Ask a Manager

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

1. A fired VP trashed our office and won’t stop emailing us

The small company I work for (seven people) recently fired our VP (via phone, no less) and he trashed our office, stole contracts, payroll/billing files, employee files etc. This was seven weeks ago. Since then, the former VP has taken to cc’ing the entire company on every email he sends — things like demanding his employee file, demanding to be reimbursed for mileage, saying how bad our president/owner is, etc. He is now threatening to show up at our office and “wait until his mileage is reimbursed.”

Our president/owner — who is more of a silent partner and we maybe see him three times a year — has taken a very laid-back approach to dealing with this. In fact he’s done next to nothing about it. We are now afraid the former VP will show up in a hostile manner and disrupt business. Is there any legal thing we as employees can do to get our president to deal with this situation accordingly? At the very least, can we claim this is causing a hostile work environment and do something with that route? We are at our wit’s end with all of this!

I can’t think of any legal options you have to force your president to act (“hostile workplace” means that the conduct is based on sex, race, religion, or another protected characteristic, which isn’t the case here), but that doesn’t mean that you can’t push him to deal with the situation. It would be perfectly reasonable for one of you — ideally whoever is most senior in your office — to say to your president, “This is becoming disruptive and we’re concerned he will show up at the office, which isn’t something any of us feel equipped to deal with. What can we do to get him whatever reimbursements he’s owed and put an end to this?” That person could also say that the situation is making people feel unsafe and needs to be dealt with.

Additionally, it sounds like your company has grounds to pursue legal action against this guy (although if the president doesn’t want to do that, that’s his call). Also, assuming you’re not the person whose job is to deal with things like reimbursements and requests for his employee file, you could block his emails or set them to go straight to your trash, so that you’re not stuck being a witness to all of this.

2. When is my application response rate good enough to stop worrying?

How does one know what a good response rate is for job applications? When is the percentage good enough to stop worrying?

I work in the entertainment industry as a stage manager, and I applied for 19 summer seasonal positions during the past several months. Seven invited me to interview, and two offered me a job (two others might have, but they didn’t offer me an interview until after I’d already accepted a position at one of my top choices, so I never got the chance to find out).

Looking at those numbers, I feel like I’m doing pretty well–about a third of the jobs I applied to wanted to interview me, and a decent percentage of those gave me offers. But I still agonize over the ones that did neither: did I screw something up? Was some part of my resume/cover letter not doing what it was supposed to?

I feel especially silly about this because, I mean, I got a job! The worrying part should be over! How do I give myself permission to stop agonizing over this?

The percentage is good enough to stop worrying when you’re getting interviews for jobs you want, and at least one offer for a job you want.

The assumption underlying your question is that if you’re qualified for a job and sending in good application materials, it should result in an interview. But that’s not correct — employers hear from many qualified candidates with good application materials, and they pick the ones who seem closest to what they’re looking for. That means that it’s very normal for many good candidates with good materials not to get an interview.

It’s certainly possible that your resume or cover letter could be improved (most people’s could). But they’re apparently doing their job, based on your results.

3. Can I leave my phone number off marketing materials for my freelance work?

I’m a doctoral student, and while I wait patiently for the faculty job market to improve (haha) I’m planning to branch out into freelance copy editing part time. My question is: Would it be acceptable to leave my phone number off of most of my marketing materials (business cards, website, etc.)? What about my resume, at least when I send it to individuals rather than businesses? It’s my personal cell phone. I expect that most of my work will be academic manuscripts to start, and at this point I’m not sure whether I’ll have more success getting work with publishers or individual authors. I don’t have a land line or (since I’m freelancing) an office phone, and I would rather be able to control that access at least until I have a chance to correspond with a client a little bit.

I think it will look odd to some people if you don’t list a phone number, and others won’t care. If you want to screen for clients who are happy to communicate over email and screen out the ones who aren’t, this would be one way to do it. But if you’re not able to be that picky yet, I’d include a phone number.

However, it doesn’t have to be the number for your personal cell. Why not set up a Google Voice number and put that one down, and have people leave messages that you then check?

4. When I cover for a colleague who’s on leave, should that go on my resume?

For the past couple months, I have been covering for my colleague who is on family leave. I’ve basically taken on their role in addition to my current responsibilities, although my title and pay grade have remained the same. Would you recommend including my temporary job duties on my resume? Or would it make more sense to discuss them in a cover letter or interview?

If you feel like the additional responsibilities have strengthened your candidacy for the jobs you’re applying for, include it on your resume. You can either focus specifics of what you’ve accomplished in that area or you can just write “served as acting communications manager for three months, including X, Y, and Z.” (The former is stronger than the latter, but might not be practical, depending on the circumstances.)

5. Talking to my boss about participating in a clinical study for anti-depressants

I’ve qualified to participate in a clinical study for anti-depressants. The commitment would be a one-hour appointment once a week for five weeks, and then an hour appointment twice a month for three or four more months. The clinic is only open 8 a.m. – 4 p.m., so I would have to go during work hours.

I would like to participate, not only because of the compensation, which isn’t necessarily a lot, but for the opportunity to contribute to research in a field that has affected me personally throughout my life-myself and several close family members.

How do I ask my boss about the viability of participating without having to reveal it’s for an anti-depressant study? I am the only person in the office, and the summer months are very slow. It’s not so much that my boss would mind me having doctor appointments, as I just don’t know what to say–he’s a very caring person and I don’t want him to think anything of it. I don’t think I would mind telling him the reason except it still seems that mental illness has a strong stigma around it and revealing that it’s something I struggle with would be crossing personal/professional boundaries. On the other hand, the university where I work is doing a big campaign on mental health awareness, but that seems geared more toward students than staff. I would love to hear what you think, and how others have had conversations (or not) about their mental health struggles with their bosses when needing time off for things relating to it.

You don’t need to explain the nature of the appointments at all — it’s fine to just say that you’re going to have a recurring medical appointment for the next few months. No further details are necessary, and your boss really shouldn’t ask anything further.

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

1. Interviewing when you only have one candidate for the job

Remember the letter-writer in February wondering if should start job searching now or wait to hear if she got a promotion (#3 at the link)? Here’s an update and follow-up question.

Just a few days ago, I got the promotion I wrote in about. It took a long time for boring reasons I won’t get into, but your response and everyone’s comments were a great help in getting perspective throughout that period. I’m super excited, and of course overwhelmed, but it’s all good.

As I’d explained in the comments, I’m in a two-person department, so I’m now the manager instead of the staff person. My company has a strong promote-from-within culture, so we started the hiring process for my replacement with an internal-only posting, which has generated one applicant.

The good news is, it’s a great applicant. I haven’t worked closely with “Chris,” but I’ve interacted with them and their supervisor enough to know they are bright, personable, and a hard worker. Chris has the right degree and right amount of appropriate experience. From everything I know, I’d be happy to hire Chris, but I want to make sure I’m properly evaluating them, and not just rubber stamping. Any advice on handling this sort of only one candidate hiring/interview process?

Pretend to yourself that Chris isn’t the only candidate, and do the type of evaluation that you’d do if it were a competitive, multi-candidate process. Otherwise you run the risk of going in thinking “are there any deal-breakers here?” when you really want your framing to be “am I excited about hiring this person and do I think they will excel at the work?” Those are two different mental frameworks. Just looking for deal-breakers can lead you to hiring someone who ends up not excelling and just being kind of mediocre, which isn’t what you want.

Also, before you think about Chris at all, spend some time getting really clear on what the must-have skills and traits are for the role, so that you can then compare Chris against those things — and figure out exactly how you’ll assess for each item on your list (specific questions to her and/or her references, exercises, looking at past accomplishments and work samples, etc.). Otherwise, you can end up doing a mushier type of evaluation that isn’t really tightly tied into what you actually need. (This is true in normal hiring situations too, but it’s especially a danger when you’re only talking to one candidate.)

2. Do I need to keep writing thank-you’s to my boss, who loves to give gifts?

I was always taught growing up that it’s important to write thank-you notes when someone goes especially out of their way to help you or gives you a gift. My manager at my current job is a very gift-giving sort of guy. He travels internationally a lot and always brings back little trinkets for me and my coworker. He also gives us $30 gift cards at our birthdays and Christmas, and bought us both flowers last week for Administrative Appreciation week. When he first started here (about a year ago), I would write a little thank-you note for each gift, but now I’m wondering if it’s really necessary or even appropriate for me to be continually thanking him for this kind of stuff, or if it’s okay for me to just say “thank you” in the moment and call it good.

And a related question is, when I travel internationally (which I do occasionally), am I expected to bring back little souvenirs for my coworker and manager as well? I know your policy is that gift-giving goes down the chain, not up, but when I keep getting all these little gifts from my manager, it makes me wonder if I should be reciprocating.

Thank-you notes in this case are really kind and gracious, but it’s also okay to just say a sincere thank-you in the moment. In fact, that’s the formal etiquette rule — that if you open a gift in the presence of the gift giver, you can simply say thank-you on the spot, and a later thank-you note is optional. So you might stop doing them every time and perhaps save them only for particularly notable occasions — or, even better, pick a time each year to write him a note expressing your appreciation for him as a manager (if you can do that sincerely).

I am very sure that your manager isn’t doing all this in hopes that you’ll reciprocate; he sounds like he’s just doing it because he’s a nice person and probably enjoys it. So I don’t think you need to worry that you’re meant to be reciprocating. (That said, if you occasionally brought back some sort of regional food treat from a trip, it would be a nice gesture — but you shouldn’t feel you have to.)

3. Looking for a job when you’re on a performance improvement plan

Can I look for a job if I have been placed on a performance improvement plan (PIP)? Will I get a bad reference? Will they tell the company I’m applying at that I am on this and give a bad reference?

You can indeed look for a job while you’re on a PIP, and in fact you really have to — because as you probably know, a PIP is basically saying “we may let you go at the end of this process if we don’t see these changes.”

The good news is that it’s pretty common practice not to contact someone’s current employer for a reference. Most employers understand that doing so could jeopardize your current job, and it’s very normal to ask for your current employer not to be contacted. You may end up getting an offer that’s contingent on a reference from your current manager at that point — but depending on what the issues are that led to the PIP, your manager may be strongly inclined to help you make an easy transition to the new job by not giving you a reference that would stand in your way.

There’s more advice advice about being on a PIP here.

4. Do retention bonuses work?

I’m wondering what your view is on retention bonuses. I’ve just been offered $10,000 by my employer on condition I’ll stay for another 12 months, as I have been actively job searching and am quite unhappy in my job – I’m overworked, stressed, unsupported and beyond that the company is in a period of turmoil with staff leaving in droves. Do they actually work? I’m not driven by money so am not particularly tempted, especially as this equals compensation for only an extra 3.8 hours a week worked beyond my agreed hours!

They do often work! It’s particular common to see them in cases where a company is closing down or moving and wants to give people an incentive to stay on until the end, since otherwise they’d obviously be actively job searching.

I wouldn’t take $10,000 to spend another year miserable, unless you’re in truly dire financial straits where the money is essential to you. And keep in mind that it’ll be closer to $7,500 after taxes, and will break down to about $625 a month. That not nothing, but your price tag for misery might be a lot higher.

5. Can you be fired if you have a disability that prevents you from doing part of your job that wasn’t in the listed duties?

Totally off the wall hypothetical here, but there are two facts about workplace law where I’m curious about how they interact.

First, the fact that many jobs seem to have a list of specific duties and responsibilities, but also round it out with the line, “and other duties as necessary.”

Second, the fact that employers are allowed to ask whether or not a person is able to perform the job duties with or without accommodations.

What happens if a person accepts a job where they can perform the listed duties, but maybe something comes along the way that they can’t do because of a disability even if there was an accommodation made? Hopefully a good employer would work with them, but could they legally be let go if they weren’t able to perform some part of the job that wasn’t explicitly outlined?

Well, the Americans with Disabilities Act (which is the law in play in your second law) protects people who can perform the “essential functions” of the position with or without reasonable accommodation. “Essential functions” are things that the person in the job absolutely must be able to do — i.e., the reason the job exists is to perform that function (for example, an essential function of a bus driver is to drive), and/or there are a limited number of employees who can perform that function and this person must be one of them, and/or the function is highly specialized and the person is hired for that ability specifically. In determining whether something is essential, the EEOC (the federal agency that enforces the ADA) looks like those factors, as well as things like the time spent performing the function, the consequences of not performing it, and whether other employees are available to do it.

An employer couldn’t legally fire someone who was able to perform their essential job functions just because their disability prevented them from performing what the EEOC calls “marginal or incidental job functions.” So if you were able to do your essential duties, your employer couldn’t fire you because you had a disability that prevented you from, say, occasionally changing water jug coolers or occasionally driving in a job where that wasn’t a core function.