brings would have to be things he likes, so he doesn’t feel deprived.
    Also where I live, there’s a law that the vendors cannot give medical offices gifts because they used to give doctors and entire offices lavish gifts to get their business. Is there no law like that where your brother works?

    1. And Cut*

      I’d also suggest mints. When I’ve got a mint in, it makes sweets taste weird, so I’m not as tempted.

  33. Lorax*

    #5, one trick that’s helped me is reading things backwards. For numbers, this involves reading each digit of the number from right to left when checking for data-entry, transcription, or copy/paste errors. Literally, check to see if the last digit is correct, the move on to the next digit, etc. It takes some time at first, but once you get used to it, it can go pretty quickly, and it works!

    For words, this could either involve reading a sentence backwards or (more commonly) reading a paragraph with the sentences in reverse order. So you’d read the last sentence first, then the second-to-last sentence, etc.

    This method helps slow your brain down and forces your brain to treat each component of the work as separate units, so your brain can’t gloss over the details or “fill in the gaps” based on what it expects while treating the information as a contiguous whole.

  35. Seashell*

    LW1, I know ulcers were blamed on stress in the past, but recent medical research shows they’re caused by a bacteria. At least that’s one less problem that your challenging boss caused. Hope you are able to get good medical treatment and enjoy a better workplace.

    1. Hroethvitnir*

      Helicobacter pylori is the cause of ulcers, but chronic stress can lead to bacterial overgrowth, including of the weirdo who lives in your stomach.

      So yes, stress can cause ulcers.

  36. k.*

    For #5, the immersive reader feature in Microsoft Word might be helpful. Among other things, you can isolate one line of text at a time to look at, or change the background colour on the page to make it easier to look at for a longer time. There’s also a read-aloud option that can help you catch issues. I find it really helpful when having to closely edit, especially when I’m struggling to focus.

  37. I'll have the blue plate special, please.*

    LW1: I’m so sorry. Watch your health and lookout for yourself. Use your insurance, too, to make appointments and check-ups while it’s still valid.

    1. Generic Name*

      And double check the end date of your insurance. Most companies will keep you on through the end of the month, but my last company ended coverage on your last day of employment.

  38. I'm great at doing stuff*

    Obviously I don’t know the details, but NDAs are usually about intellectual property and trade secrets, not if your boss is a raging a**hole. I would encourage prospective employees to candidly talk to current ones about her.

    1. Skytext*

      Also, an NDA wouldn’t cover your own personal experience. Such as if the LW told an applicant “I break out in hives on Sunday night at the thought of going into work Monday, and I developed ulcers since I started working here” that is in no way a violation of an NDA, but the applicant would get the message.

  40. Dcguy*

    #1: just so you know, the ulcer is probably from an easy to treat infection of something called h pylori, not stress. An antibiotic should knock that right out. It worked for me.

    1. MassMatt*

      Not to derail, but Australian scientists Barry Marshall and Robert Warren discovered this. They were mocked and ridiculed, because “everyone” knew ulcers came from stress and spicy food. The scientific method eventually proved them right, they won the Nobel prize in 2005, but it was a tough slog for them at first, and the myths about ulcers persists.

      This was not way back in the 19th century, they started their work in the mid 1980’s!

    2. I'm just here for the cats!!*

      I think we can count on the LW to be able to handle their own medical issues. If the OP is getting HIVES from the thought of work then I think her stress level is enough to get an ulcer.

      1. Dcguy*

        Dude, if this were me, I’d have wanted someone to say, “Hey, you can cure that incredible pain with a week of pills.” Actually, when this was me, I was thrilled when someone said something.

    3. linger*

      Still an indirect causal chain in that people are more susceptible to infection when stressed, because the stress reaction screws with your immune system. So the fact that Helicobacter pylori is the proximal cause of ulcers still doesn’t entirely absolve the abusive boss of responsibility.

      2. Hroethvitnir*

        Shoulda kept reading, because this is pretty much what I said to someone upthread.

        It’s cool H. pylori is known about, but it does not preclude stress being the ultimate cause. Chronic stress = excessive circulating corticosteroids = immune suppression = potential opportunistic overgrowth by bacteria. Also why coldsores emerge when you’re stressed, even though the causative agent is a virus that hides out until it has the chance to reproduce again.

    4. Firebird*

      “Probably” but not always. I was tested several times but didn’t have an infection. Mine was definitely from stress and went away, after I left the situation. It’s still worth checking out.

  41. SchoolHouseRockStar*

    #4 For my current employer (public school) it used to be mandatory in the job application process for 1 of 3 references to be your current supervisor or manager. I’m lucky I had managers that didn’t mind me asking and didn’t change anything once they knew, but it still was like walking on eggshells worried they’d suddenly act differently knowing I was trying to leave.

    I’m glad they don’t have that requirement anymore, my current manager freaks out anytime they learn someone is leaving (or they find out they were job searching through a reference casual discussion with them). My manager will always ask “Why didn’t you give me a heads up.” or “What are we doing wrong why do you want to leave”, in the same tone as “Did you put your name in the Goblet of fire!?”

  42. I treated you like a son*

    As a McDonalad’s character, Grimace is considered lovable and friendly. It’s only when we remove our childhood innocence do we become cynical and jaded.

    1. Juicebox Hero*

      What the huh?

      There’s a big difference between a happy friendly purple guy and a coworker girning at you every time you say something she disagrees with…

      1. Elsewise*

        I am so glad you put those pieces together, I somehow didn’t register that this was about the coworker grimacing letter and thought it was a completely random comment.

  43. buddleia*

    4. Another way in which government is completely different from other sectors. I work for a provincial government (Canada) and it’s expected that you put your current manager as your reference. The majority of managers are supportive if you wanna move on (within government); the government is considered as one big organization even if you still have to go through the interview process to get a different job.

  44. Trout 'Waver*

    In regards to #3, there is such a wide range of communication styles that it’s best to just assume that’s the way she communicates and learn to live with it.

    I’m naturally quite expressive in some ways, and the amount of people who try to police that in bad faith is non-zero. If you try to police my expressions, you’re getting lumped in with those people. Not sorry.

    If it’s bothering you, ask her to stop doing it. But framing it is as you’re universally right and she’s universally wrong isn’t going to get you the result you want.

    Also, why are you changing what you’re saying, blaming her facial expression for changing, and then getting mad at her? When you haven’t even talked to her about it. Why don’t you focus on communicating to the best of your ability instead of getting upset she’s not a mind reader?

  45. VetIfImportant*

    OP2, this is a them problem they need to sort out for themselves.

    Some people love getting this food, whether it comes from vendors or the employer directly. I am disabled and I actively screen for offices that provide various sorts of food – snacks and sometimes even meals – because it’s often very difficult for me to get any type of food while at work. Even when I’ve worked in the city it’s often been difficult to get food; sometimes those free snacks or whatever are the difference between my eating at all in a 10-12 hour period of time. Even better if there are bagels or cereal or fruit or whatever, but having something is important for me. If I found out something like that went away because one of my coworkers didn’t want to eat it I’d be upset. No one is forcing them to eat it. If it’s that hard for them to resist, maybe they should consider working with medical professionals – for example, my nutritionist has encouraged me to seek out employers that provide or have frequent food perks even if they aren’t always the healthiest options on the planet as a way of dealing with the need to eat food when traveling for food or bringing food (because of length of travel via public transit) isn’t possible.

    Sure, I’m at an extreme where I actively seek out environments that provide food, but that’s part of the point of vetting prospective employers – you get to decide what’s important to you and judge suitability based on it. Most people like having it but use it less than I do. Many people may choose not to partake as often or at all but say it being there is a nice to have. If you have preferences on the edges of the curve it’s on you to look for an environment that meets your preferences or to accept getting a job that doesn’t fit those preferences if you do.

      1. VetIfImportant*

        Difficult to carry/transport with the commute. Ad perishables never survive the commute even in a cooler. It’s soooooo much easier to just have it available there.

  46. Student*

    #4: I assume students/interns would be an exception to the rule of not asking current manager for references. I’m going to time out of my position after I graduate, and I’m hoping to use my current managers as references.

    1. Paint N Drip*

      Oh yeah, no worries there. If your manager expects you to leave on a timeline (student position, contract, project completion, etc.) that dynamic goes out the window.

    2. Aspiring Chicken Lady*

      Correct! Student workers should definitely engage with managers to get references and get additional info about where to go next.

    3. Elsewise*

      Totally! I used to manage student employees and I was very used to providing references. Honestly, even if you’re leaving before you graduate, most student jobs are still the exception because we don’t expect you to stay long anyway. You’re good.

  47. OfficeFood*

    OP2, in my experience companies that send perks like cookie trays or fruit baskets use a service to do so and aren’t picking out individualized gifts for each recipient. So personalized requests likely aren’t in the cards.

    What most companies do is keep such gifts in a somewhat private area so the group that works most directly with the vendor gets first crack at the food before making it more widely available to others. The company could decide to go straight to the free for all mode to get rid of it faster or encourage those who want the cookies (or whatever) to take multiples back to their desks for later consumption to serve the same purpose.

  48. too many dogs*

    I’ll join in the “read it aloud” group, the “print it out” group, but add another: after you print it out, take it to another room/space to read it out loud. I don’t know why, but I will read it out loud from the screen, print it and read it out loud at my desk, THEN take it to another room, knowing that it is perfect — and find mistakes. I don’t know why going to another physical location works, but it does (for me, at least).

  49. CoworkerReferences*

    LW4, I have never nor will I ever ask a current manager for a reference unless I’m working a short term contract or already have an end date from an employer thanks to a layoff.

    What I and most other people I know do is ask other people we’ve worked with at our current job, preferably outside of our immediate group reporting to the same manager, who we trust to keep it quiet.

    1. Bast*

      As someone who has worked 2 different jobs where if they knew you were looking, you got fired, I have done the same thing. In one of those jobs, we all knew and trusted our immediate supervisor (who was also trying to get out and equally sick of the crap there) to not rat us out, but you NEVER went to upper management, and not all of the managers were as reasonable as ours. It was a very “drink the kool aid” type of place, and many managers got to be that way because they had drank the kool aid. We all had each others’ backs and vouched for each other in any reference situation we could though.

      1. Bast*

        I also have mentioned during the interview that my company would terminate me if they were to find out I am looking, so I would be happy to provide references OTHER than my current boss. I have not had pushback from anyone.

  50. Pocket Mouse*

    LW3, if you mention the grimace or ask your coworker about it, please do so in as neutral a way as you can muster. When I’m doing calculations in my head, my face muscles tighten in a way that might look like a grimace – but that’s what helps me hold onto a thought or numerical value long enough to plug it in to the next step. So if it were me, you’d be seeing me comparing what you’re telling me to what I already have in my head, or holding onto strands of the conversation to make sure to include in my reply, or mentally examining a possible solution to meet both our needs. And for me personally, I might stifle the face movements in certain situations, or with certain audiences, and when I do stifle it, I notice I am not as sharp in my ideas or responses in the moment.

    You’re well within your right to ask about it and name its effect on you! But if this coworker is warm toward you otherwise, and you say you reach agreement quickly once discussing, please be open to the possibility that this is what you’re seeing.

    (Probably unrelated to your observations, but interesting: This American Life episode 840 act two has a story your question reminded me of.)

    1. mcdonalds grimace*

      I think this is a kind approach (I mentioned upthread I definitely have a thinking face that probably looks mean but I am not ever mean, at least not on purpose, and am otherwise upbeat and warm). My brows press together quite a bit so it probably looks intense when I am just trying to think (OP says this happens when their colleague disagrees with them, but maybe they’re just thinking). While I wouldn’t want someone to feel like I’m pulling faces at them, also I would probably be sad that my normal expressions weren’t being taken in good faith.
      I’m not sure its helpful to police the faces other people make, unless you’re really certain it’s the specific problem in collaborating with this person – and even if it was, is it really that difficult to ignore?

      OP please don’t take it the wrong way but are you defensive as a rule, or is this colleague more specifically prone to disagreeing with you, so you’re dreading that as soon as you see that expression? I’ve never really tried to frame the conversations I have with my colleagues as agreements or disagreements, just collaboration.

  51. A Book about Metals*

    The LW says that she and the grimacer work very closely and have a warm rapport. And that once they talk it’s always fine.

    I guess I don’t really see the issue since it sounds like it always works itself out? But if it’s bothering LW I’d still mention it given the close relationship

    1. Sneaky Squirrel*

      I’m overall feeling the same way as you about this but it seems LW feels self conscious about it and is choosing to speak up less at work as a result. That is something that needs to be addressed. Given the nature of the role is to reconcile different viewpoints, I’m wondering if it’s less the grimaces that are an issue and more that LW needs to work on feeling confident in their assertions.

    2. Salty Caramel*

      It needs to get mentioned so the grimacer can modify her expression. She may legitimately not know the message she’s sending.

  52. CatchingErrors*

    It is only moderately helpful to have someone/software read it aloud. That will catch major lapses/issues only. You need to read it yourself. It’s the process of your brain trying to parse the written text that surfaces most of the errors.

    The longer you can put it aside before editing the better.

    Also, nearly every place I’ve ever worked had a rule that at least two people have to see any content before it goes out the door. Even seasoned, experienced writers have typos, cut and paste errors, and brain farts. Someone else will catch them a lot more effectively than the person who made them.

  53. Irishgal*

    OP 5

    Check out the immersive reading function in Word. You can set it to automatically do some of the things Allison suggests and ir really helps you process and absorb information.

    If you need to read across various platforms (pdf, websites etc) then software like Read & Write is good https://youtu.be/pkf23aVIaX4?si=uxfEux4vGvWTVWhU shows how it can be used

  54. Laura*

    I am also a “need to check my work” person and even reading aloud my brain glosses right over misspellings. What works for me is reading backwards. If I was reviewing this text I would go “backwards, reading, is, me, for, works, what” that disrupts my very mature “gloss over it” function enough to catch typos. Also- let your team know/acknowledge that you struggle with this! I find that if people know it’s simply my brain, not me not caring about the work, they’re understanding and feedback can be given without emotional burden for all involved.

    Other tips- autocorrect- I set up my Microsoft apps to auto correct frequent errors for me, like changing “cleint” to “client”. It’s just how my fingers often move on the keyboard! I don’t give myself a hard time.

    Working with numbers- Do it on paper as a double check on excel. (If you have a numbers heavy job I get this might not be possible)

    Outlook auto spellcheck- I have Outlook set up to run spell check on any email I send before it goes out. Not only does this catch typos, I keeps form sending anything in haste that I may wish to rethink.

    A buddy- Are you good at reviewing others’ work? Offer to exchange review services with a friend. Or find another way you can thank a friend at work for giving your slide deck a once-over.

    Good luck!

  55. Over Analyst*

    LW 5, is it possible to get a “buddy” in a similar role to trade off with? I’ve noticed errors from multiple reports of mine coming across my desk, so I recommended that people at similar levels trade off reports to check each other’s. It shouldn’t add much time since they’re just reviewing a different document instead of their own but I find it’s typically easier to catch others’ mistakes.

  56. Caramel & Cheddar*

    LW3: “They throw me off when I’m talking, and I find myself pivoting in the middle of a sentence because I worry that I must sound very incompetent to provoke such a strong reaction. Lately, I’ve found myself speaking up less in meetings when she is present.”

    I think grimacing aside, this sounds like something for you to work on, not your colleague. I assume you’re not actually incompetent, so your first reaction to someone you perceive to be disagreeing with you shouldn’t be “Wow, I must be bad at my job.” You shouldn’t have to change what you’re saying mid-sentence or speak up less in general just because her facial expression changed. You’re both adults and can take turns with your opinions on a given topic; finish what you have to say and then, if warranted, let her have an opportunity to voice whatever it is she clearly wants to say. All these restrictions are self-imposed!

    You say you work closely with her and I know that when I work closely with people, I definitely don’t keep up the same level of neutrality as I might with people I don’t know as well or who are higher above me in the org chart. I think it’s helpful that close colleagues can be candid with me, whether that’s one-on-one or in meetings. But it’s also an important skill to be able to lead a meeting or give a presentation or finish a thought without someone’s facial expression throwing you off. In this case, she’s grimacing, but if you had a coworker who was constantly smiling in meetings, that might be equally weird and you’d still have to make it through the end of a sentence without changing direction midway.

    1. Myrin*

      Yeah, ignoring everything else for a minute, I was surprised to hear that that is OP’s usual inner reaction when her coworker’s “strong reaction” seems to happen literally every time she disagrees with something and it always turns out that she didn’t think OP sounded very incompetent. Surely there must come a point where OP, despite finding the grimacing distracting, doesn’t immediately go to “oh she clearly thinks I’m a total loser”.

    2. Sneaky Squirrel*

      Agree and I wonder how the conversations end when they’re discussing. Are they more often settled by going with her POV, LW’s, or is it a true reconciliation of the two? If her viewpoints ends up often being the decision point that they go with more so than LW’s viewpoints, it may be that LW has internalized the grimace as a sign that LW’s about to “lose” the debate.

  57. Tech Industry Refugee*

    OP #5:

    I **insist** on getting a peer review before any of my documentation is released to the client. I am a professional writer and I still make mistakes sometimes. It’s also a good opportunity to loop in junior employees for exposure to different areas of the company.

    Just make sure you select a peer reviewer with attention to detail, and specify the kind of feedback you are looking for.

  58. Bananapants*

    LW5 One trick I use when reviewing my copy (when feasible) is to use a different program to view the file. So, for example, I’ll open it in Chrome or Google Docs instead of my usual software or read through it in the Windows explorer preview pane. It stops me from seeing things the way I *want* them to be.

    1. Bananapants*

      Oh also Word’s text to voice feature. It’s annoying to listent to, but it’s way easier to catch errors and gives your eyes a break!

  59. Baela Targaryen*

    I don’t care why the coworker is grimacing — it’s rude, and she needs to knock it off. Obliviousness to how your expression is read isn’t an excuse.

  60. Keymaster of Gozer (she/her)*

    5. Change of setting. Getaway from your usual computer and put the text/data on another format.

    I keep several different electronic devices for this reason. What looks perfectly ok on the work desktop (number 1) looks entirely different on work laptop when I’m checking it out sat in the chair facing backwards. If you go through a door it works even better (there’s a whole set of psychology involved in why you forget things when you go through a doorway).

    Our brains are both more advanced than a computer and in some ways less advanced.

  61. A Simple Narwhal*

    #5 Another suggestion is to paste your work into the Hemingway Editor (hemingwayapp [dot] com).

    It will analyze for grammar and spelling errors, as well as readability. It’s free and super useful! My last job involved a lot of writing, and my boss insisted we run everything through it first before submitting our work for approval. It really helped improve my writing.

  62. Generic Name*

    #5 Hopefully this isn’t too obvious, but if it’s a word document (rather than a spreadsheet) use Word’s built in spell check feature. I think it’s called “editor” now or something. I can’t tell you how often I catch spelling mistakes while I’m reviewing other’s work that would have been caught with spell check.

  63. Lisa B*

    OP #5 – take advantage of software tools also! Make sure spellcheck is not only turned on but the options for grammar/capitalization/ etc are all turned on. Also, see if your organization has an authorized AI that you can enter information in. My org has a “safe sandbox” of Microsoft CoPilot that won’t send information you enter into the algorithm to feed future answers. So you could enter your writing, and use the prompt “You are a college writing professor and I have just submitted this writing sample to you. Critique for spelling, grammar, subject/verb agreement, (list of other things you know you specifically struggle with). Give a corrected version for me to review but also give me feedback on common errors you found and how I can better write next time.” I tell ALL my staff to run their work through Copilot, especially if they have a section that sounds wordy or that they’re struggling with. It’s incredibly helpful.

  64. Frosty*

    This will get lost in the sea of comments, but for LW#3 grimacing – I have a fairly expressive face and often don’t know that I’m doing it! My mom used to call me on it – more of a check in or a mild tease, and now I can sometimes do it for myself.

    The other day my boss called to me from his doorway – a neutral greeting from someone with with someone I have a good relationship. It broke my concentration so I turned him with a furrowed brow… immediately I said “whoa I’m sorry about that face” and he laughed saying it was fine. But I know that I looked extremely concerned or even irritated, when I was really neither – just a malleable face!

    I’d say if you have a good relationship with this person, gently check in with them – their expression might not actually be directly related to their feelings on the situation. They may still make that “face” but you would have more information on what it might mean (confused, refocusing, etc).

    You can ask her about it and still maintain a good relationship if you come from a place of curiosity rather than trying to change her behaviour.

  65. I'm just here for the cats!!*

    #1 I’m not a lawyer but aren’t non disclosure agreements for company proprietary things and client confidentiality? Like you wouldnt be able to say anything about the firms clients but you should be able to talk about how you are treated and what it’s like working at that firm.

    1. Kevin Sours*

      Also not a lawyer but… that’s what they’re *for*. But what they are intended for and what they can legally cover are different things. An NDA covering things like internal processes is probably valid (and if you squint hard enough that covers “what it’s like working at that firm”).

      That said there are exceptions for NDAs against public policy (and for hiding crime but that’s not really in play here) and some jurisdictions have made it explicit that you can use NDAs to hide abuse.

      Checking with a lawyer familiar with your jurisdiction and the exact wording of the NDA is good advice.

    2. Antilles*

      That very much depends on the exact wording. There are indeed NDAs which mostly focus on proprietary information and client confidentiality, but others add in other stipulations around poaching clients, contacting employees, or even non-disparagement clauses where you agree to not say anything negative on your way out.

  66. RG*

    LW5, if you have even a little bit of technical skill, I’d recommend looking into Word macros (assuming you’re using Word as your word processor). I am not very technical, but I implemented several macros for my team that would catch style guide errors that Word’s spell/grammar check wouldn’t. There are a lot of scripts already available online, and you can adapt them to your needs. For example, our style guide says that acronyms must be defined the first time they are used, so I used a list of common company acronyms to create a macro that would highlight them in the document, prompting the writer to double-check that they were defined properly.

    This won’t be as helpful for stuff like general flow, but it’s great for standardized stuff that’s covered in style guides or SOPs.

  67. HA2*

    I had that issue with an expressive face! My first job outside grad school I had a client-facing role, and one of the salespeople pulled me aside about it, since it would look like I was actively disagreeing with the speaker (I was a technical expert and the salespeople were not tech folks, so it wasn’t rare for them to say something that in my head I would think is not quite right but really was close enough for the pitch they were giving).

    The workaround I found for myself is that when I notice myself reacting to something being said, I just nod. It’s a noncommital gesture that could mean “I agree” but also could just mean “I’m listening”, and it’s vaguely positive so it preempts any negative face-expressions.

  68. SpringIsForPlanting!*

    For the faces… if any of these meetings are online, can you normalize ‘no-video’ calls with this colleague? Ideally they would not have squinch face, for all the reasons mentioned, but if you couldn’t SEE it, maybe it wouldn’t throw you.

  69. Knighthope*

    LW#1 – If the community/profession is that small, chances are that others know a lot more from the grapevine about your boss’ behavior and nature than you imagine!

    1. BostonANONian*

      This!! LW #1, I’m in a small, niche legal field. I worked for a crappy boss. EVERYONE knows what she is like. I mean everyone. Judges, attorneys, paralegals. When I interviewed for my current job, the partner I met with told me that I couldn’t stay where I was, because my boss’s reputation was so bad. I promise you – people know.

  70. i like hound dogs*

    I’m enjoying reading all of these proofreading suggestions! I’m a corporate proofreader and I do very much prefer to mark things up on paper. Other than that, I just read things very slowly — and twice. I’m a fast reader in general but people don’t tend to understand how unbelievably slow you have to go to truly find all of the errors (or, I mean, most of them … we’re all human).

    That said, it’s SO MUCH HARDER to find mistakes in your own writing. I have no tips other than trying to get a second set of eyes on it.

  71. Religious Nutter*

    LW1 – I really feel for you. I had to hand in notice to an abusive boss once, and it was so stressful I nearly broke down. In that case, the guy backed off as soon as he knew I was leaving and my notice period was surprisingly pleasant. It doesn’t sound like that’ll be the case with you.

    I agree with Alison that if she’s going to bad-mouth you no matter what, you might as well just leave immediately. You’d never use her for a reference, and that’s the only thing an employer can really hold over your head. That said, a great way to take the “high road” is to give her your two week notice, and then wait for the next abuse. You can then cut it off right then and there.

    “I wanted to take these two weeks to wrap up my work and ease the transition, but I expect to be treated professionally. If you can’t manage that, then today will be my last day.”

    What is she going to do? Fire you?

    It might be fun to stand up to her on your way out, but first and foremost you should protect your mental health.

    PS – If there’s whole _support groups_ around being employed by her? It seems unlikely that anyone will take her opinion seriously. There’s no way that the other law firms in the area are ignorant of her behavior.

  72. wear floral everyday*

    I’ve worked as a scientific editor for a couple of years and what helped me was to follow my checklist when proofreading and break down the process into smaller pieces. For example, first reading checking out for spelling errors. Second time, focusing on tables and numbers. Third, check formatting and punctuation and the list goes on. Focusing on one thing at the time was really helpful for me!

  73. Cinnamon Stick*

    I’ve asked a current managers for a reference, but it’s been when I was coming up on the end of a contract or funding for my position ran out.

  74. Salty Caramel*

    I’ve had job offers pending reference checks that HAD to include one from my current supervisor. I was able to do so, but it really bothered me.

  75. Strive to Excel*

    OP #5

    It’s worthwhile to figure out *what kind* of mistake your managers want you to catch. From what you say about reading and re-reading, it sounds like you’re chasing down spelling & grammar issues. Those are notoriously hard to proofread yourself, and very time-consuming to do so (sitting down and reading your document out loud is a time suck). Is that what they actually want you to focus on? Or are they looking at more fundamental mistakes?

  76. AlwaysEditing*

    I’m an editor, and I think I’m very good at my job. But Grammarly has saved my butt a few times.

    1. RedinSC*

      Right? My partner purchased it for himself because he knows he’s not good at catching that kind of thing.

  77. My Work Mask Is Cracking*

    Letters 2 and 3 both sound like asking other people to adjust their comforts for LW’s comforts.

    2: Walk away from the snacks. Temptations are not other people’s problems, and you can’t force everyone else in the world to stop doing what they’re doing because you are “tempted”. There are ways to mitigate temptation: don’t go in the room, don’t eat it, don’t participate, don’t eat it, chew it and spit it out, fill up on your preferred food, don’t eat it, or, just don’t eat it.

    3: If you work closely with this person, surely by now you know their personality and quirks, and that’s how their face reacts?

    Ignore it. It’s better than stopping every conversation to ask her about her face. If she makes a face while you’re talking, well, that’s information for you. She doesn’t like it. She disagrees. Communication includes words, expressions, movement, posture, gestures, tone. You’re asking her to not do that simply because it makes YOU react. Huh.

    She doesn’t slap you across the face when she hears something she disagrees with. She reacts. And then by your account she is able to have a productive and professional exchange.

    You say that you work well with her. Let her face be.

    1. Coldhands*

      Just flagging that the “chew it and spit it out” mentality can be considered disordered eating. It was the gateway drug, so to speak, for me and a bunch of other girls in high school when we were all obsessed with our weight. I would strongly recommend NOT doing that.

      1. My Work Mask Is Cracking*

        Fair, so ignore that. My point is that there are many things that this person can do that doesn’t involve making other people behave in a certain way.

  78. Grandma Vhagar*

    I feel for your brother, LW2. I used to work at a university and our department always seemed to end up with random breakfasts/lunches/leftovers from big meetings. It was so hard to avoid!

    The only thing that ever ended up working for me was drinking a LOT of water (in addition to the filling lunches I’d bring for myself — mainly oatmeal). It would consistently help me feel too full to go for the sweets and if I had a couple water flavoring mixes on hand, it kept it interesting enough that I wouldn’t get bored. Eventually, resisting will get easier! It’s all about reconditioning your brain.

    Also: have a little treat set aside for yourself. I’d keep Hershey’s dark chocolate kisses in my desk and let myself have two or three, which got me the chocolate fix without going overboard.

  79. Orv*

    #4 makes me wonder how people handle it when they don’t have enough references without the current employer. I’ve been in my current job for eight years, and I was in my previous job for nine. That means I really only have one recent reference if I skip my current employer, and it seems like most job application systems want three.

    1. Sola Lingua Bona Lingua Mortua Est*

      Similar boat, I was in my last role for close to 15 years. I just had to opt-out of applications where the employer embraced the reference woo.

  80. oaktree*

    LW5: It’s really hard to proofread yourself. If it’s possible, set the work aside for a day and then proof. The distance can really help.

  81. Your pit of rage*

    LW2: Depending on whether the amount of treats is really obscene, and how many coworkers agree with your brother, maybe the office could collectively agree on a local homeless shelter, domestic violence shelter, food pantry etc where they could drop off some of the treats once or twice a week. They would be spreading the wealth with folks who need extra calories. Just a thought – there is a lot of hidden and not-so-hidden food insecurity in the world.

  82. t4ci3*

    I notice that lot of the responses to #3 seem to be based on the assumption that , by LW describing their coworkers expression as a ‘visible grimace’ they meant ‘exaggerated, melodramatic theatrical grimace’ and not ‘a facial expression visible to the human eye’, and I think that we need clarification before giving any actual advice because many of the suggested responses would be absurd if B is the case rather than A. I also think that the LW’s level of anxiety response to a coworkers facial expression needs to be taken into consideration when deciding if this is a coworker problem or an LW problem, people with manipulative parents often have outsized reactions to a negative expression, but poor ability to accurately judge a facial expression.

  83. Crooked Bird*

    I’ve been having a spot of trouble with telemarketers lately, so my first thought on #3 was “excuse me, Coworker, I’d like to be put on the ‘do not grimace’ list please…”

  84. MotherofaPickle*

    A lot of these actually resonated with me today.

    #3 I have no real poker face. A grimace, at least in my experience, doesn’t mean anything negative, just that I am thinking and processing. A lot of my underlings quickly learn to read my face. Their to-go response was “No, we can’t bother her right now”. And then they would make fun of me to my face about how angry I got at my computer or how “in it” I was in whatever project I was working on.

    #4. My best manager ever: “I would hate to lose you, but I don’t expect you to be here forever. Of course I’ll give you a good reference!” I applied for a BS PT job and informed him that I put his name/number down. My former manager did the same. You work in a toxic environment.

    #5 Have a trusted coworker check your work. It’s very easy to have a blindness to your own writing.

  86. Blue Pen*

    #5 — I agree with (and employ) all of Alison’s suggestions; I would add a few additional thoughts:

    *Run your work through spell check or Grammarly—not every suggestion is perfect or even makes sense, but I’m surprised at how efficient the latter is at catching mistakes and suggesting areas to clarify. The suggestions are usually good, too.

    *I totally back reading your work out loud; but I would urge you to do so slowly and deliberately. If you’re flying through and reading what you already think the document says, chances are high you won’t catch anything. You can also have a screen-reader read it back for you.

    *In addition to changing the font, I even change up the font size. It’s crazy, but it helps.

    *To the extent you can, I would close out or step away from your work for at least an hour and come back to it with fresh eyes. It’s crazy what you’ll catch this way (or come up with cleaner/clearer way of saying something).

    *Have a neutral party read it for you.

  87. Sava*

    #5. Have word read back your work with read aloud in the review tab. You’ll hear the words you missed.

  88. Seen Too Much*

    LW5 – If this is text and the issue is spelling – read it backwards. When you aren’t reading sentences, it is easier to catch spelling errors. Even with numbers – if you are looking at the numbers right to left, It is easier to spot that you put an 8 instead of a 3.

    Also, take a break. Do another task or two, then come back to it, so that your brain isn’t filling in what you think it should be.

    Last, but not least – use a larger font. Don’t worry about seeing everything at once. I know that when I am working on a large document, making the font larger brings the letters into focus. I find it easier to notice if I have forgotten a comma or period.

    Oh- I lied – real last one – check your math – check formulas – I was working on a spreadsheet, for weeks, I thought it was finished, but the numbers weren’t looking correct – turns out I had one wrong formula that threw everything off.

  89. Texas Teacher*

    LW 5 I’m a retired teacher and dyslexic
    I agree with the suggestions Allison gave and want to add some more.
    1. Read the passage from back to front – specifically if looking for spelling errors.
    2. If possible use text to voice to read the work to you. Specifically, one that doesn’t have AI enhancements to add inflection. A blah voice might make grammar errors stand out more.
    3. In addition to changing the type of font change the size.
    4. Experiment with different color fonts/backgrounds if you can do so. Obviously, you will change it back to standard – black font/white background but for some people, less contrast reduces eye strain and the errors that come with it. For me black fonts and white backgrounds create “3-d shadows” that aren’t actually there but make it harder to read.

  90. FionasHuman*

    Read it sentence by sentence from the bottom. It’s amazing the difference changing the order can make!

  91. Jazzy*

    #3 – It’s not black and white. “either you can control your facial expressions all the time, or you’re just making those faces on purpose”. I’m on the autistic spectrum, so It’s frustrating to be misunderstood so often because of the way my face is shaped and how it tends to naturally move, especially since I’m not even aware of all the ways I’m apparently expressing myself incorrectly.

    I can mask up and “poker face” for short periods of time, but it takes a lot– I mean A LOT of my energy. I have to consciously think about it the entire time, and it exhausts me very quickly. If I do it too much, I put myself at risk of having a meltdown or shutdown. If your natural tendencies line up more closely with the norm, you can’t know how much awareness and effort it actually takes to contort your face into the “right” expressions. So yes, I do have some control over it, but it has to take away from other important aspects of the conversation, like speaking, listening, processing what’s said, taking notes, and actually contributing.

    It’s not like I’m just pissed off at people all the time and complaining about having to hide my resentment for everyone around me… It’s more that my resting face is perceived as angry, even when I don’t feel that way. My “thinking” face even moreso. In general my expressions are perceived as more “extreme” than how I really feel. So mild annoyance will make me look pissed. Or I may come off as WAY too excited in a way that puts people off, when I don’t really feel THAT excited. Often when I hear something I disagree with, my face my scrunches up not out of frustration, but from hearing something I didn’t quite expect and processing it.

    In order to mask up around upper management and clients, I have to prepare in other ways to ensure I still have the bandwidth to speak and listen. I make notes and scripts so I can carefully monitor my face. I tend to be very quiet in meetings where I mask my face unless I have a presentation or bullet points I wrote down beforehand. I can’t think of useful things to say, say them, listen intently, AND keep my face in an acceptable shape for other people all at the same time. The more I have to mask, the less bandwidth I have to meaningfully contribute in the moment.

    When I’m having a work conversation with a colleague, I can’t lean on scripting or preparation as much because I don’t know what to expect, and have to come up with an answer relatively quickly. If I trust someone, I will mask less and put more energy into actually contributing to the conversation and being an active listener.

    If this colleague is able to have an open dialogue with you civilly, it sounds like her “grimacing” has less to do with their internal feelings and more to do with your perception of their natural facial expressions, which may be more extreme than the norm. I’m not saying she is on the spectrum, but like, you’ll probably be a lot kinder to people you meet in the future who are if you accept that some people’s outward faces don’t match their internal feelings, and that just because someone can do something in one context, that doesn’t mean they can do it all the time in all contexts.

    Try to pay less attention to this colleague’s face when you’re talking. Talk to the wall above her head or another person in the group and not pay attention so closely or try to guess what she’s thinking. You really don’t know what’s going on in her head so you don’t need to worry about it. You know she’s going to tell you what she really thinks later, anyways.

    It sounds like overall you both feel comfortable with talking through disagreements. Maybe bringing it up will help, or it might make her feel less comfortable around you, and monitoring herself so closely may make her less able to actually listen and understand what you’re saying, less able to contribute and express those disagreements that produce productive conversation.

  92. Un, Deux, Trois, Cat*

    I’m a teacher – I tell my students to put their finger under each word as they re-read what they have written. It forces you to read what you actually wrote and not what you planned to write.

  93. Jodi*

    #2 I’ve never worked anywhere where treats weren’t set upon the minute a vendor dropped them off. They were gone in seconds and there was certainly no issue with needing to donate leftovers anywhere! I would bet the other co-workers would be pretty annoyed if one or two employees took it upon themselves to ask the vendor to stop sending treats because they found them too tempting. If OP’s brother knows one of the vendors well, he could express a desire for healthier options, but these are gifts and he’s free to pass on eating them.

  94. Reading Tips*

    I’m sure its come up already (I am not reading through all the comments very quickly) but to the last letter writer: Reading the document backwards actually helps find errors! I do that all the time with my school work because even changing fonts and reading out loud, I skip over a lot of errors. But if I am reading it backwards (last sentence first, then the next to last sentence, etc.) I can actually find the errors! I hope this helps.

  95. Lizard Lady*

    LW5- I get the impression you work more with words than numbers, but just in case, sometimes it helps to go backwards. Work calculations in reverse, or read the number(s) you are transcribing right to left

  96. Radiolarion*

    #5 You didn’t mention what type of errors you were making, but if you’re doing anything quantitative like calculations or code, it’s not super helpful to read over your work and much more helpful to think of sanity checks. Do the numbers you get make sense in broader context? If you plug in some sample numbers for which the answer is obvious, does your calculation give you the right answer? Are all of your numbers in the right unit?

    I supervise programmers and one of the trickiest things with some beginners is training them out of thinking it’s reasonable to check for errors by just reading their work over. Very curious whether something analogous is ever true of non quantitative work!

  97. Serious Silly Putty*

    Re #5: I wonder if the person’s previous reference was from a part-time/student/temporary job. There are some situations where it is clear that a person will be looking for the next step, and average managers would support them in that. (GOOD managers should support their employees in their next steps regardless, but even average managers must concede that many part time employees are going to transition to wanting/needing full time work.)
    I had a colleague (full time but entry level) who was applying for a special job program and used our boss and it didn’t seem odd at all. The boss even joked during the reference check: “Oh Sarah? She’s, uh, always late, um, horrible attitude, you definitely wouldn’t want her and should leave her here with us.” (Before highlighting Sarah’s excellent attributes.)

  98. Rose*

    I plug my work into gramerly – not to have it correct me but to read it out loud. This helps me immensely

  99. Statler von Waldorf*

    I know I’m late to the party on this one, but I really wanted to repeat the advice that the non-disclosure agreement that LW#1 signed almost certainly doesn’t cover as much as the LW thinks it does. I’ve seen lawyers bully people using one before, even though the NDA wasn’t worth the paper it was written on.

    Seriously, I’d pony up the bucks have a friendly lawyer take a look at it. It might not cost as much as you think. If your boss is as bad as you say, she’s probably pissed off opposing counsel more than once. I have 100% seen a lawyer give a client a really good deal on legal rates before just because the lawyer in question really didn’t like the person that client wanted to sue.

  100. Anita Brake*

    Re: #5-when I proofread something really important, I read backward. I don’t try to pronounce the words backward, but for instance, in the sentence “Joe has a blue dog.” I would read “dog” “blue” “a” “has” “joe”. For some reason, when I do this I catch more errors; maybe because my eyes are moving right to left and they have to “normalize” to read each word? Not sure, but anyway, it helps me.

    P.S. Speed will come with practice, but for now, they can have correct or fast. Not both.

  101. stitchinthyme*

    Wondering if another possible exception to #4 would be if you’ve been at the same job for a long time. I’ve been at my current company for 11 years, I lost touch with my direct supervisor from the job before that (where I worked for 5 years), and that company’s owner has a policy of never giving references; he’ll only verify employment dates. I assume that jobs before that, which would be 15+ years in the past, would be too old to use as references.

    Luckily, my current managers are decent people and it’s unlikely that I’d face any negative consequences if I were looking and asked them for references, but I am curious about the best way to handle references in this sort of situation, especially if you do work at a place where your management might react poorly to finding out that you’re job searching.

  102. Space Face*

    #3 – I often have no idea what my face is doing during meetings. Highly recommend talking with the grimacing coworker about her face in private first. I have also seen the call-it-on-the-spot technique attempted (not directed at me, but in a meeting between supervisors) and “why are you making that face?” got a highly defensive “I’m not making a face” response. No idea if it changed the face-maker’s long term behavior but the meeting stopped being productive at that point. Craft your response wisely.

  103. nnn*

    I theorize what’s happening in #3 is OP and colleague have different unspoken concepts of whether their meetings with each other are frontstage or backstage (in the Goffman sense). Colleague is thinking “This is a backstage conversation, I don’t have to do the labour of faking facial expressions” and OP is thinking “Why isn’t Colleague giving me the same basic professional etiquette she gives others?”

  104. Hannah K*

    #5 — this may be mentioned already, but playing it with a text-to-speech site or app (with appropriate security protocols for confidential info of course) is fantastic for writing. It catches typos and weird words that my reading brain doesn’t pick up on.

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