Ask a Manager

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

1. My manager asked me not to get rides home from a coworker

I am a female and I’ve asked another female coworker for a ride twice because it was late and the buses stopped running already. She had no problem with it because I live 3 minutes away from the job. Our supervisor witnessed it both times, and today after my shift she called me into her office and asked me not to ask coworkers for rides anymore because it’s a liability issue. Is she allowed to tell me that even if the coworker and I are friends and the coworker clearly has no problem with it?

A liability issue? That sounds like total and complete BS to me. I’d ask her exactly what she means, and point out that people carpool all the freaking time — and tons of government programs encourage it.

2. Letting a recruiter know I have a deadline for receiving an offer

My significant other is deciding on law schools to go to and she needs to put down a deposit by the 30th. I’m currently interviewing for the job of my dreams, but I need to know if I am going to be hired this summer by the 29th or it’s pretty much useless because I want to end up in the same city as she does. How can I let the recruiter who is scheduling my interview know this without offending them? What should I say?

You can say, “We’re on a deadline to select a city by the 29th. Is that likely to work with your timeline?” But be prepared for the possibility that they might not be ready to make a decision by then.

3. Manager says I’m not friendly enough with coworkers

I have recently started a new job at a popular casual fine-dining restaurant chain. I have received criticism from my supervisors that I don’t appear to be friendly enough with my coworkers. They also state that this is never a concern with the tables I serve, and suggest that I treat my coworkers the same as I treat customers. I have taken their suggestion into consideration and have made an honest effort to smile, be friendly and greet fellow coworkers at every opportunity. However, the issue was brought up again.

I am a quiet person by nature, especially when working in a new situation where I haven’t established relationships with the staff. I also believe in focusing on the quality of my work and have never thought that socializing with staff would be used to gauge how competent an employee I am. I do feel fairly replaceable, given the industry I am in, and therefore don’t know how to approach my employers about how I feel for fear of being let go. I feel that as long as I am friendly and helpful I shouldn’t be asked to go out of my way to make close acquaintances at work. Should I express this to my employer? Or am I wrong for feeling this is unfair of them to request?

It’s ridiculous of them, but if this is their culture, you might be fighting an uphill battle. However, you can certainly say, “I really like my coworkers, but I’m a quiet person by nature. I hope that won’t interfere with your assessment of my work.”

4. Asking about the impact of rapid growth during an interview.

During a phone interview today, my interviewer mentioned that their nonprofit is growing very quickly (including this new position for which I’m interviewing). I know that growth can be exciting, but I’ve also had jobs where the organization grew too quickly and lost touch with the mission and culture that made them successful in the first place. I was offered an in-person interview next week and I’d like to probe a little more into how they approach growth. What questions would you suggest me asking? I don’t want to come across as anti-growth, but if growth will bring chaos and confusion this won’t be the right job for me.

“There are a lot of challenges that come with quick growth, like maintaining your culture, X, and Y (fill in with whatever you’re concerned about). How is the organization approaching those issues?”

5. What to ask for and think about when interviewing for a teleworking job

I recently interveiwed for a job, not knowing that the position will work from home. Do you have any advice/tips for things to ask for during the salary negotiation process as to what employers customarily provide (computer, phone, internet access at home, etc.) and maybe something special I should ask for if I get an offer? Also, any tips for evaluating whether working from home will be a good fit for me would be great. At first, the idea to work from home sounds great, but I think I might miss the social aspect of working in an office.

The employer should pay for any expenses that you incur because of the job that you wouldn’t have incurred otherwise — so depending on your situation and the job, that could be a computer, phone line or part of your phone bill, Internet access if you don’t already have it at home (although if you do, many won’t cover it, since it’s an expense you would have regardless), postage, supplies, printer, travel expenses for necessary trips to the office, etc. As for asking for anything special, most employers consider teleworking a benefit so I wouldn’t ask for additional benefits or compensation, other than perhaps working out precisely how often you’ll travel to the company’s office (if at all) and what expenses will be covered when you do.

But think carefully about whether working from home is for you — some people (like me) love it, but others go stir-crazy or find it hard to stay focused.

6. Is it better to have a gap or irrelevant experience on your resume?

I’m in the process of updating my resume and I’ve got a situation I’m not sure how to handle. My career is going on almost 15 years; as a result, I try to keep my resume lean and only focused on my most recent/relevant positions.

The problem is, a few years ago I moved cross country and it required that I take a job not directly related to my career for a year and half. Since I’ve been at my current job for so long, this detour creates a gap in my resume if I want to stay with my relevant experience.

My husband, who has done a lot of hiring, says I need to keep the unrelated stuff out of my resume and just fudge the dates of the related positions so I don’t have any gaps. I am very uncomfortable with that, so should I have an unrelated position or a gap? I absolutely believe that the resume is marketing tool so I really want to focus on my accomplishments in the related positions, but that is a pretty big gap and I don’t want it to scare anyone off from calling me.

Your husband may not verify dates of employment when he’s hiring, but lots of employers do — and lying about the dates you held a position will be an instant deal-breaker for most companies that check. Why not just put all your relevant experience in a Relevant Experience section and put the rest of it in an Other Experience section so that it’s clear what you were doing the rest of the time? You don’t need the less relevant stuff to take up a ton of space — you can just include the employer, title, and dates, and not get into details.

7. How much time does Ask a Manager take?

You’ve said you get a lot of email each day, and that you try to respond to everyone if you can. I also see that you post things late at night and early in the morning (e.g. you posted at 1:20 am and 8:45 a.m. one day earlier this week). So how much time each day do you actually spend reading/answering emails and writing posts? Are you seriously dealing with this stuff for 10+ hours a day (you must be exhausted from it!), or are you doing a couple hours here and a couple hours there? When do you fit in the time to write and edit your various columns? Are there other aspects of your work that you fit in the mix too?

Well, I set a lot of posts to automatically publish at particular times during the day, so sometimes while that’s happening I’m not at the computer at all. So that can be misleading. It’s definitely not a 10-hour a day job! I do a little here, a little there, a little more here, as I happen to have the time and the inclination. So it’s really just sporadic bursts throughout the day (and sometimes none at all, if I’ve pre-programmed everything to auto-publish). I’m a weirdly fast writer, so it takes less time than you might think (probably 15 minutes per post on average, plus random comments throughout the day, plus maybe an hour dealing with email each day). Actually, keeping up with the comments is the most time-consuming part of the whole thing — but also one of the most satisfying, and I’m not looking forward to the day when I have to accept that I can no longer read every comment.

That said, after I switched to 3+ posts a day last August, it upped the amount of pressure on days when I’m swamped with other stuff, but I’m convinced I can sustain that without completely losing my mind if I pre-write more often.

As for what else I do, the rest of it is consulting work for a handful of clients. I’d love to eventually do nothing but Ask a Manager, but y’all are going to have to buy an awful lot of ebooks to make that feasible.

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

1. Reaching out to a long-ago boss about a job he might be interested in

About 20 years ago, when I was an undergraduate, I had a part-time job on my college campus. For the sake of anonymity, let’s say I was a chocolate teapot maker. My boss was truly an incredible boss: he knew the work we did inside and out, was supportive as long as you were doing your job (he always, always had our backs when we were doing what we were supposed to), and addressed it when people weren’t doing their work.

Anyway, I didn’t really keep in touch with Old Boss after leaving school, although I did randomly run into him when I was on the campus for other reasons some years ago, and he remembered me and we talked briefly. Where I work now, I’m not a chocolate teapot maker. But I’ve just seen a brand-new position open up that is a Director of Chocolate Teapot Making here, which made me think of Old Boss. I think he’d be incredible in this position, or he might know someone who would be interested if he’s not wanting to make a move himself.

I googled Old Boss and found an email address for him (yes, I’m sure it’s him). Would it be weird to email him out of the blue, remind him of who I am, and mention this position? Normally I wouldn’t hesitate, but it’s been quite a long time since I’ve been in touch with him, and I wondered if you thought that would make a difference.

Not weird at all. First of all, previous bosses nearly always appreciate hearing from past employees, as long as you say nice things, and second, nearly everyone appreciates being referred to jobs they might be interested in (unless the position is far below what he’s qualified for, in which case it can of course be insulting, but then you could ask if he knows anyone who’d be interested). Write to him right now.

2. What to do when peers constantly miss scheduled meetings

I work at a college in a service function (I direct our grant activity, but my question could apply to a number of service functions). I’ve written you before because management here is weak, indecisive, wasteful, uncommunicative, and focused more on touchy-feely crap than actual results. I’ve had five managers six years. In the last year, my department budget has been cut; my grantwriter quit in frustration, and I’ve not been allowed to fill his position. Yet administration insists that my work is a priority and that I MUST increase funding, or face further cuts. There are many, many cues that it’s really not a priority, but let’s start with a simple, concrete example.

How do I manage the immediate issues of peers missing meetings, when it’s an uphill battle to schedule them in the first place? I just came back a colleague’s office, where he did not show up for a scheduled meeting. Others in his division have missed meetings with me or showed up 20 or more minutes late, often with little or no advanced notice. I understand that things crop up, but this sort of cavalier behavior is chronic. Is there an effective way to manage other people’s behavior, or at least my own reaction, while still doing my best to do my job? I am looking for other jobs.

Given your first paragraph, this is sort of like asking, “A volcano is erupting all over me; how do I make sure the lava doesn’t stain my shoes?” But in any case, you can only control the pieces of this that you can control. If people aren’t showing up at meetings, you can (a) talk to them and ask them to start, (b) talk to their managers or yours about the issue, or (c) find some other way to get the information you need. In your case, I might try to do (c) if at all possible. Can you get what you need from someone/somewhere else? Can you call or email for it rather than trying for a meeting? Find some way to go around your lame coworkers, rather than relying on them.

3. How to get feedback from a terminally hands-off manager

I’m a post-doc in a research lab at a university, and have been working there for a little over a year. Professors are notorious for being extremely hands-off managers, and my boss is no exception. He never, ever addresses problematic work performance (even in the case of a graduate student who essentially did no work at all for months), and he’s very open about the fact that his management strategy is to let his students and post-docs go about their business, and watch the ones who succeed thrive and find professor positions, and let the ones who don’t fizzle out and eventually leave academia.

For the past few months, I’ve noticed that my boss has been more cold and stand-offish with me than with other members of the lab, which makes me worry that he has found my performance wanting in some way. I want to ask him to give me feedback on how I’ve been doing and if there are areas where he thinks I can improve, but, frankly, I have no idea how to go about doing it, especially given his clear distaste for this part of his job. Should I send him an email asking to set up a time to discuss this? Ask him about it when we’re meeting about something else? Just walk into his office and ask him if it’s a good time to talk? We don’t have regular meetings–I only set up a time to meet with him when I need his input/advice on a project, and those meetings rarely last more than 15 minutes. I know that if there is something he’s unhappy with, it will make him very uncomfortable to discuss it, and I’m concerned that he’ll resent being asked to do it and it will make our relationship even worse. Any advice on how to handle this situation?

If it would damage your relationship to ask for feedback, then yeah, I guess you have to give up on getting any from him. But are you sure it really will? Because that’s pretty insane. It’s not like you’re going to go to him and demand to know his deepest thoughts or scream “why do you hate me.” You’re going to ask your boss how you’re doing and what you could do better. While he might be inept enough not to be able to answer that, if it would really harm your relationship, that’s a whole new level of dysfunction that we rarely see, and it makes me want to put my head down and take a stress nap.

4. Staffing agency is getting too much for my work

I’m told that if a organization controls when, where, and how someone works, then that someone is not a contractor but an employee.

I work for an organization that takes 50 percent of what I’m paid hourly and I feel that this is too much. I understand that, for example, a staffing firm will make a certain percentage off their employees’ hourly wage, but the 50 percent I believe is questionable. I do not work for a staffing firm but a organization that provides services to other organizations and pays me (taking taxes out of my check). And according to the law, I’m not a contract worker and don’t see why my employer should be getting 50 percent of what I’m paid hourly.

Since taxes are being taken out of your check, you’re not being treated as an independent contractor. You’re a regular W2 employee; you’re just an employee of the staffing agency, rather than the firm where you’ve been placed.

The staffing agency negotiated a wage directly with you, which you agreed to. It also negotiated a fee with the company you were placed at in exchange for its services to them (finding, screening, and placing employees and handling the administrative oversight of those employees). That’s a completely separate issue that the pay they negotiated with you. But if you don’t like it, you’re free to try to either negotiate for more or leave and strike out on your own.

5. Asking for a different title

An academic requirement of my Master’s program is a second-year field practicum to help students link theory and practice. I’ve secured my placement for next year and it’s a great fit with my academic and professional interests.

My practicum host organization is working on the terms of reference right now and have suggested “Intern” or “Program Assistant” as my official title. Before going back to school, I worked as a project manager with an international consultancy. Beyond ensuring that I’m actually doing substantive work and putting my degree to use, how should I broach a discussion about something as seemingly petty as a title? I want to show on my resume that that I’ve taken on more responsibility over the years rather than taking a step backward.

Well, I’m not sure that it will be more responsibility than what you had as a project manager, so I wouldn’t necessarily frame the discussion as a desire for that — because that might be unrealistic (unless I’m misunderstanding what the practicum involves). But you can certainly be straightforward about your desire for a different title: “Would it be possible to call the position X? It would helpful to me in the future to be able to convey to prospective employees that the position involved A, B, and C.” Just make sure that whatever title you do suggest is realistic and reflects the work you’ll be doing.

6. Did my typo make this HR manager stop responding to me?

I’m going through a hiring process with a great company and for a position that I dream about. The first interview with the HR manager happened 3 weeks ago, and the next interview (in-person with the director of the department) will be in the last week of this month. The HR manager and I have been in contact for about 1 month and it has been quite smooth with quick replies. However, in my last email I asked some questions about the company’s corporate structure in order to better understand how my position will play out and I didn’t receive any answer. Today, 2 weeks after sending that e-mail, I opened the message with the objective to send her a reminder of my questions and I realized that in this specific email I made a mistake when typing the HR manager’s name. Basically, I added one extra vowel in the middle of her short name (like from Victoria, I wrote Vicatoria). I checked all the other messages and I didn’t see the same happening, it was only on 1 email. Do you think that it will kill my chances to be hired? Do you think that this is the reason why she is not answering my emails? What should I do now, send a reminder for my questions or simply leave it? The interview though still scheduled!

No, I don’t think that’s why she’s not answering. I think she didn’t answer because you sent her an email with a bunch of questions that would take a while to write out answers to and which are better saved for an interview. (And also possibly because it sounds like you’ve been sending her multiple emails before this too.) So actually, it’s good that you made the typo because spotting it saved you from sending her a “reminder” to answer your questions, which would have been a mistake.

Save substantive questions for actual conversations. Email questions only when it’s imperative to ask — like confirming a interview time or checking on a hiring timeline.

7. Do I have a job offer or don’t I?

I am in the late stages of a job search in a different city than where I currently live. I had a few phone interviews with members of the Human Capital Team, plus a phone interview with the executive director. I was out in the new city on April 1st to meet with the ED and she offered me the position on the spot. When I returned home a few days later I received an email letting me know that they would like to check my references (which seems standard ) but also that they need me to speak to someone at their national office.

Scheduling with this person has been a little tricky and is leaving me in a lurch: the interview was supposed to be this week but is now moved to next week (which means we are approaching three and a half weeks since my conversation with the ED). I want to be understanding that things happen but it is making me question the position and my standing with the organization–was I really offered a position? Where do I stand with them? The ED made it clear that they want someone who can start soon, but understands that I want to give my current position as much notice as possible and also need to move across the country for the position. My question is, is there anyway to check in and see where they are with me, either with someone in Human Capital or the ED herself? Is there anything else I can do to be an advocate for myself in this process?

At this point, assume you do not have an official job offer. It would totally fine, though, to email the ED and say something like, “My conversation with Jane has been pushed back to next week. Meanwhile, I hoped you could clarify for me where we stand — I’m not entirely clear on whether things still stand as they did when you and I spoke.” Alternately, you can email HR to ask, but since the ED herself offered you the job, she might be more inclined to push things through when she hears that they’ve been delayed.