how to survive in an open plan office

by Alison Green on December 4, 2013

On a recent open thread, commenter Frieda asked this:

Our CEO announced this week that the new office space we are moving to next fall will be all open plan. No offices, no cubicles. Apparently even executives will have the same workspace as everyone else.

Does anyone else have experience working in an open plan office space? I’m generally one to accept things that I can’t change and just see how I adapt, but I’m certainly not thrilled about the announcement. Any advice, other than investing in noise-canceling headphones? Negatives I might not have thought of? Has anyone had any positive experiences?

While companies that move toward this type of floor plan say that it fosters collaboration and team work, most people stuck working in them bemoan the loss of privacy and the distractions that impede their ability to concentration. In fact, a new Harvard study found strong complaints from workers in open plan offices about environmental noise levels – and also found that whatever collaboration benefits these layouts provide were outweighed by workers’ dissatisfaction with noise and privacy issues.

But if your company is switching to an open plan layout, you’ll need to find a way to work in the new environment. Here are some things that can help.

Establish work processes that maximize your focus and don’t be shy about asking your coworkers to follow them. For instance, rather than having colleagues call out to you from across the room when they want to talk, ask people to email you or set up a meeting. You’ll need to be willing to redirect people to this method a few times in but after a few reminders, most people should get retrained.

Agree on shared behavioral norms. As a group, your team can establish norms to respect other people’s space and concentration. For instance, you might all agree to keep phones and computer alerts silenced, to take any calls that are longer than a few minutes in a conference room, and not to eat especially odiferous foods at your desks.

Establish signs to signal that it’s not a good time to interrupt you. Whether it’s a simple sign that says “on deadline – check back at 3:00” or a red flag signaling “not available,” create some way to tell colleagues that you’re not free right now and to check back later.

Make sure you have at least some locked space. You might trust your colleagues, but visitors to the office, repair people, and other strangers will also have access to your space. So you’ll want to have a locking drawer in your desk or file cabinet or another safe place to store your purse, wallet, or other valuables.

Ensure that you have conference rooms available for meetings and phone calls. Open plan offices are challenging at the best of times, but they’re practically doomed to failure if your company doesn’t provide private space for meetings, sensitive conversations, or long phone calls. If your office is in the process of switching to this layout, make sure the planners are including conference rooms for this purpose. If your office has already made the switch and didn’t include conference rooms, it’s worth raising as a request to your management or facilities staff.

Take advantage of teleworking, or ask your office to experiment with allowing it if it doesn’t already. Even just a half day a week of working at home can give you several solid hours of distraction-free focus, which can be enormously valuable when your work requires you to concentrate without interruptions. If your office won’t allow you to telework, you might come in early or stay late when you’re working on a project that requires particular focus.

Invest in good earphones. You’ll have at least one colleague who carries on loudly, takes calls on speaker phone, or otherwise makes it impossible to focus without a barrier to block out the noise, and high quality earphones can be what keeps you sane and productive.

Make sure your company hears your feedback. If you’re in an open plan environment and it’s not working well for you and others on your team, speak up! You shouldn’t push the issue incessantly, of course, but it’s reasonable to ensure that your managers and others hear your feedback on the disadvantages of the workspace, and especially how it’s impacting your productivity.

I originally published this at U.S. News & World Report.

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my coworker’s creditors call her constantly, indignant over lack of a raise, and more

by Alison Green on December 4, 2013

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

1. Employer asked me to do 30 hours of free work as part of a hiring process

I am being interviewed for an executive director job for a U.S.-based NGO doing work internationally. I have been told I am a finalist for the position. The next phase of the process requires that I create a detailed development plan that should take “30 hours” to complete over the next couple of weeks.

I have a problem with this on many levels. I don’t think the motives of the rather young and inexperienced board of directors are in anyway nefarious, e.g., to get free work and then pass it on to someone to implement. Yet, I will not do this. The most I would spend on the task would be 8 hours, which is even more than I think is necessary to achieve their stated objective of understanding strategic competency. How would you handle this?

30 hours?! That is insane, and not acceptable.

As I’ve said here many times, it’s crucial when hiring to see candidates actually doing the work they’d be doing if hired. But that means an hour, maybe two.

I’d say something like this: “I’m not able to do 30 hours of work without charge. I’d be glad to walk you through similar plans I’ve created in the past and/or refer you to references who can talk in detail about how I’ve approached this kind of work.” (If you prefer a different framing, you could replace that first sentence with one about how your schedule doesn’t permit you to do 30 hours of work in the next few weeks because of existing commitments to your current job / clients / etc., but that leaves the door open for them to try to extend the timeline or even shrink the project to, say, 15 hours … which would leave you needing to use the first, more direct explanation anyway.)

(Also, I’m sure you’re right that they don’t intend to screw you over; they’re inexperienced and don’t realize that this isn’t okay. That kind of thing isn’t uncommon at smaller nonprofits, but you can point it out to them.)

2. How can I discreetly ask my coworker to stop letting creditors constantly call her at work?

I am responsible for reception duties as well as some accounts payable responsibilities at a mid-sized company. Every day, I receive many personal calls for a particular coworker of mine, most of which are credit card companies and mortgage companies trying to collect a debt. I have been dutifully transferring these calls to her line multiple times a day, but it is reaching a point that it is interrupting my work and seems excessive. I know it is within my colleague’s rights to tell the debt collectors not to call her at work and they must respect this request, but for whatever reason she hasn’t done this. Is there a way I can stop these calls without stepping over any personal boundaries or embarrassing my coworker?

I’m guessing that you don’t have the authority to tell your coworker to stop taking so many personal calls at work, which means that you’d need to frame it as a suggestion rather than a request — framing it as “I wasn’t sure if you knew you could tell them to stop and they’d have to, and thought you might find it helpful.” But if she declines to do so, then you’d be left needing to talk with your manager about it — and actually, that might be the place to start, because your manager might prefer to intervene with your coworker herself than put you in the position of doing it. (Or she might tell you to let it go and not say anything.)

3. Should I be indignant that I’ve taken on much more responsibility without a raise?

I was hired right out of college, a year and a half ago, at a TV news station as half producer, half assistant producer. On the weekends, I’m in charge of entire shows, but on the weekdays I simply assist all the full-time producers with their shows. However, when one needs vacation or sick time, I end up filling in, sometimes with no notice. I may go an entire month being an assistant but once.

These are big newscasts with incredibly high ratings, and more reponsibility and more pressure than an assistant deals with – but I’m not being paid more.

Do I have any justification to be indignant? Is it fair to ask for a raise based on these new circumstances? If a similar thing happens in a future job how should I react? Again, this is my first ever job so I don’t have much to go on.

You can absolutely ask for a raise based on this. (In fact, if you haven’t had a raise since you started a year and a half ago and you’re doing a good job, you should probably be asking for a raise anyway.) But I’d try not to be indignant about it. It’s nice if your employer offers you a raise unprompted, but ultimately you’re the one responsible for advocating for yourself and negotiating your salary. There’s advice

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something your cover letter does not need to do

by Alison Green on December 3, 2013

I’ve seen a few people lately advising others that a cover letter needs to address every single one of the qualifications listed in the job ad.

This is not true, and it will usually make for a crowded, less effective cover letter.

You do want to be sure that the qualifications described in the job posting are all covered between your cover letter and resume combined, but your cover letter shouldn’t be a laundry list of qualifications, especially since most of those are probably already on your resume.

Let us all repeat it like a mantra: Your cover letter shouldn’t repeat what’s on your resume. It should add something new to your application, something your resume doesn’t already contain. Do not believe anyone who tells you otherwise!

(Obviously, if a particular job’s application instructions directly tell you that you need to address every qualification in your cover letter, then you need to do that. And I wonder if this advice started when people saw some ads saying that, and extrapolated it to cover letters in general.)

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how can I back out of a mentoring relationship?

by Alison Green on December 3, 2013

A reader writes:

I’m hoping you can help me with how to tail off a coaching situation. I’ve been working with someone for a year now; her supervisor doesn’t have listening or development skills, and they don’t get along because of frustration on both sides anyway.

It’s not a formal coaching relationship at all. She was clearly having problems communicating with her boss–and her boss with her–and I said, hey, I’m willing to work with you to figure out some ways to improve that relationship. We decided to meet weekly over lunch and during the first meeting, when I asked questions about the nature of their interactions, it became obvious that her boss was frustrated with everything about her work–quantity and quality. In asking her for more detail, it became glaringly obvious that her job skills were really lacking, and her boss just doesn’t have the managerial skills to help her build a skillset and work approach that would work for her.

I am used to mentoring/coaching relationships that discuss life experience, professional experience, advancement, life-juggling, networking, etc. Having to teach someone how to build and use a basic to-do list, mind details, prioritize (which I realize isn’t automatic–but the nature of this person’s job basically does the prioritization for her–it’s more about how to stop procrastinating), rebuild relationships and credibility with people after poor performance, recognize the difference between kicking up a dustcloud of effort and actually performing–on a weekly basis, which is how often we were meeting–is draining.

We last met three weeks ago, and based on what I’ve come to know about her, I had an a-ha! moment about a basic approach to her job that I thought might work for her. We discussed it at length and worked out some bulleted steps and reminder systems that I hoped would start to retrain her brain. Over the next week or so, she pinged me occasionally to rave about how it was helping–that’s tailed off a bit now, and I’ve been busy, so I haven’t checked in much.

I told her that she needed to work with this new approach at the front of her mind for a month, and then we’d talk about her impressions of how it was working for her and make any tweaks that might be necessary. That will be next week. I’m fully committed to that check-in and the tweaks, if any are needed, but after that, I am completely out of ideas about how to help any further. I’ve kept my boss updated–he’s the one with ultimate hire/fire/PIP/performance review authority over her, and she meets with him monthly as well–and we agree that at a baseline level, she’s barely meeting expectations and there’s no real reason to terminate her (the boss has seen some small improvements, which is heartening).

So, after all that, my real question is, how do I tail this off without sounding like I’m cutting bait? (I have suggested, bluntly and more than once, that she really think hard about whether she feels this job is a good fit for her.) I’m fine with check-ins, but I am all out of ideas for any further growth and basic skills I can impart. At this point, it really is up to her to use what we’ve talked about, and I will tell her so. Beyond being a sounding board, there’s nothing more I can offer, and she’s got to start learning how to assess and direct her own performance on her own–the dependency on me doesn’t help her grow. How can I convey that in a way that doesn’t sound like I’m giving up on her?

I suppose that a “okay, I’m really out of bandwidth here and I think we’ve talked about a lot of stuff over the last year–how about monthly check-ins from here out” approach might work. I just don’t want her to feel like I’m throwing up my hands.

Yeah, this isn’t really your problem to solve. It’s great that you’ve tried, and you’ve clearly put a lot of thought into how to help her, but you’ve been meeting weekly for a year and it’s more than reasonable to decide that you’re at a point of diminishing returns. And you know, this happens even with really strong mentees — you eventually reach a point where it makes sense to scale back and have meetings be ad hoc rather than so regularly scheduled.

So the message here isn’t “you suck and I can’t try to salvage you anymore.” It’s “we’ve done some intensive work and we’re at a different stage now, so I’m going to back off.” I think you’re probably worried that it’s going to come across as the former because that’s closer to how you feel, but the latter is a completely reasonable message to deliver.

I’d say something like this to her: “Now that we’ve had some pretty intensive conversations about this stuff, why don’t you try out the things we’ve talked about and see how they go? Let’s switch from meeting every week to just checking in occasionally — I’ll leave it up to you to reach out when you have something specific you want to talk over.”

If you think she’s going to resist this, you could throw in something about not having as much time because of your core responsibilities, but still wanting to be available to her for a resource now and then … but either way, there’s no reason to feel guilty about delivering this message. You’re not even cutting off all contact; you’re just decreasing it to something that makes more sense now.

Also: While you sound awesome and I can see why your manager would be excited to have you helping out with this situation, the work you’ve described doing with this coworker sounds like less like mentoring and more like intensive remedial coaching. Your boss should have been questioning all along whether it makes sense to invest that kind of time in someone who isn’t performing well at some pretty fundamental things, and also whether it’s the best use of your time, in particular, given the other priorities I assume you have.

And that leads me to this: Combined with your boss’s willingness to keep someone who took so much effort just to get up to “barely meeting expectations,” I wonder if he just doesn’t want to do the hard work of actually addressing whether or not this is the right fit for your coworker … and has been using your willingness to help as a way to avoid that. If that’s the case, it’s really in the organization’s best interest for you to pull back so he’s more forced to deal with the fit issue.

Either way, I hope you’re getting appropriate recognition for going above and beyond here — from both your coworker and your company.

Read updates to this letter here and here.

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10 funniest workplace gift debacles

by Alison Green on December 3, 2013

I recently asked readers to tell me about their most awkward workplace gift moments — and you delivered. Here are the 10 funniest and most awkward – from which we can draw the 10 key gift-giving lessons below.

1. Employees should not be pressured to send the CEO’s family on a ski trip

The second-in-command of my organization sent all of us this email: “Dear [staff], Each year we have done a holiday gift for [CEO] to recognize his leadership of [organization] during the year. Given the very busy holiday season, I’d like to start the ball rolling on the collection early this year in order to present him with his gift by December 18th at our annual retreat day. Please send your contribution to me and I will take care of purchase, etc. Last year we presented him with a two night stay at [resort] mountain for him and his family to go skiing and they loved it, so why not repeat the appreciated gift?”

Please note that the CEO is the highest paid person in the organization, and I am an hourly, part-time employee being paid less than the industry standard. I am incredulous at the expectation here. The wording of the email implies that the staff has no choice.

2. Not every sentiment needs to be shared

I did an 8-month internship, and my boss there was not the most pleasant of people. I would go weeks without seeing her because she was constantly calling in sick and she ignored me most of the time she was in the office. At Christmas, she popped her head in my cubicle long enough to say, “I was going to get you a gift, but I decided not to.” Thanks?…

3. No self-improvement gifts

I had a coworker who kept talking all over the office about how much she loved “The Biggest Loser” and Jillian Michaels, how she had friends who had tried the “30 Day Shred” DVD who had loved it and lost tons, etc. So her Secret Santa that year got her the DVD. 

She opened it and cried, thinking she was being told she was fat. I really do think the giver had the best of intentions, but lesson learned. No diet/weight loss items as gifts, particularly to coworkers.

4. The boss’s spouse shouldn’t win the raffle

I worked for a small company, less than 20 people. It was privately owned by one person (Terry). Each employee’s name was placed into the hat for a prize ranging from $10 gift certificates to a brand new desktop computer and two tablets. Turned out the boss was included in the drawing. When Terry’s name was pulled for a prize, he politely declined it (as he should have, since his name should not have been included in the first place). But then, Terry’s spouse’s name was pulled for one of the MS Surface Tablets. And it was gleefully accepted by the spouse, who then drove away in a luxury car with the big door prize of the evening.
 Problem? Spouse didn’t even work at the company. Spouse owned a company of their own. Spouse could easily have bought that tablet 100x over. Such a prize would have really meant something to the employees working there, some of whom were having a hard time making ends meet to begin with.

5. If you need a manual for gift exchanges, you’re doing it wrong

Several years ago, I took over a department that had been badly managed by a borderline psychotic micromanager. While trying to make sense of the ridiculous, overly complex procedures she left behind, one of my new employees gave me the “party procedures.” This three-page, single-spaced document detailed which holidays, birthdays, and anniversaries were to be celebrated and when, the types of gifts that were to be given to the various classes of employees for each occasion, and what type of food was to be served at each event. Even better, each employee was required to contribute money to cover cards and gifts. Aside from the fact that most of the employees were either part-time or not well-paid, requiring that employees contribute money to anything like that is illegal at our institution. I have no idea how my predecessor got away with it despite the fact that at least a couple of staff members over the years had quit over that very issue.

Needless to say, that was one of the first sets of procedures I axed, much to the relief of the staff. Now we have end-of-the-semester potlucks, and I buy the pizza. The one woman who was actually put out that people didn’t want to exchange gifts eventually got the hint and brings in cookies or candy as a gift for the entire department, which is fine but in no way required. So far, so good.

6. Keep it PG

We had a white elephant gift exchange, and one of the gifts was a half-used jar of Vaseline and other sex accessories, including handcuffs. It was meant to be a joke, but came off entirely creepy because of the individual who gave it. He showed up halfway through the gift exchange, so we all knew which gift bag he’d brought. We had a great, easygoing office at the time, but reactions varied between stunned silence and awkward laughter. Even years later, no one really mentions that story, and that office doesn’t let you forget anything.

7. Not the place for pennies and paperclips

At one of my previous jobs, the organization did a gift swap each year. It was one of those ones where each person draws a number, which indicates what order you can choose a present and then people who come after can choose to either steal or take a new present. 

The only “rule” was that the item you bought to contribute was supposed to be capped at $15. So the game starts and people begin unwrapping gifts and every item is relatively nice for being under $15 — gift cards to coffee and bakery chains, nice boxes of chocolate, etc.

We’re getting to the very end of the presents, and finally someone chooses this small-ish box. The person opens it and finds…a box filled with random junk — paperclips, pennies, screws, etc.

A kind of silence falls over the entire room for a minute or two, finally followed by some weak/nervous laughter. 

I don’t remember exactly how, but everyone knew who brought this box of junk. I’m not sure what the person was thinking — if he misunderstood and thought the gift swap was supposed to be like a White Elephant exchange or if he was just a jerk. (I do think he felt like a jerk after seeing everyone else’s gift.)

8. Be cautious when it comes to self-published poetry

One year I was stopped on the street outside work by a guy selling his self-published poetry book. It was full of pictures of sunsets and poems in the style of:
“I walk on the beach alone
The waves crash
But I feel at peace.”
Anyway, I declined to buy a copy and he asked how to find the office receptionist, so I directed him in thinking he’d be given short shrift there.

Fast forward to when we are all opening our work Christmas hampers and I discover that the receptionist was quite the poetry fan. He must have sold her a good 100 copies of his tedious book because every single employee got one.

9. No medical supplies

Once, during a Secret Santa, I got a (unused, thank god) plastic hospital bedpan.

10. Nothing from behind the couch, please

I think my worst gift exchange was the White Elephant when I worked at a rare books library, where everyone brought truly quirky awesome stuff to throw around … and what did I end up with? The library director brought a used cat toy that looked like a voodoo doll, complete with dust bunnies and cat fur still attached as if he’d just pulled from behind the couch. If you’re going to be “forgetful,” just don’t even participate!

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I’m asked to cover when my coworkers are on a prayer break, my project was taken away, and more

by Alison Green on December 3, 2013

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

1. My project was taken away with no warning to me

A few weeks ago, the CEO of our small company pulled me into his office and told me I was going to be the lead on a new client account. I was very excited for the opportunity to spread my wings, and I got working on our first project with enthusiasm.

Two weeks later, during a team meeting with the CEO, my manager, and a fellow co-worker, I found out that my manager had been chosen to go on a business trip for the new client. A few moments later, I found out she would be working on a different version of the same project I had been working on for this new client. I was confused about the project’s direction and my involvement at that point, so I asked my CEO if he could clarify whether I was still the lead. Strangely, it was as if he completely forgot our original conversation a few weeks back…and my manager is suddenly the lead!

Never mind the fact that my manager probably asked for the new client for herself when she found out it was being given to me…I appreciate that the CEO can make whatever business decisions he deems necessary, and I am still doing all I can to make sure our first project with the new client goes smoothly.

However, I am really frustrated that he didn’t give me the courtesy of telling me that he had changed his mind about my role. It was embarrassing to find out when and how I did. Is there a way I can express this concern to him? Is it even appropriate to do so, or should I keep my mouth closed?

It’s possible that your boss simply forgot he’d already assigned it to you, or it’s possible something else is going on. In any case, it’s reasonable to ask about it when you’re told X but then Y happens. You want to do it in a way that doesn’t sound like you’re challenging the decision, just seeking clarification and even feedback. For instance: “I just wanted to check back with you about Project X. When we talked two weeks ago, you’d asked me to be the lead on it. It sounds now like Jane will be leading the work instead, and I wanted to check with you about whether there was anything in my approach that concerned you or made you think I wasn’t the best fit for it. If so, I’d really appreciate the feedback.”

Your tone here must be calm and non-defensive; it should signal “I’m concerned about whether I’m doing something wrong” — not because you should assume that you did, but because this makes it a lot more likely that you’ll get the real story than if your tone signals “I’m annoyed.”

2. Was I in the bottom of the pile for this job?

More hyper-analyzing of rejection emails: The phrasing in a rejection I received was, “I am currently considering other candidates for the position.” Does the plural use of candidates mean that I was on the bottom of the pile? Also, it makes it sound like he’s sending the rejection before making an offer. Does that mean he really didn’t like me since if he did like me he’d like to keep me as backup in case their first choice didn’t accept the offer? Most rejection emails I’ve gotten announce that they have filled the position.

I thought the interview went well and that I did everything perfectly, so while I would understand being beat out by someone who was a better fit, thinking that a whole slew of candidates beat me out makes me feel awful and that I’m doing something horribly wrong.

You’re over-thinking it! You could be a strong candidate — even in the top 10% out of, say, 200 or 300 candidates — but just not as strong as the 3, 5, 8, or 10 people the hiring manager has decided to talk further with. Or you could be just as strong as them, but he can only reasonably talk to a certain number of people. Or, of course, it’s also possible that you are indeed in the absolute bottom of the whole pool. But you can’t tell that from this email. It just means that you’re not in the group they’re interviewing further.

3. Will it hurt my chances if I ask for a Skype interview instead of interviewing in person?

I’m working in New York and interviewing for a position in Kentucky. I had a phone interview this morning (not a screening, but a real interview). A few hours later I got a call saying I had interviewed very well, and they’d like to fly me down later this week for another meeting. When I hesitated he mentioned that if that didn’t work we could do a Skype interview instead. I explained that due to a death in the family I’ve taken a lot of time off work lately (and my managers are on the difficult side… but I didn’t mention that), and that I would email him by tomorrow at lunch with an answer.

I don’t want to come across as being disinterested or unwilling to commit, but the truth is that a Skype interview would be a much better fit for me. Do you think it will reflect poorly on me/hurt my chances if I opt for that instead of letting them fly me in?

Well, maybe. It could, or it might not — but there’s no way to say for sure. It’s easier to create rapport and be impressive in person than it is over Skype, and there’s some research showing that candidates who do video interviews are perceived as less likable and are less likely to be hired. That doesn’t mean that that’ll be the case with you — but there’s also no way to really know for sure. If this is a job that you really want, I’d try to go there in person if at all possible. Is there any way to schedule it for a time that minimizes how much time off work you’ll need?

4. My company said they’ll re-advertise the job I want if no one but me applies

I have been doing the assistant cook job at work for about 9 months because another employee went long-term sick. She has now resigned and I have applied for the position. I shall be attending an interview and we will be required to make a couple of dishes in a certain time.

I am the only applicant who has responded and said that I will be attending. I am already doing the job and have proved that I can, but I have been told that if no other applicants come for an interview, they will re-advertise. Why would this be?

Three possibilities: (1) They want to make sure that they’re truly searching for the best person, not just hiring the person who happens to be there (which is actually good practice for many jobs), or (2) they’re just not fully sold on you and want to make sure that they’re comparing you to others, or (3) they don’t think you’re the right fit for the job and don’t want to offer it to you. I have no idea which of these it is, but in any of these cases, the best thing you can do is to do an awesome job at your interview and continue being awesome at work the rest of the time. From there, it’s up to them. Good luck.

5. I’m asked to cover when my coworkers are on a prayer break

I’m working in a support department consisting of 3 employees (including me). My coworkers are Muslim, and every Friday they have a 1-hour break for praying in the mosque. And when they’re going to pray, I’m holding down the fort alone.

Unlike my colleagues, I live the furthest away, use public transportation, and have to switch trains/busses 4 times. Public transportion in my area is quite unreliable, so I’m the one who often arrives late (50% not late, 40% late by 3-10 minutes, 10% late by 40-60 minutes). I always leave home at the same exact time, but sometimes little misfortunes happen when I change buses, which accumulates into one mega time waster.

Once a year, we have a performance review. Is it reasonable to ask my manager to consider this one hour I spend every week covering from my coworkers while they’re at the mosque — when I have the responsibilities of 3 people — to proportionally compensate for my lateness? And if my manager says no, is it fair that I just close the door, hang the phone, and put a “Friday Prayer Break” sign up when the Friday prayer time comes?

No, covering for two people for an hour a week is not likely to cancel out being late so often — at least not unless you’ve talked to your manager and explicitly worked out an agreement that it is. (But you’d want to do that in advance, not wait until it comes up in a performance review.)

The thing is, it either is or isn’t okay to be late in the type of work you do. (In some roles it would be, and in others it wouldn’t be.) If it’s not okay in your role, then you’ve got to figure out what you’re going to do about it — leave earlier? Talk to your manager and work out an accommodation? Stay later to make up for it, with your manager’s blessing? But you can’t just keep coming in late without talking to your manager about it and expect that it should be fine because you cover for your coworkers for an hour on Fridays.

And no, you can’t shut down the office while your coworkers are gone on Friday without talking to your manager about that too.

You need to talk to your manager about all of this and figure out what makes sense.

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I want your updates … and an interview with me

by Alison Green on December 2, 2013

Two things —

1. Listen to an interview with me about internships

I’m interviewed on the latest episode of The Money Jar podcast, talking about how to be awesome at your internship — or any job, really. (And this is timely, because I’m hiring an intern. Details coming tomorrow.) You can listen to the interview here; my segment starts at 16:05.

2. Where are you now?

Every December, I publish “where are they now” updates from people whose questions I answered here in the past year. It’s time for 2013’s version, so …

If you’ve had your question answered here in the last year, please email me an update and let us know how your situation turned out. Leave no juicy detail out!  I’ll post updates as they come in. (Don’t post them here though; email them to me.)

And yes, I know we just had a round of these in October, but there are plenty more to be had and we can’t break this end-of-year tradition.

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should you ask for the job at the end of an interview?

by Alison Green on December 2, 2013

A reader writes:

I read that if you ask for a job at the end of an interview, you should be prepared to accept the position on the spot. Is this true? What if the offer (salary, benefits, all of those things that you are not supposed to ask during the interview) is unfair/not up to par?

By asking for the job, do you lose negotiation power?

And how likely is the company to offer the job right after the interview?

You shouldn’t be asking for the job at the end of the interview. I know there’s plenty of advice out there that recommends it, but it’s not a good idea.

First of all, you shouldn’t even be ready to know that you want the job at the end of the interview. We’re talking about how you’ll be spending 40+ hours a week. Are you really prepared to sign up for that an hour after you walked into this company, without any further thought?

Secondly, good interviewers aren’t going to make a decision on the spot anyway. They’re going to think it over, talk to your references, and maybe talk to their colleagues. And they might have other candidates they want to interview. And that’s a good thing, because you want to work for a manager who takes hiring seriously (which is part of taking seriously the rest of managing a team, including developing and retaining good people, addressing problems, and replacing those who aren’t meeting a high bar — more things that you don’t want done thoughtlessly). You do not want to work for a manager who manages haphazardly or without much care.

Plus, by asking for the job in that manner, you (a) come across as a little naive about hiring, (b) come across as not especially thoughtful about whether this is really the right job for you, if you don’t even want to go home and think about it, and (c) put your interviewer on the spot in a way that’s likely to be awkward for both of you.

Now, there are some interviewers who like to be asked for the job — who even say that they don’t know how interested a candidate is otherwise. But this is silly. There are plenty of ways for interviewers to gauge interest — including asking outright. But if you’re concerned that you won’t appear sufficiently interested, then say something at the end of the interview like, “I’m really interested in the position, and I’m looking forward to talking further with you.” (And anyone who deems that insufficiently interested in probably someone who is going to require you to wear 37 pieces of flair while claiming you only need 15.)

Anyway, to answer your direct question: If for some reason you choose to disregard my advice here and you ask for the job anyway and they do offer it to you on the spot, then no, you’re not required to accept it if the salary and benefits aren’t what you want. You can still negotiate, and you can still ultimately turn it down.

But you shouldn’t ever have to worry about that, because you shouldn’t be doing it.

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6 secrets to getting a better performance evaluation

by Alison Green on December 2, 2013

With the year drawing to a close, it’s performance evaluation time in many companies. Performance evaluations don’t have to be stressful or nerve-wracking, especially if you follow these six tips to get ready for for yours.

1. Realize that most managers hate doing performance evaluations. It’s not that managers don’t want to give you feedback, but structured performance evaluations can feel bureaucratic (even though they shouldn’t be if they’re done well) and take up a lot of time to do, especially if the manager has a large number of staff members. As a result, many put them off or look for ways to get them done faster. As an employee, you can take advantage of this by making your evaluation easier for your manager. That leads directly to the next two points.

2. Let your manager know that you’re looking forward to your evaluation, not dreading it. One reason managers fret over evaluations is that they assume they’re nerve-wracking for employees. If you make it clear that you’re looking forward to feedback, you immediately make the process more pleasant for the person charged with giving it to you.

3. Evaluate yourself first. Some companies build self-assessments into their evaluation processes, and so you might be asked to fill out a self-evaluation before your manager does her piece of the process. But even if you aren’t, you can do one anyway and supply it to your manager. And it doesn’t have to be hard – just list out what your goals were for the year and how much progress you made toward them, and add a section on strengths you bring to the job and a section on where you’d like to do better in the coming year. If you provide this to your manager before she needs to finish her own evaluation of you, there’s a good chance that she’ll pull directly from it when she writes her own (sometimes quite liberally!).

4. Start planning for your evaluation from the first day of the evaluation period. In other words, if you’re evaluated every December, start thinking about your evaluation in 12 months earlier, in January. Think about what your goals for the year should be, and lay out a plan to achieve them – including monthly or quarterly milestones to make sure you’re on track. Then, work toward those milestones, and at the end of the year when it’s time for performance evaluations, you can ideally show your manager that you met all of your goals for the year.

5. Keep an evaluation file throughout the year. If you start trying to think about what you did well this year, you’re unlikely to remember the fantastic reception your report got in February or that great praise you got in June. Instead, keep a file where you jot down notes on project successes during the year, so that it’s handy when you’re reflection on your performance during evaluation time. You can even include notes of praise from others in the file and reference them in your review.

6. Ask colleagues to give feedback to your manager. Ideally, as your manager reflects on your performance over the last year, she’ll seek out input from other people who work with you closely and who might have insightful perspectives on your work. But don’t wait to see if she does this, or take the chance that she might not ask the people best positioned to speak about your accomplishments. Instead, think of who particularly appreciates the work you do and tell them you’d be grateful if they’d provide input to your manager. It’s fine to be direct about this; for instance, you might say, “Jane, Susan and I are getting ready to do my annual performance evaluation, and if you have any feedback on my work this year, I’d love it if you’d share it with her.”

I originally published this at U.S. News & World Report.

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I don’t want to be an employer’s second choice, manager doesn’t care that our new coworker is horrible, and more

by Alison Green on December 2, 2013

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

1. I don’t want to be an employer’s second choice

I got an interview for an internship, and the interviewer told me they would get back to me on a Tuesday (interview was on Friday). I hadn’t heard back from them on Tuesday so I sent a follow-up email. Interviewer replied back, saying it’s taken a bit more time to meet with all the candidates (even though I knew they interviewed my “competition” on the same day I had my interview), so they would get back to me on Thursday/Friday. Friday came and no news. So the coming Monday, I sent a follow-up email. Before the end of the day, I got a call from the interviewer that they were moving forward with another candidate. I asked for feedback, etc – the reason that I didn’t get it was because the other candidate had IT background, which I don’t have. So I totally accept defeat. After the call, I still sent a thank-uou email for the call and the opportunity and said that I look forward to be considered for future opportunities at the company (I really liked the person who interviewed me, so I was still happy despite the rejection).

So the Thursday of that week, interviewer replied to that thank-you email and asked if I have time for a second interview. Thinking it was another opportunity, I said yes. He called me to give more info. And I found out that I was being interviewed for the same role. Over the phone, he gave me some tips on how I can do better in the interview. Given that I was already rejected, I asked if there was a problem. Interviewer said he felt like he lacked info about me that they are unable to make a decision. Really?

I am done with the second interview but I honestly wanted to cancel the interview all together if I had the chance. Am I making assumptions too early that they just want to interview me again because their first choice rejected them? Am I wrong to feel demoralized to work for a company that only thinks of me as second choice?

Lots of people get hired for jobs as the “second choice,” and there’s nothing wrong with that. This isn’t like dating, where you probably wouldn’t want a date with someone who only asked you out after someone he liked better turned him down. This is employment; it’s not personal if they originally preferred someone else to you. Really, the only relevant question is whether you want the job if it’s offered to you.

I also wouldn’t be too put off that they want to have a second conversation with you. It’s not unreasonable to interview someone twice before hiring them, especially if you still have outstanding questions. In fact, it would be a very bad idea to hire someone when you still have outstanding questions, so it makes sense that they’re asking to talk again — and you can probably get a sense of what those questions are by whatever his “tips” to you were.

2. Our manager doesn’t care that our new coworker is horrible

I work in a small office where we recently added a new position due to our growing business. Our jobs entail a lot of complicated tasks and requires sharp memory and attention to detail. Our new employee has been with us for four months. She does not like to follow directions, argues, and makes mistakes frequently. She always has a bad attitude. We have tried re-educating her on things she makes mistakes on in the nicest way possible, but she still makes the same mistakes and is basically rude. Our manager is pushing us to give her more tasks to learn when she is struggling with the little we have given her. When we told our boss our concerns, she turned everything back on the team like it is our fault she can’t retain anything. The team morale is very low now. What can we do so that our boss address the issue which is the not-so-new employee?

Your manager sounds like she sucks, which might trump anything you try. However, I’d push your manager to recognize what’s going on by continuing to push the problem back to her to deal with. Keep it dry and factual — you don’t want to sound your assessment of your coworker to sound personal — but do go back to her with what you’re seeing, and don’t pull any punches. For instance: “We’ve tried X, Y, and Z to train Jane to handle these projects, but she hasn’t caught on. She sent the wrong proof to the printer this week, and when the client complained, she told him it wasn’t her problem and then left for the day. When Bob tried to coach her on fixing the problem the next day, she told him not to talk to her. All three of us who work closely with her have serious concerns about her ability to do the work she’s charged with. How would you like us to handle this?” If she tells you that you need to give Jane more training, then say, “I’m certainly willing to, but I’ve tried X, Y and Z. Can you help me figure out what else to try?”

But ultimately, you can’t make your manager be a good manager. If she’s resolved not to deal with performance problems, there might not be much you can do to change that.

3. Applying for jobs when I have a specific requirement of the company

I am trying to get licensed as an accountant. My state requires working experience under an active licensed CPA in order to get licensed, and my current manager(s) are all inactive CPAs, which will not fulfill the work experience requirement as mandated by the state. I have decided to start job searching to find a company that is eligible to sign off on my work experience, but how do I convey that in the application process without coming across as snooty/pretentious (“I only want to work for you if you have an active CPA in your company”)? I’d rather not waste their or my time.

I suppose you could say something in your cover letter about this being the reason that you’re looking, but I think you’d actually be better off waiting until a company reaches out to you for an interview or phone screen and asking at that point. (You don’t need to go to the interview to find out; it’s fine to ask over the phone at that point and explain why.) You’re going to be sending in these applications either way, so I’d rather you not get into it in your cover letter and just wait until you’re actually talking to someone.

(You could also try using LinkedIn to figure out if a company has an active CPA on staff, which might help you narrow down your applications.)

4. Resumes when you don’t have much to put in the Education section

I understand that there shouldn’t be any mention of high school on a resume. However, what if you never attended college or had any specialized training of some sort?

Just skip the education section on your resume altogether. It’s not required to put it there.

5. My old manager keeps emailing me job listings that don’t fit what I need

One of my supervisors from a past internship emails me about job openings in my field once in a while. Unfortunately, the jobs have all had an hour and a half or more commute if I drove to them (which I can’t because I don’t have a car), and the jobs don’t pay enough that I’d be able to afford to leave my parents house and move closer. Basically, they’re jobs I can’t apply to. The first time my old supervisor emailed me one of these, I thanked them for keeping me in mind but told them I couldn’t apply because it was just too far away. I didn’t want to seem ungrateful or discourage my old supervisor from emailing me about jobs in the future, so, after that, I started emailing back a thanks for the heads-up and not saying anything else.

Is this a good way to handle it? Or should I let my old supervisor know about my current transportation/living limitations? I’m afraid I’m going to see them/talk to them at some point, they’ll ask if I had any luck with the jobs, and they’ll want to know why I didn’t tell them I wasn’t applying to any of them.

Well, when people send you job listings, they’re not generally expecting that you’ll apply to each and every one; it’s more “here are some listings to look at.”

I don’t think you should keep reminding your past manager about your transportation situation since you’ve already told her one; if you continue bringing it up in response to these emails, it risks coming across as “do a better job of finding me suitable postings.” Instead, just thank her when she thinks of you, and disregard the postings if they’re not right for you. And if she asks you about any of them at some point, you can simply say, “I so appreciate you forwarding me postings that you see! It’s been challenging for me to find something close enough to where I live since I don’t have a car, so the more listings I’m able to look at, the better.” (Note that that’s not a commentary on her specific listings, but rather a broader statement about the challenging you’re facing in your search.)

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