Ask a Manager

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

1. Is “return to work” a way to get people to leave?

I have a friend who works for a very large tech company that recently announced a return to work mandate. My friend insists that the company doesn’t really care about whether people are working from home. They say that the real reason the company is demanding people come back to the office is because they can’t afford their staff. My friend thinks that the company’s strategy is to force people back into the office with little justification and hope that so many people quit in response that they won’t have to initiate layoffs. Do you think this is likely? What do you think of this strategy?

That does seem to be the widespread theory! A lot of tech companies over-hired in the last few years and are well aware that requiring a return to the office means they’ll get a lot of attrition. As I wrote in a different post earlier this week, it’s a bad way to cut your numbers — it means you’re likely to lose your best people, who have the most options — but when you’re faced with needing to make enormous cuts (and pay severance to a huge number of people if you do it through layoffs), it can change the calculus.

I maintain it’s a bad strategy; if you have work-related reasons for wanting people back in the office, so be it, but changing a major policy (that influences who you’ll be able to hire and retain in the future) with the sole purpose of getting people to quit is a bad strategy. In reality, though, I suspect it’s both — they want people back in the office for Reasons, and they see it as a side benefit that it’ll shave their numbers down.

2. Employer won’t hire anyone who doesn’t wash their coffee mug after their interview

I saw an article about an employer who gives this “test” at every interview and won’t hire anyone who doesn’t pass. The gist is that he will take you down to their kitchen and offer a cup of coffee, and at the end of the interview if you take your cup back down to the kitchen and wash it, you pass. If you don’t, you fail and don’t get hired. What do you think of these types of tests?

On one hand, I can see it being a helpful thing to know if your candidate is considerate. But on the other hand, I don’t think someone who doesn’t wash a coffee cup at an interview is necessarily inconsiderate. There are many reasons I can think of that someone might not wash their cup (they don’t remember where the kitchen is and don’t want to look dumb by asking, they really need to use the restroom after drinking a whole cup of coffee, they forgot they had a cup in the first place, etc.). I also don’t like the idea of these goofy tests on the first place. Assuming you’re not interviewing for a job washing coffee cups, it seems weird to evaluate a candidate solely on that. And it’s cheesy.

It’s a terrible test! In addition to the reasons you gave, it also ignores a very common concept of hospitality, where the host handles any clean-up from the meeting and it’s not impolite to assume that they will. Plus, if you want to assess candidates for courtesy and consideration, there are lots of more direct ways to do that.

People who have secret “tests” unrelated to the job itself generally think their methods are brilliant and are utterly unaware of how flawed they typically are — which correlates strongly with not knowing to interview effectively and screen for what they actually need.

3. Can I ask my manager to drive me to work in the winter?

I’m starting my first internship (required by my degree) in a few weeks. I’m excited but a little nervous. I live somewhere where it snows quite a bit, and I’m concerned about how I will physically get to the building once winter starts. I can’t drive. There’s a pretty good bus system here, but I still get a little panicky thinking about walking a block in knee-deep snow from the bus stop to where I’ll be working.

When I interviewed for the internship, my future boss told me she got excited seeing the address on my resume. Apparently, we live very close to one another, within minutes. She probably passes by my apartment on the way to work.

Would it be weird/unprofessional if I asked her if she’d be willing to give me a ride once winter hits? If it helps, she seems like a very warm, mom-to-everyone kind of person. The second I walked in to interview, she offered me a sandwich and a soda before I’d even really introduced myself.

It’s fine to ask very occasionally in particularly bad weather — but don’t ask for her to do it as an regular thing. For a lot of people, that would be a pretty big imposition. If she offers it on her own — which she might at some point — that’s a different thing, but it’s not something you should request.

(Also, I know this was only a throw-away comment in your letter and I don’t want to read too much into it — but she’s not an office mom! It’s can be really undermining to women to be tagged with that label. Maybe she’s a kind, supportive, or thoughtful manager … but not she’s not being maternal, any more than a man who cares about the people working for him is being paternal.)

4. My boss took off two weeks with no notice

This is my first time working in a job where salaried employees have “unlimited vacation” as long as they are attending to their job duties. Last week, my boss announced on Monday that they were off for the week. Last Thursday, they cancelled all of their meetings for this week and announced they’d see us after Labor Day. So no management available for two weeks, notified the the day it started.

I am a project situation that requires management input, as well as certain timely things that require their approval before happening, for which no alternate arrangements have been made. We are in the middle of several timely projects, which without their input require me to shoulder additional responsibility (and hours) that I could not plan ahead for. There’s no one above my boss who could help. This is really bothering me, and adding significant stress to my position.

With unlimited vacation, is it considered reasonable announce that day that you’re taking a week off? And then extend it with a weekend’s notice? I want to know if I need to adjust my thinking to understand that this could happen in any future workplace.

There are jobs where you absolutely could announce the day of that you’re taking a week off — jobs where you manage your own workload and can make plans for anything that needs to be covered in your absence to be covered or where you have the authority to decide that it’s okay to put things on hold. There are also jobs where you definitely couldn’t. And there are jobs in-between, where you could do that once but if you started doing it multiple times, someone would ask you to give more notice.

When you manage people, though, you shouldn’t do this without an explicit conversation with the people you manage about what your absence will mean for their work (unless it’s obvious that it will mean nothing — which isn’t the case for you). Your boss dropped the ball by not doing that.

You asked if you should expect this could happen in any future workplace and sure, it could. The more senior someone is, the more control they’ll generally have over their own schedule, which can include last-minute time off. But generally if you have a manager who’s reasonably on top of things, they won’t do what your boss did to you — or if they do, you can point it out once they’re back and ask for different arrangements in the future, or you can just call them and say, “Before you disconnect, we need to talk about X, Y, and Z.”

5. What are my responsibilities after giving notice?

I recently gave three weeks notice at my job and am serving that time out right now. My boss and I are a two-person department so presumably a lot of work will fall on her, but no one has once approached me to ask what I do, what needs to be taken over, how to do things I’m in charge of, etc. I trained my boss on her job and know she certainly can’t do mine, because it’s very admin/computer heavy and she’s borderline technology illiterate. Do I need to approach her/other management now that it’s my last week and give an overview of what will need to happen when I leave? Or does them not asking me mean it’s not a concern so to let it go?

This is something your boss should be managing. If she’s not, it’s not on you to go over her head to try to make it happen. However, as part of being generally conscientious, it would make sense to ask your boss if she wants to meet to go over transition items, or if there’s anyone she wants you to train on X or Y. Ideally you’d also leave behind documentation of where projects stand, key things a replacement will need to know, etc. so that you can direct her to it when you leave.

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

1. A virtual baby shower … with no shower

I work for a primarily remote company, and last fall I gave birth to my second child. Our small team (less than 20) comprises mostly women in their late 20s-early 30s, and I’m in my late 30s. A few weeks before my due date, I was surprised with a calendar invite for my virtual team baby shower. I was surprised because no one asked me whether I wanted to have a baby shower, and no one asked about my registry or if I had a preference for gifts. There was another team member whose wife was also pregnant, so this was a joint baby shower.

Overall it was fine, though a little awkward over Zoom. We played a game where we tried to guess which baby photos were of which team members. However, there was no gifting involved whatsoever. It seemed like it was just an acknowledgement that babies were on the way. I can’t help feeling that the organizers, being a bit younger, maybe haven’t been to a baby shower and didn’t know that the “shower” aspect means gift-giving? And I wonder if the other attendees assumed that the parent company sent me a gift of some sort, and whether anyone feels slighted that I didn’t send a thank-you note in return?

As small as this is, it has stuck with me. I think the time for bringing it up has certainly passed, but my instinct is to get involved in the planning of any future showers to ensure the expectant family is celebrated in the way most helpful for them. These issues are certainly small potatoes, but as a gut-check, am I being petty?

You’re not being petty, but you’re missing the fact that work showers are often more about celebrating the impending birth than giving gifts. It’s true that normally the whole point of a shower is to “shower” the expectant parents with things for the baby … but at work, there’s a competing (and more important) principle of “don’t pressure people to spend money on work celebrations.” Some offices resolve that by having the party with the gift-giving removed.

However, your coworkers shouldn’t throw showers for people without asking if they want one first! Some people won’t want one for personal reasons, and some people don’t do them for religious reasons. So if you’re able to influence future events, that’s the part I’d focus on — getting people’s permission first. (Also, maybe get rid of that baby picture game, which is problematic for a bunch of other reasons.)

2. Can I use sick time for psychedelic treatment?

I suffer from treatment-resistant depression and have been exploring the option of seeing a psilocybin facilitator. Oregon recently legalized the use of psilocybin if used under the supervision of a licensed facilitator, and there are plenty of studies and anecdotes that suggest psilocybin can really help with depression.

The experience itself and subsequent integration would take up an entire day on its own, and since I don’t live in Oregon I’d have to take time off to travel as well. That means realistically I’d have to take 2-3 days off to do this, using either sick or vacation time.

My thought is that, while this is an experimental treatment, I am seeking it out to treat a mental health condition, so it would be fine to use sick time for the day itself. I’m less sure whether using it for the travel time would be okay as well, though I lean toward feeling like it would be.

For context, I have been at my employer for about four months and have generally received praise from my boss and coworkers, but I am still relatively new. Also the amount of vacation time my employer provides is okay but not great, so I’m reluctant to use it for anything except true vacations. Do you think this is something I can ethically use sick time for? Or should I use vacation time instead? (Either way, I wouldn’t tell my boss or coworkers why I’m taking the time off, I’d keep it vague.)

Yes, you can ethically use sick time for that. It’s for the purpose of treating a health condition, and the travel time is as well (just like if you took a week of sick time to travel to the Mayo Clinic and consult specialists).

I assume you’re feeling weird about it because Psychedelic Mushrooms! but it’s a state-legal medical treatment, and it’s no different than taking time off for another medical treatment someone else might not agree with (chiropractic? Chinese medicine?). Your employer doesn’t get to sign off on what medical treatments you pursue; that’s between you and your health care providers.

Read an update to this letter. 

3. My coworker gave me no heads-up before my meeting with an outside consultant

A colleague, Tim, reached out and asked if I could talk about a process my team handles. When I got into the virtual meeting, the only person there was someone I did not know who introduced themselves as an outside consultant, Melanie.

I went into this meeting thinking I was meeting with Tim. He gave me no heads-up that I was meeting with a consultant, so I was thrown off kilter.

I gave Melanie the excuse that an emergency message just popped up that I needed to deal with and asked her to bear with me for a minute. Then I quickly contacted to Tim to see if he was joining the meeting. He did join, but commented that he hadn’t planned on actually attending the meeting. I stumbled my way (badly…) through the rest of the meeting.

I’ve met with consultants before, but somebody in the department they’re working with always reaches out beforehand to say something along the lines of, “Hey, we’re working with XYZ Consulting on a process improvement project and we’d like you to talk to them about our X process.”

The process Melanie wanted to know about is not one that would be shared out in detail to people who don’t have a need to know. If I hadn’t been able to get Tim to verify that this was indeed a person who was officially affiliated with our organization, what could I have done?

Yeah, it’s appropriate to be wary of sharing your company’s internal processes with a complete stranger who no one told you you’d be meeting with! (Has Tim never watched any spy shows?! He needs to watch The Americans immediately.)

If you hadn’t been able to reach Tim, you could have said to Melanie, “I’m so sorry, but Tim didn’t tell me I’d be meeting with an outside consultant and, given our information security policies, I can’t do the meeting without some clarity from him so we’ll need to reschedule.” That inconvenience would be on Tim, not you.

4. Is unequal pay illegal if it’s not based on a protected class?

Are there are legal ramifications for inequitable pay if it’s not based in protected class? Some huge differences just came out at our company and it seems like in some instances there may be a nearly six-figure difference in salaries, based on people who have been at the company longer versus newer hires. The lower salaries affect probably about 10% of the company. The company admits they never adjusted existing salaries up when the location changed and they hired new people in the higher cost of living area; titles are the same but many of the people making less have more experience, a notably higher workload, and have generated more revenue. There are no overall protected class disparities between the people with the high and low salaries.

The company basically says sorry, we know, maybe we can fix later when the economy is better … but no one believes that change is actually coming. Is there anything to be done to force their hand?

Pay inequities are only illegal when they’re either based on a protected class (like race, sex, religion, national origin, etc.) or when they have a disparate impact on a protected class (like you end up paying men more on average for the same work because they negotiated differently when they were hired, or so forth). The law doesn’t address other types of unequal pay.

That doesn’t mean there’s no pressure you could apply to your company, though. This is what worker organizing is for (which could mean unionizing but doesn’t have to — the law protects your ability to organize with coworkers for better wages regardless of whether you’re doing it within the formal structure of a union or not).

5. Can I still get severance if I find a new job right away?

I work for a large company that is in the process of acquiring a major competitor. I know that part of this process will include layoffs, given the number of redundant positions between the two companies, so I’m proactively job searching in case my role ends up being one of the ones eliminated.

If the timing were to work out where I got a job offer very shortly after being laid off, would I still be entitled to severance, or do severance offers typically contain some sort of clause that they will end if the person finds new employment?

Most commonly, you’d get the severance regardless of how quickly you find another job; in many cases, you could accept a large severance package covering months of pay and begin working a new job the next day, if the timing worked out that way. But that only what’s most common, not what’s true 100% of the time; there are also severance agreements that stop paying out once you find new work. So you’d need to carefully read whatever you’re signing and see exactly how your company is structuring it before you can know for sure.