Ask a Manager

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

1. Do I have to drive my employee’s employee?

I have an employee (there is a middle manager between us, so I am his grandboss) who doesn’t have a car. He was told when he got hired he needed a car for this job and he said he would get one. So far, he has Ubered to get to where he needs to be. I don’t care how he gets to and from work/other events he needs to attend for his job as long as he is reliably on time (this has not been an issue so far). However, he often asks for rides from me and/or his boss to/from work. Our office is about 30 minutes outside the city we both live in, but we live on opposite sides and I picked where to live specifically to make my commute easier. He and his direct supervisor live much closer together and his boss has so far not brought it up to me as an issue. I told him I could bring him from the office back to where I live or anywhere along the way. So far, he has not taken me up on this more than a couple times, but I’m worried it will continue.

The problem is … I don’t actually want to give him a ride. My commute is my time to listen to music or a podcast or process my day — I don’t want to talk about work with my direct report’s direct report. But I also feel guilty since I am going back in the same direction anyway and he’d otherwise pay for an Uber, and I know I make significantly more money than him. Plus, our industry often has blurry lines between being colleagues and being friends. Do I need to feel guilty about not driving him on my way? If I’m in the clear, how do I bow out without sounding like a horrible boss?

You won’t sound like a horrible boss for not giving rides to/from work to someone who was told when he was hired that he would need a car for the job (or even if he hadn’t been told that, frankly). Rides are a favor, not something anyone is entitled to. It’s also perfectly plausible that you have other things you need to do on your commute — maybe you’ve set aside the time to catch up with your sister, or you head to the gym after work, or you’re meeting a friend, or — as you said — you use the time to process your day. It’s also not a great idea to regularly give extra one-on-one time to one team member and not the others; once or twice is no big deal, but if you did it regularly, people could rightly feel weird about it.

If he asks again, it’s reasonable to say, “My schedule before and after work has gotten more complicated and I can’t help out with rides anymore.” (You could also say that proactively if you think he otherwise might be counting on you without your knowledge.) Make sure to also talk with his manager to make sure she’s comfortable with how she’s handling it as well … and also make sure the employee isn’t pressuring for coworkers for rides they’d rather not give.

2. AI attending meetings

I was a bit weirded out on a Zoom meeting today, when one of the participants had an AI tool join on their behalf and transcribe and summarize the meeting. A link to the transcription, and then a summary was also emailed out — I’m not sure whether to everyone on the meeting invite, or just everyone who attended. Either way, I couldn’t shake the feeling I was being spied on, and I feel like the tool is crossing all sorts of boundaries by mass emailing a transcript. (We take shared notes for this meeting, and anyone with the link can access them, so it’s not like this is a secret meeting, but that feels different from an unexpected AI transcript.)

What I’m wondering: is this sort of thing becoming normal? Are there ways I can reasonably push back on people sending AIs to meetings on their behalf? At my org we have a lot of pretty candid discussions during meetings — but if an AI were in the room, I wouldn’t feel comfortable having those discussions. No one else in today’s meeting seemed too squicked out by this, so I’m unsure if I’m just behind the times to think that if you can’t attend a meeting, you should review the (human-written) notes or catch up with a colleague.

Nah, a lot of people wouldn’t be comfortable with that. Your company itself might not be comfortable with that, if anything proprietary was discussed!

It’s possible your coworker didn’t even realize the AI tool was going to join (see this letter), but either way it’s reasonable to bring this up within your team or organization and ask for clear guidelines on when AI involvement is and isn’t okay. You could also simply say at the start of future meetings, “We’re going to be speaking candidly here and if anyone is using AI transcription tools, please turn them off.” Also, if you note an AI tool in attendance, it’s fine to call it out and ask that it be removed.

3. A squabble over a desk

I have a member of staff, Ann, who uses DSE equipment for health reasons. It’s a busy office and every desk is a hot desk. She is not always in the office due to driving around for appointments. A new starter, Beth, sat at the desk where Ann’s designated equipment is. Ann was abrupt when requesting Beth to move, as she needed her equipment to set up her desk at a different location. Beth then made a flippant comment to a coworker, Chris, saying, “I wouldn’t sit there if I were you” and giggled with Chris. This was said in front of Ann, which made her feel uncomfortable.

Now, three months later, Ann is stating she feels there is an atmosphere from the incident that is causing her anxiety and she feels this is discrimination due to her disability. I have asked Beth to apologize but she hasn’t. Ann will not let this go, but she also hasn’t attempted to resolve it herself and refuses to try, as she doesn’t see what she has done wrong. She wants an apology or says she will make a formal complaint. I don’t feel a formal complaint is necessary for such a minor incident.

Is something else going on beyond that one interaction? Has Beth been weird or hostile toward Ann since then? Has Chris? If not and it’s really just one that one incident three months ago, have you explained to Ann that Beth didn’t know why she told her to move, and that Ann being abrupt about it contributed to the misunderstanding? If so and Ann doesn’t care … let her file the formal complaint if she wants to. It doesn’t sound like much will come of it, but if she wants to do that, she can.

Separately, what’s up with Beth refusing to apologize after you asked her to? This is all so much messier than it needs to be — and people’s reactions so unnecessarily intense on all sides of it — that I wonder if there’s something else going on with the culture of your team.

(Also: how much of a pain is Ann’s equipment to move? If it’s a hassle, then she’s not a good candidate for hot-desking, and should be entitled to keep her stuff at one work station, even if that means someone occasionally needs to move.)

4. How do I find a recruiter?

I am sitting at 20+ years of various office/administrative experience, with some retail and project management thrown into the mix. I have one bachelor’s and four associates, all in disparate subjects. The most recent one was me trying to get into another career field, which didn’t pan out, even with a lot of networking on my part.

Basically, I get a job and then leave after a respectable amount of time because Reasons (it’s boring or there is no growth or the pay is bad, etc.). I also still don’t know what I want to do as a career, like so many other elder Millennials. I’ve been told by many people that I would be good at X or Y job, but I feel I’m missing the crucial “actually did that job and have experience doing those tasks” part. Because of these factors, my husband has suggested that I use a recruiter, because as he put it, “it might help with having somebody to talk to with an ‘expert opinion.’”

How do I go about getting a recruiter? What sort of due diligence should I use to find one that won’t have me writing to you about their bad behaviors? And maybe a secondary question of: is engaging a recruiter in this situation a good idea? Are there any alternatives?

So, recruiters work for employers: employers hire them to fill jobs, and they seek out candidates for those specific positions. They’re not really job counselors for people looking for work. Now, if you’re in a field that uses recruiters a lot, you could approach some who work in your field and talk about whether they’re working on any openings that you might be a good fit for. But if you don’t really have a target field or an in-demand skill set, that won’t work well.

If you’re looking for someone to help you figure out what kinds of jobs to target, you might find someone like a career coach more useful (although their quality can be very hit-or-miss).

5. What to say to an employee’s message that they’re out sick

How should a manager respond to a text or email from an employee that they are sick and will not be at work that day? I usually say something like, “I’m sorry to hear that you’re sick. I hope you feel better soon. Thanks for letting me know.”

Is that sufficiently warm? Is there something else that I should say? (Other than quick work-related questions like, “Should I cancel the llama meeting?”)

Nope, that’s fine! Personally I would go a little less formal (“Sorry to hear it, hope you feel better soon!”) but that’s just individual style.

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

1. We got a complaint call about a new hire before she started

We hired a new executive director, who starts in a week. Did multiple reference checks (including a former direct report and a former supervisor), criminal background check, employment and education verifications, licensure verification, and some casual googling (by an internal HR professional, not an external service). We also have been getting unsolicited “this is an amazing hire/human” calls from various people in the industry around the country. We don’t ask on our application whether there are any pending or potential outstanding liabilities, and have not yet directly addressed this with our new hire.

Yesterday, our comms manager (whose info was on the press release about the hire, which went out six weeks ago) received a call from a woman who identified herself as a former employee of the new ED’s current organization. She said she was filing a lawsuit against that organization for wrongful termination, her program area was not prioritized by the ED, and a couple of irrelevant personal gripes, “just to make us aware.” Our comms manager asked her to put it in writing and send it to our HR (she has not done this yet). A quick google of this woman turns up multiple lawsuits she has filed — not saying any are not legitimate, just that there are several (for varying things, none of which appear to be similar to her current claims).

I feel like our organization has met both our legal obligation and followed reasonable industry best practices for prehire screening. That being said, what would you do in this case?

It’s less an issue of legal obligations and more about guarding against a new organizational leader who could bring serious issues along with them.

But I’m not terribly concerned in this case. It’s hard to say for sure without knowing all the specifics, but when two of the three things mentioned are that the ED didn’t prioritize her program area and some irrelevant personal gripes, there’s probably nothing here you have to pursue. Caveat: I’d be more concerned if the wrongful termination claim is based on truly alarming facts, like if the ED personally led a damaging retaliation campaign after a good-faith complaint of discrimination. But assuming it’s nothing like that, and with the rest of the context provided, this doesn’t sound especially damning, assuming you had a thorough interview process along with the post-interview due diligence you described.

Read an update to this letter. 

2. Employer sent my rejection to my father, not me

I went into the same industry as my father works in. Recently I applied and interviewed for a position where the manager happened to know my father. There were no chances of me ever encountering my dad while working this position, and in fact even the manager rarely interacted with him. It was really just down to a happenstance of networking. We have an uncommon shared last name and a family resemblance, so while I never made any reference to the family relation in my application or interview, it wouldn’t be difficult to make the connection between us.

The manager ultimately chose not to hire me. Rather than tell me that, though, they reached out to my father to explain that I was a wonderful candidate, someone else with more years of experience interviewed, etc. It was humiliating and infantilizing, and my father wasn’t very impressed either. It’s not like I was a teenager looking for a summer job at my dad’s shop, I’m an adult who simply followed the same career path as him.

How do I avoid being demoralized from this, and at what point does networking become living under my father’s shadow? I’m absolutely mortified, and it was one of the few jobs in the industry that even interviewed me. I’m beginning to question my own qualifications. Was I only considered as a candidate because of my last name? What do I even do about this whole thing?

Is this part of a pattern where you’re continually referred to as “Portius Warbleworth’s daughter” and people see you as an extension of your dad and don’t recognize you for your own skills and achievements, or was this just one weird hiring manager? I’m guessing it was one weird hiring manager since you don’t mention it being part of a pattern … and if that’s the case, you’re giving them much too much power in your brain. There are outlier hiring managers who will do all sorts of weird things, but they’re not representative of what you can expect to find while interviewing.

For what it’s worth, my guess is that the interviewer didn’t decide, “I will relay the rejection through her father, as he is the proper conduit for all matters concerning her professional life” but rather this an employer that doesn’t send rejections at all (which is super common) so you weren’t going to receive one regardless. But then the interviewer wanted to mention it to your dad, the same way they might contact someone who had referred a candidate to let them know the person was great but they ultimately didn’t hire them. That’s still not okay; this is your work life, not your dad’s, and he didn’t refer you — but I suspect it explains what happened.

3. Recruiter asked me to rank my enthusiasm for the job on a scale of 1-10

I’m interviewing for a new job and, for the first time in my career, I’m working with a third party recruiter. After a first round interview last week, I had a phone call debrief with the recruiter, and they asked me: “On a scale of 1-to-10, with 10 being ‘I would accept an offer for this job right now, the organization sounds great’ and 1 being ‘I’m not interested in this position, I’d like to be taken out of the running,’ where would you rank things after that interview?”

I like the recruiter—and I really like the organization!—but I didn’t like the question. I replied that what I’d learned about the organization so far seemed great, and that the interview I’d just participated in was encouraging. But, I said that I didn’t have enough information to accept a job after just one interview. I made it clear that I wanted to move on to the next stage of the interview process, but that I wasn’t looking to rush into a new position without hearing more.

The tail end of the debrief wasn’t awkward, per se, but there was definitely some silence after my answer. I don’t think the recruiter was happy with my response.

Did I misstep here? Is it worth contacting the recruiter (or the company itself) to further clarify that I’m interested in this position? (Beyond what I said to the recruiter and in my thank-you note after the call?) Maybe I’m just overthinking things. Thoughts?

Your answer was fine and you didn’t misstep. Some recruiters try to ensure that candidates are Really! Enthusiastic! at every step, because they don’t want a situation to get to the end of the hiring process and have the candidate turn down an offer. They’re assuring their client (the employer) that you’re interested as the process moves along, and they feel it will reflect badly on them if they put you through the whole process and then you turn it down — or they at least want the opportunity to make sure any concerns you have addressed early on. (Alternately your recruiter is just used to people playing along and giving a number and didn’t like that you declined to partake of their scale. Either way, your answer was fine.)

4. Am I supposed to leave work when I run out of things to do?

I have been working in blue-collar jobs for the past decade (construction, warehousing, etc). My early work experience was mainly in customer service, including front desk/secretary work. As I am transitioning away from manual jobs to more office work, I am having a hard time with the pace that comes with sitting in front of a computer. How much work am I supposed to get done in a day?

I am frequently under-tasked, and since my positions are for small companies and at an arm’s length, it can be hard to get clear answers and/or more work assigned in a short time frame. So I end up leaving early for the day rather than sit around and twiddle my thumbs. I am always scrupulous about only charging for the hours worked. However, that means contracts that are meant to be 24 hours a month are often only bringing in 18 hours of pay. Some of my friends who have more experience in this environment say I am being too honest and that it is up to my employer to make sure they provide enough instruction / tasks to fill my shift. I am so used to being in roles where if you are not actively (physically) working, you aren’t being paid. (Note: none of these roles are public-facing — if I leave one hour early and miss a late in the day email, nobody is affected.)

Your friends are right. It’s not about being “too honest,” but the expectation of most office jobs is that you’ll stay for your whole shift, even if there’s a bunch of downtime. You’re not expected to leave (and decrease your pay) when you run out of tasks, unless that’s something your manager specifically instructs. Part of what you’re being paid for is your availability to take on work if it does materialize. Sometimes it will, sometimes it won’t — but they’ve hired you to be there for a specific set of hours, and you don’t need to leave early when you run out of things to do.

If you want to be conscientious about it, you should ask your manager if there are long-term projects you can work on when things get slow. Or you could see things that need to be done and propose your own projects. But even if you don’t do those things, there’s nothing unscrupulous about staying until the end of your scheduled day.

5. Network access and equipment return after a layoff

My questions are about my responsibilities around network access and equipment return. I’m a remote worker with a company-issued laptop, and was told to expect an email from IT about how to return the laptop; so far, a week has passed and I haven’t heard from IT. What’s a normal timeline for this kind of thing?

I was also told my network access would be revoked at 5 pm on the day I was laid off … but a week has passed and I still have access! (I know this because I have MS Teams on my phone and am still getting chat messages; I have not accessed the company’s cloud storage, VPN, or email servers, or even turned on my work computer.) About 48 hours after my access should have been terminated, when returning my signed severance paperwork, I told the HR person that I still had access and shouldn’t. Do I have an obligation to keep mentioning it, or should I just offload Teams from my phone and forget it?

You don’t have any obligation to keep reminding them to secure their systems. Remove Teams from your phone and forget about it.

With the laptop return, you should have heard by now but sometimes it does take longer (especially if IT was affected by layoffs too). Give it two to three weeks before you get concerned; email again at that point and say you need instructions for returning the laptop ASAP as you’re not comfortable being responsible for it indefinitely.