Ask a Manager

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

1. Coworker sleeps too deeply when she’s on-call

I work in a job (child welfare) that requires overnight and weekend on-call shifts. We get calls almost every night, but usually those are in the evening hours; true middle-of-the-night emergencies are more rare, but always highly urgent.

I have a coworker who can’t wake up to calls in the early morning hours. She’s very responsive in the evenings, and even late at night and in the later morning — it’s just the wee hours of the morning, when she is most deeply asleep, that cause a problem. She’s missed a call three times now; when that happens, the on-call worker from a neighboring office has to get called in, which delays our response time significantly (and makes the other worker mad!).

Our general office policy is that it’s fine for this to happen once — stuff happens, people sleep too deeply when they’re tired, etc. After the first missed call, your supervisor talks to you about how to prevent it happening again (changing the ringtone to something more startling, giving the supervisor your personal number so two phones are ringing at you, etc.). After the second, it’s a serious warning. We’ve never had someone miss three calls without a corresponding performance/attitude/other problem before, but that’s not the case with this coworker; she’s great at her job when she’s awake!

Our management seems to be at a loss as to what to do at this point, and they’re asking us for suggestions. Other than the standard “this helps me wake up” advice, what are the options here? It’s not really a performance issue that can be worked on, and it seems silly to fire a good employee for sleeping too deeply at 3 am! But someone does need to be responding to these emergencies, and honestly the rest of us would probably revolt if we had to take more on-call shifts and this coworker was excused (we’re already on-call one weeknight out of 10, and a full weekend every eight weeks). Any suggestions?

It sounds like it should be treated as something more like a medical issue than a disciplinary one — and the coworker herself should be enlisted in finding solutions. Surely there’s got to be a technological solution, like some sort of equipment that can be kept in her bedroom that would blare loudly and flash lights when she’s called? A wristband that vibrates when a call comes in? Other devices that provide emergency alerts for hearing-impaired people? Technology almost certainly can solve this (and your organization should pay for it the way they would other assistive devices used for medical accommodations).

2. Coworker is rude to my intern

I’m managing a summer intern. While she does 95% of things fantastically, she does make the occasional mistake. I address these with her in one-on-ones where I ask what occurred, we discuss the seriousness of the mistake when it’s a big thing, and then talk through ways to help her not make that mistake again (if it’s relevant). Our team’s culture is to always bring up mistakes to people one-on-one so that person can correct it, or to let them know it’s been fixed if it needed to be dealt with immediately.

There’s a problem employee, Jane, who is at a lower level than me but not a direct report who frequently calls out only my intern’s mistakes publicly via Teams. None of these mistakes have specifically affected Jane. In fact, Jane has made (and continues to make) the same mistakes as the intern and many other mistakes, and she also gets defensive at any correction at all. How do I tell my intern that it’s Jane who is in the wrong, not her (other than the mistakes)? And how do I tell Jane to stop being a jerk to the intern?

Tell Jane that if there are problems with your intern’s work, she should come to you privately so you can handle it; she shouldn’t address it herself. You could say, “It’s important to me to praise in public and correct in private, and most people don’t appreciate being called out publicly like that. If something needs to be addressed with her, please let me know and I will handle it with her one-on-one.”

And then to your intern: “I’ve asked Jane to stop doing this and to come to me privately if there’s anything that concerns her, because our culture is to raise mistakes with people privately. Frankly, it’s also not her job to be monitoring your work like that. I’m sorry that’s happened, and I want to make sure you know you’re doing a great job.”

3. Should I wear a button to signal I don’t want to talk about politics at work?

I recently started a new mid-level position in a professional office in a heavily-Democratic region of the country. People tend to assume you are a Democrat, and political comments that are anti-Trump and pro-Harris are extremely common. I happen to be anti-Trump AND anti-Harris, and I don’t want to hear anything about politics at work, ever. It makes me feel “othered” and has led to me struggling a bit to form bonds with my new colleagues, which I feel is important to my success with the company — and I don’t know how to act or what to say when these comments are made directly to me.

What do you think about my wearing a Cornel West button on my coat, in hopes that people might notice and just stop talking politics with or in front of me? Is there anything else I can do? I should add that if someone noticed my button and then attempted to talk to me about my political beliefs, I think I would feel comfortable politely letting them know that I’d prefer to not discuss politics at work.

If you don’t want to talk about politics at work, wearing a political button is the exact wrong thing to do! The button would signal that you’re inviting political conversation (and in this case not just conversation, but probably debate) — and it will come across oddly to wear it and then say you don’t want to talk about politics at work. You’re better off just saying, “Oh, I really hate talking about politics at work” or “I have a politics black-out right now — thank you for understanding.”

4. Employee is constantly anxiety venting

An indirect employee (reports to one of my reports) has a lot of stressors about a sudden unpleasant life change. I’ve given their supervisor resources regarding free counseling sessions through work, flex scheduling, etc. to share. However, this employee has started handling their anxiety and anger by coming to my office to report/vent about anything bothering them. Sometimes multiple times per hour. About seemingly minor things I would expect folks to deal with on their own or brush off (no I really don’t need to be told someone didn’t wipe up some drips of coffee in the break room).

Should I weather this knowing they are in a tough place, or shut it down and save my own sanity?

Shut it down and save your sanity. They’re asking you to perform an unreasonable amount of emotional labor, and you can decline (and should decline, since you presumably need to focus on work during that time). You’re also not their boss — they shouldn’t be coming to you this frequently at all.

There’s advice here and here on handling this sort of interruption, but since you’re their boss’s boss, make sure you’re also working with their manager to ensure that the problem doesn’t just get transferred over to her.

5. My colleague is copying me

As a small business owner, I often work with strategic partners. I’m developing opportunities with one partner and noticed on several occasions that she’s mirroring my language. For the most part, I let it go.

She recently posted on a professional networking site that she’s seeking new opportunities and asked me to recommend her in comments. I was incredulous when I read the post and noted her elevator pitch is pretty much the unique metaphor and structure I use for my pitch, which I shared when we met.

I already told her I’d write a referral before I read it. I’m not sure how to respond to this. If I don’t bring it up, I feel it’ll only get worse down the road. She’s also an up-and-coming speaker and I’m wary that she will use my anecdotes; it’s a very niche industry.

How can I address this in a way that doesn’t damage our relationship? This person has become a friend and there’s a second partner in our venture, so I’m not ready to walk away from this yet.

Her request for a referral actually gives you an easier opening to bring it up. You could say, “I feel awkward writing you a referral when the pitch you wrote is so similar in metaphor and structure to the one I shared with you that I use. I’m concerned it will look like I copied yours or you copied mine, and either way that’s not good for either of us.”

(Of course, make sure it’s really copied! Some pitches are generic enough that it would be hard to call dibs, but based on the way you described it, I’m assuming that’s not the case here.)

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

1. A man at our events makes other attendees uncomfortable

I’m on a planning committee for an event involving a fandom generally beloved by mostly women, often mothers and daughters. This event is spread over a few days and involves speakers, tours of book/filming sites, etc.

There’s a middle-aged man, Alex, who is a fan and has attended previous in person and virtual events (where I was not on the planning committee). Alex is passionate about this IP, which is great, but he tends to monopolize the attention of a few of the attendees. When one would gently but firmly say, “I’d like to stop talking now and enjoy the tour, Alex,” he would move to another and so on.

Additionally, at past events, the committee has gotten verbal and written feedback that Alex made some people uncomfortable, mainly by approaching their daughters to talk about this IP and other similar ones. Absolutely nothing untoward happened and all the children were with their mothers, but the girls involved didn’t wish to engage in conversation and their mothers had a hard time ending the conversations with Alex.

Alex was also removed from a social media group for this IP, for continuing to call and text a member, Joyce, after she asked him not to, and then mailing things to her home as apologies for upsetting her. This social media group isn’t officially part of the event, but Joyce will be there as a speaker. Alex has attended other, virtual events since then and has behaved appropriately and not interacted with Joyce.

Alex is neurodivergent, and his difficulties with communication, social cues, and rejection are absolutely part of his disability. It’s worth noting that while he clearly has higher support needs in terms of interpersonal skills, he has low support needs in his high-level career. The other planning committee members and I are struggling to figure out how to best handle this. We want Alex to be able to have a good time without impeding on other attendees’ boundaries. (As an aside, I only mention Alex’s neurodivergence as background that he processes the world differently than neurotypical adults. We have other neurodivergent folks attending and on the planning committee, and we’re trying to be as inclusive as we can.)

Past committees chose to rotate time buddying up with him to try and smooth these experiences, but that’s not something this committee is able to do. Should we quietly look for volunteers to keep Alex company? That might be our solution, but it also feels like we’d be imposing on people who are paying for this event to ask them to give up their focus on the event to engage Alex. Are we able to request that he only attend virtually instead of in person? I’d love any advice on how to proceed with being sensitive, respectful, and maintaining everyone’s boundaries while not being infantilizing or rude to Alex.

Can you just be straightforward with Alex? “We’re looking forward to seeing you at X! We want to share some feedback from previous events to help ensure everyone has a good experience. At previous events, some attendees felt you crossed boundaries by approaching kids who didn’t want to talk with an adult they didn’t know and by keeping people in conversation when they wanted to focus on the event. We are happy to welcome you back this year but ask that you not approach kids you don’t know, and be mindful that while adult attendees may enjoy a brief (five minutes or so) chat, most will prefer to return their focus to the event. We look forward to seeing you and hope you have a great time.”

It might sting, but it’s kinder to clearly spell out what he needs to do if he wants to be welcomed back in the future. You also have the option of asking him to only attend virtually, but you could give this a try first and see if it solves the problem.

Related:
telling a member that his behavior at our events is ruining it for everyone else

2. Acceptable beverages on video calls

I have a very low stakes question that I find myself overthinking in a new role. What are the generally accepted beverages and/or containers to drink out of on calls?

I would assume water bottles are fine, coffee mugs, coffee tumblers, etc., but I recently found myself thinking about things like cans of kombucha that might look like beer, a green juice with a straw, soda, that kind of thing.

My job is casual enough that it definitely doesn’t matter internally, but there’s something about seeing myself using a straw on camera that makes me feel like a toddler.

If it looks like beer, pour it in non-clear glass. Otherwise, any of those are fine, including straws! (Assuming it’s a standard straw and not, like, a Krazy Straw.)

The exception is if the meeting or your industry requires an especially high degree of polish. For example, I wouldn’t bring a soda can with a straw to a meeting with a VIP client for the first time — although it’s hard to defend why and, like so many things, it’s about cultural connotations around those items rather than any real reason.

Related:
does it look unprofessional to have an energy drink at my desk every day?

3. Management scheduled a team-building workshop to fix our bad manager

I’m part of a small team in a government agency. The team lead is my skip-level boss, Julie. Our team and our larger agency have gone through a bit of turmoil and employee tension in the past few years. There were a lot of factors, both in and out of our control, that contributed, but the main one was Julie. She has poor communication skills, is disorganized, and doesn’t seem to understand much of the work we do but refuses to admit it. This is especially a problem because our team is responsible for making sure the agency is in compliance with certain laws, so we are breaking the law if we don’t do our jobs correctly.

For years, upper management has ignored the problems with Julie, until this year when one of my coworkers reported the lack of compliance to the appropriate authorities. Upper management is now showing some interest in addressing the situation by asking us to attend a three-day-long workshop to “rebuild our working relationships.” We all anticipate that this will be a long and awkward “team-building” event that will do absolutely nothing to address the serious management issues we’re having, but will make our lives harder by interrupting our actual work.

Is it worth going to upper management as a team and telling them that we don’t think this workshop is a good use of our time, and that they should focus their energy on actually managing Julie? I don’t personally have a lot of confidence that management will actually listen to us.

You can try. The problem, of course, is that the same incompetence (and/or lack of care) that has allowed them to bury their heads in the sand about Julie up until now is the same incompetence that now makes them think a workshop on “rebuilding relationships” will somehow address it. Either they’re truly inept enough to think that’s an appropriate response, or they don’t actually care about resolving the issues and just want to be able to say they’ve done something. (However, this such a ludicrously bad attempt at “something” and so unlikely to fly with anyone exercising any real oversight that I’ve got to think incompetence is at least one of the factors in play.)

That said, it sounds like they were moved to action after the initial report, so it’s possible that applying additional pressure will move them a little more. So I say give it a try; tell them you’re happy they want to address the problems, but the workshop has nothing to do with what the issues are. Just keep your hopes low.

4. Porn Hub sticker on laptop

I work at a community college. One of my colleagues has a student in her class with a Porn Hub sticker on her laptop. We’re just curious if and how you would address this with a student?

In college? I’d leave it alone. If she doesn’t have the sense to realize not to do that once she’s at work, she’ll be informed pretty quickly.

This assumes the sticker is just words and not, say, an X-rated photo. If it were that, you’d need to tell her to stop exposing unconsenting classmates to it.

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

1. My employee keeps sighing heavily

I have a new person working for me who is doing a good job with the work but is constantly sighing and it’s annoying me to no end. I’m not sure how to approach it because I don’t want to make them feel bad, but I find the sighing to be distracting and unnecessary. Full disclosure, it might be a trigger for me because my emotionally abusive parent used to walk around the house sighing. What would be the best way to approach this?

Start with, “Is everything okay? I’ve noticed you sighing a lot and wasn’t sure if you were frustrated or how to read that.”

Who knows, there might be something going on that you should hear about, so it’s a useful question to start with. But if the sighing doesn’t reflect frustration or something similar, it’s a way to flag that they’re doing it, it’s audible, and it’s potentially sending distress signals they don’t intend.

If that doesn’t solve it, then it’s trickier. In theory if it continues, you could say, “I’m sorry to ask, but any way to rein in the sighing? It can be pretty distracting.” But that feels a little too close to “breathe differently” for my comfort. On the other hand, if I were annoying someone in this way without realizing it, I’d want them to tell me. But if you do mention it that way, you really only get that one shot at it. If it continues afterwards: headphones when you’re particularly aggravated.

2. Coworker said I was rude for not talking about my age or religion

I worked in a large delivery warehouse and was assigned to work one side of a large conveyor belt to sort packages. A coworker of my same level who I hadn’t met before (older woman, probably in her 50s) was assigned to work across from me. She introduced herself to me and we started an initially positive conversation about how our days had been going.

Eventually she asked how old I was (the conversation was not about age and I had not asked how old she was). I said I was over 21 (a requirement for the job). She asked exactly how old I was, and I said I’d rather not say. She then asked if I was Christian (also a topic never mentioned in the conversation) and I again said I’d rather not say. She asked why I wouldn’t answer this question, and I said I didn’t feel comfortable discussing religion in the workplace.

My responses offended her and she said I was being disrespectful to her. I said I didn’t understand how I was disrespecting her, and she responded that I was being rude to my elders since I wouldn’t answer what she saw as simple questions. I just said okay and didn’t speak to her anymore, but she continued to rant about me and youth for some minutes and had an attitude whenever she had to interact with me physically for the sorting.

I know her response was not reasonable, but could my actions reasonably be interpreted as rude? I wonder if she interpreted “I don’t feel comfortable discussing religion in the workplace” as me criticizing her for bringing it up, which was not my intent. Also, is there a less inflammatory way to word the above and decline to share information that I consider private and irrelevant to my job duties?

No, you weren’t rude! She was rude. It’s one thing to ask how old someone is — it’s not the most polite, but fine, people do it — but she needed to drop it once you declined to answer. Her pushiness about religion is even more inappropriate. And for her to then claim that you were being disrespectful for not answering her invasive questions is absurd, as is framing this as some sort of “respect to your elders,” a concept that has no relevance at work (not that she would be entitled to answers outside of work either).

For someone so ill-mannered herself, it’s pretty ironic that she has such wrong-headed ideas about what politeness entails.

As for other ways you could have responded to her questions, I like asking, “Why do you ask?” Depending on her answer to that, you could have then responded, “Oh, I don’t talk about religion (or age) at work.” But this woman wasn’t going to be reasonable or polite no matter how you said it so please don’t second-guess yourself.

3. How do I convince my coworkers I don’t want to make a career out of my hobby?

I was recently honored to be invited to show off the fruits of thousands of hours of part-time hobby work on a creative project — think a “jam band” getting minor critical attention thanks to an appearance at a local festival — and both my immediate and larger team at work know about it. I keep getting questions about why I even work there when I can do that sort of creative work, none of them realizing that “doing it” and “making a living from it” are two different things.

My director has been around the block long enough to know that there’s a big difference between having a fun hobby and a low-pressure 9-5 with good benefits and a pension vs trying to make a go of being a touring musician in my 40s, but the folks I work with all seem to think I’m on the verge of quitting. How can I make it clear that this is like my surgeon uncle selling his hand-made peppermills on Etsy? I’ve been laughing it off for weeks, but I really wish at this point that none of them had figured it out.

I don’t want anyone — particularly anyone higher up — to imagine that this side hobby is my “real thing,” no matter if I make some money at it or not. I’m concerned that it could now harm my chances of promotion into a slightly higher-paying low-pressure 9-5 because “everyone knows” I want to leave.

How are you responding when people make those comments? Ideally you’d respond with something like, “Ugh, no! There’s no faster way to kill the joy of a hobby than by trying to make money from it.” Alternately: “Most people don’t make serious money from this. It’s a hobby.” Or: “I’m very happy with having my job and a hobby on the side.”

If you’re really worried, you could share your concerns with your boss, stressing that you’re in your current career for the long haul, but I think you’re likely fine.

It’s so interesting how many people have lived for decades in this world but still believe it’s really easy to turn creative projects into full-time income. They’re the same people who encourage the office cupcake baker to open their own bakery, I suppose.

4. Letting an abuser resign instead of being fired

When I was at a previous organization, a coworker came to me about a sexual harassment issue they were having with their supervisor. I helped encourage them to go to HR, and ultimately, along with previous complaints, they decided to terminate. But instead of firing him, they gave him the option to resign. He went on to work at another public educational institution (not a school).

Why did they give him the option to resign? I understand they can’t speak disparagingly about him without proof, but it feels pretty awful that he was able to save face (I hated to see him lying about “his decision” to leave after the harm he caused, as did my coworker!) and was also able to get a new job where he could be in a similar leadership position to cause harm again.

Yes, this is what allows harassers and other abusers to move from company to company without any real consequences to their careers, while foisting the problem off on one unsuspecting organization after another.

As for why it happens … sometimes organizations find it “cleaner” to handle it this way, which really just means easier for them. The risk of scandal or controversy is higher with a firing, and sometimes they worry about legal pushback from the person being fired. In general, quiet resignations tend to be easier and safer moves for risk-averse employers. When the issue is something performance-based (like someone who simply couldn’t do the job) and the person offers to resign instead of being fired, it often does make sense to accept that, and sometimes employers apply that principle across the board even when they shouldn’t.

Beyond that, it often stems from misplaced sympathy — “he’s a good guy who made a mistake” / “we shouldn’t destroy his career over this” / “he deserves a chance to start over somewhere else” / etc. … with comparatively little concern for the lives and careers he might derail at the next place.

Related:
should we let an employee resign instead of being fired?

5. Can a company make you pay for mistakes?

A couple of years ago, I started a new job. My department was responsible for managing multiple offices, including opening new offices in other cities. As we were working on a new office opening, I started getting escalating emails from the owner (a notoriously aggressive attorney) saying that the firm would not be financially responsible for any mistakes that were made. I received similar messages regarding desks that were scratched, chairs that were broken, etc.

I interpreted this as saying I might be personally pursued financially if a mistake or accident caused the company to lose money or physical assets. I had heard of a past employee in my position who had to write a check for an expensive coffee machine after accidentally ordering one extra that was not able to be returned. (They were also subsequently fired.) This was a major reason I very quickly left the company.

Some amount of asset loss is a normal part of doing business, no? How do companies typically handle a situation where an employee mistake costs them money? Is there ever a situation where an employee could reasonably be held financially liable?

If you’re exempt, your employer can’t dock your pay for mistakes (with the exception of serious safety violations). If you’re non-exempt, federal law does allow employers to dock your pay for mistakes, as long as the deduction doesn’t take you below minimum wage for that pay period. However, many states forbid it or heavily restrict it (for example, restricting it to things like reimbursing cash register shortages) so if you were non-exempt, you’d want to google the name of your state plus “dock pay for mistakes” (no quotes).

More importantly, your boss was a huge dick and you were right to get out as soon as possible. Part of employing humans is accepting that some mistakes are a normal part of doing business. (Scratched desks?!)