Ask a Manager

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

1. How much direct mental health support should managers provide?

You get a lot of questions about how employees can deal with managers who overstep the mark in the name of mental health, pushing employees to be vulnerable and share details about the mental health. I very much support your advice — that generally, it’s safest for employers to have really firm boundaries and to enforce them when management try and get too touchy-feely.

But it’s got me wondering if as manager maybe I lean too hard into that? I have very strong boundaries between my personal and professional life (I didn’t used to! but I’ve developed them!) and I maintain those boundaries as a manager and encourage my team to do the same.

Earlier today, we had a “mental health” session at work where our managing director shared his own mental health journey and diagnoses with the view of “encouraging people to be brave” and “help people feel comfortable bringing their whole selves at work.” While there was no explicit encouragement for others to do the same, it definitely made me feel a bit weird. I immediately sent a follow-up to my direct reports saying that of course I’m here to listen if they ever need it, but I’ll never ask anyone to share any personal details with me. I also reiterated that they can always use sick days for mental health (and that they don’t have to explicitly tell me that that’s what they’re doing), and pointed them in the direction of our employer resources, which includes free access to professional mental health services.

While of course I want to support my team, my approach if anyone came to me with mental health struggles would be to encourage them to take some time off, point them in the direction of employer resources, and let them know the process if they need any official accommodations. But now I’m wondering if I’m too cold and should be more of a sympathetic ear to my direct reports? How much should a manager do when it comes to mental health?

No, you are right and your managing director is overstepping. “Encouraging people to be brave” or to share their “mental health journey” can mean “encouraging people to make themselves vulnerable to discrimination” (particularly when their “whole selves” aren’t part of what’s mainstream in their office). Moreover, the workplace is not the right place to delve into trauma or be asked to listen to other people’s trauma — and that’s what “mental health journey” can mean.

Your approach to supporting your team with time off, resources, and accommodations is exactly right. Unless you are a trained therapist — and unless you are their trained therapist — it would be inappropriate for you to do more.

If your employer wants to make sure it’s supporting employees’ mental health, that’s great. They can offer strong mental health coverage as part of their insurance, be flexible with employees who need time off for therapy, talk openly about what types of accommodations are available to people who need them, and be thoughtful about workloads and how much stress employees are expected to take on. That’s what they’re uniquely positioned to do and it’s the most useful contribution they can make.

2. People are stealing the items I bought for shared use in our bathroom

I am a manager at a government agency. We have very specific purchasing rules, this applies later. I like to be comfortable at work — we are all here a long time every day! So I have been personally purchasing toiletries for the bathrooms (feminine hygiene products, lotion, air freshener, wrinkle release, dental floss picks, lint roller, etc.) that cannot be purchased using public funds. I intend these items to be used by colleagues. But without fail, these items just walk away in their entirety. I’ve replaced items often, but just this morning the nicer lotion is missing, the bottle of Febreeze is gone, and the new box of tampons is 100% empty.

I’ve never said anything to anyone about it because I feel petty. I’ve never shared that I’m providing these things because I hoped that it would just be a nice community thing. And I assumed that since we’re all government employees, most of us responsible for finance and purchasing, everyone knows those items are not being purchased by their employer. Is there an appropriate way to address this? Or do I just call it quits and chalk it up to a lesson learned?

Lesson learned, probably. If you were in a small office with only a few people using that bathroom, you could try explaining to people that you were buying those items personally and ask them to leave them in there … but at a government agency, I’m guessing there are a lot of people using that bathroom, not all of whom you know, and it’s likely a losing battle. It was kind of you to try!

3. Am I overdoing it with “thanks” emails?

I’m a few years into my career and still a bit confused about email etiquette when it comes to saying thank you. My job involves a lot of outreach to both coworkers and different organizations for quick bits of information, so I always send a brief “thank you” or “much appreciated” once I get the information I need for the sake of warmth and politeness. It feels wrong not to! When I get perfunctory thank-you emails to my inbox, however, I nearly always delete them right away without much of a second thought. Or in the case of the team I work with, it feels like I’m laying it on thick thanking them multiple times a day for things that are a part of their job that they do without a second thought. I can’t tell whether I’m coming off as friendly or simpering. Is it possible to overdo it with the thankfulness?

There’s no one right answer to this; different people handle it differently. I tend to think a quick “thanks” is useful not just to express appreciation but to confirm you got whatever the other person sent you. It’s closing the loop. And yes, the person on the other end is probably deleting it without much thought just like you are, but there’s still value in acknowleding “I’ve received this and am now set.”

That said, you’ve got to know your office culture — if it’s email-heavy and no one else is doing it, you might adjust accordingly.

4. Can you opt out of a retention interview?

A friend started a new job this week. She told me that during onboarding she learned about retention interviews. They are done by HR and are similar to exit interviews. I don’t know what the process is to select someone for an interview or how many people are interviewed each quarter.

I think this is (potentially) a great idea. But if you’re tagged for something like this, is it okay to opt out? Is it something that’s shared with your manager?

Info from retention interviews usually is shared with your manager because the point is to figure out what they need to do/keep doing/stop doing in order to keep you around, and your manager is usually — although not always — the best person to spearhead that.

Opting out is likely to raise the question of why. If you have an easily explainable reason like that you’re slammed with deadlines, that’s one thing. But otherwise it’s likely to make your manager wonder if you’re completely disengaged or demoralized, and it’s pretty likely they’ll ask you about it (and “I’m not willing to talk about things that would keep me here” is kind of a startling message, unless you’re able to point to a reason why — like “we’ve done these five times now and it never seems to affect anything”).

5. Should I design a thank-you PDF to send after my interviews?

In the past, you’ve given advice about what to write and how to send thank-you notes to a potential employer. What are your thoughts on creating a PDF thank-you card that can be sent to potential employers via email after an interview? The jobs I’m applying to include elements of graphic design and technical competency. I could see how sending a customized PDF thank-you card could be a great way to directly show off my skills to a future employer. However, I haven’t heard anyone do this before. I don’t know if that’s because this is a bad idea or because this is a new idea. Thoughts?

I wouldn’t recommend it. Post-interview notes are a business communication and, as such, should be sent as regular emails. (You also shouldn’t send a card through the mail for this purpose, even though you might do that in your non-work life.) These notes also aren’t really about thanking the interviewer at all; they’re about building on the conversation you had in the interview. A card just isn’t the right medium.

It’ll probably feel clearer if you stop thinking “thank-you note” and instead think “business follow-up.”

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

1. My employees don’t want to talk in meetings … but their jobs require it

I manage a team of budget analysts who are the bridge between departments and our central budget office. Two team members have never been comfortable with public speaking, and one has shared that she has extreme anxiety around having to speak in meetings. This seems to have gotten worse since the team went permanently remote in 2020. One team member shared that in a meeting with our DEI consultant she volunteered an answer and the facilitator said the answer was something else, and as a result she no longer feels comfortable sharing insights and opinions.

I am not sure what to do. I want to be sensitive to the trauma they feel around speaking at meetings (all on Teams, and they are not required to turn cameras on), but I also need them to participate so that information is provided at the moment it is needed (it’s not always possible to ask for it in writing in advance) and be willing to make recommendations/suggestions (not just report facts). Any suggestions?

The core question: how essential is it to their jobs? From what you’ve written, it sounds pretty essential. If that’s the case, you should be straightforward about that: “I hear you that you’re not comfortable with this. It’s an essential piece of your role because (insert reasons) and I do need you to answer questions and make recommendations in these meetings. What can I do to help you do that?” (For example, could you role-play the meetings with them? Start debriefing with them afterwards, so they’re getting immediate positive feedback? Suggest Toastmasters, or have the organization pay for a public speaking class?)

You should also look for opportunities to reinforce that they have good insights — make a point to praise their ideas in other settings, maybe ask them to train others when that makes sense — because building up their confidence might help.

On the other hand, if it’s something that only comes up a couple of times a year and it’s more of a nice-to-have rather than a must-have for their jobs, it could make sense to just work around it — finding someone else to fill in for them or even doing it yourself if that’s feasible. So the question is really how central it is to their work.

By the way, I’m wondering what happened in that meeting with the DEI consultant that led one of your employees to no longer feel comfortable sharing her opinions. Was there an issue with how the consultant handled it? Is the employee overreacting because of the subject matter? There’s probably something worth exploring there.

Read an update to this letter. 

2. Do I have to wear a bra, part 4: what about at a coworking space?

How professionally do I need to dress for a coworking space? No coworkers of mine are there but I do know the staff since I go every day. Most people who are there are generally put together and dress somewhere in between casual and business casual. Some outfits I’ve been iffy on: patterned workout leggings, crop tops with high-waisted pants (revealing about half an inch of midriff), sweaters that are a bit linty, and baseball caps — things that I’d wear to the coffee shop but not to an office. Most of all, I would like to skip wearing a bra sometimes. What do the unspoken laws of the hotdesking space permit?

Skip the bra if you want to!

I’d like to say skip the bra at the office too if you want to, but that’s often a more complicated calculus (it shouldn’t be, but it is). But in a coworking space where no one’s your coworker and people are dressing casually, go right ahead and skip the bra.

As for the other outfits … it depends on the vibe there (which I can’t quite assess from your description) and how much you care if you’re out of sync with that. Some coworking spaces really play up a polished vibe and others don’t at all. I don’t think you need to worry too much about linty sweaters, though.

3. My old boss is using me as a business lead

I am a former federal contractor who is now a federal employee. I have nothing to do with our contracting office; my job uses the same skill set for which I contracted (like graphic design or engineering). My former director at the contracting firm asked me to get coffee with her and catch up, so I said yes!

She said she would bring two other contracting people who are related to my organization: one who tries to get agencies to contract with the firm, and another who specializes in my professional area.

I was immediately grossed out and thankfully begged off due to a conference my team needed to attend. She’s reached out again this week (post-conference) to see if we could pick a new date to get coffee.

We didn’t work closely together (she’s a mover-and-shaker; I’m a happy cog-in-the-wheel) but got along well! I feel grossed out and sad to be used as a lead. I guess I’m realizing that it’s “just business” to her, but any recommendations you have as to redirect this kindly would be appreciated. I have nothing to do with contracts, and there are a lot of “no schmooze” guidelines for federal employees.

Grossed out is a strong reaction — business networking is pretty normal for people to do. But you can definitely make it clear that you’re not up for for the meeting she was envisioning.

One option is to lean on the federal guidelines — “I have nothing to do with contracts and as a federal employee I have to follow really strict guidelines about that kind of meeting, so I would need to keep it just the two of us. If that works for you, how about (date/time)?”

If you didn’t have that excuse, you could say, “I’d rather catch up one-on-one — can we keep it just the two of us? How’s (date/time)?”

(That assumes you want to catch up with her. If you don’t, you can plead a busy schedule and say you’ll let her know when things slow down. But in general, if you’re up for it, it’s helpful to stay in touch with old managers.)

4. Should I tell my new job about my husband’s out-of-state interview?

Do I tell my new job the real reason I need to miss a couple days — that I’m going with my husband on an in-person interview trip out of state?

My husband is in a soul-sucking job he’s been trying to get out of for a while. He’s the primary breadwinner in our family. I stayed at home with our baby for two years, and just started a new job two months ago. My pay is okay, but it’s a third of what my husband makes.

He’s been headhunted for a job that, professionally, is perfect. But it’s located across the country, and in a place that’s culturally vastly different than where we live now. We are both very unsure if it’s the right move, which is why we feel it’s important for me to accompany him to try and get a feel for the place. I am guessing we’re not going to be won over, but we’re willing to give the visit a sincere chance.

The dates he’s been offered are all in the next couple weeks and in the middle of the week, so no one would believe it’s a fun vacation. I could call in sick, but I hate being gone suddenly and unless I wanted to claim to be violently ill, there would be an expectation that I’d do at least some work from home. I may or may not have much time on the visit to do work.

But I’m worried that if I tell my boss the real reason we’re going, it will impact my work’s perception of me and my dedication. (I could not keep my current job if we moved.) And especially since we don’t feel sold on the move, I’d hate to risk my reputation for nothing.

Yeah, definitely don’t tell them that you’re going on a trip to decide whether you’ll be moving or not. That’s going to make them instantly concerned that you’re on the verge of leaving your still-very-new job.

That doesn’t leave you with many good choices, considering the constraints you mentioned (plus being so new makes it harder to take sudden vacation time anyway). Given that, your best bet is probably some version of illness or a family emergency (the latter is sort of accurate, actually). If you go with illness, you don’t need to claim to be violently ill to get out of working from home; you can simply say, “I’m sick enough that I don’t expect to be logging on.”

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

1. My coworker misinterprets all my facial expressions

Do you have any advice on how to keep your facial expressions completely neutral without looking/sounding robotic? I am a woman with a low tone voice and also am fairly quiet when I speak, so many people tell me I have a calm demeanor. I sometimes use my hands when I talk (I’m working on not doing that), but even when I am sitting still, my facial expressions apparently show all of my emotions.

I have a coworker who is very sensitive to other people’s tones and facial expressions, so I have tried to make myself appear as neutral as possible when I speak to them. However, they often misinterpret what seem to be very small things — for example, they accused me of sneering when I was leaning in and squinting slightly to read a document with tiny text. I suffer from TMJ and sometimes will have facial twitches (that I cannot control). I am doing my best to keep my face neutral, but any tips you (or readers) can give me are appreciated. I want to be engaged with this person so I don’t want to be robotic — but every eye widening/smile/non-smile/facial twitch seems to provoke a negative reaction from them. I’m sure they already interpret every tone of my voice to mean something, so I’m already working on that and keeping my hands still. I just need my face to cooperate so everything is calm/neutral but natural.

If this is only an issue with this one person, it’s an issue with them, not you. You should not have to keep your face and hands unnaturally still simply because they misinterpret things in the worst possible light. You are giving them too much power! You cannot become perfectly neutral and motionless at all times and, what’s more, you should not. If you muzzle your face’s natural movement in order to please them, who’s to say you won’t encounter other people who now think you’re chilly because your face isn’t displaying any normal human emotions?

Rather than contorting your own normal responses to accommodate this person, I think you’d be better off figuring out how to respond when they accuse you of sneering or other things you’re not doing. For example: “No, I am not sneering, I am squinting to read tiny text. If you need to know what I am thinking, please ask me rather than assuming, since you are often misinterpreting me.”

Read an update to this letter. 

2. My team is complaining about a coworker’s award

My company gives out an award monthly to someone who exemplifies our company values and does something above and beyond. I nominated one of my staff (let’s call him Bob) after he did a wonderfully kind thing for one of our clients. I didn’t even know he had done it until we received an email from the client’s family thanking us. I nominated Bob because what he did was so touching it brought me to tears. I was so excited when I found out he was chosen to win.

Ever since we surprised Bob at a staff meeting with the news, his colleagues have been complaining because they feel they are more deserving of the award. They have complained to me, my boss, and each other. I have been left feeling guilty and almost as if I have to apologize!

Every single one of these staff are successful at their jobs. I make sure I always pass along any positive feedback that we receive, and I regularly tell them how much I appreciate and value them. I provide gift cards in small denominations in conjunction with sharing positive feedback.

When they are complaining about this award to me or my boss, we listen and then ask them what they have done that’s truly exceptional so that we can nominate them too. Not one of them has been able to give us an example beyond simply doing their jobs successfully.

What would you do in this situation? Am I wrong to be feeling miffed and a little disheartened at their reaction? I did not expect this kind of reaction from our team and don’t know how to react to their complaints.

“The award is for people who go above and beyond and do something exceptional. If that is you, wonderful! I absolutely want to hear about it and would consider you for the award too. Here’s how you can submit that sort of info to me.”

That said … it sounds like you’ve already said something similar? All you can really do is keep saying it.

I don’t think you’re wrong to be disheartened by it, but take it as a flag to look more closely at the dynamics on your team. Do people feel there’s unfairness in how recognition, financial rewards, or high-profile projects are allocated? Is there something about the structure of your team that encourages people to feel competitive or even pitted against each other? Could the issue be something with Bob himself? (For example, if he’s difficult to work with, that might be driving the reaction.) You also might ask one of the employees this has come up with — pick the person with the best judgment or sharpest insights and see what they think.

3. Using a SAD lamp at work

I recently started a new job (and successfully negotiated salary based on your column — thank you!) that requires me to be in the office. After working entirely remote since March 2020, I’m finding the transition to in-person work to be hugely challenging.

This time of year is also when my depression is at its worst. While working from home, I found that using a SAD lamp for an hour or so during my work day was a big help. I haven’t been using it this winter because I’m in the office, but I can really feel the difference from not using it.

Would it appear unprofessional to use a SAD lamp at my desk? For context, it’s about four inches by eight inches and wouldn’t be a distraction for anyone else, but I am in a cubicle close to the kitchen, so it’s a relatively high traffic zone. I’d also love to use it without making it a whole to-do in terms of accommodations, disclosing my depression, etc.

Not unprofessional at all. Use your lamp!

If anyone asks about it, you can say, “I’ve found the light really helps my energy at this time of year.”

4. Returning to work after a death in the family

My father died suddenly earlier this month. While I was away, I set up an out-of-office message with instructions about where to direct emails and other business. That message didn’t specify the reason — it just said that I was offline unexpectedly with an undetermined return date, which is line with previous guidance from my manager not to specify “family emergency” or anything similar — but it was quite detailed about alternate points of contact.

Returning to work after a two-week absence, I can see that a lot of people did not follow my instructions, and they are now annoyed at me over missed deadlines large and small. I’ve been responding to people with a pleasant tone noting that I was out and I will now get to work on things as soon as I can since it wasn’t forwarded to others in the interim.

Well. Apparently, this is a bridge too far for some people — many of whom have been quite huffy about it — and the only way to assuage them seems to be using the words “family emergency.” But that opens up another can of worms (even aside from my manager’s instructions not to use the phrase): immediately, the response I tend to get is “I hope everything’s okay!”

And, well — no, it’s not. My dad just died. But saying that will inevitably lead to a sympathy message — maybe several, depending how many people are copied on a given email chain. And, frankly, I’m exhausted of sympathy. I have at this point responded dutifully and kindly to hundreds of expressions of sympathy: Facebook comments, physical cards, multiple hours in-person at his viewing, emails from friends, phone calls, and on and on. I am tired. I want to focus the energy I do have on my work, without judgment and harsh words about delays or flowery expressions of sympathy, and not have to think about the past few weeks for the time I’m in front of my work computer.

I have several “breezy reply” templates to use — basically, “Thanks for your sympathy / condolences. I’m managing okay, and it’s good to have some work to focus on” — but even these will get old quickly. And, of course, sometimes I just can’t focus, despite wanting desperately to do so. This is all impossible to explain to people whose deadlines we have blown past because they didn’t forward to the alternate points of contact, or to other colleagues who wish me well but whose messages I just find exhausting right now. Other than seeing a therapist (which I do), what advice do you have for navigating this gracefully and professionally?

I wonder if your boss just meant not to put “family emergency” in your out-of-office while you were away (a little weird, but okay). But if she also meant not to say it when talking with people now, that’s making this harder than it needs to be — so you could say to her, “Can I ask about your request not to say I was out for a family emergency or explain that my dad died? It’s making it harder to respond to people who are upset about their work not being done while I was out and I’d like to let them know the circumstances.”

But also, when you get the “I hope everything’s okay” response, it’s okay to just … ignore that. You’re feeling like you have to respond in some way, and you don’t. They’ve said the polite thing, and you can just move forward with whatever business needs to be dealt with.

Something similar is true of sympathy/condolence messages — you can just say “thank you” and don’t need to get into “I’m managing okay, and it’s good to have some work to focus on” or anything else. Just “thank you” or “thanks, I appreciate it” on auto-play so it takes as little energy from you as possible. (In some cases you could skip even that if you can instead easily move straight into the work topic at hand).

I’m sorry about your dad.

5. Verb tense on resumes

Where did this trend of using third-person verb endings in one’s resume come from? I see so many resumes that say things like “answers questions about products” or “manages staff of seven in busy restaurant” and, while I know it’s minor in the grand system of resume sins, it drives me nuts. I’ve been telling folks to think of the bullet points as starting with an unstated “I,” in which case “I answers questions” only agrees in subject and verb if the writer is Dobby the House Elf. Where are people getting this – did I completely miss the memo announcing this change in convention, or is it as weird as I think it is?

I think people have copied it from job descriptions, a lot of which are written in the third person (“answers questions,” etc.). It looks a little unsophisticated on a resume, but it also doesn’t really matter in the scheme of things. (Although I agree that if you’re helping someone write a resume, you should have them put it in first person without the “I” — “answer questions,” etc.)

What bothers me more is when resumes use gerunds in the blurbs about each job — “answering questions,” “managing staff,” etc.

There’s no real reason for any of this, other than convention. But the conventions are what they are, and a resume will flow more smoothly if it’s written in the way that people who get stuck reading hundreds of them are used to seeing.