Ask a Manager

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

1. I reported a manager, who’s now trashing me whenever my name comes up

I need a gut check here. This has been really bothering me but I’m not sure it’s really a big deal or if I just need to be more resilient. I previously worked on Manager A’s team. He engaged in some fairly blatant EEO violations against me. The violations were substantiated and my company’s solution, which I agreed to and found satisfactory, was to move me to Manager B’s team. I do not know whether there were additional disciplinary actions taken against Manager A (nor would I expect to know). The nature of my work dictates that I still must work very closely with Team A, despite reporting to and being evaluated by Manager B.

Since then, Manager A has continued to disparage me to my coworkers, ranging from the innocuous (e.g., facial expressions when I am talking or when my name comes up) to direct statements to them intended to question my judgment and competence. Usually I hear about this from peers on Team A, and often from multiple people saying the same thing. These coworkers mean well and are trying to keep my apprised (not intentionally stirring up drama), but I have recently asked them to stop sharing this information with me for my own mental health. I have also directly asked Manager A to address any concerns about my professional actions to either me or Manager B, to no effect. If it matters, some of the previous EEO behaviors leading to my changing teams involved Manager A threatening to poison my references in retaliation for my participation in a protected activity.

I am not overly worried about damage to my professional reputation — unsurprisingly, Manager A is widely known to be a terrible person and a terrible manager — but there is always a possibility. The primary problem is that despite my best efforts, I feel awful at work and second guess everything I do. Is this worth bringing up to HR? Manager B is alright, but extremely conflict averse and unlikely to intercede in a meaningful way. Our HR department is generally solid, which is why right now I feel like that is my only option/a good option, but I am afraid of coming off as a whiner.

It’s not whining to point out that Manager A is actively engaging in illegal behavior against you! And it is illegal — federal law prohibits managers from retaliating against employees for making good-faith complaints of harassment or discrimination (which I assume covers the EEO violations you mentioned). In fact, lawyers generally have a field day with retaliation cases, because retaliation is often much easier to prove than the original charge of harassment or discrimination would have been. If your company’s HR is even mildly competent, they’ll want to know that Manager A is opening them up to this kind of clear-cut liability.

Go back to HR and frame it this way: “I appreciate your handling of the EEO issues I raised about Manager A. Unfortunately, since then he’s been actively retaliating, such as (fill in with details of what he’s been doing). I know that federal law says managers can’t retaliate against employees for making harassment or discrimination complaints, so I wanted to bring this to your attention and ask for it to stop.”

2. How can I get team members to contribute equally to group tasks?

I am on a team of eight where some people have varying degrees of motivation to get work done. A few members end up doing way more work, including routine, maintenance, and other unsavory (but very necessary!) work that everyone is responsible for helping out on but they end up doing the lion’s share of. Another subset will spend endless hours doing personal things (reading news, Reddit, etc.) and will do work but only when prompted. My other co-lead and I have gotten some comments and have directly observed this dynamic get worse over the last few months and have decided that we need to change how things are done. Are there different ways we can track and make sure people are contributing? And how can we do this without being overly childish or demeaning towards our group?

I can imagine us implementing a chore wheel or some other type of schedule based on different tasks, but I also want to be sensitive that we’re all adults and not bleed into micromanaging.

Do you and your co-lead have the authority to simply assign work? Because that’s what you should be doing. You’d of course like to think that you could count on people to take equal shares of the work simply because the need has been pointed out to them, but what you’re seeing is that that’s not happening. You could try a meeting with the whole group where you explain the problem and ask what solutions people can suggest — and that meeting itself might prompt some people to take more of their fair share, just by calling out the issue — but unless that results in a fairly immediate realigning of who’s doing what, you need to just start assigning it.

Don’t use a chore wheel; people will find that infantilizing. You could use a work version of that, though, where you rotate tasks throughout a month or quarter — but you need to be prepared to actually assign the work rather than waiting for people to claim it voluntarily. The latter just punishes your most conscientious team members, who will step up when they see no one else is.

Related:
my manager delegates to the group rather than to a person

3. My company wants me to start a new job without a raise for a “test period”

I have worked at my company (fintech startup) for three years in a primarily “soft skills” role and have recently been “promoted”(I use quotation marks because it is not finalized even though I have already taken on new responsibilities) to a more technically-focused position. I do not have official, resume-based experience relevant to this job title but have demonstrated aptitude over the past few years, hence the transition. This new role comes with an increased salary and requires cross-country relocation. Relocation, while difficult, is something I am willing to do.

I’ve just been advised that my new compensation, which is on the lower end of the industry standard for the position but higher than my current salary, will not be effective until I’ve been in the role for four months, contingent upon a successful “review.” I have been given no indication what a negative review would mean. Meanwhile, I am meant to start in my new role next month.

This seems outrageous to me. I’ve been doing the work for my new role, in addition to my existing responsibilities, for months as we are a small startup. If we hired a new employee, they’d be paid right out the gate, not given a reduced salary for four months as a trial, and no new hire would accept this salary for the position. I have not had many white collar jobs. Is this normal, or are my employers trying to take advantage of me and save some cash because I’m already bought in to the company?

They are trying to take advantage of you because you’re already working there, they know you want the promotion, and they think they can.

To be fair, they might legitimately have concerns about how you’ll perform in the new position; you’re untested and they might be taking a risk. They might figure that if they were hiring externally, they’d be hiring someone with a more established track record who wouldn’t be untested, and that they’re paying you less at the start because they’re giving you a chance they wouldn’t give otherwise.

But you also are taking a risk, with a cross-country move! And there are better ways for them to handle this; they could, for example, start you at the lowest end of the salary range and say that they’ll move you to a higher number after X months, as long as you’re performing well. And they could spell out specific metrics they want you to meet first, so that everyone is on the same page about exactly what will warrant the higher salary.

On your end, it’s reasonable to say that you’re not prepared to undertake a cross-country move without a firmer commitment from them, and that if you’re doing the work, you need to be paid fairly for it, just as they would do with an outside candidate. I would not get on a plane to make that move unless you’d be okay with finding yourself still paid at your current rate five or six months from now.

Read an update to this letter. 

Related:
can I refuse more work without a raise?

4. My boss and I both respond to the same email requests and duplicate each other’s work

I have a coworker who will need something from a vendor and it’s my job to get those things as needed. She will email our boss and copy me, asking for it, but she does not place either of our names in the body of the email — she will just say, “I need X.” Then, if anything is unclear, my boss and I (who are in different offices) ask the same questions and we both reach out to get the thing.

Since I am his direct assistant, it makes more sense to me that she should ask me and copy him, freeing him up to do more important things. I have asked her to email me and just copy him so that he is in the loop, since he likes to be copied on everything, but we trip all over each other to get things.

Please help! If she emails him and copies me, do I ignore it? Then he may think, “Why is my assistant not getting this?” He also admits that he “gets in the way.” Maybe I should ask him what we should do when both of us are emailed so that we are both not fetching the same things or emailing the same people for the same things. Or maybe when she emails us both, I should reply right back and say, “Do you want me to get this or you?” But I think this is not a good use of time.

Everyone knows me as the one who loves to assist and be a team player. I just find this annoying as it happens a minimum of 15 times a day!

I think you’re looking to the cc field to solve this — thinking that if only your boss were cc’d instead of being in the To field, this would all get clearer — but I doubt your boss is paying that much attention to whose name is where, and he sounds like someone who’s going to rush in regardless.

Instead, you need to talk to your boss and come up with a clearer delineation of labor so that it won’t matter who is or isn’t cc’d, because there will be a clear system for who handles what. Ideally, through that conversation, you’d reach an understanding that you will handle all the requests this coworker sends unless you specifically flag for him that you need his help with something — and that he should assume you’ve got it handled unless you say otherwise. Even more ideal would be if you proposed that he not be copied on these requests at all, since including you both is causing confusion and duplication of energy! Can you point that out to him and ask if you can experiment with a week where he’s not included at all, and see how that goes? He might not agree to this, since he apparently likes to be included in everything, even while admitting he gets in the way, but it’s reasonable to propose and, who knows, he might be willing to try it if you present it as a short-term experiment rather than a permanent change.

5. How can I get people to spell my name correctly?

I have a really common name that has a couple variations on how it can be spelled (think Ashley/Ashleigh, Erica/Erika). In my professional career, I have had many people misspell my name. I don’t make a big deal out of it, but more and more often I’m seeing people who seem to consistently use the wrong spelling of my name, especially in emails (FWIW, my name is my email address, so it’s not like they don’t see it). I even had one guy who I worked with for over a decade who never once spelled my name correctly.

As I’ve said, I’ve never made a big deal out of this, but I started a new position in the last year and I’m seeing this kind of thing start again with my new coworkers. I’d like to professionally nip this in the bud without seeming like I’m going to be a pest about it. What’s the best way to put this forward (particularly in an email setting)?

You can try. Some people will just never get it (I say this as the possessor of a similar name), but you can try.

The first time it happens, you can write back, “By the way, it’s Erika with a K.” If it keeps happening, you can try, “Please note my name is spelled Erika.” Most people will make a good-faith effort to at least try to spell it correctly after that. But some just won’t — maybe they have someone in their life who spells it Erica and it’s ingrained in them that way, or who knows what — and there are only so many times you can correct people before you start looking like the infamous “don’t call me Liz” person. Obviously it’s your name and people should get it right, blah blah. And yet this is still the case. (As evidence of this, you spelled my name wrong in your email to me about name misspellings! I don’t care at all — but it underscores how common it is.)

You should certainly expect and insist that your name be spelled correctly in printed materials, but in casual emails … well, life as a one-L Alison tells me that sometimes it’s going to be wrong, and it’s much better for your peace of mind if you can choose not to care that much.

(Personally I never bother correcting people unless it’s from a close friend or relative or if it’s on something official, because to me it becomes more annoying if I have to put any energy into it. I did once correct my then-young niece because family should know better, and then for years she insisted on writing “Allllllllllison,” which she found extremely enjoyable.)

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

1. My office has a regular “Drinky Day”

Every Thursday afternoon, the CEO at my job hosts “Drinky Day,” where he and/or other employees bring in beer, wine, hard liquor, etc. This is a mandatory meeting where we “debrief.” We do work that’s adjacent to addiction issues, and it can be stressful. When I interviewed for this position, this “debrief” was described as a time to support each other since our work is exhausting in so many ways.

I hate this meeting. It makes me so uncomfortable because there is no “debriefing.” It’s just the full-time employees sitting at our desks in our shared office space while they drink and ramble on about nothing relevant and I watch the clock. Even if no one is talking or if they are rambling on about nonsense, the CEO keeps us until 5pm (often later). I get the impression that he loves this event and talks about it often and even had us come to his house to drink last week. I do not drink at work. While it’s nice that the director wants us to socialize, having a drinking party at work every week is extremely uncomfortable for me.

I want to tell him that I do not want to participate in this any more. I would rather be able to go home and complete some additional work at home, or be allowed to work in the office without everyone drinking. How do I tell him that I do not want to participate?

Oh jeez. I suspect this started as a real meeting, or at least as a reasonably legitimate way for people to process difficult work, and then got alcohol added to it, and now is being used as the CEO’s personal social outlet.

Do you know where your other coworkers stand on it? If you can find a few who feel as you do, you could push back as a group — saying that the meetings aren’t useful to you and you’re not comfortable with drinking at work, and asking that they be made explicitly opt-in rather than mandatory.

But otherwise, try saying this to your boss: “I’d like to opt out of the Drinky Day meetings. I’m not comfortable being around drinking at work and I’d prefer to use the time working on my cases. Can I excuse myself going forward?” (Or even, “I’m going to excuse myself going forward and wanted to give you a heads-up.”)

A decent manager will be okay with this. Hell, a decent manager will hear this and realize he erred in not considering that some people might feel this way (or that even if everyone liked it at first, eventually someone would be hired who didn’t — or someone who might be in recovery). But I don’t know if you have a decent manager or not, so you’ll need to factor in what you know about your boss. Is he likely to be personally offended and see this as you declining to be part of the team? If so, you’ll have to calculate how much of a hit to your political capital it’s likely to be, especially as a new employee, and how much you care and whether you’d be better off just working through these meetings (since you said everyone’s at their desks for them) and trying to tune them out as best as you can — but it’s ridiculous that you have to make that calculation.

2. Was this plan for a four-day work week bad?

I wanted to see if this plan for a four-day work week sounds as strange to you as it did to me. This was a few years ago, and Covid and remote work kept it from actually going into effect.

I was working for a tech company of a few hundred, and the policy about to go into effect was for everyone to work four days a week, and have either Friday or Monday off. Sounds great so far, the days are even still eight hours! However, everyone was to be given weekly goals that must be met by Thursday/Friday in order to get your day off, or you must come in the day you’d otherwise have off. You might also need to come in based on company and team needs at managers’ discretion. This was to be applied across the whole company. Everyone would be paid for 40 hours a week whether they worked four or five days.

I was on a coverage-based team, answering customer requests. We had enough people to avoid stress if no one was out sick or on vacation, but someone always was. This would also leave us with half coverage for customers on Friday/Monday. Part of our income was based on monthly goals and some months there just weren’t enough requests to hit those goals and get your full pay, so I saw weeks being similar. On top of that, our coverage-based department usually needed half of us to work on company holidays already, so I didn’t think half of us on two normal weekdays would work out.

I felt alone in being skeptical. Everyone else was totally stoked! I saw myself unable to make plans for a day I wasn’t sure I had off, and getting angry every time I find out the day before that I don’t get it off, and stressing about goals more than needed through the week.

There was at least an option to opt-out, which I was taking, and you could only change it once a year. Once I shared the above views with some coworkers, some changed their mind as well — figuring better to just know you’re working than to have hopes crushed about it. However, I was also worried that if everyone else did end up getting their day off all the time and I opted out, I’d be angry about that as well, unable to change for a year. It seemed like a recipe for stress, low morale, and animosity to me, even if I could try to avoid those things myself. Was this the bad news like it sounded to me?

Well, it was tricky for your team’s specific set of circumstances.

I can see what the company was thinking: “Hey, let’s give everyone a shorter work week, with the understanding that sometimes business needs will need to take priority. This is meant to be a perk and we don’t want anyone to feel demoralized when occasionally we need them five days, so we’ll structure it in a way that lets everyone know up-front what could require that.”

It sounds logical! And for a fully-staffed department that wasn’t coverage-based, or for one that already wasn’t meeting its monthly goals with a five-day week, it might have worked beautifully. But those two factors made it a difficult fit for your team — and that makes it more complicated for the company as a whole.

That said, I don’t see any reason to opt out; if you were bothered by the uncertain nature of it, you could have left those days open and then enjoyed the surprise free day off if you ended up not being needed. (In fact, I think it’s odd that they even suggested people could opt out; if they didn’t offer you anything in exchange for opting out, there’s no advantage to refusing extra time off just because you couldn’t plan around it.)

3. My employee pressured a client to hire her son

One of my employees made a delivery to a client. While making the delivery, she brought up how her son tried to go to an open interview at one of the client’s locations and the location didn’t have any open interviewing happening at the time. My client said that it happens all the time.

My employee then sent an email letting her know her son’s name and a list of preferred locations that he would want to work at.

I feel like this was highly unprofessional on her part. This is a longtime client and my employee has only talked to this client two or three times in the two years she has worked here.

Yes, it was unprofessional and inappropriate. She used the access that she’d been given for work purposes to try to lobby a client for a personal favor for a relative, and probably annoyed the client in the process.

The initial overture was sketchy — maybe in a certain light you could see it as an attempt at networking — but the follow-up email crossed a clear and bright line.

How is this employee’s judgment normally? If it’s generally fine, just talk to her about why that was inappropriate and that she can’t use access to clients for personal gain. If this is part of a pattern of judgement issues, it’s a sign that you’ve got a bigger problem you need to address.

4. How do we decide which donations to match?

I’m on a committee in my medium-sized company that has been tasked with drafting a policy around donation matching. My company is impact driven and has strong values around inclusivity and corporate responsibility. We already offer volunteer days, with no restrictions on what counts as volunteering. However, with donation matching, we’re considering adopting some guidelines around which organizations we give our money to. How do we balance allowing enough discretion for our teams to support causes they care about, but also ensure we don’t contribute to organizations that actively perpetuate harms? Also, my committee is skewed pretty young and progressive, so I’m worried that we might adopt a policy that only allows donation matching on causes that align with that perspective.

It’s pretty typical for donation matching programs to allow most 501(c)(3) organizations to be eligible, often with an exclusion for religious organizations. You can also include language saying you won’t provide funding to any organization that discriminates based on race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin or that espouses hate. Beyond that, most companies leave it pretty broad.

Be aware, though, that would mean matching donations to a very wide range of organizations — including groups with quite controversial stances. Some companies solve that by limiting the categories of organizations that are eligible — limiting it to, for example, educational institutions, arts and cultural organizations, environmental organizations, and direct service charities — although participation tends to be lower if you have a very limited list of qualifying organizations, since employees want to support the causes that are important to them. So ultimately it depends on what the company’s goals are with the program.

5. Order of degrees on a resume

I have a doctoral degree in a healthcare field, but I’m going back to school for a master’s in computer science with the goal of shifting towards a career in health tech. When I list my education on my resume, should the doctoral healthcare degree stay at the top due to being the highest degree, or should the master’s in CS get listed first due to being the most recent? Or should the order change depending on the job I’m applying for and the relevancy of each degree?

List the most recent first.

That said, like all resume rules, this is flexible if doing it differently would strengthen your candidacy for a particular job.