Ask a Manager

Remember the reader whose boss led a gossipy clique and wanted to have a drunk sleepover? Here’s the update.

At first, I tried to keep to myself and remain professional, but interactions with my coworkers kept getting worse: I would work an event while they would smoke outside or bring their children and entertain them, but at the same time they were “too busy” to find time to train me on parts of my job. I kept trying to work hard and develop quality educational materials, but eventually it ended up in exactly what one of your readers predicted: in June, my boss called me in to talk about traits like “poor interactions and rapport with others, stand-offish or snobbish, not a team player, unapproachable…” I was disappointed and relieved at the same time! We discussed how this might not be the best place for me, and she did me the courtesy of being understanding and supportive, and she wrote me a positive letter of reference. Although I know this goes against your advice, I gave my notice with nothing lined up because I was so desperate to get out of there! My husband had found a job in April, so he was supportive of the decision to go back down to one income so that I wouldn’t have to come home feeling miserable every day.

Interestingly, after it started to get around the small office that I would be leaving in a few weeks, I started receiving visits from each and every one of the “unpopular” people telling me that I would be missed because I’m “one of the good ones,” and that they understand why I’m leaving and wish they could do the same! One of them told me she cries herself to sleep every night but can’t leave without finding another job first. I had been feeling sort of ashamed that I was such a quitter and that I couldn’t just suck it up and get along with everyone, but their comments made me realize that it wasn’t just me who found the office culture toxic, and I felt lucky that I could get out!

Now I am struggling trying to find another job, but I have been doing some volunteer work and trying to make connections while I search. While I have been on a few interviews, I haven’t found anything yet. I’ve accepted that I left the “best” job in my area as far as pay and opportunities (on paper it really was an awesome job!). However, since the “best” job was that horrible, it’s really given me new perspective!

Thanks to you and your readers for your advice!

Remember the manager whose new assistant called in on her third day on the job because she needed to help her mother with something? Here’s the update.

The situation actually worked itself out. When she came back the next day, I sat her down, made sure her mother was ok, and then explained to her how important reliability is, etc. (followed your advice). She acted like she was incredibly sorry and embarrassed, and I thought we were on the same page. She finished out the day, but when I came in the next day, there was an email from her telling me she had to quit. She said she thought she was able to take the job, but she really couldn’t.

My manager and I now refer to her as the “space cadet.” We’re always on the look out for others like her.

I learned a valuable lesson from her. Experience isn’t everything. I ask much more probing questions now, even if the position I’m hiring for is part-time.

Remember the reader whose stalkerish ex-boyfriend was applying for a job at her small company, after she’d repeatedly told him to stop contacting her? Here’s her update.

Things went REALLY well and went really great! Thank you SO MUCH for your help.

What I was so nervous about coming forward about — what I had perceived as something that would be considered to be a “tough call” or too minor to bring up to an employer — received the same swift and decisive response one might give a bomb threat (sorry if that sounds bad, but)…

I probably started a little too passive or apologetic with, “This might sound weird, and I’m not sure what to do, but my ex-boyfriend is applying …” and I was cut off almost right there, halfway through my sentence, with, “OK, I’ll let HR know, and I’ll make sure they take care of this. We don’t want to deal with that here. This will be stopped.” The conversation wasn’t longer than 15 seconds.

They still held the interview (he came from out of town) but needless to say he didn’t get the job. Of course, he told me all about this.

I have since been promoted (this happened shortly thereafter).

I did employ the silent/nonresponsive method for a month or so after I was told to do so. I may have at some point told him how it made me feel and that he needed to back off. He still texts me and I gradually began responding back, but he seems to accept the fact and move on. At any rate, I successfully established a boundary with him, and I am thankful for having your advice that gave me the courage and confidence to do that.

Five more reader updates:

1. The reader whose paychecks were bouncing

I went to the labor board about the whole thing (you should’ve seen the look on the labor commissioner’s face when he figured out the company tried to pay their bounced check with a bounced checks – it was quite pained) – the gears ground slow but sure but they eventually made a judgment. The company responsible for employing me did not even bother appealing. Or showing up at all.

I am now, however, in the position of having to foot the bill to collect the stupid thing. (I have to cover court filing fees and a process server to carry out a writ of execution). The employer company is supposed to reimburse me for costs reasonable to collecting the debt, but 1. It’s not cheap and 2. If I can’t trust them to pay the first amount, I’m not sure what good tacking on more will do.

I just can’t afford the monetary, emotional, and time cost of pursuing this right now, but when I land a permanent job, I will reevaluate.

And I am now a happy member of a local credit union.

2. The reader who wanted to leave a job after six weeks (#3 at the link)

I ended up accepting a great offer that pays quite a bit more than the current position and when I went to give notice to my current manager he was already aware that I would be leaving, gave me a great reference, and wished me the best (instead of pushing me out the door, which is what I feared would happen!).

He also acknowledged that he didn’t have much time to sit down with me and to train me and he realized that this probably played a part in me leaving so quickly but that he would work on doing a better job going forward.

3. The reader who wanted to know why so many employers are rude and inconsiderate to job seekers

I wish I had good news. I finally got that tech test the following week, I spent a few hours on it, sent it in and was told I’d “hear back soon” – that was 6 weeks ago. Nothing has changed, I’m still struggling to have people get back to me – even about basic things like volunteering. I’ve definitely got a better attitude about it and far few things are being broken around the house. It’s still a shame that people can act like that and it still makes me angry but it’s no longer my focus, so thank you very much for your advice and support. I’m taking a class in a few weeks that will hopefully help me transition to a field where my skills will be more in demand. Best of luck to you all!

4. The reader who had resigned but was having trouble getting the new employer to set a start date

Well, I had to get more aggressive with this new company in getting them to commit to a firm start date. I did start in mid-July. After being out of work for 5 weeks. I did share with HR the reasons for my concerns and that yes, I was indeed upset about being pushed off for so long. They did apologize, saying that one of the managers on my “team” had resigned the same day their offer went out to me. So they had some issues to work out.

I am still with this company 2 months later. It’s not a horrible job, but not as great as I thought it would be. My major issue with the management here is the lack of communication between departments. I have asked about job expectations, sales goals, process procedures etc and can’t say I have a complete understanding on what my job function since it changes weekly or I never get a response.

In the meantime, I have been looking around to see if any new opportunities are available with another company. I am trying to make the best of my situation when I can.

5. The manager whose employee wanted to learn a new skill and wouldn’t take no for an answer

It’s a rather dull update. I’m afraid as things went exactly as planned and worked out quite alright. Your advice helped me a lot with how to approach the situation. I went to my employee and had a conversation with her about what her responsibilities were, how she fit into the company and how her job was important and deserved her full attention. I was firm with her and told her that I expected this to be that last time we had to discuss this matter and in fact, it was. She is still with the company, still doing the job she was hired to do and has been a loyal employee. Personally, I believe she still has some ill feelings towards me due to the situation but for the most part we work together just fine.

Thanks so much for the great advice. I love to read all of your advice in hopes that I can use some of it in the future when situations arise. I’m always learning and trying to be a great team player and manager.

Remember the reader whose boss had retaliated in his performance review after he talked to HR about being written up for an absence during Hurricane Sandy? Here’s his update.

This tale actually has a happy ending; it’s just not the ending I would have wished for when I wrote to you back in January.

I did end up receiving a raise, but it was smaller than it had been in previous years. I don’t know if that was because of my horrible review score or because the company was being less generous than usual with raises for everyone.

I settled into my new group and a few months went by with nothing interesting happening until one Friday morning I got a phone call from my boss’ boss. “Could you meet with me in Conference Room 3?” It was unusual for Big Boss to contact me but I figured she wanted to know about a project I was working on so I locked up and was walking away from my desk when I got another call from her. “Um, could you bring your badge and your purse with you?”

At that point it dawned on me that I would not be returning to my desk after this meeting!

Turns out that 200 people were let go that day because my (now former) employer lost a couple of major clients. Only two of those people were in-house medical coders and I was one of them. Was it because of that review? My gut feeling says that it may have well been, but I guess I’ll never know for sure.

Remember the happy ending I mentioned earlier? In the end, whoever was responsible for my being laid off actually did me a favor. I got a generous severance package, so I knew that I wouldn’t have undue financial hardship while I job hunted. Then, within six weeks, I landed a job as a remote coder for a large hospital system, making more per hour than I did at my former job. Working from home is kind of the Holy Grail for medical coders so I am thrilled with my new circumstances and actually find myself being thankful that things turned out the way they did.

Remember the manager who suspected a candidate had lied to her about salary? Here’s the update:

As many people wrote in and noted, I needed to dig deeper into what the candidate was considering salary. Upon doing so, I found out she had included stipends she was receiving for extra duties (coaching sports, etc.) as part of her salary. Once those were accounted for, our offer of base salary was actually higher than what she was making. She accepted that offer, even though she is not taking on extra duties yet with us. So, her base salary went up $1k, but overall compensation (and duties) declined slightly.

She has worked out to be a strong employee, and the more we’ve worked with her, the more we realized how much the environment she was coming from affected her interactions with us in the interview process. It’s clear to us she didn’t have a lot of trust at her previous employer, had to battle exceedingly hard to get basic things done, and was used to there being a bit of a contentious relationship between employees and leadership. Early on, she had a couple things she felt strongly on and got fairly fired up about, but they were pretty basic asks (supplies she needed, a scheduling tweak) that we were easily able to accommodate. She and her manager have a pretty good rapport at this point and she actually jokes about how she doesn’t have to battle so hard for things anymore. Lesson learned for me: the workplace PTSD people talk about can have major effects on people early on in their new jobs, and we as interviewers need to distinguish what behavior is caused by current experience and what is a part of someone’s own makeup, and that they will carry with them.

On an aside, many people mentioned the public school salary scales, and how all this information should be able to be found. In my state, we are not bound by those scales and are able to make competitive offers based on the same indicators many employers would: the duties of the individual position, job performance, prior experience, and the market for someone with the specific skills we need. For example, a strong music or special education teacher is harder (usually) to find than a strong middle school English teacher, and thus can sometimes earn a higher salary.

Remember the reader back in December who wrote in wondering if she needed to thank her bosses for a Christmas bonus when she hated her job and they knew it? She was pretty miserable at work at the time, but here’s her update:

My original question was about my Christmas bonus (but really about how miserable I was) and you posted it on the site. Things did not get better after the holidays – they got worse for me. I was thrown in the middle of a number of circumstances that made me very uncomfortable (awkward, not physical), I was spending a lot of time serving as a go-between at the request of one of my bosses (no problem there), but then was not included (I asked but told it was not needed) in meetings that directly influenced the project, making it hard for me to serve as the go-between, and when that became apparent, was blamed by my boss, for the miscommunication issues. My office is located two blocks from where one of the bombs exploded at the Boston Marathon (I felt the blast from my desk) and while I had clients as far away as London calling me and other colleagues reaching out (I was the only one in the office that day – who would go into work on Marathon Monday if given a choice?!), my boss was the only one who didn’t say anything. Oops, I take that back – he texted me at 11 PM that night to ask if I had set the alarm when I left.

Things kept getting worse and I was crankier, more easily upset, and generally angry about my scenario – I wasn’t enjoying anything I was doing outside of the office either, and I was arguing with my family members and a couple friends. It was awful. The good news was that I had been accepted to a graduate school program that was directed towards a complete career shift, so I just needed to stick it out another three months, which seemed like ETERNITY. Unfortunately, I couldn’t do it. I gave my two weeks notice in June after what truly was the last straw for me (told I should cancel a doctor’s appointment with less than 24 hours notice for a meeting that I would not be participating in and was not involved in the scheduling, despite it being on the calendar for two months prior, just so I would be in the office – other colleagues would be there, as well, but as office manager, I was expected to greet them) and offered to train my replacement at any point up until August 15th, even if I was no longer working at the company.

Now, I had two bosses and one is the guy I’ve been mentioning above. The other one was (and always has been) a perfectly fine boss to work with. He’s understanding, demanding, expects excellence, and provides flexibility in my style of approaching tasks. After I gave my notice, he approached me and asked me to continue to work for him as his “Project Manager” for the remainder of the summer. He gave me a small raise, paid me on an hourly basis, and allowed me to work remotely 100% of the time. My only regret was not resigning sooner! I worked hard this summer for him, and spent a lot of time running, in yoga class, reading novels, watching movies, and needlepointing (my favorite things to do!) and am now finishing my second week of graduate school, which is already amazing and quite fulfilling. I feel like a new person!

Not to mention, the first boss (the meanie) hired a replacement for me who was a college student who was already planning to study abroad this semester. Since her departure, he has emailed me multiple times requesting information (I trained the replacement before I left and also provided significant documentation for her and her subsequent replacement). It always looks like a last straw – most emails have a thread for a couple days previous with multiple back-and-forths. Every time he sends a request, I point him in the direction of the manual I created and give some info (it’s usually on the fly and I don’t remember the exact name of the document, just the general gist of what it was called) and within 20 minutes the subsequent replacement emails out to say the issue has been solved/dealt with. It’s a terribly redeeming feeling.

Remember the reader whose coworker watched porn in their shared office? You’re going to love this update:

It’s been an incredibly interesting year. I donated a kidney to my brother-in-law back in April, and while my company did not have to keep me due to current FMLA rules, they did! I even got to keep all of my benefits and received a small annual raise during reviews while gone. I thanked my boss, and she said it was a testament to all my hard work at the company. Wow!

Fast forward to last week, my boss offered me a promotion to office supervisor! I took it with a little hesitation, as I would be supervising this coworker. We hit our first rough patch today. He blew up and we immediately had a sit down discussion with my boss to discuss concerns and issues. I do not think this will be an easy road for him. He opened up about a fair amount of resentment towards me today which worries me, but it is at least helpful to understand him better. My boss has been providing good feedback and has been a great support during this shift in roles (I have never really supervised anyone before). It’s an unusual situation, but I think it will work out in the end.

And here’s an update to the update, sent after the one above:

He quit!

Things are looking up!  The replacement is two days on the job and picking up everything quickly and accurately.  Couldn’t be happier!