updates: my friend accused me of getting him fired, the jerk on the plane, and more

by Alison Green on March 27, 2025

Here are four updates from past letter-writers.

1. My friend accused me of getting him fired, but I didn’t (#3 at the link)

Thanks again for publishing my question. I was nervous about submitting it but your advice helped me realize that my fellow writer and friend knew the risks of what he was doing by going against our employer’s company policy.

I also realized through the comments section that I didn’t fully explain what this policy meant! As with other media outlets, our employer publication strictly forbids us from accepting trips, dinners, or expensive gifts from businesses or individuals in exchange for writing about them. It is written in our contract as well. There are writers that overlook these requirements, such as my friend, and choose to accept these comps and write articles in return.

Along with my friend, I know at least two other writers who were discovered and fired for doing the same thing. Like you said, I’m guessing that my friend was fired and reacted to me out of irrational thinking. Out of the blue, he DMed me saying that I was two-faced. It seemed to have come out of nowhere. I was shocked and I didn’t reply right away or ask what this accusation was about or didn’t think about doing so.

I had no idea what happened to him until hearing about it later from the media grapevine. I never found out why he would assume I would do something like this. Around the time of this happening, I had a fallout with a mutual colleague that turned out to be a complete jerk. I don’t know if she planted that idea in his head or not.

A few months later, he seemed to realize that I didn’t say anything and he tried to make amends. It turned out that his editor knew what was going on and was building a case for his firing by collecting his social media postings from his trips and work dinners as evidence.

We seem better now but I’ve become more cautious around him and within my work circles about who I socialize with or what I share. I’m a freelancer in a certain field that is very tight and competitive, so I’m trying to retool myself either to return to a staff position or obtain another steadier means of income.

2. A fellow conference attendee was a jerk on the airplane

TL;DR: Reporting the jerk to the company seems to be the right thing to do, but doing so, even if I have a way, may not generate a desirable outcome for me.

I consulted some HR professionals in my country informally, anonymously about my situation. Unfortunately, my employer’s policy does not cover people from other companies. In addition, no other parties were seemingly affected so the situation was a “he-said-she-said” one. The most important point was that HR’s function was to protect the company and not me: HR from the jerk’s company would see me as a risk to their company’s reputation. The HR from the jerk’s company would ignore me even if my message reaches their inboxes. In the future, they may ignore my job applications to reduce the possibility of a complaint.

The jerk needed to cause more trouble on the flight such as a criminal act before the company HR would take action.

3. Irrational jealousy over colleague’s promotion (#80 in this speed round)

My teammate who got promoted got very little training and no support in her new-to-her manager role. She was constantly told that managing is hard and is a different skillset , but wasn’t given any help developing that skillset. She stepped back down to individual contributor after only a year. Soon afterwards she quit because she was told her time as a manager had reset her time-in-grade to zero, making her ineligible for a promotion to the next IC level any time soon. Seems like I dodged a bullet!

4. How honest can I be that I need more WFH days if I’m going to stay? (#5 at the link)

No joy on the extra WFH day, which is kind of unsurprising. I didn’t lay out specifically that I would be looking for work elsewhere as it just felt too much like an ultimatum. If they had been open to the option, I think they would have inquired how much of a priority it was , but their opposition to remote work kind of supersedes all.

Been doing the commute for a few weeks now, it’s on public transport and I’ve been taking the early train to allow me to leave early which gets me home in time for dinner and bedtime. It’s been kind of fine! And it’s been amazing spending time in our beautiful new town.

Attempting to kick the job search into gear though. Apprehensive as I feel like I will need a transfer out of my industry (dysfunctional, bad salaries abound), which feels overwhelming. Will update properly when I get the new role, fingers crossed!

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{ 56 comments }

{ 56 comments… read them below }

    1. HailRobonia*

      I bet if your birthday is on February 29 they only recognize it once every four years…

        1. The Unspeakable Queen Lisa*

          Ha! I agree, with TeenieBopper, I said out loud, “that’s bullshit”.

    2. Observer*

      Agreed. Dodged a bullet indeed!

      But also, if you are good at what you do, maybe start looking at other opportunities?

    3. MassMatt*

      The promotion to manager with no training or support is bad but sadly commonplace. The next to last sentence re: the person promoted being reset to be ineligible for other positions makes it next level awful.

    4. CrazyCatWriter*

      I read the follow-up, and the original question, and I was thinking, “Dang, that hits kinda close to home.”

      About eighteen months before COVID, a manager left for another opportunity. The department director Danielle (not real name) announced immediately that she was promoting Andrew (also not real name) to take the open slot. Andrew was super junior (in terms of tenure and at Assistant level), had no management experience, had no experience working with our clients directly, was surly and standoffish in our department, and had a reputation with other departments of being difficult to work with. One of Andrew’s new reports came to me to complain, saying that he’d have applied for the position if it had been posted. (It was not.) Frankly, I would have, too.

      Naturally, this blew up on several occasions over the next eighteen months where Andrew would have to represent the company at industry events; the Advertising Manager said to me one day after one such event, “Andrew was badmouthing our customers in front of other customers!” Andrew disappeared in early March 2020 and refused to come into work before any sort of WFH procedure was implemented. (The company was slow at that. I think there was some denial going on.) Andrew was let go during the early days of COVID; without events to represent the company, his position was seen as redundant, and Andrew’s reports were passed on to another manager.

      No one could ever figure out why Danielle promoted Andrew in the first place, unless it was because they had bonded over Pokémon Go.

  2. Richard Hershberger*

    #1 This guy was accepting illicit meals and trips, and posting on social media about them? Then when he gets caught, the only explanation he can think of is that the LW ratted him out? Not, I think, the sharpest tack in the box.

    1. Palmer*

      Ya, destroying a friendship with an unfounded accusation like that leads me to think this person might not have the best judgement… might be better off keeping more distance from that friend.

      They showed you who they are, believe them.

    2. Aerin*

      It blows my mind what people will post to social media. It’s probably a generational thing (I first got on Facebook when it was still limited to certain colleges) but does it occur to them that you can always… not post a thing? Use your privacy settings so only certain people can see it? You are under no obligation to share every cool thing you do, and that goes quintuple for when you’re doing a thing that carries serious negative consequences…

      1. mreasy*

        I don’t think it is generational (we’ve all seen the havoc older folks wreak on Facebook). I just think some people don’t have much common sense.

        1. Jillian with a J dammit*

          It always amazes me how many people, of all ages, will call in sick to work and then post pictures at a ballgame or amusement park. Perhaps forgetting that they are “friends” with co-workers or even supervisors.

          1. Elizabeth West*

            Or that they have their Facebook posts set on public. Half my cohort sticks everything out there for the world to see and forgets it can actually see them.

            1. Princess Sparklepony*

              I get accused of being a bot because my FB is so locked down.

              You do not need to know a thing about me, including what I look like!

      2. Rogue Slime Mold*

        Even then, I remember some college seniors applying to jobs being like “Ha, what’re companies gonna do, hire someone in college to check my Facebook page?” Like this was an inconceivable technical leap.

      3. Yvette*

        Like those idiots who push over rock formations in parks and put it on Facebook or YouTube or whatever, and are so so surprised when they get caught and punished

    3. Observer*

      Really!

      I am really glad that the LW is being cautious around this guy. Neither ethical nor smart. That’s a pretty toxic combination.

    4. MassMatt*

      LW #3’s “friend” has got to be one of the dumbest written about here, which is saying something. You engage in payola, taking dinners and trips in exchange for positive reviews/writeups, and POST ABOUT IT ON SOCIAL MEDIA, get caught, and in addition to surprised Pikachu face, lash out at a friend? Terrible person.

    5. Rogue Slime Mold*

      It put me in mind of all those letters in which people’s illicit workplace affair is revealed, and they believe it must be one specific person rather than being visible to the entire office, and possibly from space.

    6. Impending Heat Dome*

      I was gonna say, this dude is the poster child for “Loose Lips Sink Ships”. I would dial my professional (well, any) relationship with him back to “Yes, I know him” and nothing more. First, he signs a contract and then knowingly violates it for personal gain, then he’s dumb enough to post publicly while doing it, and then when he gets caught, he lashes out at his colleagues for apparently “getting him in trouble”. Yikes! This dude is radioactive. Stay far away so you don’t accidentally get contaminated with his mess.

    1. Artemesia*

      One can only hope that someday the OP will be on a committee evaluating people for awards, or for hiring and this guy will be sitting in a chair in front of her. There are moments like that. I have enjoyed a couple in my career. Hope she has the pleasure.

    2. Bea*

      “Unfortunately, my employer’s policy does not cover people from other companies.”

      You’re disappointed that one employer’s HR can’t fire or reprimand someone at another completely different company, just on someone’s word that the person was rude to them on a plane??

      I’d be horrified and disappointed if it DID.

      1. Archi-detect*

        I think they meant that if OP reported it to the company of the offender’s HR, they wouldn’t act on it. Honestly, that is still reasonable as it is hearsay to use the legal term, or he said she said for the normal one. If they did fire him over it, that feels like an easy lawsuit if it wasn’t true, and HR has no way to verify

  4. Bruce*

    LW3 I declined a promotion a few years ago, luckily my boss reacted well (he was retiring and wanted me to take over, I instantly told him “No way!!!”). We found another candidate to replace my boss, and as a bonus I stepped back to an individual role and we promoted one of my staff to take my role… something I’d been grooming him for since we first hired him! Both of them have done as well as can be expected, and I have no regrets!

  5. Buldak*

    LW4, sorry to hear that and hope your search goes well! All of us are expecting your employer to be like, “whaaaaat? How can we get you to sTaY??” once you put your two weeks in.

    1. Artemesia*

      yup. Hope you get to relish the moment you say ‘well I asked for more WFH time and it was not possible here, so of course I began to look elsewhere.’

  6. Observer*

    #1 – False accusation.

    This guy has shown you who he is. Be *very* cautious about *anything* he tells you. Don’t believe anything he tells you and also watch your back.

    1. Not Tom, Just Petty*

      OP, realized that he is REALLY, REALLY self centered. He thinks that people are out to get him, not that his actions got him in trouble. Not only his actions of breaking the rules of his contract, but the actions of posting about it on social media. He is a dangerous level of oblivious. Don’t share any professional info, job searches, career moves with him. He is not going to help you.

  7. Seashell*

    I can’t imagine not responding “What?” or “Huh?” if someone randomly messaged me that I was two-faced. My first thought would be that they sent it to the wrong person or something was mistakenly autocorrected.

    1. Salsa Verde*

      Yeah, that’s the part that seemed really strange to me. I would never ignore that message from someone I considered a friend, and I would 100% try to find out why they thought that.

      It’s interesting that the LW did not seem interested in doing either of those things, but maybe she knows it’s not worth it with this guy.

      1. The Unspeakable Queen Lisa*

        If it’s not a close friend, I could absolutely see being stunned and not knowing how to reply in the moment and closing out of the app. Then after you sit with it, maybe you think it’s not worth it to fight a false accusation about who knows what. I think this is the sort of moment where your reevaluate what you know about someone.

      2. Just say non*

        I agree! I can’t imagine someone falsely accusing me of something and not responding. I would be concerned he would badmouth me to a lot of people, e.g. that I “can’t be trusted to keep a professional confidence”.

    3. Academic Physics*

      If it was a passing friendship I can see myself doing that. Too little time, too little bandwidth for people who are one steps from strangers. I got cats to feed.

    4. Ess in Tee*

      Honestly I’d probably look at the message, think “yeah I’m not touching this,” and close the conversation. My time on earth is finite.

  8. Coffeemate is searching the globe*

    The guy on the plane does sound like a complete jerk, but I’m not surprised your HR people reacted that way – to them you’re some random person who happened to attend the same conference…

    1. Tippy*

      Agree. Can you imagine the insanity if people were now being called in to HR because someone, not associated with your company, who sat next to you on a plane is now calling your company because of alleged inappropriate behavior of which they have nothing to back any of it up?

      1. Six for the truth over solace in lies*

        It would certainly make harassment by bad actors very easy!

    2. umami*

      Yes, I am not sure why that even seemed like an option? Getting a call from a stranger on a plane with allegations about something an employee supposedly did during a flight is … sketchy. Plus, I thought their complaint was that the conference itself had rules against harassment, so I thought that was where she was hoping to call out his behavior. Not sure how that escalated to calling the guy’s HR after the fact. It’s not satisfying to not have an avenue for him to be punished, but the OP simply doesn’t have standing to report it in a way that would be actionable at this point.

      1. The Unspeakable Queen Lisa*

        The complaint was that the guy was awful, full stop. We all want awful people to get what they deserve. It’s totally natural to think, “Is there a way I can make sure this guy sees the consequences he deserves?” It’s also natural to try to think of an authority figure you could appeal to to fix the problem. And people have been fired for their public conduct after others reached out to their employer. Not absurd for her to have asked.

        1. umami*

          Yes, my comment was about how it would seem from the other side if she did reach out. She had no proof, no video, no anything to present beyond her words, and that would likely be viewed strangely by someone’s HR office. Sometimes you just have to hope that karma will take care of it when you don’t have any actual evidence to prove someone’s bad behavior. It’s not absurd to ask, but the ask was about reporting it to the conference, not about going to the offender’s HR.

  9. SunnyShine*

    LW2: There’s no justice here when people are jerks. The fact that the flight attendant cut him off from drinking and that you didn’t see him at the conference probably means he did or will get bad karma served to him. If he’s unpleasant to strangers like that, he’ll get caught eventually.

  10. New Jack Karyn*

    A lot of folks are saying, “How weird to complain to a company about their employee’s bad behavior when it wasn’t onsite or toward another employee.”

    It’s not that weird a concept. We can disagree on whether this guy’s behavior was bad enough to warrant official action from their company, but it’s not out of pocket for a complaint to be made.

    There was a letter a couple of years ago, from an LW who lost out on a job because of their behavior on the train with a person who turned out to be (I believe) the wife of the owner of the company. Alison made the point that, from the employer’s point of view, that interaction spoke to his character. Same thing goes here: The guy in question made racist and sexist comments, and purposely bumped the LW more than once.

    Thought experiment: What if the guy was wearing logo swag, and made an outright racist rant in public? It would not be unreasonable to let his company know the kind of person they have working for them.

    1. I'm a Birdplane*

      I don’t think it’s that specifically anyone thinks it’s weird to complain to a company about *their* employee, it’s that the LW was trying to complain to *her* HR. What is her HR meant to do?

      1. appo*

        yeah this is 10000% the disconnect, I’m sure they were very confused when she brought this up to them

    2. amoeba*

      I mean, I think the point is that there’s literally no proof – if it’s documented somehow (like in those prominent cases that were on the news recently…), sure, send that stuff to their HR! But it’s pretty obvious that they won’t be able to/want to do anything just on the word of a complete stranger with nothing to back them up. Just imagine how easy it would be to get somebody into trouble if HR took something like that seriously!

      1. Antilles*

        Bingo. The train LW doesn’t work as an analogy, because there’s a huge difference in the way the scenarios played out:
        -In the train case, the employer got from someone they know and trust (CEO’s spouse) about a complete unknown (candidate).
        -In OP’s case, it’s the exact opposite: The employer got information from a complete unknown (random person on plane) about someone they know and trust (current employee).

  11. Torgo*

    Long time reader, first time commenter. Regarding the jerk on the plane: as a sometimes event organiser and someone who takes codes of conduct seriously (I have on more than one occasion had to eject someone from an event or online forum due to code-of-conduct issues), I think the OP should have also reported the incident to the event. The person in question identified themselves by their company and as an attendee of this event. After having been subjected to their behaviour, the OP would probably have been at the very least filled with anxiety about encountering this person again at the event. This is the kind of thing that chills people, especially women, out of tech. If I were the organiser of this event, I would want to know about this person’s behaviour, even if it was on the plane.

    1. Kristin*

      I agree. If I was the event organizer I would want to know, too. I might also want to know if someone had to be cut off from alcohol on a plane among other behaviors, if my company was paying for the ticket. (And did he even attend the conference?) But, as others have said – karma is what we can hope for.

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