Ask a Manager

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

1. I got in trouble for overstepping at work

It’s been 18 years since my last job. I was a stay-at-home mother of five, but I was also stuck in a seriously abusive relationship; he prevented me from doing anything. After finally escaping him in 2019, I became extremely agoraphobic, with severe anxiety and all that stuff that makes it hard to be around people.

I wanted to try to put myself back out there. Believe it or not, I handpicked my job as a laundry attendant to slowly get myself back out there. It had been a little over a month and I was feeling great. I felt like I had a lot to prove to them and myself, but I have never been the type of person to just stand around, doing nothing, waiting to be told what to do. I found things to do — sweep, vacuum, clean shelves, dust the top of machines. All of a sudden, the housekeeping supervisor has this huge problem with me, stating, “I only need you to do what I hired you to do!” I wanted to cry all day. I’m so confused why hard work, good work ethic, and taking initiative has become such a bad thing. I have never worked at a place that punishes their employees by cutting hours because they work too hard.

I have made a few comments about how they keep the rooms. As a guest, I would not stay there. They only change the top covers if they are stained, and no one cleans properly. And this isn’t some hole-in-the-wall, this is an award-winning hotel. So my supervisor took my ideas to her boss and blamed me for the crap happening in the laundry room. I’m totally beside myself and confused.

It’s not unreasonable that they’d want you to stick to the job they hired you to do! If the job is laundry attendant and you were going beyond that to do other work — even if it was work you could see needed to be done — they might legitimately feel you were overstepping and/or causing them more work. That’s not always easy to see when you’re the person trying to take initiative, but sometimes doing X without being trained or authorized to do X can cause problems you don’t have the context to anticipate. For example, you could be stepping on someone else’s toes, or messing up an established system that you don’t know about because they didn’t have any reason to teach it to you, or adding to the list of things your boss would be responsible for overseeing.

Sometimes volunteering for extras will be helpful and appreciated … but you have to be willing to be told no and not take it personally.

I can’t tell how much of the problem came from your comments about how they keep the rooms — but it wouldn’t be surprising if they bristled at that, especially if they were already concerned that you were overstepping the bounds of the job they hired you for. It sounds like your manager is telling you pretty clearly that the contributions you hoped would help just aren’t things they want to see, for whatever reason. If you don’t like the idea of sticking just to your assigned duties, this job isn’t the right fit (which is okay! no job is a good fit for everyone who does it). If that’s the case, why not look for a job with broader responsibilities?

2. Is it a faux pas to bring luggage to an interview?

I once interviewed someone who brought their luggage with them. To be fair, we were close to the airport and this was a city where five miles is an hour of driving. It was a little odd though, and they had come about 30 minutes early and joined me and my coworkers while we ate lunch (open concept floor). After the interview, we concluded that they should have waited at the coffee shop across our building instead of coming into the office so early.

We ended up not going with them for a few reasons, but I was curious if this was actually a faux pas, or if I was being a little unfair. I was early in my career and that workplace had a cliquey mentality, so looking back I wonder if the luggage wasn’t such a big deal. I still think the lunch/earlyness was weird, but I’m happy to be corrected.

I can’t count the number of people I’ve interviewed who brought their luggage with them to the interview! If someone has flown in for an interview and has come straight from the airport or will be going there right afterwards, they might have no choice. It happens all the time, and it’s normal and not a faux pas in any way.

Arriving 30 minutes early is a misstep though. Depending on the reception area set-up, it can force the employer to deal with the candidate before they’re ready for them. And unless the candidate was explicitly invited to join you for lunch, that was definitely an overstep — you could have intended to use that time to discuss the hiring process or confidential work or all sorts of other things.

3. I’m the only one still wearing a mask

I work for a smallish company (about 75 employees) and as of about a year ago, my department has gone almost 100% digital. From January 2022 until January 2023, I worked from home almost exclusively. Unfortunately, at the start of this year, the VPs decided to require everyone to come back to the office at least three days per week. Upon returning to the office, I discovered that I am the only person in the entire building who wears a mask. My partner is high-risk, and I have told anyone and everyone who will listen that I have to protect him and that we cannot take the risk of just vaccinating and hoping for the best (though we are five times vaccinated now).

At the end of last month, I came down with bronchitis after babysitting my nephew and niece and had to go back to working from home until I recovered. I had just shaken the fever this last weekend and came back to the office two days ago, when I learned last night that a coworker (who was in the office yesterday, unmasked) tested positive for asymptomatic Covid.

I’m pretty angry with my workplace. One year ago, I was happy with my job; I felt productive, had a healthy work-life balance, and could see myself working there for many years to come. Today? I’m pissed. I feel betrayed and that they’ve undermined all the hard work my partner and I have done these last 3+ years to keep him safe. Further, the idea of potentially having my lungs hit by Covid scarring while I’m still dealing with lingering bronchitis effects terrifies me. If I end up testing positive, I want to let all the higher-ups know how I feel about this, but should I? And how do I say it without all the fuck-words that are in my head and heart?

What you describe in your office is pretty typical of most offices, not just yours: most people, unless they are high-risk or have high-risk loved ones, have largely stopped masking.

I get why you’re upset — I still mask in most indoor situations too because my mom is immunocompromised from chemo and I don’t want to endanger her. But the vast majority of people in the U.S. have decided Covid infections and the risk of long Covid are things they’re willing to live with. I know that sucks if you’re high-risk or close to people who are high-risk. If it feels like the world has left you to fend for yourselves … it has. But it’s extremely likely that you’ll encounter the same conditions in any other job (unless it’s fully remote and you’re confident it’ll stay that way) and extremely unlikely that your company will require everyone to start masking again, or even that they’ll think you’re reasonable for being upset that your asymptomatic coworker wasn’t masking before the positive test.

What you’re upset about isn’t something specific to your company; it’s the response of the world in general. I’m sorry.

4. Is this job description a red flag?

I just came across a job listing that had these last two bullets:

• Maintain a calm demeanor and manage issues professionally and respectfully in accordance with our company standards.
• Act with integrity and trust, modeling behavior that respects our employees, peers, and customers in accordance with the core values of our company.

Stuff like this always gives me pause and (to me) is a red flag that they have to specifically ask people to be a cordial, working professional in a job listing. Or is it a green flag that misbehavior isn’t tolerated and they have a code of conduct that folks really buy into?

I wouldn’t read anything into it. It reads pretty boilerplate.

Even if it were a little weirder, I wouldn’t necessarily read much into it. Sometimes hiring managers overreact to their last bad hire — like if the previous person was hostile and argumentative all the time, sometimes that’ll show up in the form of a job description that seems disproportionately focused on handling conflict well, and it’s not because it’s a high-conflict workplace but because they’re trying to avoid the mistakes they made with the last person. That doesn’t mean you should ignore anything that seems weird in a job description; it’s always okay to ask about it (“I noticed you emphasized the need for X; can you tell me more about that?”). But I wouldn’t consider it a red flag on its own.

5. Should I tell employers I was laid off a few months ago?

I was laid off from my tech job in mid-February and I’m currently still job hunting (not having much luck!).

Should I mention “laid off” on my resume and/or cover letter? I’ve heard mixed reviews from everyone I’ve talked to (friends, recruiters, former colleagues), so I’ve kept everything on my resume as “present” and don’t mention being laid off until during a live interview. Thoughts?

You don’t need to specify that you were laid off on your resume or in your cover letter — although you might choose to if you think it helps to explain for why you left — but you definitely definitely definitely should not be sending out a resume in May that says you’re still at a job that you left in February! That’s deliberately misleading, and I’d be concerned if I realized a candidate had done that.

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

1. My employee is missing the mark with our dress code

My direct report has been very open about being on the autism spectrum and having some learning disabilities. I’ve been working with him closely to provide regular feedback and coaching on a few performance issues. He is eager to improve, and I want to provide as much support as is reasonable.

One area where I’m struggling is his appearance. We’re a professional service firm, so we regularly interact with clients. We’re not overly formal, but it’s important that we look put together. He’s come to client calls looking disheveled, with hair all over the place and a t-shirt with small holes in the neck. I’ve told him a few times that the expectation is business casual on calls, like a button-down or sweater.

The problem is he’s following that advice now, but the shirts are often wrinkly, or a bit too small, or he’s not wearing an undershirt and he’s showing a lot of chest hair. He’s technically following my recommendations, but still doesn’t look client-ready.

How direct should I be with feedback moving forward? I have no problem continuing to remind him that the expectation is a neat and clean appearance. However, it feels overly personal to spell out everything I’ve said above. Of course, I also want to be respectful of the fact that some of this might not be obvious to him. As his supervisor, how much coaching do I owe him on this?

Please be direct with him! I think your initial feedback — that the expectation is business casual — assumed he’d have access to a sort of cultural playbook about what that means, but a lot of people were never given that playbook and you’re more likely to get your message across if you spell out exactly what it means. (Notably, this is the case for most people, not just people with autism, and so many problems would get solved if managers would do more of it.)

So spell it out! “We’ve talked in the past about our dress code being business casual, and I’ve realized I should be clearer about what that means. Especially when you’re going to be interacting with clients, you should (fill in details of exactly what you want to see from him that you’re currently not).” I suspect you haven’t done that yet because you feel awkward about dictating this stuff at such a micro level — like it’s somehow insulting or overly micromanagery — but the reality is, you have expectations that he’s currently not meeting, he’d probably like to meet them, and you’ll be helping him out by telling him exactly what they are.

2. How to get coworkers to stop asking how I’m doing

For the first time in my life, I’m facing health issues that are impacting my work. I’m pregnant and this pregnancy is wreaking havoc on my body in myriad ways. My boss knows the full details and is incredibly respectful and supportive, and it’s getting to the point where my coworkers — and even coworkers I don’t know — can visibly tell that something is wrong. I can barely walk most days and am increasingly working from home in a very in-person office, so when I’m not there it’s noticed.

My coworkers are lovely and they mean well, but every day they ask how I’m doing. I just want to yell, how do you think I’m doing? I’m shuffling around the office like I’m 80 and am clearly in pain! I don’t like talking pregnancy in detail, both because it’s my private medical information and also out of sensitivity to a coworker experiencing infertility, so I usually just brush it off with a casual “oh, you know.” Because the truth is I’m NOT doing well and I’m not going to get better until I have the baby, five months from now.

Any tips for respectfully getting people to stop asking how I’m doing, even though I know they’re asking out of concern?

“You’re kind to ask, but it’s easier on me if we can skip talking about it until I’m through it. Ask me in five months!”

Or, “You’re kind to ask, but it’s been rough and it’s easier for me not to get that question at work. I’d be so grateful if no one asked me that for the next five months!”

3. Manager keeps delaying our team off-site and I’m frustrated

I’ve been working at my company for one year, and my manager started working here around the same time. We have a small team (two other coworkers) and are all remote, but all teams at this company are allocated a travel budget for multiple team off-sites per year. Our team has never had an off-site yet, despite repeated promises from our manager and constant pleas to him from our team.

When I first started, the plan was that we were going to meet in September, then that changed to October, then for sure December, then definitely January or February, then April or May (we even put together a google sheet with everyone’s availability so our manager could pick the week), then 100% June and now it’s certainly happening in July or over the summer. I can’t take this anymore! We’ve tried everything — we bring it up to him nearly every week and he acts like he’s taking it very seriously but then he’ll delay it again.

There’s never any good reason for his delays. He doesn’t claim to be too busy, and he wouldn’t have to plan any itinerary himself — he just needs to pick the date so we can be authorized to book plane tickets and hotel rooms, then we can take care of the rest. He does have a history of not really caring about things that we care about unless it’s something he’s personally invested in, so my guess is he just doesn’t care that much and therefore it’s not a priority to him.

There’s nothing work-related that isn’t happening because of this. It’s mainly about team connection and getting to spend time together in person. The company allocates every team a travel budget for a trip each quarter, to get to visit the offices and meet other colleagues but also to have fun team events. It’s been tough seeing everyone else get to experience this multiple times and we’ve never done it once.

I mentioned this issue in a “listening session” that our broader org was holding for smaller groups to discuss any problems they’re facing and everyone seemed horrified, but that didn’t result in any changes either. It seems too whiny and petty to mention to my skip level but I don’t know what else to do. I know this sounds like a very minor problem but seeing other teams have two or three off-sites over the last year while we have zero has been really demoralizing and upsetting. Any advice?

A lot of people hate off-sites, and your manager may be one of them. Or he might have things going on outside of work that make it hard for him to commit (caring for a family member, health issues of his own, or who knows what).

If you and your coworkers haven’t already told him very clearly that this is important to you, try that. Say it’s important to you for X reasons, you’re disappointed by the delays, and it’s frustrating watching other teams having off-sites while you don’t. Ask point-blank what needs to happen to commit to a date, or whether it’s not something you should plan on at all for the foreseeable future. But if you’ve already done that, or you do it and nothing changes … well, I think you’re not going to have an off-site anytime soon. It’s really his call to make, as the head of your team.

If your sense is that the organization is committed to these to such a degree that his boss would overrule him if she knew about it, then in theory you could raise it with someone above him … but I suspect there are things more worth saving your capital for (and realistically, forcing him to lead an off-site that he actively doesn’t want to do might not produce the type of event you see others having anyway).

4. My boss asked how things are going … and I didn’t tell him I’m planning to leave

I am the only full-time employee for a super small business. Everyone else is contracted workers or family members of my boss, the owner. I’m the executive assistant.

I don’t have horrible complaints, but I am currently looking for a new gig for more pay. He is also an older man, and he is often irritable and forgetful.

My boss really appreciates me and tells me so. He has given me a holiday bonus and a birthday bonus ($500 and $250). Just now he called me to say he realized he hasn’t asked me how I am in a bit and how I feel the work is going. I said, “Pretty good.” Then he asked, “What would make you feel great?”

I really didn’t know what to say. Obviously more pay would make me feel great, but I wasn’t ready to say that. So I just said, “I am great, no complaints.” He said that’s good and again he stated how much he appreciates me and how he couldn’t do everything without me.

I just worry that I will be blindsiding him if and when I get a new job and put in my notice. Is it right to say everything is going well, even though I am currently job searching?

You’re fine. You don’t owe your boss full transparency that you’re thinking about leaving just because he happened to ask how you’re doing. If you end up resigning soon and feel weird about the timing, you can say the new opportunity fell in your lap and was too good to pass up.

That said, for the rest of your career, a good answer to have ready to pull out in response to the question he asked is, “More money would always make me happier!”

5. Asking about AI in an interview

I have an interview coming up soon for a marketing position, and while I feel fairly prepared and confident I’m a good candidate for the job, I’m curious about bringing up something during the “what questions do you have for us” portion of the conversation.

Specifically, this position would require a bit of copywriting and promotion of the works they put out, and while I don’t believe this particular company would ever push someone out of a job just to use a trendy new technology, I would like to broach the topic of AI just out of curiosity and an abundance of caution. I’m thinking of framing it as “what conversations are you having as a company about the rise of AI use in writing, and do you have any screening tools in place to prevent AI-created pieces from being submitted?”

Is that an off-base thing to ask about in the interview process? Like I said, I’m not exactly worried about this company fully embracing AI like techbros, but I don’t think AI is going away anytime soon, and I’d like to know sooner rather than later if this is going to be something that will impact the job.

Totally reasonable, and your wording is great.

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

1. Candidate asked for feedback on his interview — after I’d hired him

I interviewed someone today (two interview rounds). I decided to offer him the job a few hours later and he verbally accepted on the phone. He then called me back right away with a couple of clarifying details and a slight negotiation on pay — no problem, I can understand being mildly flustered in the moment and wanting to call back to make the request rather than just leaving it. I said I’d need to see if the increase was possible and I’d come back to him tomorrow.

He then texted me very quickly after that and asked for feedback on his interviews today. Isn’t that a bit weird? I’ve heard of requesting feedback while waiting to hear if you’re being moved to the next stage, or after a rejection to see how you could improve. But why would you want feedback when you’ve already been offered a job? It’s not like the offer was insultingly low or anything, just on the lower end of his requested salary range.

Possibly relevant is he is very young, this would only be his second job out of high school. Have you come across this before? Do you have any insight?

Yeah, it’s because he’s inexperienced and just doesn’t know the norms around this stuff yet. He’s probably heard you can ask for feedback after an interview, not realizing that that typically means after you’re rejected. If you’re hired, that is the feedback, for most people!

My take would be different if he had asked a more nuanced question like, “Based on our conversations so far, do you have thoughts on where the biggest challenges are likely to be for me and how I can prepare for those?” But it sounds more general than that.

To be clear, I don’t think it’s weird that he wants feedback. Most people would find it interesting to hear an employer’s post-offer analysis of their strengths and weaknesses in the interview! He just doesn’t have the experience yet to realize it’s not typically asked.

Related:
can I ask my new manager why she hired me?

2. When your mom was a scandal back in the day

I (F, 57) am a volunteer at a local secular nonprofit and was chatting with another volunteer (F, 60+) the other day. I was trying to recover from hearing some bad news and she tried to comfort me by saying that God would take care of me. To fend off the unwanted religion talk, I blurted out that that doesn’t make me feel better, because my late mother was kicked out of her church after someone tricked her into making a big mistake and her life fell apart. I wish I hadn’t said anything, because it turns out one of my friend’s few relatives in our country lives in my hometown and goes to the same church my mother did.

I don’t know what to do if she gossips with her relative and finds out that my mother was the reason their handsome young pastor needed to transfer to another county back in the day. He seduced her, claimed they had a secret engagement, and denied any such plans when she fell pregnant and refused to get a back-alley abortion. Of course, his version was that she was a temptress who wanted to ruin his reputation, and of course the patriarchy believed his version over hers. He got a new start and went on to a nice career, while my mother got the shame of our whole town without resources to relocate. It happened over 50 years ago, but if it was a sufficiently juicy story in a small town, people may still gossip about it. I know there was still gossip when I was in school because my mother couldn’t even go to my school concerts without people pointing and whispering.

I don’t need a negative story sticking to me decades after I thought I had escaped it by moving to another part of the country. I don’t know if I have the guts to lie and say it’s false too, or what people will think if they find out I lied to cover up an embarrassing story. I don’t want to be our local version of George Santos. But I don’t want to have to move out of the area to get away from the shame — I have rent control and moving is awful anyway. What options do you recommend?

I think it’s highly unlikely that this will be a subject of gossip 50+ years after the fact! Social norms have changed a lot in that time. If someone gossips about you because they believe your mom was a temptress half a century ago … well, that person is being really, really weird, and anyone they try to gossip to about it is likely to find them really weird as well. It’s unlikely that anyone will think negatively of you because of this.

But if someone asks you about it, my advice is: own it. “Yep, my mom was seduced by a man who abandoned her when she got pregnant and then the whole town shamed her for it but not him. Isn’t that horrible? Thank god the world has changed.”

3. I’m being pressured to take a promotion I don’t want

I have worked with my current company for about 15 years, and anticipate retiring from this company when the time comes. I very much love what I do and who I work with and often get asked to assist other teams with special projects, so my work is never repetitive or dull.

I have been promoted multiple times, and on each occasion I have been asked if I would rather manage the team I was leaving. My answer has always been no, as I was working towards a specific goal and have no interest in managing.

I am now in a role I love, but have reached the top of the ladder career-wise unless I become a manager or director (neither of which I want). I was offered the opportunity to manage my current team and said no. My company then hired a manager I love working with, but they will be retiring soon and I have been asked by a very senior person to “seriously consider” taking over at that time.

This will be the fifth time I have been asked to manage in my career, and I feel like saying no this time may damage my reputation with senior leaders and other departments that I work with regularly. Others in my area would love to be considered, so I feel awkward that I truly do not want to do this.

Logically, I can see that I am a good fit, due to my background, experience in other roles, exposure to project work, and relationships with other areas. My team also treats me as their de facto leader if our manager is out. But I just don’t want to manage.

What do I do? Do I just go ahead and take the promotion, even though I know others want it and I don’t? I have no desire to harm my future prospects in the event I change my mind one day, but I secretly wish my current manager would just stay another 10 years.

I feel this sounds like a six-year-old saying they don’t want to eat vegetables, even though it’s good for them, and I feel stupid even asking this question. What normal person does not want a promotion, after all? Please be kind … I realize I sound like a bragging idiot, and that I am incredibly lucky to have this as a problem … but I have honestly cried about this. I just want to continue to do my current job and do it to the best of my ability. How do I get out of managing without harming my reputation?

You don’t sound like you’re bragging or like a whining child! It’s completely normal and okay not to want to manage, and you don’t need to do it just because people want you to. I mean, if everyone else wanted you to, I don’t know, sell real estate or become a voiceover artist and you didn’t want to, would you feel bad about declining? There’s a weird thing in our culture where it’s assumed everyone wants to move up and up, but a lot of people don’t … and even more of them specifically don’t want to be managers.

Having had past managers who clearly didn’t want to be doing the job — and in one case who had protested against having to — I can tell you that people who manage under duress end up doing their teams (and their employers) no favors. If you don’t want to do the work, you won’t approach it as well as your team deserves. But even if you’d be phenomenal, you do not need to take a job you don’t want. Period.

It’s fine to tell your employer and anyone else who’s pressuring you, “I appreciate the offer, but I’ve given it a lot of thought and I am confident I don’t want to move into management.”

Read an update to this letter. 

4. Can we be required to use FMLA if we get Covid?

My employer has recently sent a “reminder” that now that the Covid emergency has officially been declared over in the U.S., normal sick time rules apply for Covid and anybody who will be out more than three days has to file an FMLA application, regardless of whether or not they have the paid sick time to cover it. So, that’s anybody who gets Covid who isn’t lucky enough to have two of their required minimum five isolation days fall on a weekend. This is strange, right?

I’ve been looking for information about when your employer can require you to take FMLA and all I’ve been able to find is that you can be required to take it after you file the application, nothing about whether you can be forced to request it for an absence of a week or less when you have the sick time. It seems like the lack of information suggests that this isn’t a thing people normally have to worry about being forced on them. What are the possible ramifications of being forced to take FMLA time, possibly repeatedly, for common illnesses where it’s totally within the averages to be out of commission for about a week?

In general: Your employer can indeed require that you use FMLA when you’re out sick, even if you don’t want to, although it’s not the norm to do it for routine absences of a few days. It’s a pretty anti-employee move, because it means that if at some point you need to take a longer leave of the sort that FMLA is normally used for, you’ll have already used up some of your FMLA allotment for that year. (You get 12 weeks of FMLA-protected leave per year.)

Specifically for your situation: The part of FMLA that would be relevant here is the part for “serious health conditions” (as opposed to caring for a new baby or the other circumstances where you can use it). The law defines “serious health condition” as “requiring continuing treatment by a health care provider” or “a period of incapacity of more than three consecutive, full calendar days with follow-up treatment.” If you have a mild or asymptomatic case of Covid and aren’t seeking treatment, would it even qualify for FMLA? I’d guess no, but you’d need a lawyer to tell you for sure (and they don’t seem to know for sure either).