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metafilter_feedmetafilter_feedmaru_feedchina_shop posting in fan_flashworksaskamanager_feedIt’s “where are you now?” month at Ask a Manager, and all December I’m running updates from people who had their letters here answered in the past. Here are four updates from past letter-writers.
1. Men are gross in our non-gendered bathrooms (#3 at the link)
The bathrooms in our building continue to be a source of mirth and disbelief.
As well as continued seat-up, shake-it-all-about behavior, there’s been the (female) facilities manager who refused to accept that “all gender” means sanitary bins should be available in all stalls (“men don’t want to look at those”), and building-wide reminders to use the supplied brushes to remove anything you might leave clinging to the bowl … with a very weak flush simply meaning the transfer of matter from bowls to brushes, neither less visible than the other.
The building-wide reminder that caused the most consternation was a recent request from facilities for people to stop using toilet paper to dry their hands and throwing the damp balls of paper on the floor. It went on to declare this must be retaliatory behavior in protest against the fact the bathrooms don’t have paper towels for hand drying or waste bins (only air dryers and the hard-fought-for sanitary bins).
We wandered the corridors and break rooms for days murmuring “who DOES that?” to each other, knowing full well some of us meant “who throws balls of damp toilet paper on the floor?” and some of us meant “who sends a blanket email claiming toilet crimes are political?”
There are half a dozen executive-level leaders in our building, all of whom received the email and were asked to share the message with their teams, and none of whom attempted to hide their bemusement at the entire thing.
Under these conditions, standard male behavior around seat placement becomes positively benign. Although part of me is disappointed the reminders haven’t mentioned that particular aspect of how you leave the bathroom for the next person, I’m now (along with everyone else in my office) so invested in what the next episode of new office drama The Bathroom will bring we’re willing to turn a blind eye at this point.
2. I’ve been getting all my colleague’s meeting invites … for 10 years (#4 at the link)
Thank you for the advice! It did help, it was the blunt encouragement that I needed. I contacted IT again with the mindset that I was not going to let it go until it was resolved. They responded with some instructions that the director needed to follow, which I sent to him in a friendly email, hoping it wasn’t too weird. He followed the instructions and as far as I can tell it worked! It’s a huge relief, it happened so quickly that it made me feel silly for giving up before but IT really did keep telling me they’d fix it before and I started to feel like a nuisance. Anyway, thank you and your readers!
3. I’m being docked PTO days for a suspension, despite not doing anything wrong (#4 at the link)
You answered my question about three PTO days that I lost after an internal investigation against me found no wrongdoing.
As you suggested, I tried to concentrate on getting the PTO days back. I mentioned in the comments of the original post that I finally managed to track down my department manager (my team manager could not help me). He really pushed back hard on HR but was mostly unsuccessful. I got the third day back eventually after the team manager and department manager both confirmed I did my normal job on the days I was partially suspended. I also had to submit a detailed record of my work done on those days. HR refused to reinstate the other two days. I was able to make my trip (an important family event that required travel) by taking unpaid leave.
However, what affects me much more is the uncertainty of why all of this happened. Some commenters suggested that I must have an idea of why I was suspended. This is unfortunately not true. I do not handle money or interact with external customers. I went over all interactions and projects of the last month again and again, but nothing problematic comes to mind. Some commenters suggested a mix-up with someone else. This might be the case, but I have no idea. I also do not know if I was truly cleared or if they just gave up. All of this makes me very anxious. Can this happen again tomorrow? Am I now on a short list for layoffs? Have I inadvertently offended someone? Is there someone who wants to hurt me? … I have always liked to work for this company, but now I’m panicking when my phone rings. The behavior of HR does not help. I’m looking for another job. I hope to be out of here by the end of the year.
Two minor points that are not that relevant (anymore): I had plans to go for a promotion in the near future. I asked HR how the situation would affect that. I got a non-answer like “the investigation will be considered in an appropriate way.” Great. And this is almost funny: I was scolded by HQ HR (the ones doing the investigation) for having a misleading job description. It contained a lot of boilerplate things like being required to travel. This might have been behind the restrictions during the temporal suspension. When I contacted local HR and asked for a correction, I was told that the boilerplate section has to stay in.
I want to thank you and the people in the comments for the feedback and the support!
4. Customers with ridiculously long payment times (#4 at the link)
I never found a way to get that client on a reasonable payment plan. I haven’t worked for them in months and they still owe me money. The frustrating part is that they aren’t a small business struggling to make ends meet; they just don’t pay people for a quarter of the year.
At any rate, a few months after I wrote, a former colleague reached out and asked if I wanted to work for the company he works for. Initially, I turned him down, but then they asked me to name a price. So I did thinking they wouldn’t be willing to pay it … and they decided to prove me wrong.
So, I’m back “workin’ for the man,” but I am loving my job and my coworkers are great. Plus the healthcare plan is excellent. Which, let’s be honest, is really why we all work here in America — to be able to afford healthcare.
The post updates: the gross bathrooms, the docked PTO, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.
blueswanyuletidemods posting in yuletide_adminyuletide_pinch_hits for requests currently in need of writers.askamanager_feedSeveral years ago, a reader shared with us this epic email that was sent by their company’s boss after a holiday party gone terribly awry, and as we enter the holiday season we remember its glory.
“This happened about ten years ago, but the email I received from our boss was so epic I preserved it.
Context: The second year I worked at this company, our holiday party was held on a dinner cruise boat. Our boss footed the bill for dinner and an open bar, and a few other companies also hosted their own parties on the boat at the same time. Since I was underage at the time, I did not drink, and actually left early with my date. Everything was fine when I left. The Monday after, I rolled into the office– the first person there– and was greeted with this email from our boss [identifying details removed]:
‘Good morning to all. I hope all of you had time to recuperate and reflect about the unusual chain of events and circumstances at this year’s Christmas party. Some of you went home early and did not take in the full range of events.
Unfortunately, some of our staff got out of hand, including the spouses. Things were said, and things were done, that quite frankly were very inappropriate. Also, we had people from the adjoining group that decided to take advantage of our open bar and co-mingle with our group.
In regards to the inappropriate behavior, I am not going to go into all of the details, but let it be said that the root cause was probably due to the open bar. Some of our staff decided that the open bar meant that the drinking could be unlimited, not only in how much, but how they drank. As a result, some our staff and spouses decided that shots were OK. Shots were ordered for some who do not even drink. Shots are not OK at a company Christmas party. Other staff and spouses got multiple drinks at once for themselves and for people not even in our group. Others decided it was OK to get openly drunk and beligerent, to the point of making racial slurs. I, myself, am guilty of attacking someone from the other group after he decided to retaliate by groping my wife.
Having thought about the circumstances and the fact that we have to work together as a firm and team, some of you need to apologize for your behavior and/or for the behavior of your spouse. We specifically implemented a no fraternization policy and some of you could get fired on that alone, while other staff exercised no restraint over their spouse for their drunken condition. It is not OK for a spouse to misbehave, just because he or she is not an employee. Many careers have been destroyed, and people get fired, due to the conduct of their spouse. You are expected to exercise constraint over your spouse, or take them home. And if that cannot be done, then you should not bring your spouse.
In regards to the Firm’s policy on drinking, there will be no more open bars. Unfortunately, some of you and your spouses exercise extremely poor judgment. Because of this poor judgment, it puts the Firm at risk. Given the poor road conditions that night, some of you could have ended up dead. It is also unfortunate that a few have to ruin it for the whole group.
I would like to start the apologies by stating I am sorry for not handling the situation that I was confronted with in a different manner. I feel embarrassed, and it was not conduct befitting of the firm’s president. I also felt betrayed by some of you for patronizing the one individual from the adjoining group, who’s behavior was lewd and offensive, not to mention the outright theft by running up our bar tab.
I invite others to make some form of apology, either by email or in person for what they did or said, or what their spouse did or said. You can do this voluntarily, and you know who you are, or I will confront you by Wednesday of this week. I do not intend to ignore what happened. If I have to confront you, you could lose your job. I will be available Monday and Tuesday late afternoon, or you can email me and/or others. Let’s not let this one incidence stop us from being [#1 company in field]. We have a lot going for ourselves and let’s keep it going.’”
The post “I will confront you by Wednesday of this week” appeared first on Ask a Manager.
metafilter_feedschneefinkmetafilter_feedmetafilter_feedmarthawellsaskamanager_feedIt’s “where are you now?” month at Ask a Manager, and all December I’m running updates from people who had their letters here answered in the past.
There will be more posts than usual this week, so keep checking back throughout the day.
Remember the letter-writer whose friend hired them but wasn’t paying what they had agreed on? Here’s the update.
I’m happy to say that the outcome of the conversation with my now former boss was positive and I didn’t expect it to end as well as it did. Thank you, Alison, and everyone who provided helpful feedback.
I respectfully brought up with my friend what she was thinking to do in terms of the summer when the days were longer and I told her I needed to know what she was thinking to figure out my finances. I also said I was expecting the benefits and the pay we had discussed. I wanted to see what she would do / if it would change anything before making my final decision to leave. Instead, this led to her changing my pay once again and paying me by the hour instead of by the booking, both of which were not what we had first agreed upon. I was supposed to be paid a salary amount we had discussed when she was hiring me. I realized it was time to have the conversation to leave.
I ended up telling her that I was no longer able to work for her as I required some stability in my life financially and I was not receiving the pay and benefits that we had initially discussed. I also told her that I valued my time as I had given up many weekends and worked sometimes seven days a week at both jobs and it affected me financially, as well as my health. I said I understood if it was difficult in the beginning but that as time went on, I realized that she wasn’t capable of holding her end of the deal and I had to consider my well-being as well.
Surprisingly, she took it well. I was expecting her to try to convince me to stay, but I think she realized it herself too that she was stringing me along. She admitted that it was a lot to ask of me to be on call and how it affected my life. I’m a bit wary of how genuine it was, though.
In the aftermath, we still talk and are amicable but I have made my boundaries clear and I have been all the better for it. She did ask if she could reach out to me if she was ever in a tight spot and needed an extra hand, and I left the door open to that but only on my terms. I have not gone back to help as of yet, I’m focusing on my primary job and enjoying some free time. I’m realizing that running yourself into the ground for an extra check isn’t always worth it!
Some questions that came up in the comments:
- I hadn’t ever signed a written work agreement (though looking back I should’ve). Lesson learned. But she was my “friend” or so I thought and I didn’t think it through as I should have.
- She did lure me away from my previous job with promises of the same pay plus benefits and that I would be hired as a full-time employee from a government program incentive she had received to start her business. She had kept saying “by February” or “by March” I would be officially “hired,” but come May/June nothing had happened yet.
- I am currently living and working in Greece so things are a lot different than how it is in the U.S. and perhaps other countries.
- This was a part-time gig but she was treating it as full-time. At the time, I heavily relied on a second job to stand on my own two feet here.
- The boss of the job I worked at before I started working for my friend happily would take me back in a heartbeat. He is a kind and genuine man and very straightforward, almost the polar opposite of my friend.
- I am a private English teacher here. That is my full-time job that I have focused on building here on my own. The job my friend hired me for was focused on tourists and highly seasonal and dependent on weather, among other things. It was for horseback riding tours in the area. I had years of experience riding and training horses and it was what I did as a hobby.
The post update: my friend hired me but isn’t paying me what we agreed appeared first on Ask a Manager.
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snickfic posting in recthethingrunpunkrunaskamanager_feedA reader writes:
One piece of your advice I’ve made use of many times is to think of a person struggling in their role as “miscast.” It’s not like they’re a terrible person or failing on purpose, they’re just in the wrong role for their skills. When the conversation turns to ending their employment, I can be kinder and more compassionate, as you’ve written, even when they have frustrated me greatly throughout their time with us.
But I worry I’ve gotten stuck when the reason someone is being let go for attitude. I’m thinking of a time, a while back, when I fired a person who no one could stand to work with — arrogant, smug, judgmental, and no self-awareness whatsoever of the way they came off. This person had middling skills, but the reason they were let go was the “no jerks” policy, not because they weren’t right for the role. That’s not being miscast, so how should I approach that sort of termination meeting? It’s probably about to happen again, and I don’t want to be a jerk to somebody who’s getting fired and will stop being a problem for my team soon. But they’re not miscast — they’re a jerk! How on earth do I “kindly” tell them so?
I answer this question — and two others — over at Inc. today, where I’m revisiting letters that have been buried in the archives here from years ago (and sometimes updating/expanding my answers to them). You can read it here.
Other questions I’m answering there today include:
The post how to fire a jerk appeared first on Ask a Manager.
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