Ask a Manager

I’m off today. Here are some past letters that I’m making new again, rather than leaving them to wilt in the archives.

1. I got in trouble for saying “bite me” in a meeting

I recently attended an intense work group meeting with my boss and a coworker. The coworker responded to one of my questions with a joke, to which I responded jokingly back with “bite me.” Everyone laughed it off at the time, but in a recent routine meeting with the boss I was reprimanded. The boss said she looked up the term and it means “F off.” I am mortified because I do not think of that term in such a vulgar way. It was simply an quick response said in a joking manner, in private, in what I thought was a safe space. Am I wrong to feel a bit singled out?

I don’t think it means “F off” exactly, although it means something in the same neighborhood — and either way, it’s a fairly vulgar and aggressive term to use at work. There are some offices where it would be completely fine, and others where it would be jarringly out of place. Your boss has just let you know this one is the latter, at least in her view. That’s a reasonable call for her to make.

I doubt she’s going to hold a grudge over this, but if your sense is that it’s colored the way she sees you, you could always say, “I wanted to apologize again for my language the other day. I hear that term so often that I wasn’t thinking of it as vulgar, but I appreciate you flagging it for me and I won’t use it again.”

And keep in mind that work meetings aren’t a safe space — you very much will be judged on what you say in them, and even when you’re quite comfortable with a particular set of colleagues, you can still be expected to speak reasonably professionally.

– 2019

2. My coworkers are in a self-help cult

A few months back, my coworker Jason, then new to the team, was hawking a program which from Googling appears to be a for-profit self-help cult. Jason has done the full program and volunteers with them in his free time. Bernadette decided to try it and signed up for the the $800 intro course a couple of months ago. Over a recent weekend, she took the “advanced” course as well. In a team meeting this week, Bernadette spent about five minutes rambling an apology about how she has been dissatisfied at work because she wasn’t giving it her all and how she thinks she’s a bad team member and wants to do better, while Jason encouraged her with smiles and nods.

Bernadette has been a stellar team member for the past year other than this self-denunciation. I have no idea where her perception that she’s no good comes from, but my guess would be a combination of Impostor Syndrome and the cult. The unaccountable apology was uncomfortable and awkward for the rest of the team, and none of us knew what to say in that moment, so we all just sort of stared at our laptops. I don’t want anyone else here to be harmed by this expensive systematic bullying, nor do I want our team meetings to be disrupted by this kind of bizarre and unprofessional outburst in the future. What in the world do I do?

For now, I don’t think there’s much you need to do about the meeting disruption. If you start seeing more of this at meetings, you should flag it for your manager — but if it stays a one-time weird moment, I’d just leave it for now. You could, however, counter to Bernadette the critical things she said about herself.

You could also make sure that other people on your team know the facts about the organization, so that they might be more likely to decline if Jason or Bernadette try to recruit them (especially because trying to recruit is part of the model). You could try giving Bernadette and Jason that same information too, of course — but people caught up in things like this typically will have already been trained to resist outside critiques of the group, and it may cause some tension in your work relationships with them. (Which you might be fine with! Just factor that in.)

– 2019

Read an update to this letter here.

3. I pretended I’m allergic to bees when I’m not, and it made things weird

I’m fresh out of college and starting my first job, so I’m already self-conscious about how young and inexperienced I am. I was walking to my car with a few coworkers when I saw a bee on my car door handle. I have always had a fear of bees, so I panicked a little. One of my coworkers gave me a weird look, so I said, “Oh I’m allergic to bee stings and I don’t want to get sick.” Well, the nurse (I work at a school) overheard and now they’re asking for an allergy plan and Epi-pen. I’m not even really allergic! How do I get out of this without it seeming weird?

We’ve all said something weird in the spur of the moment and then later thought, “Why on earth did that come out of my mouth?”

Talk to the nurse privately and say, “I overstated the situation. I’ve been stung before so I’m afraid of it happening again, but I’m not actually allergic. I should have been clearer — I’m sorry for raising any alarm!”

– 2019

4. Did this candidate really work on the project she claims?

Someone has applied for a position in my department, who I will interview today. In looking at their LinkedIn profile, they claim to have worked on a project with which I am intimately familiar (at a previous company), and I don’t recall their involvement. Should I interview this person, or should I point out the inconsistency to the hiring manager, or contact HR, or …? There is a possibility that I simply do not remember the person, so should I reach out to people at the previous company and ask whether they remember this person?

Start by asking the person about it when you interview her. Ask about her role and the work she did and see what she says. If it sounds off to you, then yeah, at that point I’d reach out your former colleagues to see if you can verify what the candidate is telling you — but it’ll be more effective to do that once you know exactly what she’s saying she did.

It’s also okay to be up-front with the candidate that you’re familiar with the project and explain whatever your own involvement was. Not in a “gotcha” way, but in the normal way you’d do it if it you didn’t have any suspicions. That may or may not lead to any further light being shed on the situation, but it can make it more likely.

– 2017

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

1. “Girl boss” artwork appeared in the women’s bathrooms

A few days ago, new artwork appeared in all of the women’s bathrooms in our building (and we’ve confirmed that it’s only the women’s bathrooms). This artwork is of the inspirational “girl boss” variety, with phrases like “I am motivated to achieve my goals!” and “Work hard to achieve your dreams!” and “Stay focused!” There are also some quotes that feel religious-adjacent with words like “blessed” and “miracles” in them.

Because they appear to be officially installed by facilities, I strongly suspect a somewhat new admin is to blame since she’s the one who puts in orders for things like furniture and decorations. I think this was her misguided attempt at making the bathrooms more cheerful. Except every person who uses the women’s bathrooms is cringing at the result. It comes across as totally patronizing and out-of-touch (most people in this building work in technical roles). It’s been a bit of a running joke the past few days.

Do you have any suggestions for raising the issue without hurting anyone’s feelings? The last thing I want to do is get on the admin’s bad side (assuming I’m right and this was her project).

Can you take it to someone who’s not the admin? Her boss, or a facilities person, or whoever manages admin stuff?

You could simply say: “Some new artwork has showed up in the women’s bathrooms — and apparently only the women’s — that’s rubbing a lot of us the wrong way. It’s got religious terminology like ‘blessed’ and ‘miracles’ and some ‘girl boss’ themes that feel patronizing. Can that be removed?”

I can’t guarantee the admin’s feelings won’t be hurt (if indeed it was her), but there are other factors in play here that matter more — and it’ll be useful for whoever was behind the posters to learn why they weren’t universally embraced.

2. Interviewers seemed focused on conflict with coworkers

Years ago, during an extremely demoralizing job search, I was interviewing for a job in academia for which I had direct, extensive experience. It was one of those panel interviews where the interviewers take turns asking scripted questions. There was one pretty typical question asking me to share a time I dealt with conflict with a coworker. I gave a relevant example, emphasizing how I navigated the situation and preserved the relationship with the colleague.

So far, so good, and the panel asked me a couple other questions on other topics. But the following scripted question went back to conflicts with colleagues: “Tell us about a time you dealt with mistrust in a situation with a coworker.”

I managed to come up with a different story, but by this point, I was wondering about the culture of that department, even though everyone I was interviewing with was pleasant and at least seemed collegial. Part of me wanted to ask about colleague interactions and what was behind their second question about mistrust. But I couldn’t think of a respectful way to ask and, truth be told, I was so desperate to get a new job that I’m not sure concerns about a toxic culture would have dissuaded me from taking the job if I’d been offered it. (Spoiler alert – I did not get the job. Rather, they hired an internal candidate from an adjacent department).

In the end, I got hired at a completely different company with wonderful coworkers, so the university job was probably a bullet dodged. But I still wonder about a way I could have addressed what the panel’s questions seemed to imply.

If you ever notice a theme in interview questions that makes you uneasy or even just curious, you absolutely can ask about it! The basic formula is “you’ve asked a few times about X — is there anything I should know about that?”

So in this case: “You’ve asked a couple of times about conflict with coworkers. Has that been something that’s come up a lot in this role?” Or maybe, “You’ve asked a couple of times about conflict with coworkers. Is that something the person in this role is likely to have particular challenges around?

3. My old job forgot to remove my social media access — can I use this to get a new job with them?

It turns out I happen to know about a security issue at a large tech company. It’s not deep company secrets or anything, but I’ve realized I still have complete admin permissions on several of their social accounts. When I left this role in 2022, I emailed no fewer than five people two different times to tell them to remove me from these pages, but apparently they never did. (I only found out when checking an email folder that is normally just junk.) Technically, I can remove my own permissions (at least I used to be able to) since I’m an admin, but I didn’t because back when I still worked there I updated my own permissions once and when I let that team know they freaked out and said it should go through them. Clearly, they have not kept on top of it.

Can I do anything with this? I’m currently job hunting, so part of me wants to send a letter to the manager of this team letting them know about this problem and how I have the perfect experience to manage their audits, but I have no idea if that is a bonkers idea or would come across like a threat. I can do that anyway, just to let them know without any request or expectation, I guess. Or part of me thinks that this information should be worth something (even though it’s just stupidity on their part).

I’m not sure what I’m asking, maybe going on 15 months without a job has made me desperate, but if you have any thoughts for me I would appreciate it!

You can’t use it to get a job. It’s just a slip-up their side, and noticing it isn’t really a qualification on your side, or at least not enough of one that it wouldn’t look weird to try to use it that way.

Email the manager of the team and explain you noticed that you still have admin permissions, despite reminding them to remove you two years ago, and so your current plan is to remove yourself if they haven’t done so by (date) and you wanted to alert her so it doesn’t raise any alarms if they see you do that, and also so she’s aware there’s a security hole they might need to plug with other people too. Then, if that date comes and they haven’t removed you, remove yourself.

If that email provides an opening for you to mention you’re job searching and would love to talk about working with them again, you can use that — but that’s about the relationship you already have, not any kind of “gotcha” from their mistake.

4. Manager says we can only speak English at work

I work with a very diverse group of coworkers; more than half speak English as their second language. I’d say about half speak language A as their first language, a quarter speak language B as their first language, and a quarter speak English only.)

During a recent meeting, our manager reminded everyone that English is the only language we should be speaking at work. I know that insisting people speak English only is wrong, but are the rules different at work? Does it make a difference if it’s in front of other employees versus in front of clients? What about two employees speaking privately versus five employees speaking in a shared language in front of one employee who doesn’t?

I’m one of the few English-only employees so I didn’t feel comfortable judging and am planning on leaving soon for unrelated reasons, so I’m not planning on doing anything. I’m just curious about your take.

(I don’t know if it makes a difference, but my manager speaks English as a second language but does not speak language A.)

Employers can’t legally prohibit employees from speaking in another language unless if it’s justified by a business necessity, like when they’re waiting on English-speaking customers or doing team projects where an English-only rule will promote efficiency, or to allow a manager who only speaks English to monitor the performance of employees whose job involves communicating with others. So your manager’s blanket edict violates federal law.

5. Should I leave a short job off my resume?

I am in my late 50s, nowhere near able to afford retirement, and I can’t pay insurance out of pocket forever. After a short career in IT, I switched to nursing where I stayed 30+ years at one large university hospital. I stepped away in 2022 for complicated reasons, and now I’m trying to get back to work.

I am curious what you think of a late-career job seeker leaving a short-term position off the resume. Which is worse, a two-year gap, or the same gap with a two-month job in the middle of it? Or does it even matter at this point?

Since leaving the long-term job, I’ve submitted hundreds of applications and had maybe 10-15 that made it to screening calls or were forwarded for department consideration, a handful of actual interviews, and two job offers. One I turned down because when shadowing at the facility, I found it so far out of reasonable regulatory compliance, I ran far away.

With the second one, the job I wish to omit, there was a disconnect between what I was hired for and what they expected me to do. There was also a lot of information withholding in the department, a weird hazing vibe, leadership was rarely available by any means, and the final straw: I witnessed my supervisor-ish unofficial trainer verbally and physically assault another newish coworker over a made-up mistake. The coworker begged me not to report it because they were in the middle of trying to transfer to another department and didn’t want anything to mess that up. I resigned the next day. Total time there including notice: 8 weeks. I left eligible for rehire, good terms, I was able to bite my tongue and cite a reasonable explanation.

I’m keeping my resume as current and relevant as possible. I’ve had an outside resume expert review it. I pull out specific accomplishments from my tenure at the long-term job and tailor to fit each application. I’ve followed some suggestions to utilize AI to glean key words from job descriptions and further refine each application when needed. And I of course don’t cite the above toxic explanation when recruiters or applications ask for a reason for leaving – I say that I left to focus on the care of an ill family member. This, coincidentally, was true enough, and the reason I cited in my resignation.

Since including this eight-week-long position, interest in my applications seems down. This could be coincidence. I am considering taking it off the resume/applications. Any advice?

Take it off. Leaving after eight weeks raises a lot of questions, and you weren’t there long enough to have had accomplishments that would strengthen your resume enough to overcome those questions. Even with your explanation that you left to take care of an ill family member, the job is a weird blip that’s not helping you and is probably hurting.

You’ve either got a two-year gap or a nearly-two-year gap with an eight-week stint that abruptly ended. The gap on its own is better.