Ask a Manager

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

1. Was this birthday card inappropriate?

A coworker of mine will soon be celebrating her 28th birthday. So another coworker of ours picked out a birthday card from the shop in the lobby of our office building for everyone to sign and give to her. The card had a picture of a shirtless man on the front (he was wearing jeans and sitting on a motorcycle) and the inside of the card said something to the effect of, “I got you a six-pack for your birthday.” (Groan.)

It was my job to then go around to everyone in the company and ask them to sign this card. It occurred to me when I got to the offices of upper management that this card is probably not appropriate for the workplace. Should I have asked my coworker to go select a different card? Could it be considered sexual harassment to show people in the workplace this type of suggestive content?

That in and of itself wouldn’t normally be considered sexual harassment in the legal sense (it would need to be “severe or pervasive,” and this doesn’t sound like it rises to that level). However, there is a reasonable chance that your coworker would be a little skeeved out to get this kind of card from her coworkers, and that at least some people in your office would be skeeved out at signing it. And yeah, upper management probably isn’t going to think it’s the best choice.

To be clear, it’s not because a shirtless man is so scandalous. It’s that lots of people don’t want to sexualize their workplaces, even a little; they don’t want to think of their coworkers through the lens of sex, or be seen through that lens themselves.

It’s not that hard to find a birthday card that doesn’t do that, so yeah, I’d ask your coworker to find a different card, at least if you’re going to be the one passing it around.

2. Was I supposed to tell my manager that I listed her as a reference?

Do managers typically expect employees to get their permission to use them as a reference when looking for a new job? I have never thought so in the past, but I recently listed my supervisor as a reference on a job application, and the hiring manager called her after interviewing me. When I told my supervisor later that I got the job, she implied it would have been nice if I’d told her I was using her as a reference. What is the etiquette? We were on very good terms and she provided an excellent reference for me, so I found that sort of odd.

Yes. You should check with anyone you list as a reference before offering their name — out of courtesy but also because you want to confirm that they’ll give you a good reference. If this was  your current manager (which is what it sounds like, but I’m not positive),  it’s especially important, because you don’t want her to find out that you’re preparing to quit from a reference-checker; you want her to hear that from you.

3. My coworker’s mechanical keyboard is driving me crazy

I work in a cubicle with two other people in cubes near me. My company provides computers, keyboards, mouses, etc., but “Ed” in the cubicle next door has decided that he prefers a mechanical keyboard (which uses an actual physical switch to tell the computer that a key has been pressed, rather than a membrane common in most keyboards now). He purchased it on his own and brought it to the office to use on a daily basis.

The problem is that this mechanical keyboard is driving me CRAZY. It is much louder than a membrane keyboard and I find the clickety-clackety sound super distracting. Headphones are an option but I don’t like wearing them all day – that gets distracting for me as well.

I can deal with normal office noise – phones ringing, talking, and even (to some extent) people crunching on chips with their mouths open. But this noise is about to set me over the edge. Is there a nice way to ask Ed to stop using this keyboard and go back to the one the company provided? Or do I just have to grit my teeth and bear it because telling someone that their typing is too loud is a jerk move? (Additionally, our office will be moving in the future, not sure when, but at that point I’ll likely have an office making this whole point moot.)

You can try, but you might not be successful, since there’s a pretty good likelihood that he’s going decide that his preference for a mechanical keyboard outweighs your preference not to hear it.

But it would be totally to reasonable to try saying something like, “Ed, I’m so sorry to ask you this because I know that you prefer this mechanical keyboard. I’m finding that the noise of it stands out and is really distracting me. I’ve tried wearing headphones to block it out, but that hasn’t proved practical. Is there any chance I can convince you to revert back to the other keyboard?” If this were me and I had a decent relationship with Ed, I would also try bribing him with offers of food or something else I knew he might like.

But ultimately, you might need to accept that it’s a noise that’s not unreasonable to hear in an office, even though it does stand out.

(For what it’s worth, I actually kind of like the sound of mechanical keyboards and old typewriters and that kind of thing — it reinforces work mode for me and makes me feel like I’m in old-timey office setting, which I find enjoyable. Maybe there’s a mental switch in that direction that would work, if talking to him fails?)

4. My overtime hours are being banked for later

I’m non-exempt. If I work more than 40 hours a week, my employer moves the excess hours into what they call a “flex hour bank,” where I can take them out at any time and add them to a week when I haven’t worked very much. That way they don’t have to pay me overtime.

This process seems different than what I’ve found reading about flextime. As I understand flextime, you can’t just move originally overtime hours to another week entirely to avoid paying overtime. What do you think about this?

Nope, it’s not legal. Because you’re non-exempt, you must be paid overtime (time and a half) for all hours over 40 that you work in a given week. It cannot be put into a flextime bank — even if you agree, and even if you actively want them to, since you can’t waive your right to overtime pay.

(Weirdly, the exception to this is if you work for the government. They’ve exempted themselves from the law that prohibits private sector employers from providing comp time in lieu of pay for non-exempt workers.)

5. Update: Can I speak up about how our meetings always run way past the allotted time?

Here’s an update from the letter-writer in May who was wondering about speaking up about her office’s overly long meetings:

A quick update to my question about what to do about the interminable meetings everyone in my division was subjected to every month.

I have a very good relationship with the director and decided I would bring it up with her, framing it as you suggested. However, my plans to have that conversation were delayed by a medical emergency in her family, followed by a bunch of issues cropping up at work. For several weeks, I didn’t have much face time with her and so I decided to table this for the time being.

Happily, just last week she brought it up herself. Maybe she reads AAM! She simply asked during our annually planning session (which wasn’t as bad as you might expect) whether anyone thought we needed to make changes to the monthly meeting format. A few people – myself included – quickly chimed in with recommendations. It was resolved that we’d cut out the manager’s reports, do a division newsletter with that information instead, and shorten the meetings to focus on the company-wide updates and one longer presentation on a big-picture issue from a rotating cast of staff members.

Not surprisingly, the only manager who strongly objected to the changes was the worst prattler of them all. When someone (not even me!) suggested that the reports were a little (or a lot) mind-numbing, she said, “But not mine! I always make mine fun!!” I’m guessing she’s going to try to translate all of that “fun” into her newsletter contributions, but I’ll be able to skim right over them from the comfort of my office…

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

1. My boss lied to a client about getting engaged

My boss recently visited some of my clients who were out of state. In an effort to build rapport, he told them he was planning to propose to his girlfriend over the weekend. (I’m not sure why he wouldn’t talk about the weather or sports, but whatever). He has no intentions of proposing, and did not propose that weekend.

He asked me to send the follow-up materials to the client, and when I did, she replied and cc’d him and asked how the proposal went. This is where it gets weird. He then sent a follow-up email, detailing in multiple paragraphs the proposal and including pictures of him with his girlfriend. The client and members of the team all congratulated him.

Maybe this was just a joke and he was having a laugh (although if I was the girlfriend I’d be annoyed! – he is not engaged) but what worries me is how easily he lied, and then I realized he’s told white lies (stretched the truth?) about other stupid stuff that isn’t even worth lying about. Now I have to deal with a client who is super excited to work with us and keeps asking for updates. I’ve talked about this to a trusted friend at work and we agree my boss crossed the line with the email and photos.

Advice on how to handle the clients? Just shrug it off? How can I tell my boss he needs to cool it with the little white lies? He’s still young, only 27, so I feel he needs to get the straight path before these lies get bigger and bigger.

What the hell!? Seriously, this is so weird. And even weirder and more disturbing that he kept the lie going — the multi-paragraph description of the proposal and the photos take this from one instance of bad judgment to a real integrity and character issue.

I’d say this to your boss: “Hey, Jane keeps mentioning your engagement and I feel really uncomfortable lying to her. Can you tell her the engagement is off or postponed or something? I really don’t want to be in the middle of this.”

If you can also get your coworkers to make it clear that y’all don’t think this is funny and that in fact it’s disturbing and makes you uncomfortable, that might disincentivize him the next time he’s thinking of doing something like this. (That also means don’t laugh just to smooth over your discomfort when he talks about it; he sounds like he’ll think you’re laughing along with him. Shocked, uncomfortable looks are what you want here.)

But you know, your boss is a liar, and willing to lie for the smallest of reasons. Proceed with caution with this guy.

2. Talking with job applicants pre-interview

I will be leaving my job at the end of the month, and I am helping my company find my replacement by interviewing candidates (and I hope to be able to train the new person before I leave). This is my first time on the interviewer side.

I sent the job description out to my professional network, as I have done with previous openings at the company, and a few people are interested. In the past, I’ve met or talked with interested people who got in touch to answer questions about the company before they apply, but those have always been for jobs in other departments. Now that I have a say in hiring, should I decline requests to talk about the company and job ahead of time? I want to be sure we find the right person for this job, so on the one hand I would like to “screen” people if I can, but on the other hand I don’t know if this is would be ok to do as an interviewer.

Sure, that’s still fine to do if you were doing it before — that’s part of recruiting, in fact (or at least in some recruiting models). That said, you should balance it against other priorities in front of you, which probably means that you shouldn’t talk with everyone who asks to talk ahead of time. Instead, strive to only talk with the people who look strongest, while saying something to the others like, “As a first step, I’d encourage you to throw your hat in the ring, since we’ve found that the best way to explore a possible fit is to steer people to the process we’ve created, and I’ll make sure that you get all your questions answered if we move forward.”

You should also try to assess whether the people asking to talk first genuinely have questions they need answered before they decide whether or not apply, or whether they’re just looking for a back door to getting interviewed. For the latter, you’re better off directing them toward your formal process (unless they’re incredibly strong candidates, in which case you might fast-track them anyway).

3. Employee is upset that he didn’t know his coworker was applying for the same job as him

Two of my employees recently applied for the same position within the company on a different team. One of them was very vocal about his application, while the other applied for the job quietly. The vocal employee did not know that his colleague was applying until we told him that he did not get the job. He asked who got the position, and was told that it was his coworker.

I helped both of them with their applications, but did not talk to them about the fact that the other was applying. Now the person who was rejected is upset that he did not know about the other person applying for the job, and at least partly blames me for not telling him. Was it my responsibility to say something? How should I proceed from here?

No, not at all. He presumably understood that there would be other candidates for the job, since that’s a normal part of applying for a job, and he couldn’t reasonably have expected you to tell you who they were.

I’d say this to him: “Some people prefer to keep it quiet when they’re applying for another position, and we make a point of respecting that and taking people’s confidentiality very seriously. We don’t want anyone to feel that we’d share their personal information with others in that situation, and we’d do the same for you if you asked us to.”

4. Should I let employees know when I’m paying them for time they didn’t work?

Recently, I had an hourly employee who hasn’t worked a full eight-hour day during the last six months that she was with us (she was late most days and left early due to personal matters), but I still always paid her for a full day. The reason was because she constantly complained about how she was short on money and had asked for raises three times during this time (I gave it to her each time).

I had to let her go because she was simply not what I was looking for in terms of her work ethic, low work performance, careless mistakes, and intention to instigate work drama.

Before she left, she said that I did not have to tell her when I overpaid her because it was as if I was gloating and that I made her feel guilty (she also said she would have seen the overpayment on her own). Is this true? As employers, are we obligated or are we not supposed to explain to employees when we have intentionally overpaid them as a generous gesture? How did this message get misconstrued?

Relatedly, if I let the staff go early because it’s a long holiday and I clocked them out at 5:30 p.m. (the end of a full day), is it okay to tell them or just let them figure it out when they see the payment stubs/paycheck?

I don’t know exactly what you said to her or how you said it, but in general, no, there’s certainly nothing wrong with letting an employee know that you paid them for a fully day even though they didn’t work a full day. It’s possible to say it in a rude or obnoxious way, of course, but a simple statement of fact? There’s nothing wrong with that. And really, you were being generous; it’s a bit much for her to turn around and criticize you for not being generous in exactly the way she wants.

For what it’s worth, it sounds like you were way too generous with her — keeping someone on who never worked a full day, let alone giving them raises, despite what sounds like low performance — can go beyond “very generous” and cross over into problematic, if it signaled to your other employees that you’re not willing to hold people to basic standards of reliability and performance. In any case, this is a person who sounds like she took advantage of you; don’t let her further mess with you by convincing you that you did something wrong in letting her know you’d paid her for full hours.

As for the other question about letting staff know that when you let them go early, you’re paying them for the full day — yes, do let them know. Some people may be torn between appreciating the early dismissal and worrying about losing the pay, so it’s a kindness to let them know as you’re releasing them that they’ll be paid for the full day. They’ll enjoy it more that way.

5. Can my company hold my check until the next pay period?

As an hourly employee in California, I am required by my company to turn my hours in by Monday morning. Our company does everything they can to do as little as possible for their employees. Because I am rarely in the area my shop is in, I have to email a copy of my hours to the secretary. Every week for the last 8 months, it has worked just fine. Well, two weeks ago I emailed my hours on Sunday night and they said they didn’t get them until Tuesday and that I have to wait till next payday to collect both checks.

Is that legal? And as an hourly employee, am I required to turn my hours in on my own or are they supposed to collect my hours?

Nope. California law requires that w ages earned between the 1st and 15th days of the calendar month must be paid no later than the 26th day of that same month, and wages earned between the 16th and last day of the month must be paid by the 10th day of the following month. And if your company sets up other payroll periods (such as weekly or biweekly), your wages must be paid within seven calendar days of the end of the payroll period within which the wages were earned.

So now, they can’t hold it, unless it fall within what’s allowed above.

They can, however, require you to turn in your hours on your own. But if you don’t or the system otherwise fails, they still need to ensure that you’re paid on time.

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

1. My team is the target of contempt from other departments

I’m working my first job out of college. I’ve been here for nearly a year doing various marketing tasks. My job is alright, but I love my department coworkers. My problem is other departments.

Our department rarely sees clients and we don’t have many strict deadlines to meet. That being the case, we usually leave on time every day ― and other departments openly hate us for that. Every time we try to have a conversation with other departments, they say things like “I wish OUR department had time to have fun like YOURS does,” implying we don’t do anything. Other frequently heard phrases are “oh, you’re leaving at 6? Must be nice,” and “looks like the marketing and design department aren’t doing anything again,” when they walk past and see me reading an article (which is part of my job, but no amount of explaining this seems to make the passive aggressive comments stop).

I would go to HR about this, but they are a part of the problem! I’ve heard them openly gossip within ear shot about our department. I’ve even had people refer to our department as the “dumb” department. I graduated with top honors, so you can imagine how much this irritates me.

I’ve tried being nice and explaining my job and department, but no one cares to listen. They’re satisfied with being bitter with us. However, it is really bringing morale down. I’ve been searching for another job (a subject to talk about on another occasion), but how would you suggest dealing with this while I am still employed under the same roof as gossiping and passive aggressive coworkers?

Yeah, that’s obnoxious. There’s also probably not much you can do about it, beyond what you’ve already tried.

I wouldn’t go to HR about this, even if they weren’t part of the problem; that’s not really their thing to handle. The real solution is for your manager to (a) talk to the perpetrators about it and ask them to cut it out, (b) enlist the help of other managers in stamping it out when they hear it, and (c) most importantly, think about what it means that her department is perceived this way and find ways to make your team’s work more visible — because as annoying as the comments are, it’s a bigger problem if your colleagues don’t value what your department does. (And if HR is calling it the “dumb” department, there is a pretty serious issue.) And if she doesn’t do C, A and B won’t matter very much.

That’s stuff that’s on your manager to handle though, and there’s not much you can do about it on your end, so it will probably help your quality of life significantly if you can find ways not to care. Look at it as a case study in why perception matters, resolve to get a sense of how any team you join in the future is seen by the rest of the organization as part of your due diligence before taking a job, and know that you’re on your way out.

2. How can I take notes and contribute to a meeting at the same time?

I work in a technical individual contributor role where I am responsible for all technical contribution and most of the project management for a long-time vendor. While other engineers and supply chain managers are invited, I’m often the only person from our company who actually attends weekly teleconferences with the vendor. I’ve tried several times without success to reschedule for a more convenient time for those colleagues. My manager has received feedback that my meeting minutes are not detailed or clear enough for the non-attendees and asked me to improve the quality of my meeting minutes.

I have a VERY hard time running the meeting and making the sole technical contribution from our side while simultaneously typing up minutes. When I do the minutes in real time, it results in long pauses in the discussion while I mentally summarize and consolidate the important information and type it out. When we get into a detailed technical discussion I often miss capturing important points because I’m mentally engaged in the discussion, not in typing. If I focus on typing I lose my train of thought and don’t communicate everything to the vendor. I’ve fallen back on taking copious notes by hand and typing up minutes after the meeting, but am so slammed with work that sometimes I don’t get a chance to go back and finish the minutes and email them out for several days.

My manager’s sole suggestion is to improve my typing skills so that I can talk and type simultaneously, and to let the vendor team members talk among themselves while I capture details. Do you have any suggestions on how to take effective meeting minutes while also running and contributing to the meeting?

You might not be able to; for most people, those two things are mutually exclusive. So what about a different solution? Can someone else at the meeting take minutes? Can you bring an admin with you from your office to take the minutes?

Explain it to your boss this way: “I can either take detailed notes or be fully engaged in the conversation; I can’t do both without one of them suffering. Because of that, I’d like to bring Fergus along to take minutes so that I can focus on the technical information the group needs from me.”

3. The second shift uses my desk and leaves crumbs on it

I work for a manufacturing plant and my desk is in the QA lab. Sometimes people on second shift will eat their lunch at my desk and leave crumbs on my desk for me the next day. They also like to move my items around on my desk, like move my stapler or use my scissors, phone, and other items I have on my desk. What do you suggest I do?

Is it a person who’s assigned to sit at your desk during their shift? If so, it’s not really your desk and they’re borrowing it — it belongs to both of you. That would mean that it’s reasonable for them to move things around and use the scissors or phone. But if they’re not assigned to sit there and are just using it because they need somewhere to eat lunch, you could say something like, “Hey, I know you need a spot to eat lunch during your shift, but I’d really appreciate it if you didn’t move items around on my desk, since it sometimes makes it hard for me to re-locate them.”

In either case, the crumbs are gross and you can ask them to cut that out. If it’s a shared desk, say this: “Hey, I know it’s a pain to have to share a desk, but I’ve been finding crumbs on it when I come in in the morning. Could you try to clean it up a bit before you leave at the end of your shift?” If they’re not actually working at your desk and just plopping down there to eat, you can ask them to eat somewhere else or simply to clean up when they’re done, whichever your workplace set-up makes more practical.

4. Cover letters that are all about what the candidate wants in an employer

I’m a career counselor in a government program (I’m so sorry!) and I have a novel situation. A client submitted a cover letter stating (in detail) what she wants in an employer then listing her abilities. Her letter starts out, “I thought I would not waste your time or mine by submitting the same old cover letter by stating my qualifications of why I think I am the best applicant for the job. I thought I would take a different approach and instead tell you what I’m looking for in an employer.”

She then goes on for about a third of the page about what she is looking for. She then says that “an administrative support position requires you to be a multi-tasker” and goes on to a bulleted list of her personal qualities with a couple examples (which I think would make a fine cover letter in paragraph format).

I have no idea what to tell her. So far, I’ve just stuck with correcting grammar and spelling. Is this something employers would want to read? A long bit about what the potential candidate wants rather than what they can give at the beginning?

No. Employers aren’t too interested at this stage about what she’s looking for in an employer — they’re figuring out whether or not she’s what they’re looking for in an employee. There will be time to explore what she’s looking for later in the process, if they ask her to interview — but the point of the cover letter is to get her in the door, and the way she’s approaching it won’t do that. At this stage, she needs to focus on demonstrating that she would excel at the role they’re hiring for.

Also, let her know that employers who ask for cover letters don’t consider them a waste of time, and it will sound arrogant and out of touch to state otherwise.

5. My pay was docked after I took a vacation day to volunteer

I took a day of vacation to volunteer for a friend’s event, and after the event was over, the friend gave me a cash gift, thanking me for the help. My employer found out about the money I received and decided to dock my pay for the day instead of giving me the paid vacation day. My employer stated that I was not to take another job during vacation time. Is this ok?

What?! No. That wasn’t a second job; it was volunteer work, followed by a gift.

If you’re exempt, your employer can’t dock your pay like this. If you’re non-exempt, they can, although it would still be ridiculous and crappy for them to do it in these circumstances.

I would go back to your boss and say this: “I understand the rule about second jobs. This was not a second job; it was a volunteer event. I should be able to use my vacation time to volunteer, even if I end up being thanked with a gift for it, and I’d like to ask that you reinstate that vacation day.”