Ask a Manager

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

1. Should employers get back to all rejected candidates, or only people who were interviewed?

I want to be a respectful hiring manger, and I totally agree that not getting back to people after an interview (whether you’re hiring or not hiring them) is extremely rude. Do you think it’s important to respond to everyone who submits a resume? Or is it standard to disregard resumes that don’t make it to a phone interview?

Reject everyone you’re not hiring, even if they never made it to the interview stage. These are people volunteering to help your company, after all, and they’re also potential clients/donors/consumers. Why pass up the opportunity to make a good impression on them, and why not do something very quick and simple that will (a) prevent them from wondering if they’re still being considered and (b) prevent some of them from calling you in a month to inquire about their status?

It’s far more outrageous not to bother getting back to people who put in the time to interview with you, yes, but it’s also so easy to set up a rejection system that will take only seconds to use at all stages of the process that there’s just no good reason not to.

2. My coworker uses the c-word at work

One of my coworkers (who outranks me within the department, though I do not work with him or report to him) has a terrible attitude and an even worse potty mouth. I consider myself fairly laid back when it comes to language in the workplace — most “traditional” curse words don’t faze me. However, I have heard from two different people that they heard the coworker in question use the “see you next Tuesday” term at work. Just to be 100% clear — I did not hear it myself and I do not have any hopes or plans to address this past offense with him or HR since I didn’t hear it. However, knowing him, I’m expecting he’ll use it again, and I want to be ready to respond in an appropriate fashion.

Just for a bit more context — our HR department is far from impressive, the coworker in question’s manager is non-confrontational to a fault, and the department/organization have a bit of a “boys club” atmosphere. I 100% do not think that language is appropriate at work (or anywhere, really), but I don’t want to naively assume that I’ll have universal support in my comments.

Address it directly with the coworker if you hear it yourself; I wouldn’t take this to HR or your manager unless (a) you ask him to stop and he doesn’t, (b) it becomes pervasive rather than just used once or twice, and (c) it disturbs you enough to escalate it. But if he uses it around you and it bugs you, by all means speak up! I’d say something like, “Bob, that word really bothers me. Would you mind not using it around me?”

3. An employer insisted on contacting my current manager, but then didn’t offer me the job

I applied for a new job and it turned out that after the interview and speaking to my references, the company needed to speak to my current manager. They requested this over the phone and told me they “wouldn’t be asking if I wasn’t their top choice” and that “it’s sometimes a red flag when an employee doesn’t disclose to their current company that they’re thinking about moving on” (in what world?!?!?). So I took the risk and said yes. I disclosed to my current manager that I was a top candidate for this other company, and that because of this they needed to speak with her. It turned out she really didn’t want me to leave, and it became an emotional conversation (I started crying). She accepted their call that afternoon; it lasted 20 minutes. I tried to pry about the questions they asked, but all she said was that they were very standard. A few weeks went by, which is fine, because this company has notoriously slow hiring processes. But then yesterday, I got an automatic email the HR department sends out to people who didn’t get the job. I can only assume this was based on what my current boss, who desperately wants to keep me on, said.

How do I approach my current boss about not getting the job? A peer told me I should lie and say I turned the new company down after weeks of negotiating. I’m concerned that my current manager sabotaged me, and I’m finding it difficult to continue working here knowing this. I did follow up with the company that didn’t hire me to ask what had changed. I know from an inside source that they did fill the position. I haven’t heard back yet.

This company was in the wrong to insist on speaking with your current employer; that can jeopardize people’s employment, and they were wrong to push you. What happened afterwards is harder to know. It’s possible that your boss gave you a great reference, but the employer just ended up hiring someone else. It’s also possible that she gave you a misleadingly crappy reference in a horrible attempt to keep you. While either is possible, the former might be more likely — since that employer has already showed that they’re willing to behave badly by you, and they also behaved badly by sending you a form rejection after all that rather than connecting with you personally. But you can’t know for sure either way.

As for what to tell your boss, I don’t think you should lie, which leaves you with telling her that it didn’t work out (although she’s not entitled to details beyond that if you don’t want to share them). You probably also need to talk with her about what this all means for your continuing tenure there, since she’s going to have that question on her mind whether you talk to her about it or not .That said, if you distrust your boss enough to think she’s capable of this, then yeah, there’s some urgency to get out as soon as you can and so that’s going to be a tricky conversation to manage. (Meanwhile, resolve never to give in on this kind of request again! It’s put you in a really bad position here.)

4. I don’t like my internship, but my boss wants to hire me on permanently

I am at an internship for the second summer in a row. Along with being an excellent worker, my boss genuinely loves me. This summer, I took the job largely because I feared being unemployed. But more and more, I realized that the corporate world is not for me! Neither of my degrees are even remotely related to the work this company does, and I recently realized that I am wasting my time and talents here since I am doing something totally unrelated to my interests, passions, and background. However, before I realized this, my boss and I spoke about her appealing to management to extend my internship to a possibly more permanent position at the end of the summer. Without following up with me recently, my boss submitted a justification through HR and I suspect that it will be honored. I really don’t want to stay here and am actively looking for more relevant and meaningful work elsewhere.

How do I speak to my boss about this? I feel bad that she has already gone through the process of getting this job extended and I am planning on flaking on her. And if/when I do speak with her, do you think it would be wise to quit this job even prior to having a job offer or should I allow the extension and stay here until I am offered something more permanent?

Talk to her ASAP. She’s expending her own political capital to get a position created for you, and so the faster you let her know that you wouldn’t accept it, the better. Tell her that you’re grateful for her confidence in you and that she went to bat for you, but that you’ve been doing some soul-searching about your future and have realized that you really want to work in ___.

Don’t quit before you have an offer elsewhere (or at least not until your internship reaches its regularly scheduled end point); you should keep the commitment that you made when you signed up for the internship, which presumably was to stay some specific number of months. And definitely don’t accept the conversion to a permanent position while planning to leave as soon as you find something better. Right now, you have a boss who loves you and will be a great reference for you in your job search; you’d put that at risk by treating her faith in you that way.

5. Including two simultaneous jobs, one official and one unofficial, on a resume

After I had been working at my current company for a little over a year, I was asked to take over a position that was being vacated while the company searched for candidates to fill the position. I was trained by the employee leaving and subsequently took over that department (which only has one employee). I submitted my resume for the position about a month and a half into the candidate search and was subsequently offered the position. I told the manager that I couldn’t accept at the salary offered (no change from my current salary, which is two-thirds of what the previous employee made). I was asked to continue in order to help train the new hire and because I had been doing so well with the clients. I was also asked if the manager and I could reevaluate the position/salary in a few weeks.

Now, six months later I am still working in that position doing all of the daily required work, but I spend three days of my week in that position and two days doing the duties of my official position. How do I put this on my resume? The duties required in these two jobs are vastly different and the unofficial position where I spend most of my time requires significantly more technical and advanced work. I don’t want to truncate the unofficial position on my resume because it displays my skills and talents more significantly but it technically isn’t my job and isn’t my official title.

I’d create a bullet point under your current job that reads something like this:

* Acting teapot manager: Manage teapot department, kept productivity at 110% during six-month teapot manager vacancy, achieved X, achieved Y

If it’s too significant to be combined into a single bullet point, then I’d list it this way:

Official Title, Company Name, Jan. 2013 – present
Acting Teapot Manager, Feb. 2014-present
* accomplishment
* accomplishment
* accomplishment
Official Title, Jan. 2013 – present
* accomplishment
* accomplishment
* accomplishment

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

1. My boss implied I hired someone because of her religion

What’s the best way to address my boss making an assumption that I hired someone based on an EEOC-protected category?

I have a new manager who’s great overall. He speaks frankly and is helping me develop in my career. I sent him a resume three days ago for an employee I’ve hired who starts tomorrow (the hire was decided prior to my boss joining the team). My manager and I had a check-in meeting today, and he said the new employee’s resume was interesting to read. With a little smirk, he added, “I know now why you hired her.”

This employee’s resume shows service at an organization that indicates her faith. It’s a faith I share, and I believe my manager is assuming that I gave this candidate undue weight because of this. I’m on the interview committee at work, and pride myself at being able to put aside issues like this in deciding on a candidate’s fitness for the role. How should I confirm with my manager that this is his suspicion and address that I found it offensive that he would assume this? With a manager I haven’t worked with before, I don’t want to leap to conclusions. However, I also feel that if my suspicions are correct, I need to address it head-on.

I agree; you shouldn’t just let this go and allow the assumption to hang out there as unchallenged fact. I’d go back to your boss and say, “I didn’t fully process it when we were talking the other day, but I want to make sure you don’t really think that I hired Violet Thistlewell because of her religion.” If you get any response other than that a convincing explanation that he was joking (and actually, even then — because that’s a pretty sketchy joke), follow up with, “I want to make sure you know I’d never hire that way. I hired Violet because she has a great track record in ___.”

Read an update to this letter here.

2. An employee on my new team is undermining me with snark

I recently started a new job and learned through my manager that a person on the team had interviewed for the role I was offered. This is a new position that was formed as part of a restructure and from what I understand, the person who applied felt they were a shoo-in for the position since they have been working for the company for several years. I am completely new to the organization and the business.

Anytime someone from the team asks me a question, this person is quick to respond, “Why would she know? She’s new to the business.” I try to ignore it, but lately it has been making me feel insecure and has me wondering what I can do to protect my credibility. I tried involving this person in my business processes to diffuse hard feelings; however, they continue to comment on my limited knowledge of the business. I realize this person has more knowledge of the business but for whatever reason (I suspect poor people skills) they were not offered the job. I’m trying my best to learn, but there is no way I can get up to speed and know as much as they do. considering they have had longer exposure to business within the unit. It’s difficult enough to adjust to a new job. How do I deal with this?

By nipping this in the bud. By allowing her get away with open snark toward you, you’re weakening your own authority, both with this employee and with anyone watching. The next time it happens, interject and answer the question you’ve been asked. Meanwhile, deal with her privately, by talking her through the standards of behavior you expect from anyone on your team and how you’d like her to approach things differently — and hold her to that. There’s advice here and here on how to do that, but you’re going to need to be more assertive than it sounds like you have so far, which has given her an opening to undermine you (and will get worse if you don’t stop it).

3. Rejecting a candidate for the second time

Do you have any advice on how to best reject a candidate for a second time? In this case, a candidate was a finalist for one position but was not selected. When a different opening was posted a few months later (which on paper she is also qualified for), she reached out again and we interviewed her again. She’s not the right fit, and I feel like saying no a second time really closes the door in a way the first rejection does not. Knowing she will likely read it that way, how should I follow up with her?

Just explain her your reasoning — and if you’d welcome applications from her again in the future, add that too (but don’t say it if it’s not true). For instance: “This was a tough decision, but ultimately we concluded we’re looking for someone with more experience in X. I really appreciate you going through our process twice now, and if we haven’t scared you off, we’d welcome your applications in the future.” Or, if it’s not a skills/experience issue but more about personality/culture fit, you could be vaguer: “I really appreciated the time you put into our process. This is a tricky role to hire for and we end up turning away some great people in the process. I won’t be moving you forward to our final interviews, but on a personal note, I enjoyed the chance to get to know you better and wish you all the best.” Or whatever. Just make it a little more personal than a form letter, since it’s her second time around.

4. Company told me I had more leave than I did and now wants me to repay the difference

I work for a small company that has only one HR person, who also does payroll. She recently emailed me that she miscalculated the maternity leave I took in August-October and would need to take $1,400 out of my next two paychecks. I spoke with her in person, and her mistake was not checking my leave accumulation balance and just using an arbitrary number. This is not the first time she’s made a mistake like this with me or many of my coworkers. The mistakes only come to light at the end of the fiscal year for my company.

Is there any financial recourse for me? She did these calculations before my son was born and I chose to take a specific amount of maternity leave based on her calculations. I would not have taken as much had her math been accurate. I have emails from her telling me the earlier amount.

If the company overpaid you, they’re entitled to recover that money from you by withholding it from your next paychecks … but you”re also entitled to point out that they gave you bad information that you relied on to your detriment. I’d pull together those emails she sent you earlier with the wrong amount and explain that you were promised X amount of leave, that you had no reason not to rely on the numbers the company gave you, that repaying the money would be a hardship and feels unfair (since you would have made different decisions had they given you correct information), and ask for the repayment to be waived or reduced. If you don’t get anywhere with her, take your case to her manager. (You might also try to get your own manager to go to bat for you on this, if your manager has some sway.)

5. Did this auto-reply indicate that I should follow up about my application if I don’t hear anything?

I have a question about an online job application I recently completed. I filled it out and then uploaded my resume with it. When I hit submit, their response word for word was the following: “Thank you for applying. We will contact you shortly.” This is interesting because virtually all job applications will say that they will contact you if your qualifications match their requirements. Here they are not saying that, so I am wondering if I should contact them through email about the my status if they do not contact me?

Nope. You’re reading too much into the auto-response. Companies don’t put nearly as much time into refining the wording of these as applicants spend in analyzing them. It’s just an acknowledgement that they received your application, nothing more and nothing less.

You’ve applied, they know you’re interested, and they’ll get in touch if they want to interview you.

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

1. Is it okay to ask my employer to look at my daughter’s application?

My daughter works as a payroll and benefits specialist and employee trainer for a great company which, nevertheless, is eliminating her position in all locations across the board (by implementing a computer kiosk system). It so happens that I also work for a great company that is looking for an HR generalist. My daughter has applied for the position and submitted her resume online. I subsequently called the recruiter and left a voicemail to say that my daughter had applied, but I did not leave any details about her experience.

More than a week has passed and I have not heard from the recruiter, so I don’t know if she looked at the resume. Is it okay to call her or email to elaborate on why I think my daughter is a good candidate?

No. It’ll come across as inappropriate pressure for her to hire your daughter. It was fine to call or email her once to let her know that your daughter was applying; that can get someone’s application a second look or particular attention. But from there, it’s in their court. If you get in touch again, it’s likely to come across as getting too involved on your daughter’s behalf (and could actually end up hurting your daughter’s chances, if it raises worries that you won’t respect boundaries either during the rest of the hiring process or while she’s working there).

However, you can certainly help your daughter’s chances from the other side of this: by talking to her about what the company is likely looking for and by helping her present herself as strongly as possible.

2. What’s up with my company’s new restrictive PTO policy?

My company has instated a new policy for non-exempt employees, and I just can’t find any other company example of this PTO style. If we have to miss work between 8-5, we have to take that time as PTO. Previously, we were allowed to make up the time (within the same week) outside of that window, by staying late, working weekend, coming in early, etc.

An example HR gave: Previously, if I had a doctor appointment and would need to come in at 9 (when my normal hours are 8 – 5), I could work through my lunch or stay an hour later and make up my normal 40 hours. But we can’t now. We have to take that 1 hour as PTO and take our lunch, then leave at 5. I can’t find any other example of this policy. Is this a normal policy?

It’s a weird policy, but it’s not unheard of. Why not ask them what the reasoning is, so that you better understand where they’re coming from? It’s possible that it’s just rigidity for no good reason, but since it’s a change, it’s more likely that it’s in response to something.

3. Should I hold a grudge over the job I lost out on to an internal candidate?

I interviewed for an accounting position with a private equity firm. I really like the firm and the boss I would be working for. I was incredibly excited about the position. I aced my second interview and waited for feedback. A few days later, my recruiter informed me that I knocked out the more experience finalists and had a great chance. But! The hiring manager stops short of making an offer, saying that he needed to speak with the CFO before anything finalizes. Lo and behold, after 2 weeks, my recruiter called me back to say that someone on the corporate team decided to raise her hand last minute, and the firm allowed her to transfer.

My recruiter isn’t delighted by that decision either. Besides not getting his commission, my recruiter has a good, long standing relationship with that firm. He checked with the manager to see if anyone internally was interested before starting the process. And I did everything right: I prepared for my interview, I wrote down a list of questions to ask, I was enthusiastic but not desperate, I wrote thank-you notes within 24 hours after the interview. Is it okay that I feel terribly wronged by that decision? Honestly, I would rather it be someone who I competed against, not someone who knew about this vacancy for 8 months.

Then, so-called good news, my recruiter told me that since they allowed an internal transfer, they will need someone to fill the corporate position that is being vacated. The hiring manager, the one I originally interviewed with, strongly advocated for me to fill the corporate position, which he does not oversee. That makes me kind of uneasy. On one hand, I really like the firm and they seem to treat their employees well. It’s a great place for me to build my career. On the other hand, I am afraid that I will end up wasting my time meeting the new team and find that they don’t like me or I don’t like them. I ended up telling my recruiter I will entertain another meeting. Should I just suck up my bitterness and pessimism, and give this a second try, even though I really want to hold a grudge?

This stuff happens. It sucks when you’re in your spot, but this really isn’t a horrible crime by any means. Employers take last-minute candidates all the time, and really, it’s in their interests to be willing to do that. I don’t see any reason to hold a grudge here or to resent them for what happened.

4. Do I have to pay overtime on make-up days?

I have an employee who is paid an hourly rate and who has been working for only 2 months and is now asking for two personal days off. She suggested for me that I allow her to make the two days up on a Saturday. If I accept, would I have to pay her overtime for these two Saturdays she works to make up her lost hours?

If working those Saturdays brings her over 40 hours in that week, then yes — even though it’s to make up for time off earlier. Overtime law doesn’t care why someone works more than 40 hours in a week; it just wants them paid overtime for those hours.

5. Listing older jobs when you have a sporadic work history

My husband has an AA. He went back to school in 2009 and graduated 2011. Prior to then, he had been unemployed for a year. He sporadically temped in 2007 and 2008, nothing that lasted longer than a few weeks. He worked at a call center and a grocery store before then, and was let go from one job at a car dealership (as a receptionist) after working there for only a month. He had two on-campus jobs while he was enrolled in school. Essentially he has no work history prior to that, because the earlier jobs were 2006 or thereabouts. Since graduating, he has worked retail, and he finally did get a part-time position doing what he went to school for.

When I recently assisted him with his resume, we included the two current positions (reception and retail) and the on-campus ones, but none of the much older ones, so it looks like his resume only goes back to 2009. Putting on older jobs seems like it would highlight an exceptionally long gap. It would also force the resume to 2 pages.

I only know how to write academic resumes. I don’t know how to advise him. The school’s career center is not the most useful (they still advise putting objective statements). Can you give me any further advice or guidelines to give him?

It’s hard to give specific advice on this kind of thing without seeing the resume in question, because the answer can change depending on factors like how long he’s been at each job, what kind of achievements he has from the earlier jobs, and what transferable skills each one might offer. But one option is to include an Other Experience section, where he lists some or all of the earlier jobs (but definitely not that one-month job). However, not listing work history from before 2009 might not be that big of a deal if it was mainly call center and retail work anyway.

The thing to consider here is whether adding those earlier jobs would strengthen the overall picture of him as a candidate (in terms of skills, accomplishments, and stable job history). If it would, add them. If it’s a neutral or negative, skip them.

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

1. I accepted a promotion without asking about the salary

Thanks to a lot of the great comments on Open Thread, I successfully interviewed for and got a promotion at my company. The issue now is that I have no idea what my new salary is. I can only assume that the position comes with a pay bump, as I am now a manager, but it wasn’t discussed in my internal interview, nor was it discussed when my boss called me to offer me the position (he is in a remote office). It was a very brief phone call with my boss saying, “You came out as the lead in the interviews, and so we want to offer it to you.” It sort of took me by surprise (I was dealing with another work emergency at the time) and so I just said yes and left it at that, thinking that we would have more time to discuss the details. But almost a week has gone by and I havent heard anything about a plan for any additional training etc. etc. – my boss and I have just set up a couple of phone calls to talk this week.

How do I bring this up with him and our operations manager without coming across too forward or that money is the only reason I took this new position (which is partly is)?

You guys have to stop accepting job offers (including promotions) without talking about salary. Here’s the thing: Once you accept, you lose all your negotiating power. They already know that you’re going to accept the job at whatever they offer you, because you already have.

It is not gauche or overly greedy to ask about money. You work for money. They are expecting you to ask about money. They will not think it’s weird. When someone offers you a job or promotion that you want to accept but doesn’t mention money, say, “Great! I’ve been so excited about this role and I’m thrilled to get the offer. Can you give more details about the offer — salary and so forth?”

But that doesn’t help you now, I realize, so go back to your boss and say this: “I’m really excited that you’ve offered me the role. Can we discuss the details of the offer, including salary?”

Depending on the specifics of the conversations you’ve had with her, you might be able to play this off as if you assumed this conversation was planned all along, and that nothing is a done deal until salary is hammered out. But if you’ve already had conversations that would make that impossible (i.e., if it definitely sounded like you already committed), you can’t do that — because if you clearly already accepted, that will look unprofessional. In that case, you can use the language above, but modify it accordingly.

2. Is it creepy to name-drop in an interview?

I have a phone interview tomorrow, and the recruiter mentioned that I will have the meeting with the hiring manager, “Jane.” I looked up Jane on LinkedIn and contacted a mutual friend “Liz.” (Not sure what my true intentions were, but maybe to see if Liz thought Jane was super nice, crazy, etc.). When I asked Liz if she thought it would be creepy if I mentioned her during the interview, she said “You can ABSOLUTELY mention in me, in fact, please tell her I said hello! Networking indicates that you have done your homework and that you want the job. Always a good idea to check in with the other person (me) to make sure the relationship is in good standing– for this interview, I am confident that it will help.”

However, I just asked a job coach I hired, and she said it would be a bad idea, that it would be a distraction, and that it would have a “gossipy” feel because I talked to others about her. She said that it definitely won’t help, and could possibly hurt. What do you think?

I think you need to dump that job coach because she’s giving you terrible advice. It’s not at all gossipy or distracting to do this. It’s completely normal, people do it all the time, and your job coach needs to find a new line of work where she’s giving out horrible advice.

3. Interviewers who ask when you graduated from college

I’ve had a couple of interviews over the past few weeks, one in person and one over the phone, and during both, the question of “when did you graduate college?” came up. As my resume only covers the last 10 years of my working life, I’m wondering if this is how potential employers are now getting around “how old are you?” One of my friends mentioned they might just be filling in the gaps, but I tend to think that it might be a way around that.

Well, if you appear to be on the younger side (in appearance or based on your resume), an interviewer who asks this is probably trying to gauge how seasoned you are — it can be a quick shorthand for maturity, professional gravitas, and general life experience. But if you’re older, then yeah, it can absolutely be a round-about way of trying to calculate your age. (Keep in mind that age discrimination laws only protect those who are 40 and older, so the first scenario isn’t legally problematic, while the second one can be.)

4. Mentioning a death during a job interview

I interviewed for a position the other day (my 10th interview for a job in my projected career field that I didn’t get, which is a problem for another day) and one of the panelists, upon learning what county I am from, rather excitedly asked me if I knew X. In fact I did know X, and was saddened when this gentleman died 2 years ago. It was also apparent to me that the panelist asking me had no idea that X had passed away, as he spoke of X in the present tense.

What is the best way to handle that situation in the future? I didn’t want to be the bearer of bad news in an interview but I also didn’t want to pretend that X wasn’t dead! (I indicated that I knew X and for how long and moved on.)

Handle it like you would in any other context; interviewers don’t require kid glove handling on this kind of thing. I’d just say something like, “I did indeed know X and thought he was great. Did you know that he passed away several years ago?”

5. Refusing to hire people who don’t have phones

Is it legal to not hire someone if they do not have a working phone, landline, cell, or other? I refuse to believe that in this day and age of emails, Skype, and other means of communication, a phone would be a complete barrier to not being able to even be considered for a job.

Yes, that’s legal. (However, I’m not sure how an employer would know unless you volunteered it. You could set up a Skype or Google Voice number without actually having a phone.)