Ask a Manager

It’s mini answer Monday — seven short answers to seven short questions. Here we go…

1. Forced to come to work with strep throat

I’ve been sick with strep throat for 4 days. My doctor has sent a note and talked to my boss, but they still are making me work even though I don’t even have a voice. They’ve said if I don’t work at least half a day, I won’t have a job. What can I do?

I work with food so I didn’t think it would be legal to let me work while sick let alone force me to.

It’s  common in food service jobs for workers to be pressured to come to work even when sick (and it’s an industry that often doesn’t provide sick leave), but your employer is being especially bad by ignoring a call with your doctor. As for what you can do, though, well … ultimately, if they’re going to be jackasses, there’s not much you can do — you can go to work sick and keep your job but potentially infect people, or you can stay home and risk losing your job. Personally, if I were in your shoes, I’d say, “I would come in if at all possible, but I’m sick and contagious and not comfortable working with food when I may infect others,” and then let the chips fall where they may — but whether that’s feasible for you depends on your own situation. (And frankly, no matter how you handle this, I’d start looking for another job, because your employer is horrible.)

One other thing: Many local food code regulations require ill food handlers to stay home (although that’s frequently ignored), and you could think about tipping off your local board of health or other relevant body if your jurisdiction prohibits it.

2. Can my employer make me cover my tattoo when we don’t have a policy against them?

I have had a visible tattoo for three years. Previously, the company I work for had a no-visible-tattoo policy, which was clearly stated in our company handbook. I always made sure the tattoo was hidden by my hair when at work.

Two years ago, we got bought out by a multinational corporation and had to reapply, as well as sign off on a new handbook. The new appearance policy doesn’t include anything at all about tattoos. The corporate handbook does not as well. At this time, I started occasionally wearing my hair up, with the permission of my manager, who has since left the company. The corporate handbook does state that the individual locations can set their own rules.

Two days ago, I was strongly warned that if my tattoo was visible again (it’s on my neck behind my ear and my hair was in a ponytail), I would be disciplined. This is the first time I’ve ever been spoken to about it. There are also other people at this location with visible tattoos who don’t have them covered and have not been told that they need to.

Can my employer enforce a rule that isn’t really documented as a policy, and only on me? As a side note, if they can’t, how do I show them that without angering a couple department heads, and risking my job? I have worked here 20 years and while I feel this is not legal or fair, I don’t want to lose my job over it.

They can enforce any rule they want, even if it’s not in a handbook and even if the rule didn’t exist yesterday or is only enforced for people with blue shirts or loud voices — as long as the rules themselves don’t violate employment law (so, for instance, as long as they don’t discriminate based on race, religion, sex, or other protected classes). So yes, they can absolutely tell you that you can’t have a visible tattoo, even if there’s no written policy about it, and even if they’re not enforcing it evenly (as long as they’ve not only enforcing it for people of some races and not others, or otherwise singling out protected classes).

3. Which jobs should I include on my resume?

My resume looks bad enough as it is. Only my short unpaid internships are related to my Bachelor’s degree, and none of my previous, current, or currently-searching-for jobs have anything to do with it. What’s making me feel more awkward about submitting my pathetic resume is determining what jobs are important or worth noting.

In January I became established with a temp agency and was offered a position at a factory. I took the job and loved it, then was laid off almost six weeks later due to lack of business. Within two weeks I was offered a warehouse position, which I kept for three months rapidly going back and forth between loving and loathing the job, with the job culminating one stressful morning when I told the temp agent I couldn’t handle it anymore.

Neither these nor my four years in two retail settings match my BA in Linguistics or my desire to become a receptionist. Most importantly, owning my own jewelry business has nothing to do with linguistics or reception either. Which of these positions would be detrimental to my resume? I’m keeping the retail positions since I had/have held them for a decent amount of time, but will an office manager really care about my temp work or that I own a budding unsuccessful business? It doesn’t help that I’m usually pretty down on myself, so I don’t expect employers to want me as their representative in the first place. It feels as though my all-over-the-place resume will be unimpressive no matter what I put on it.

It’s hard to say without knowing more details, but you’ve got to figure out what jobs you’re applying for and then figure out what experience in your past strengthens your candidacy for those roles. That might be only a few of the positions you’ve held or it might be all of them; it really depends on what type of work you did in each, what you achieved there, etc. Basically, ask yourself what in your past would make an employer excited to hire you for the types of jobs you’re applying for … and then write a resume that highlights those things.

4. Can I ignore my former employer’s calls and emails for help?

I work in a large organisation. Due to organisational change, I was at risk of redundancy and I had to pick up the slack as other (more senior) people left the organisation. I was constantly being told “I worked at my pay grade” despite performing tasks which are linked to a senior manager’s job description. As my manager was new, she didn’t understand the requirements of the team and I frequently had to explain various tasks and make decisions on how to resolve any problems. She also constantly undermined me.

I had enough and took a promotion at a larger organisation. My manager dragged her feet about recruiting a replacement and I had 3 days to teach her my job. I left her notes etc. On my last day, my manager called me in to discuss a project she needed to do in 9 months time and asked for my input. This took 2 hours and I did ask her why I was there, as I didn’t see the point of me being there. I basically worked late on my last day and was nearly late to my own leaving do, to which she didn’t turn up.

I am now getting emails asking me for basic information, which anybody in my industry should know and also being told by peers of my old manager that “she doesn’t have a flipping clue.” I also went to my old work on a day off to hand in my ID card and I was then asked various questions and was expected to interrogate their systems to find out some basic level information. I politely told them no. I now feel I should ignore the emails, ignore the phone calls and never step foot in that place again, despite the “stay in touch” mentality. Am I being unreasonable?

Nope. They’re being unreasonable by expecting you to be on call to answer their questions after you no longer work there. It’s reasonable to answer a question or two like where a file might be located or what the password is to X, but not beyond that.

I wouldn’t simply ignore the calls and emails though, not if you want to preserve the bridge. Instead, politely say, “I’m sorry but I need to focus on my new job and am not able to answer these questions.”

5. Asking about a small organization’s maternity leave policies

I work at a small nonprofit, a job I love that I landed thanks to your advice. We’re small enough that I’m the only person who covers what I do, and it’s busy and demanding. I’m at the point in my life where I’m considering starting a family in the near future (2-4 years). We don’t have any kind of employee handbook that I could use to discreetly look into maternity leave, and I’m the youngest person on staff by more than a decade, so I have no examples to seek out. I’ll probably be the first person to even ask about maternity leave in 20 years!

How would you suggest I learn more about maternity leave at my organization? Should I wait until things come more into focus? I’m very career-driven and as my work is very cyclical have already thought about times of the year when I could more easily be out and how my work could be structured while I’m gone. I’m a planner so I’d really like to know what my options are before I even think about starting a family, but bringing it up too far in advance might be weird. Do you have any advice about when and how to have this conversation?

If the organization is that small and hasn’t dealt with maternity leave in many years, it’s possible that they don’t have a policy at all and that they’ll need to negotiate a plan directly with you when the time comes. If that’s the case, it might not do you much good to bring it up now — and could potentially hurt you, even though it shouldn’t — so it might make sense to wait until you’re closer to the time when you actually need to know, especially since you’re new.

When the time gets closer though — or if you’re at a point where you need to know in order to be able to plan — you could certainly say, “This is a few years off, but since I’m hoping to be here when it happens, I wanted to talk about how a future maternity leave might work.” But be prepared for the fact that once you bring it up, your boss is probably going to assume that it’s happening sooner than you intend to convey.

6. Dealing with a distracted manager

How do you deal with a distracted manager who always seems to have 10,000 things at once?

For example, it took me 4 or 5 attempts before I was successfully able to organize a meeting with him. Then, during that meeting, when I asked him directly what projects I need to work on, what bits of those projects I need to work on, and when I need to have them done by, he couldn’t give me any straight answers, and his whole manner was very flighty and distracted and frankly, quite a short attention span. How can I get him to focus?

You probably can’t. He’s flighty and distracted. You can, however, propose your own plans for what you should be working on and when you’ll have them done by, and ask him to approve or modify those plans. But ultimately, you’re going to have to accept that you’re working for a flighty, distracted boss who doesn’t focus and won’t give you the kind of guidance you want.

7. How do I bill consulting clients for out-of-town work?

I do side work as a business writing consultant. I charge an hourly fee, and bill for the length of each training session plus some additional prep time. I have been asked to travel out of state by an area business to run three 4-hour training sessions. The company will fly me out, I’ll run a session after we land. I’ll spend the night and on day 2 run two more sessions before flying home late in the evening.

How much do I bill? I’ll be doing 12 hours of instruction, but they are two marathon days, and I’m tied up during all that travel time. I am no sure what the normal etiquette is here, so I have no idea how much to propose for compensation for this trip.

Ideally you’d include an agreement about this in your contract; you don’t want it to be a surprise to the client. How much you bill for it depends on a bunch of factors, but some consultants will bill travel time at half their rate, others will fold it into a fixed fee for the project, and others will simply have a higher per-day fee for days away from home. In general, people who bill for travel time will bill for the time actually spent traveling, but not for time spent sleeping at your hotel. Personally, I’m more of a fan of fixed rate fees for projects in general, and when you do that, it’s easier to fold the travel premium into that overall cost.

Whatever method you choose, you want to factor in how whether you can do work for other clients while you’re traveling and how much of an inconvenience it is to you.

It’s short answer Sunday — six short answers to six short questions. Here we go…

1. Interviewer wants to know why I’m thinking of leaving my current job so soon

I recently interviewed for a company that I’ve aspired to work with for many years. The interview went well and after asking for feedback the interviewer agreed that I did well. Later that day, the recruiter who scheduled the interview contacted me to ask further questions, why I’m leaving my current role. After coming into contact with the recruiter the next day, she articulated to me that the interviewer and her were discussing my candidacy and that he needed further information as to why I was leaving my current role so soon (I’ve been employed there for 3 months).

My response was that it has been one of my long term goals to work for their company and that once I’ve accumulated the appropriate experience I would advance towards my goals. I also mentioned that there is no issue with commitment to a company and that I haven’t been interviewing elsewhere as I’m focused on realising my goal.

Is it a good sign that they are interested in further knowing about my candidacy?

Well, they still considered you a viable candidate after the interview, but they’re concerned that you’re thinking of leaving your current job after only three months, which is a very short amount of time. When you see someone leaving a job after only three months (assuming it wasn’t intended to be a short-term contract job all along), you worry that they (a) don’t stick with commitments, (b) are too quick to give up when something isn’t exactly as they’d hoped, or (c) aren’t succeeding at the job. So they’re looking for an explanation that assuages those concerns.

2. I made a mistake at work — how do I recover?

I’ve been at my job for a little over a month. It’s an organization I admire and I enjoy the work a lot. I’ve been enthusiastic and prided myself on my follow-through.

Well, tonight I made a mistake. It’s not a huge mistake but it was a dumb, rookie-type mistake that I should be beyond (given that this isn’t my first job out of college or something). Basically, I was unclear of exact procedure, didn’t think things through, and used bad judgement. Now I know the exact procedure, I understand why it’s in place, and the thought process I should have been using that would have led me to take action earlier. If definitely won’t happen again! I offered to help rectify the situation any way I could and my supervisor said no, she’d take care of it.

What do I do now? We had a text message exchange and I apologized several times. But I also may have been initially defensive because I didn’t realize I had made a mistake. I started over-explaining instead of just saying, “I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.” Lesson learned–when receiving unexpected criticism via text message or email, let it sink in for a few minutes before responding.

I was out of work for a year and I’m terrified that I have just torpedoed my chance to establish myself as a dependable employee and win the respect of the management. At worse, I’m scared I’m going to get fired over this.

Go talk to your manager and say something like: “I wanted to tell you that I’m taking that mistake very seriously. It happened because of X, and I’m going to do Y in the future to make sure it doesn’t happen again.” And then do that, and move on.

People make mistakes, even silly ones. The thing most managers care about is that you’re taking it seriously, get that it’s a big deal, and have a plan for avoiding it in the future. Show her that those things are true, and you’ll go a long way toward easing any worries this raised for her. (Also, read this.)

3. My employer makes me lie to companies we purchase subscriptions from

I work for an energy management company. We use energy industry data, such as for natural gas, power and oil, in analysis we perform on behalf of our clients. I am in charge of subscriptions to resource companies who provide said data. I have been doing this job for 12 years and all of that time, I was “encouraged to be a team player” and pursue the minimum number of subscriptions to this data, even though most of it is shared among 200-300 employees, via our internal database, in Excel spreadsheets, etc.

I struggle each day with our persistent breaches of contractual obligations. I elevate my concerns constantly but most fall on deaf ears. Those who are sympathetic do not have the power to make changes. I am at the point where I fantasize about secretly telling our reps what we are doing with the data. We have only been “dinged” one time by a company and it was for a small fine….but we were recently acquired by a very large, global company, and our illegal use is no longer small potatoes.

It would be easy for someone to say that I should quit if I am not happy, but in this job market, I cannot afford to lose this paycheck nor the flexible schedule.

You really have three choices — stand on principle and refuse to do it (possibly saying, “Now that we’ve been acquired by XYZ, I really think we need to be more careful about this than we have in the past”); accept that doing it this way is a condition of the job, and decide if you want to remain in the job under those conditions; or tip off the companies what your organization is doing and hope they’ll take care of it for you. The first is the most principled stance, but the second and third may be more practical in your particular shoes.

4. Employer wants me to present on my “expectations for the future”

I have recently been short-listed for a tenure track position at a high level research institute, and was asked to present myself in front of the commission. Among the points I should cover are my “expectations for the future,” but I’m not really sure what they mean by that. Is it in reference to the expected salary and working environment? Or is it how I would envision my future career (in terms of achievements, publications, etc.) if given the opportunity to work and grow there? I’m a little bit confused as I don’t know in which direction I should focus my presentation; taking the wrong one would certainly be quite embarrassing.

I’m pasting the relevant part from the original email for your reference: “In the first 20 mins you present yourself in front of the commission. You should introduce yourself, your career profile, your professional achievements (with particular emphasis on the scientific and technological ones) and your expectation for the future.”

It’s very confusing wording, but I would assume that they are not looking for a presentation about your salary expectations and desired working environment. It’s more likely that they want to hear about your professional goals and plans for the future.

5. Listing internships on my resume that I’ve just started

I have recently gained two remote internships/volunteer opportunities in my desired field. The first one I started at the end of May, and the other I am starting this week. I am looking to start sending out my resume for in-person fall internships. I am wondering if it is alright to add these two internships on my resume, even though I only have one month experience for one, and am just starting the other.

Sure. Just make the starting and future ending dates clear, like this:

Chocolate Teapot Intern (June 2013 – September 2013)

6. The name of my degree sounds like something different than it really is

I got my undergrad a few years ago, back when hybrid majors were considered “cool” and universities everywhere were implementing them left and right. I went to a very well known school (Georgia Tech) and got a media degree, focusing on television production/editing and writing. The problem is, the name of my degree is ridiculous: Science, Technology and Culture (frequently shortened to STaC). Nobody knows why, but Georgia Tech gives all of its majors techie names, even when they don’t need them. So now, even though my degree really IS a media degree and I’ve spent a few years now working in the media industry, people see the name of the major and assume (quite logically) that it’s some kind of science degree. When every job wants a degree in media, journalism or something similar, this is a problem.

I’ve tried adding the college within the university that the program was in, but its name is equally long and cumbersome: the Ivan Allen School of Literature, Languages and Culture. Listing both out seems to just confuse people, and it turns what should be a quick bullet point on the resume into a paragraph.

I’ve tried just changing the degree title on my resume to say “Communications and Media,” but since the school is well-known for its history as an engineering school and doesn’t have a degree with that actual title, I think people probably think I’m lying. I’ve tried adding “Communications and Media” in parentheses after the title, but without an explanation, it makes no sense. It just sounds like a random string of words that have nothing in common. How do I list my degree so that people see I really DO meet the minimum qualifications?

That’s annoying, and I don’t have a good answer for you. I’m hoping others who have struggled with this might…?

Meanwhile, though, you should contact your school, and possibly that department, and explain what problems this is causing for you. They should be aware of the real-world problems they’re causing for their graduates by naming the degree like this.

It’s short answer Saturday — seven short answers to seven short questions. Here we go…

1. Was I right to call out this colleague for commenting on my appearance?

Our IT support is based in India (I’m in the UK) so most support is done via instant message and everyone has a photo loaded into the system, which displays next to their name. I had raised a case and it was being dealt with by instant messenger. The guy made a comment about how I had a nice picture. This was the end of our exchange and the message came in while I was away from my desk (having told him I was going into a meeting), so I decided just to ignore it. He came back a bit later on to clarify some further information, and when I thanked him for his help, he commented, “Your pleasure beautiful.” I replied that those sort of comments weren’t really work-appropriate, and when he said he didn’t know what I meant, I repeated the sentiment in slightly different terms. He asked if I minded, so I replied, “No harm done, just thought it might be useful for you in the future.”

I didn’t think the comments were appropriate, but I’m not about to inform HR about them either and he apologized. Should I have just chalked it up to cultural difference and kept quiet?

No, it’s good that you said something, both because (a) you shouldn’t have to act like you’re fine with those comments when you’re not, and (b) he needs to hear that it’s not appropriate so that he stops doing it.

(Also, I am hoping/assuming he meant “my pleasure” rather than “your pleasure,” although telling people “it’s your pleasure” would be pretty fun.)

2. How can I ask an interviewer not to alert my current employer that I’m job searching?

I had a first interview this morning with a company that is a client of the company where I currently work. I had filled out the application online on the company website. Although the form asked for phone numbers for my jobs, it did not ask for references; for my current employer, I wrote, “Please contact me first” for the phone number, because I do NOT want my current employer to be called. (It is a long story, but my boss has already tried to fire me once in the last month, for requesting an ADA accommodation, so I do not want to give him a convenient pretext.)

At the interview, though, the interviewer asked who my supervisor is, and I provided the name of my direct supervisor (not the person who tried to fire me). She did not ask for permission to contact my supervisor, and I was not asked to provide a list of references at this point. She told me that they will let me know by the end of next week if they will call me back for a second interview.

At first I thought she just wanted to see if she knew my supervisor, but now I am terrified that she will call my supervisor for a reference and my current employer will find out that I am job-searching. Should I have asked if she would be contacting my current/previous employers yet? Or told her bluntly that I would rather she not contact my current employer? This isn’t something I can call back to confirm, right? Or am I getting upset over nothing?

You can absolutely contact them to reiterate that you’d like your search kept confidential from your current employer, if you didn’t already say that explicitly. Send an email and say, “Because my employer does not yet know that I’m considering changing jobs, I hope you will keep our conversations confidential for now. At whatever time you need to speak with references, I’d be glad to provide you with many from previous jobs.”

3. Getting a chance when you have more education than work experience

How do you gain new skills if you are never given the opportunity because you are more education-heavy than experience-heavy? I stayed at home while going to school and was out of the workforce for 6-7 years. I worked for almost 3 years as an admin assistant and was laid off for over 2 years. I’m currently working as a data entry associate for over a year with a master’s degree and am being grossly underpaid. With lack of time career-wise and holding 5 degrees, how do I get a better opportunity?

Whoa. Five degrees? Honestly, that’s going to be a red flag to a lot of employers because they’re going to wonder if you’re scattered and unfocused about what you want to do, not motivated to stay working, etc. So for starters, I’d seriously considering only listing a couple of them on your resume, because five is more likely to work against you than it is to help you. Aside from that, it’s hard to say what would help without knowing a lot more context, but there’s loads of advice on this site about job searching in general.

4. Telling an employer you can’t work as many days as they need

I work in a profession where working part-time is the norm. I interviewed recently at a company, and I cannot work all the days they expect me to work. I like the place — I didn’t know available days untill I was interviewed. However, I may be only able to give them 2 days vs 3. How do I handle this on the call back interview? I just thought about it — the practicality of working that third day is impossible.

Just be straightforward: “In our last call, you mentioned that you’re looking for someone to work Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. After we spoke, I thought about it and realized that Mondays aren’t possible for me, although I can absolutely work the other two. Is that prohibitive or does it make sense to continue to talk?”

5. Changing your stated salary preference after you’ve already given a lower number

This week I have spoken with an HR manager and the potential direct manager about my annual salary preference for a job. The job title is not directly related to my college major that I graduated with, but it does contain tasks that will help me learn concepts that are important for my future job roles that I plan for my career. From the job description and from my phone interview with the manager, the job is not very difficult–the only challenges are understanding the business model and communicating with clients to resolve discrepancies.

When the HR manager and the direct manager called me, they both asked me my salary preference. To each of them, I stated $XX. I did not do enough research to learn about the salary ranges for the role, and I felt mortified that I did not do this. I did some research today about the job’s salary ranges in my city, and it seems that I could have stated a salary preference that is $4,000 more than what I have stated before. I am going to have an in-person interview with the company soon, and I am wondering if there is still a chance that I can restate my salary preference and asked for $4,000 more than what I have stated previously.

You could try, but it’s probably not going to work. You’ve already told them that you’re willing to do the work for $XX, and so you’ve sort of collapsed your negotiating power (which you didn’t have a lot of to begin with if you’re right out of college.) Even if you now have reason to think they’d pay more, you’ve already told them you’d do the work for less — so it’s not a strong position.

6. How to refuse a non-required drug test without seeming sketchy

I have had my job for almost 7 years. I work closely with one client company, and we have a great relationship. I visit them often, along with another few members of my team. The client office has some security–we have to sign in, get a guest badge, and be escorted by the person we’re visiting at all times. There’s an opportunity to get permanent badges for a few of us, which would allow us to arrive, not have to sign in, and not have to be escorted around the building.

The catch is that we basically have to go through a process as if we were being hired, including background checks and drug tests. I’d rather not get a drug test for privacy reasons, and this is more of a “nice to have” type of thing rather than something that’s necessary for me to do my job well, so theoretically I shouldn’t have to. Still, I’m not sure how I can discuss it with my manager without rousing some kind of suspicion. I’ve smoked pot in the past and don’t see a problem with it, but there’s no chance I’d test positive, so that’s not a concern. My own company doesn’t test upon hire but has a clause in our contracts that we can be required to undergo a test if substance abuse is suspected.

I know based on a search of your site that you have similar feelings about privacy. Any thoughts about how I can frame this? Or should I just let it slide and hope they never get around to processing the badge request (a real possibility)?

I’m a big, big proponent of non-drug-users speaking up against unnecessary and invasive drug testing, because it’s important to get people to realize that there are lots of reasons to oppose drug testing other than “I use drugs” and that plenty of non-drug-users are concerned about civil liberties and privacy. So ideally, you’d simply explain that to your boss — something like, “I feel strongly about privacy rights and generally oppose drug testing, so I’m planning on skipping this since it’s not a requirement.” If your boss says anything implying that you’re casting suspicion on yourself or even just makes a joke about it, say, “The issue isn’t that I couldn’t pass the test. The issue is about privacy. I hope you understand.”

Of course, this won’t go over well with every employer, and if you know that it’s not going to go over well with yours, and if you’d rather not deal with it, then I’d look into whether you can opt out in some less pointed way.

7. Listing a reference who you can’t reach

I’m a recent graduate and I’m pretty anxious to start putting in applications. Unfortunately, the coordinator for my undergraduate research program hasn’t been getting back to me (for about two weeks now) and is either on vacation or simply ignoring my emails. She also didn’t answer her phone and her voicemail is full. She is my only really relevant reference and would definitely speak highly of me. Perhaps I should have asked if it was okay to put her down as a reference while I was still working with her, but I didn’t think of it at the time.

Most of the places I’m applying to are using automatic application systems which ask for references, so unless I want to wait for an unknown amount of time, I can either put my research coordinator down without telling her ahead of time, which I’m sure is a no-no (although the employer might not be able to contact her anyway) or submit these applications without any references.

Am I killing my chances by submitting these applications without references, or should I wait for my professor to respond and risk the positions being filled?

If they’re asking for references, then list her. Send her an email telling her that you wanted to check with her first but couldn’t reach her and that you hope it’s okay.

Don’t submit without references, if they’re required; you’ll just look like you can’t or don’t follow directions. That said, it’s obnoxious and unnecessary that they’re asking for them at this early stage, since they’re only going to end up contacting them for a tiny fraction of their applicants.

It’s fast answer Friday — seven short answers to seven short questions. Here we go…

1. When a “sick” employee is spotted around town

Should an employee who has called in sick to work and is seen out shopping lose that day’s pay? I am the employer.

No. First of all, it’s perfectly possible to go shopping when you’re sick. You might not feel well enough to function at work but still be able to drag yourself out to buy the gift you have to mail to your niece by tomorrow in order for it to arrive for her birthday. Or you might feel sick in the morning but feel better enough by the afternoon that you’re able to run errands. Of course, it’s also just as possible that the employee wasn’t sick at all, and was legitimately caught faking it. But you can’t know for sure, and you shouldn’t be in the business of policing this kind of thing (even if you could, which you can’t).

Either you trust your employee or not, and she does good work or not. If you don’t trust her, or her work isn’t good, then those are the problems you’re facing and need to address — not whether or not she was really sick that day.

2. Telling a candidate we can’t meet her salary expectations

I have a great candidate whose stated salary expectations are about $10,000 higher than what we can pay. Is it appropriate to go back to her to say, “Our salary range is $X. Given that knowledge, would you like to continue with the interview process?” And if so, any best practices on how to say that?

You can say it exactly like that! The only thing I might add to your first sentence is “and we’re not able to increase that range.” Otherwise, you risk the candidate thinking that she can negotiate for more at the end of the interview process. (Of course, she might anyway, but it’s worth being clear so that you minimize that risk.)

Most candidates will appreciate you being direct and giving them enough information that they can make an informed decisions.

3. Proposing going part-time after maternity leave

I’ve worked full-time for a small business for 6 years. I will be returning from maternity leave next month, at which time I would prefer to work part-time (25 hours a week instead of 40). How should I address this with my employer?

Just be straightforward! “When I return at the end of this month, would you be open to me working part-time? Here are my ideas for how we could structure the position to make it work.” It can also be helpful to propose trying it for X months and then revisiting at the end of that period to see how well it’s working.

4. How long should salary negotiation take?

I received a job offer for a software developer position. I told them I was excited to consider the offer and asked to have the details in writing so I could go over it. I decided to negotiate on salary because considering the entire offer, including the base salary and benefits, the offer seemed a little weak based on my experience and skills, not to mention it was a worse overall offer than my existing job. (At my existing job, I make a lower base salary, but they add 10% of my base to my retirement account monthly without any contribution on my part.)

After explaining to the recruiter that I felt the offer could be better given my skills and experience, she said things like, “We are a small company and don’t usually negotiate salaries” and “I guess we could see what our VP of Technology thinks…what are you thinking?” I gave them a figure that made sense to me, and was still within the salary range we initially discussed over a month before. She told me that she would discuss this with the hiring manager and the VP and see what she could do for me.

For the last two weeks, they have been touching base every few days with another excuse of why they don’t yet have a counteroffer. Examples: “We need to run some numbers and analysis and get back to you by the end of the week,” “The VP of Technology is out on vacation now,” “The hiring manager is out on vacation now,” and “The recruiter is out on vacation now.” I personally am beginning to question whether I even want to work there now. I feel at this point like if they can’t get a reasonable offer together, what will it be like to work there? Why is it so hard for them to make decisions? I’m also becoming suspicious about what is taking so long. My question is, do you think this is a reasonable and professional amount of time to take to put together a counteroffer? What do you think I should do at this point?

It’s certainly possible that all those people are out on vacation one after another — it’s summer, after all — and two weeks isn’t actually that long for this. Four weeks would be unreasonably long, but at two, you’re still in the realm of what’s reasonable.

To me, the bigger red flag is “We are a small company and don’t usually negotiate salaries.” I’d wonder if there are other perfectly normal things they think they can skip doing because they’re a small company — raises? Professional development? Feedback? Vacation time? It’s possibly that salary negotiation is their own blind spot, but I’d make sure that you’re clear about their culture before accepting an offer.

5. Using color on resumes

Is it time to incorporate some tasteful color and design elements into resumes? Would using a color that matches a company color (red for Target, orange for Lowes) work well?

No. Hiring managers aren’t looking for creativity in a resume (unless you’re applying for a design position). I promise you, all they want is a concise, easy-to-scan list of what you’ve accomplished, organized chronologically by position, plus any particularly notable skills, all presented in a format that they can quickly scan to get the highlights. That’s it. They don’t care about color.

Since I notice from your signature that you’re a professor in a business department of a university, I also want to thank you for asking before suggesting this to students, since so often people advising students give them job search advice that isn’t grounded in a knowledge of what employers actually want and which encourages students to spend energy on things that won’t help them (and sometimes hurts).

6. My boss told me it wasn’t my place to question him

I work at a large Fortune 500 company, where I have been here for 15 years. I have a brand new boss who is new to the department yet seems to be walking the halls like John Wayne with his imaginary gold badge. He REALLY enjoys his title. His need to be always right is wearing on our team. HR is even involved since I went to his boss to complain and requested I be moved someone/anywhere else.

Issue: During our last meeting we had a tiff and I mentioned he had too much time and was too involved in my day to day activities. His reply was, “It’s not your place to question your boss.” I can’t seem to shake this comment off. He told the same thing to the other female employee. Is this sexist or am I looking too much into this? He has 3 employees and seems to harass only the 2 females but this could be coincidence.

I don’t know if it was rooted in sexism or not — there would need to be a larger pattern of treating male and female employees differently to say for sure, because the comment itself isn’t inherently sexist. If you’re seeing such a pattern, the pattern is certainly something it would be appropriate to raise with your HR department.

That said, it really isn’t your place to tell your boss that he has too much time on his hands. You can certainly talk to him about your concern that he’s overly involved in your work, but you need to do that in a professional manner — not be getting into “tiffs” with him or telling him that he has too much time on his hands. You were out of line there, which means that you’re giving this guy legitimate complaints about you, which isn’t going to help your case.

7. Applying for a lower position after earlier applying for a higher one

I’ve seen your posts about applying for two jobs at one organization, but this situation is a little bit different/more awkward. Last night, I applied for a director position at a museum I’d love to work for. I have the minimum qualifications but it’s a bit of a stretch. After submitting my application, I noticed they are looking for a manager position in the same office (to be supervised by the new director). I’d be better suited for the manager job, and I’d probably enjoy it more, but I don’t think I should contact them and let them know I’d rather be considered for a lower-level position. How would you handle something like this? Eep!

Apply for the manager job with a cover letter that says, “I applied for the director position earlier, but after seeing the manager position, I believe it may be a better match for me.”

If you were a strong candidate for the director position, this would be stickier, because you wouldn’t want to undermine that application or generally come across as not confident in your own qualifications, but since the director position was a stretch anyway, this is a reasonable way to go.

Happy 4th of July!  To celebrate, we have seven short answers to seven short questions. Here we go…

1. Should I leave my dream job?

I would like to ask your advice on whether or not to resign from a nonprofit. I was hired over two years ago by a visual arts organization. It’s been a really amazing opportunity, but a huge amount of work. It was run (somewhat poorly) entirely by volunteers before they hired me. The volunteers running the organization before did a lot of expansion without actually having the money or infrastructure, so all of the new funds I’ve brought in for the past two years are going to paying for these expansions. There’s not much chance of hiring any more staff or of me getting a raise for the next few years.

This job has been affecting me negatively emotionally for a while, I’m starting to get burnt out, I dread going in in the morning. It’s just too much work for one person to do reasonably long-term. I love the work in theory, but it’s just too much for one person to keep up long-term and I know I’m not doing as good of a job as I could be. I’m really underpaid, have never gotten a raise, and am working a second job to make ends meet.

My second job is looking for staff, and would be able to hire me full time. I would be making more money, and would actually be able to start saving. Resigning from the organization would mean sacrificing a paying job in the arts, future opportunities that it could give me and a lot of autonomy and control over my work. But in a lot of ways, I feel like I would be getting my life back. I would be able to take a vacation, save for grad school and actually start making art again.

It’s a really difficult decision. Do I leave a “dream job” because it’s consuming my life, or do I keep plugging away in the hopes of having a work/life balance in the future?

It’s not really a dream job if you’re dreading going to work in the morning, is it?

I can’t tell you to resign, but I can tell you that there are a lot of ways to be involved in the arts that don’t involve a job you dread that doesn’t pay you enough, so don’t let fear of that hold you back.

Whether or not you leave, I hope that you’ll point out to the board that the expansions those volunteers made aren’t sustainable, as proved by the fact that the work it’s generated has been too much for one person — and one underpaid person, no less. A sensible board, if they look at the situation and agree with you, will scale back, because otherwise they’ll keep losing people like you. (In fact, finding out how they react to that conversation might be the place to start.)

2. What happens if my employer gets caught misclassifying me as an independent contractor?

I have worked for a company for about 9 years now and basically helped build it from the ground up. My boss has claimed me as an independent contractor for the last 9 years and I’ve been given 1099 tax forms for each of those years. The government is now auditing my boss and wants to interview me . My boss is trying everything he can to make me look like an independent contractor, and I had taken his word for it that indeed I was. After doing some research, I now see why my boss is freaking out. I have learned that really this whole time I have worked as an employee. The investigator will find this out when they interview me because I’m not going to lie, which my boss suggested I do. When this happens, will I have some sort of claim against my boss for back pay as well as loss of benefits and the whole employee package that I never got in these last 9 years?

Your employer will have to pay financial penalties, but these are recoverable by the state, not by you personally. However, in some states, like California, employees can collect a portion of the penalties by bringing action in civil court on behalf of all misclassified employees at their workplace. You can also file to have the payroll taxes your employer should have paid on your behalf credited to your Social Security account. Beyond that, you’d need to talk with a lawyer in your state to find out what other impact this might have on you retroactively.

3. Should I ask for a raise when I don’t think I’ve really earned one?

I began working in my current position just about a year ago. It was a career change for me and I was lucky to get hired in at the next level above entry due to having a masters degree (in an unrelated field). I’m very happy with the work, but the problem is that in order to make this career change, I took a significant pay cut. After a year, I’m realizing it’s simply not sustainable unless I can earn a little more money. I live as frugally as possible, but am living paycheck to paycheck and sometimes come up short.

My options are to apply to similar positions elsewhere where I would likely earn more money (my workplace pays on the low end of the salary scale) or to ask for a raise. I just don’t think I have much justification in asking for a raise though. I feel confident I’ve learned quickly and done my job satisfactorily. That said, I haven’t done anything particularly remarkable or blown any goals out of the water. I’ve had fewer projects assigned to me than my other coworkers who have been here a year or two longer so it’s been hard to really make my “mark” or show my boss what I’m fully capable of. We did receive a modest annual cost of living increase this month so that helps, but it’s still not enough (and my salary is still lower than our competitors). Should I just try for the raise even though I’m having difficulty even convincing myself I’ve done anything to earn it? Should I explain my financial concerns to my boss? Or, should I just start applying to other jobs?

If you don’t think you’ve really earned a raise above the cost of living increase, it’s going to be hard to make a case for it. However, you could certainly talk to your boss about your desire for more projects, and higher level ones, which might give you an avenue for earning a raise over time. Meanwhile, though, you could also start looking at other jobs — if you find a higher-paying one meanwhile, then that’s an option as well. But in general, asking for a raise on grounds of need doesn’t work well.

4. I interviewed with eyeliner smudged on my face

I just had an interview that went really well, except when I got into my car afterwards, I noticed that my eyeliner was completely smudged. It was fine when I got OUT of my car, but in the crazy heat on my way into the building, it went from perfect to not so pretty. In my ”thanks for the interview” note, do I apologize for it? Or just let it go? I’m completely mortified that I didn’t have a chance to check it when I walked into the building and the interview went so well.

If we’re just talking about smudging — as opposed to it being completely streaked down your face — I’d let it go. If it was streaked down your face, though — like in a way that no one could have avoided noticing, including people who are normally oblivious to makeup mishaps; we’re talking clown-level makeup disaster here — then I think you could pull off an “I was mortified when I got into my car to realize that my makeup had run in the heat; I hope having black stripes all over my face didn’t distract from the conversation.”

But again, that’s only if the problem was truly extreme; otherwise you’d be better off not calling attention to it or seeming like you thought it was a bigger deal than it was.

5. Pregnancy, phone interviews, and start dates

Back in February, I applied to a lead engineering position at a Fortune 500 company (20 weeks pregnant). After just one phone interview, I ended up in second place, with the hiring manager stating that he would have hired me if he had another position available.

To my surprise, this morning I got an email from a friend who works for the same hiring manager, saying that the same position was reopened and that my application is still valid. Does this mean that I get to skip the initial phone interview? Also, since I’m currently 9 months pregnant, would it be acceptable to negotiate a later starting date?

No idea if it means you can skip the initial phone interview — different companies will handle that differently. In fact, I’d ask your friend what it means that your application “is still valid” — does it mean that it will automatically be considered or should you apply again or contact the hiring manager? (Actually, I’d contact the hiring manager regardless; your friend may not be fully in the loop on how the hiring manager is handling this.)

And yes, you can absolutely try to negotiate a later starting date. There’s no guarantee of success, of course, but that’s a very normal thing to do when you’re about to have a baby.

6. How will walking off the job during my notice period affect me?

I worked in a grocery store for 7 years. I gave two weeks notice and was harassed by management once I did. I ended up walking out in the middle of my second-to-last shift. They consider this job abandonment. How is this going to affect me in the future?

You probably won’t get a great reference from them (but it sounds like you might not have anyway, given the way they handled your resignation), and it could affect your reputation among coworkers who witnessed it or heard about it (unless they felt you were justified, which for all I know they did).

In general, walking off the job should be an absolute last resort (when you’re being asked to do something illegal or unsafe, for instance), because it’s rarely worth the price you end up paying for it.

7. Should I say that I have a degree that I won’t have for a few more months?

I’m applying to a government job that requires an MLS in library science, which I will have completed by the end of August (need to complete summer classes and my comprehensive exam). The posting, however, expires before that. On the resume that I’m submitting, I clearly state that my degree won’t be completed until August, and I can also discuss it in my cover letter, but considering that this is the government, I think it’s likely that by the time they start calling people for interviews, I will have my degree. I am otherwise well-qualified and it’s a position that I would love to pursue (and positions of this type don’t come up very often).

My problem is, when I fill out the required “application questionnaire,” one of the questions is “Do you have an MLS? Yes/No” with no place to enter an explanation. I obviously don’t want to lie on an application (especially with the government!) but I’m afraid that checking “no” will automatically keep my resume from even being seen by the hiring manager. Do you have any advice on what I should do?

Check “yes” so that you get through any electronic screening they might be using. You’re making your situation clear in your cover letter and resume, and this is a pretty normal way to handle it.