Ask a Manager

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

1. My coworker misuses words and it’s affecting how she’s seen

I co-manage a small group of seven employees within a large organization. On a personal level, I really like my co-manager and we talk outside of work quite a bit. We have always managed as a team, and I really like that. However, her grasp on speaking well is, well, almost non-existent. Instead of using “mostly,” she will say “morely.” Instead of “best,” it’s “bestly.” I think you can get the picture – she just makes up words, and then repeats them constantly. She says these things when speaking to executives, customers, suppliers, and when interviewing people. She’s really not dumb, but I think she sounds incredibly stupid when speaking to people. I brought up the “morely” thing once, and her response was something about her family being from the south. No matter where her family is from, it’s not a word. Also, she herself is not from the south. I want to help her not sound so stupid, but I also don’t want to offend. Any suggestions?

It’s probably not your place, and it sounds like she wasn’t very receptive when you did try to bring it up. Really, this is something that her manager should be addressing.

That said, if you have a good rapport, I could see trying one more time and saying something like, “Could I give you some input on something that I’ve noticed that I think might be affecting the way you’re perceived by colleagues? I’ve noticed that you’ll sometimes use words in a non-standard way, like saying ‘bestly’ rather than ‘best’ and “morely’ rather than ‘mostly.’ I know that you do great work and that you’re smart and accomplished, but I worry that misusing words like that will impact the way people who don’t know you as well will see you.” But again, you should only do this if you have a really good rapport and you think that you’re someone she’s open to hearing feedback from.

And if that doesn’t work, then I think you need to drop it and let her manager handle it (or not handle it, which might be the case).

2. What should I keep when a hiring process is over?

I’m a new manager and will be hiring to fill a few positions soon. Should I keep any notes I take during the interview process? I know to ask open-ended questions, to make sure I ask all candidates the same questions, and to steer clear of race, religion, etc. But I don’t know what I should keep or how to document to justify who was hired and why. We don’t have a very strong HR department, so I want to make sure I do the right thing.

Federal law requires employers to keep job applications and hiring-related noted on file for one year from the date the application was received, and for two years for applicants who you’re aware are 40 or older (which means it’s easier to just keep them all for two years, rather than having separate rules for some). The purpose of these laws isn’t to require you to do anything with them after your initial review; rather, the point is because if you’re sued under one of these law, the applications may be looked at as part of the legal action. You don’t need to keep written justifications of who was hired, although you certainly could if you wanted to (and risk-averse lawyers would love you for it).

Also! You’re right that you shouldn’t be talking about race, religion, etc. in interviews, but you’re absolutely not required to only ask open-ended questions or ask all candidates the same questions. If you restrict yourself to asking everyone the same questions, you’ll really hamstring your ability to interview effectively. You might have some core questions that you ask everyone, of course, but you should also be asking follow-up questions that you won’t be able to predict ahead of time, as well as questions specific to each candidate’s experience.

3. Tech problems interfered with my performance on a hiring test

I’m in the process of interviewing for an attorney position with a technology company. I have undergone two interviews so far and recently completed a one-hour timed writing assignment that consisted of responding to a request the company received. While drafting my response, I encountered some technical issues. I had zero to very slow internet connectivity and my computer froze. My work product was therefore not as good as I am capable of — even considering the time pressure restriction. While the gist of it was decent, it had several typos I would have corrected had I had a few minutes — minutes wasted dealing with the internet connection and my frozen computer.

I considered explaining my situation to HR and asking if there was an opportunity to complete another assignment, but I’ve decided that since I didn’t royally mess up, it would work more to my disadvantage to be perceived as making excuses. However, I can’t help but be really, really disappointed. Do you agree that I shouldn’t contact HR?

Ideally you would have said something at the time you were submitted it, like “I had some technology issues while drafted this — my computer froze and cut down on the amount of time I had to edit this once writing it. I’d be glad to provide more polished writing samples too if you’d like!” But I agree that doing it after the fact won’t come off as well. I think at this point, assuming it’s no longer the day of the test, you need to let it lie.

4. Should a working lunch be unpaid?

I work for a CPA firm, and we have to fill out time sheets to see billable time and what client it is for. There have been issues with the time sheet in general before, but not quite like this. We had a Lunch & Learn added to our calendars. It was never said or understood if it was optional or what exactly it was about. The speaker was with a life insurance company, so we thought it had something to do with the company offering some life insurance opportunity for us.

The day before the talk, we received an email stating that since they would be providing lunch, this was to count as our lunch time. We are already at 45 hours minimum. So many of us are taking short lunches and coming in early to be able to leave at the same time. When we got to the Lunch & Learn, we were all surprised that it was one of our partners talking (the other guy had something come up, apparently) and they gave us a rundown of some services we offer in another branch of our company and how to spot people who might be potential clients and how to give them the information if presented with an opportunity. I am salaried, but not all of the people in the room were, so we were told to count that hour as lunch (not get paid) even though we just listened to a presentation about the company. None of us would mind learning about this, but it seemed to be sneaky and rude that it doesn’t count towards our paid company time. Should I file a complaint with the state or does this sound reasonable?

I was with you until you jumped straight to filing a complaint. The first thing you should do is to talk to your employer: “The Lunch & Learn ended up being work time — we listened to a presentation from Fergus on company services and how to generate business. I’m assuming that since it changed to this, we should mark it as work time, right?” And if you get push-back: “I think we’d run afoul of the law for non-exempt employees, since it was so clearly work-related.”

If that doesn’t change anything, then the non-exempt employees at the lunch could indeed talk with your state department of labor if they want to. (In reality, it might not make sense to do that if only a single hour is at issue. But it’s their prerogative either way.)

5. Employer keeps saying a job offer is coming, but it hasn’t shown up

I got a verbal job offer right before the holidays. It’s been three weeks now and I have yet to get an official job offer. I’ve spoken to the HR coordinator several times on the phone and he has insisted that my letter would be coming three different occasions. I feel as though it is too abrasive for me to contact them again. He has assured me I am the final candidate and that I am not being strung along.

What in the world could be taking so long? They have already gone through my references, background check (I’m assuming)… I’m at my wits end and finally stopped applying for other jobs since I got a verbal offer!

Well, it could be lots of things — decision-makers out of town, higher priorities that need to be dealt with first, possible budget issues or the question of a looming reorg, someone else leaving and throwing their staffing plans into question … all sort of things, and it’s impossible to know from the outside. The thing you can know from the outside if that you don’t have a job offer yet, regardless of what promises they’re making you. Hopefully it will come through, but it’s very possible that it won’t, and the worst thing that you can do is to count on it as a sure thing. Instead, protect yourself by proceeding as if there’s no offer yet — because there isn’t.

If you still haven’t heard anything in another week or two, it’s reasonable to check back in (this time, specifically ask what timeline you should expect), but meanwhile, keep job searching.

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

1. My boss won’t let me manage my staff

I’m really getting fed up with having to supervise a slacker. My boss won’t let me fire him because “the next person could be worse,” though I don’t see how. Despite coaching, memos, training, and close supervision, he continues to mess up on the same kinds of tasks, is unreliable in attendance, and doesn’t follow through on what he’s agreed to do. I wind up spending time fixing his mistakes for customers because he has called in sick or had an emergency. He seems impervious to documentation and poor performance evaluations, and doesn’t seem to care at all about the inconvenience he causes to others.

I’d like to demand proof for every absence – doctor’s notes, notes from car repair shops or his furnace repair technician, but I can’t do that. I’d like to be able to put him on a performance improvement plan, something our organization doesn’t do. I can’t even give him a mandatory referral to EAP — I can only suggest it.

After years of this, I’m starting to look for other jobs. Should I tell my supervisor that her lack of support is driving me to this? What would it take to get through to her?

Your manager sucks. Big time. And yes, when you leave, you should tell her that the driving force behind your departure was her tying your hands and refusing to let you deal with performance problems — or at least you should tell her that if the relationship will allow you to say it without burning the bridge and losing the reference.

If your’e asking if you should tell her now, before you resign for another job, I don’t think there’s really much point. What you’ve described is such shockingly bad management — such refusal to let you have even the most basic tools to manage your staff and get things done — that it’s highly unlikely that it will do any good. Best case scenario, she makes a few changes around the edges; you’re still going to be stuck working for someone utterly inept whose instincts are to stop you from doing your job.

(That said, I do want to point out that demanding proof for every absence is unnecessary and distracting. Either your staff member is at work enough to get the job done or he isn’t. Don’t get caught up in wanting doctor’s notes and other proof. A clear warning and then firing is what you’re looking for here … except of course that you’re not allowed to do it.)

2. My old company pulled my resume wording word-for-word for an ad for my replacement

I left a position about six weeks ago, for a much better opportunity. The pay, environment, and job are all improvements.

I know my previous employer is trying to fill the position I left, and this morning I got an email from a recruiter which looked quite familiar. The job requirements were pulled word-for-word from several points on my resume. I confirmed that the job is for my old employer.

I do not normally go around looking for things to be offended by, but frankly I’m not sure how to feel about this. While I realize that my previous employer is looking for someone with a very similar skillset to what I have, is it a faux pas to lift my resume for their own use like that? Would it be rude of me to ask them to at least re-word it?

Yes, it’s a faux pas; they basically stole your resume content for their own use. It would annoy me too. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with saying something like, “I noticed that a lot of the wording in the posting for my replacement is pulled straight from my resume. I wonder if you’d tweak it a bit so that it’s not a word-for-word copy.” (Of course, someone who does this in the first place might think it’s a petty request, but those of us who write for a living won’t.)

3. Returning to a more junior position after covering for a more senior coworker for a year

I have been covering a maternity leave position for a senior coworker for almost a year, and it’s been great. I have had so much more responsibility and have learned a ton of new skills. I also feel like I’ve performed very well, despite it being a very steep learning curve and a much higher workload.

My coworker is due to return from leave in about a month, and I’m starting to get anxious about returning to my previous job. My maternity leave position was essentially a higher-level, more senior version of my previous job, and so I feel now like I am overqualified for my old position. I think I’ll be bored and restless and will feel like I’ve taken a step back in my career. I’m not sure how to talk to my boss about my concerns. I would like to stay with my organization, but I’d rather find a new job then go back to a lower-paid, less demanding position. How do I broach the subject with my boss? Do I wait until after my coworker comes back from maternity leave, or should I do it before that? How do I phrase my concerns without sounding resentful or ungrateful?

I’d talk with your manager now, rather than waiting — since to have the strongest shot at a different role, you’ll want to give her some time to think about what you’re asking. I’d say something like this: “I’ve been thinking about what will happen when Imogen returns in a month. Now that I’ve been juggling higher-level responsibilities and a higher workload for a year, I’d love to find a way to continue using some of these skills. Are there any possibilities to change my old role or put me in a different one, to allow me to continue forward on this past year’s path?”

How possible this is will depend on a bunch of factors like how big or small your organization is, what roles might be open or possible, and how well you performed this past year. But it’s very reasonable to ask, and once you have this conversation, you’ll have a lot more data to inform your thinking about whether or not to stay.

4. Was my firing mishandled?

My manager was out on medical leave. One of my coworkers was sent to my desk and told me to go to the manager’s office because he was on the phone there and wanted to speak with me. When I entered, the Human Resources manager and site manager were in the office with my boss on the phone. They issued me a termination letter, and the manager rudely read it to me over the phone. I was stunned and didn’t know what to say or even ask. The site manager had signed the letter and written that it was on behalf of the manager. I never signed a thing. There was no place for my signature on any departure paperwork of any kind. There was nothing about any kind of negotiation on how my departure would be described and the letter included that all health coverage was terminated immediately.

I just feel that this whole process was handled unethically. I understood that when a person is out on medical leave, they have no work contact except for with the benefits department. The person who signed the document is not the person who actually read the letter. Am I wrong to think this was handled inappropriately?

It sounds like it was handled pretty coldly — they should have had an actual conversation with you rather than just handing you a letter and reading it to you on speaker phone.

The other stuff isn’t particularly problematic though. The site manager signing the letter in place of your absent manager and not having you sign anything isn’t really a big deal. Some places have people sign termination paperwork and others don’t. Whether or not your manager is supposed to doing any work while she’s on leave isn’t something you can really know yourself; it depends on arrangements she’s made that you probably aren’t privy to (and ultimately wouldn’t be relevant to you in this situation anyway). And the fact that the person who read the letter wasn’t the signatory doesn’t really matter, although the reading of the letter is odd on its own — and again, far more cold and weirdly stiff than a termination conversation has to be.

5. Can I accept a job offer but explain I’m going to keep looking for something else?

I’ve been job searching for upon graduation, and now an offer has come in but it is much lower than I was hoping it to be. I want to continue looking but now I am faced with accepting or declining this job offer. I want to accept it as a back-up job but it doesn’t feel ethically correct. Could I accept the offer but let the employer know that I anticipated a higher wage and let them know in the months to come I will continue looking?

No. If you say that, the employer is going to yank the job offer, and rightly so — no one wants to hire someone who has made it clear that they’re going to be actively looking for something else. However, what you can do is try to negotiate the salary. But if you decide to accept the job, you should do it in good faith — meaning that you’d need to stop actively looking for something else after that. (Assuming, of course, that this is a job that expects a reasonably long-term good-faith commitment.)

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

1. My resume writer isn’t following through and I want to ask for my money back

I hired a resume writer and have paid half of the money to have my resume completed; it is a significant amount of money. The person has given me a timeline and has not stuck to it (it’s about three weeks late so far, and I have not heard from her), and I am not impressed with how she has conducted herself throughout the process, like not listening or making the changes I ask for, and I have had to give her the same information many times.

I would like my money back as I still have not heard from her. Any thoughts on how to do this?

I’d trying writing to her and saying this: “Since I haven’t heard from you and we’re three weeks past the timeline you gave me, and because you haven’t been responsive to my requests and I’ve had to give you the same information multiple times, I’d like to cancel our work together and have you refund my money.”

Whether or not she’ll do it is a different issue, but it sounds like you’re justified in asking for it. Also, if you signed any kind of contract with you, take a look at that and see if it provides for refunds.

2. Rejected for a promotion in a group meeting of other internal candidates

Have you ever heard of a firm telling their internal candidates that they were not chosen for an open position in a group meeting?

I recently interviewed for an analyst position at my firm along with three coworkers. After four weeks of hearing nothing from HR, the director of client services, or the hiring team’s manager (who is also the manager of three of the candidates), we were finally emailed a meeting invitation. 30 minutes later, we sat down with the director of client services, the hiring team’s manager and each other/our competition for the same position. We were all told by the director that they had hired the outside candidate. Are you kidding me?! Who does this? I cannot find any examples of this sort of thing on the internet. I was hoping you could provide your opinion on this unique situation.

Ick, yeah, one of them should have met with each of you individually to let you know that you didn’t get the position and give you some feedback — which is a pretty basic obligation for internal candidates, particularly when the hiring manager happens to be your own manager. I don’t think it’s quite as outrageous as it sounds like you do — but definitely bad practice and thoughtless.

3. We have to pay our own expenses for work travel and then get reimbursed later

My employer is requiring the office manager and me (creative director/product development/sales) to attend an industry show in Atlanta. It is a really big show and Atlanta is more expensive than your typical town, so the expenses for eating and/or taking cabs will be higher than typical. For example, we recently attended a show in Tennessee and our food allowance was $30 per day. For this Atlanta trip, the food expense will be $50 per day.

I have one problem with that. It’s going to be $400 in food expenses for the week for just one of us. The employer is requiring that we pay our own expenses during the trip and that he will reimburse us after we return from the trip. Both the office manager and I are on tight budgets, so it is going to take the money we need to pay bills with in order to pay our expenses during the show. In my view, this is asking something of us that should not be asked. The company is telling us we are required to go to this show, stay there for eight days, and finance it ourselves? Shouldn’t the company give us $400 cash to return with receipts and excess money? Or is this something I have to live with?

This is a very, very common way to handle work-related travel expenses, so it’s not outrageous that your employer is doing it. However, because it would cause you hardship, it’s completely reasonable to ask for a different arrangement. I’d say something like, “I’m not in a position to front this money and then get reimbursed later. Could we instead take petty cash and return itemized receipts, or use a company credit card?”

4. Can I negotiate a different work schedule rather than a higher salary?

I’m waiting to hear back about a job. To be honest, it’s a huge career change and I have little experience with the work I’d be doing, or even any kind of record in the kind of work environment I’d be in (moving from blue-collar to white-collar). I think I’m so far along in the running because I have genuinely had enjoyable experiences at all of the interviews I have been to, and I get the sense that they’ve enjoyed meeting with me too.

Even the bottom of their pay scale is roughly twice what I’m making currently, and I don’t think I have anything to negotiate with besides simply “I was hoping for more. Would you consider X?” because they’d pretty much just be taking a leap of faith for me. I have no qualms with negotiating just to see what happens, but I’m wondering if there’s any sense in trying to negotiate work schedule instead of pay. Is it more or less likely that I’d be able to negotiate starting and ending work early? I’m very much so an early morning person and would much rather work 8-4 or even 7-3 than the 9-5 that is expected. What’s my best bet here? A lot of the work is data-entry and envelope stuffing kind of work, so it seems quite possible to do outside of typical business hours.

You can absolutely ask for that type of schedule! Many people negotiate schedules like that for themselves. They may or may not agree to it (and it’s possible that there are legitimate reasons for it not working in this particular role), but it’s not outrageous to ask for.

Also, employers tend to be more agreeable to starting early/leaving early than starting late/leaving late, probably because the latter is at odds with some deep-rooted puritanism about early rising that as a society we still have.

5. Holidays and paid time off

I have a question about holidays/paid time off. My department is required to work on certain company holidays that other departments have off. To compensate for those lost holidays, the company pays our team an extra day’s work on those dates. However, we’ve recently been informed that if we aren’t working those days—i.e., using any accrued PTO, like annual vacation, sick, or personal days—we won’t be eligible for the extra pay.

Does that sound right to you? It seems to me that since the extra pay is meant to compensate for the holiday that the rest of the company gets, anyone in our department who needs those days off will end up getting “double taxed,” since they must dip into their accrued paid time off AND forfeit the value of the company holiday. My gut tells me anyone who uses their PTO for those days should either still receive the extra day’s pay (since they’re still losing a company holiday), or shouldn’t have that day deducted from their accrued PTO. Am I right, or am I overlooking something?

Nope, it’s unfair. While I can see not wanting to give you an additional day’s pay (since that adds to the overall cost of your yearly pay), if I were your manager I’d handle this by either giving you a day off at a different time or not requiring you to use PTO for that day.

Legally, you don’t really have recourse here; companies aren’t required to offer holidays off or holiday pay, and they can give a benefit to one department that they don’t give to another. But it’s certainly a recipe for bad morale. It would be reasonable to ask your boss if she’s open to handling it differently.