Posted by Ask a Manager

https://www.askamanager.org/2025/12/updates-the-unfair-schedule-i-doubt-my-bosss-nephew-is-really-a-genius-and-more.html

https://www.askamanager.org/?p=34756

It’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. How can we create a schedule that’s fair to people with and without kids? (#2 at the link)

Since our job is very flexible in terms of how to manage/create your off-of-direct-customer-facing-service schedule, I think coworkers were getting a little opportunistic about the lack of oversight in order to create these very ideal (for them) schedules. I kind of mentally handed back the scheduling to the people who wanted a lot of accommodation or to cut up our normal scheduling blocks (wanting to work an opening shift 9-10:30 instead of 9-12 like before). I ended up following the advice that the reasons I don’t want to fill in all the gaps aren’t important, stopped trying to justify myself at all, and said some variation of “that doesn’t work for me” or “I can’t do that.” The schedule went through 15+ rounds of version changes but I got my one closing a week and one opening, and while I have the majority of the late afternoon/early evening slots, I’ll take it.

We also have a new boss who has implemented a kind of review of our scheduling and who does the most substituting, covering, etc. so I’m hopeful that might be a factor in limiting this sort of behavior going forward. My coworker with the most scheduling limitations has also agreed to keep to this schedule for our usual duration (one year) so we won’t have to revisit this again until the spring. I think I’ll be better prepared to stand up for myself this go around.

2. I doubt my boss’s nephew is really a genius (#3 at the link)

I took your advice and reached out to my boss’s boss via Teams but he never got back to me. So I decided I would call him, instead. But before I even had a chance to call him, our HR department reached out to me asking if they could talk to me. Apparently, someone else in my department had filed a complaint with HR about boss’s nephew (HR did not specify the person’s identity or the nature of the complaint) and HR was investigating so they wanted to talk to me as his “supervisor.” I told them everything I knew (about the favoritism, etc.) and I explained how I wasn’t really his supervisor in any real sense of the word, all I did was approve his timecards and that my boss was his supervisor in every other way. They thanked me for being candid about the situation and that was it.

A week or two later, at our next staff meeting, my boss announced that the nephew was transferring to a new department effective immediately. He is still with our organization in that other department and is doing good work from what I hear. I and my co-supervisor still do not have any other direct reports. We both have the title of supervisor, but we really function more as team leads. This is not the case with supervisors in other departments at our organization, I don’t know why my department is different.

No one in my department, including my boss, has ever brought up the HR investigation, FYI.

Not a very exciting update, but I think my organization handled this appropriately. I just wonder why this was ever allowed to happen in the first place.

3. Are my longer hours unfair to my coworker?

The good news is that I took your advice, and things got much better for Jane … at least for a while. I pulled back from doing a lot of unrecognized overtime, which reflected better on her with the contract employees and people at the office level. The bad news is that I got several reprimands from my corporate-level boss for not working those additional hours and for being “out of sync with the culture of my cohort.” (Remember, even though on the office level Jane and I appeared the same to contract employees, on the corporate level we were on different strands or cohorts.) It also gave me far, far too much work to do within the hours allowed, which caused others to fall behind.

Eventually, it became too much, and I took another position with another company. Apparently, my former company never hired another person to replace me. Rather, they assigned additional work to others in my cohort. I’m still friends with Jane (as well as people from my own cohort), and I’ve learned that many contract employees and office-level managers are miserable because my replacements are not customer service-oriented or responsive to their needs. At the same time, those who took over my work are now forced to work many extra hours just to do the bare minimum. And this makes more work for Jane. It’s a bad situation. I am glad I am out, but I do feel for Jane and the others who are still stuck there.

4. My coworker reacts out loud when reading about politics

I don’t have much of an update about implementing the advice you gave; shortly after I sent in my letter, the coworker in question moved to another job. I’ll admit that my frustration with this issue was related to a lot of other issues with that job, so I’ll use this space to brag about the fact that I landed my dream job! It’s part-time, so I’m still at the other job, but I’m so beyond happy that I’m right in my niche and part of a supportive team that wants to use my expertise. I definitely used a lot of your resume and interview tips, so you get credit for this one for sure!

The post updates: the unfair schedule, I doubt my boss’s nephew is really a genius, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.

https://www.askamanager.org/2025/12/updates-the-unfair-schedule-i-doubt-my-bosss-nephew-is-really-a-genius-and-more.html

https://www.askamanager.org/?p=34756

Posted by Ask a Manager

https://www.askamanager.org/2025/12/updates-my-boss-is-a-jerk-missing-work-for-a-tennis-tournament-and-more.html

https://www.askamanager.org/?p=34741

It’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 five updates from past letter-writers.

There will be more posts than usual this week, so keep checking back throughout the day.

1. My boss is a jerk — how do I deal with her? (first update)

I’m the person who wrote in years ago about my jerk boss (and, if I recall correctly, I initially balked when you called her a jerk!). I had previously provided an update about taking a new job and how grateful I was for your advice and the support of the community. As a quick update, I’m still at that new company and over the years, I have been promoted to a director-level role in my department and now manage junior employees. There have been lots of ups and downs at the company and I won’t stay here forever but ultimately, I have grown just so, so much since leaving the last job and I remain grateful to y’all for the support.

I’ve actually been having trouble with one of the company’s owners who is — and I can now say this with confidence — a jerk. Ahead of another Monday spent in conflict with her, I spent some time this weekend diving through workplace blogs, searching for some inspiration to steel myself for the week ahead. And perhaps unsurprisingly, I quickly came across my letters to you from 2020. What a blast from the past! I read through my letters, viscerally recalling the stress I was under each day about projects that haven’t meaningfully mattered to me in years, and read through your responses and each and every comment from the community.

While I won’t go into the meat of my current issues here, I did want to reach out to share again that this community really has meant so much to me. I didn’t intend to search for my original letter to you today but, upon finding it, I discovered that much of the core feedback is still true. I am still in control of how I react to poor leadership, how I value my work, and how much humor I can find in some situations. In many ways, my life now looks completely different than it did five years ago (I’m married, been promoted, moved across the state, etc.). But today, standing again in muck flooded by jerk leadership, I remembered I have waded through this before and I did so with such smart, empathetic, and supportive folk alongside.

I have continued to follow along with the site and the many folks who write in. Thanks to everyone for keeping this community thriving. And Alison, thank you again for sharing your guidance to an early career woman stuck in the muck; your advice still rings true to me now years later.

2. Missing work for a tennis tournament (#4 at the link)

My teenage tennis player son worked at a tennis club, almost exclusively with other tennis-playing teens. Their unpleasant boss was unwilling to accommodate their high school tennis season and tournaments that all these employees had every spring, very predictably. We appreciated that commenters took his tournaments seriously, like my son did!

My son chose to resign, and he was able to start up somewhere else immediately. The situation at the club devolved and more teens quit. However, I’ve noticed there are fewer part-time job opportunities for teens these days, so I imagine the hiring pool is pretty large. I wonder how many spring tennis seasons it will take to give this manager a clue!

The biggest takeaway is what my son has been able to learn from this. He says his new manager is respectful and organized. In contrast to the tennis club manager, who once made my son find a sub while he was home actively throwing up, this manager has reasonable expectations.

I’d felt the parental impulse to tell him not to quit, to learn to deal with a tricky employer. But in that environment, who would he learn professional norms from? It is easy for both parents and employers to not listen to teens, nor take their concerns seriously.

Thanks so much for responding to us. I hope my son keeps reading your blog!

3. I ran into an employee topless at the beach

I took your advice. After two additional weeks of awkwardness, I actually asked her if she was embarrassed. I originally tried being aggressively normal and that worked to a small degree, but I felt like she was only interacting when forced to interact. I asked her if she was embarrassed about our run in and she actually said she was a little bit. I told her not to be embarrassed at all and that we have all done things in our lives that we wouldn’t want our boss being present for. I told her not to worry and that I didn’t think any less of her. I asked her to start going back to normal and she quickly did.

4. My manager wants us to do a “mental health check” weekly

Shortly after I wrote to you, my boss stopped asking for the mental health checks. In fact, we don’t even have that weekly team meeting is often anymore. Probably one out of every four weeks. They get canceled a lot. So I’m guessing that maybe somebody else said something as well directly to her or that her manager said something as well because they did stop.

She never mentions anything like mental health like that anymore.

Happy to say, while there are other issues with our team, that is no longer one of them.

5. Can I drop out of a leadership program that’s the opposite of what I want?

One thing I forgot to include in my letter is that I work for a very large company. There were about 700 nominees in the program and no monitoring of our level of participation.

So, I ended up just not going nor doing anything. The program meetings were all on zoom and frequently in conflict with my actual job meetings, so I felt justified in blowing them off … but no one even noticed. And, my manager has forgotten about the program entirely.

It ended this month with a whimper, and that’s that. All that stress and anxiety over what turned out to be nothing.

Thank you very much for your advice and to the commenters who weighed in as well.

The post updates: my boss is a jerk, missing work for a tennis tournament, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.

https://www.askamanager.org/2025/12/updates-my-boss-is-a-jerk-missing-work-for-a-tennis-tournament-and-more.html

https://www.askamanager.org/?p=34741

Posted by Ask a Manager

https://www.askamanager.org/2025/12/update-how-do-i-live-down-a-reputation-for-being-extra.html

https://www.askamanager.org/?p=34567

It’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 asking how to live down a reputation for being “extra”? Here’s the update.

Thank you so much for publishing my letter a year ago. I really appreciated your advice and the kind responses in the comments.

Looking back, I was in a dark place emotionally and a toxic work environment when I wrote. I don’t think I really recognized how anxious and unhappy I was until I was beyond it. Believe it or not, I’ve remained in the same workplace and things have dramatically improved. The primary reason for the positive shift: staffing changes. I got a new supervisor who is completely removed from our insular middle management cluster, and a number of my most gossipy coworkers moved on one-by-one, replaced by fresh faces. A couple of more outspoken peers joined our larger organization so that I’m not the only — or first — person to speak up in meetings. I’ve had fewer opportunities to mix with cliquey middle management. And the former supervisor who told me in a one-on-one that I had an “extra” reputation has risen to an upper leadership position … which is actually great because now they’re in a separate building, so there’s an even bigger buffer between me and them. It’s like a fire has been denied oxygen.

I’ve basically spent the past year really digging into my work, avoiding workplace scuttlebutt, connecting with the local community my site serves, and focusing on how best to help customers. And it’s paid off. My pool of clients has expanded dramatically, which is wonderful in itself, but it also means I pull in impressive statistics that upper admin absolutely notices. Even the staffer who called me “Little Miss Too Much” recently mentioned my “eye-popping” program numbers (unprompted); so I feel like whether or not coworkers want to be my BFF, I’ve garnered a certain amount of respect within our organization. I’ve conducted some mentoring within my field of late, so there are people who now see me as a sort of “senior scholar” and ask for my advice. I’ve landed another grant for our organization. And I just received a promotion! I literally went from singing along to Taylor Swift’s “Anti-Hero” in my car at the end of work to bellowing Beyonce.

A few things I’ve learned in all of this: First, I probably never need to rise into management — at least not within my current organization. The people who occupy middle and upper leadership roles here are just so … complicated. At least for me. I can interact with them on an occasional basis and behave politely, but they aren’t my main focus. My clients are, and that’s where I’m directing my energy. At the end of the day, I have very impressive numbers and I frequently overhear my customers agreeing I’m the best at what I do. That’s what the job’s about.

Second, I now make sure to heap lots of sincere praise on coworkers, including those above me. This helps spread goodwill.

And third, this may sound petty, but I’ve been in this workplace now long enough that if I sit in a meeting where someone freaks out because “it has to be this way because we’ve always done it this way” or a peer proposes an initiative I think is sheer lunacy, nine times out of ten I can sit quietly, nod, and then just quietly do things the way I think is best without dramatic repercussions. Our organization is big enough, our departments are siloed enough that as long as chain of command is respected and observed, we have a fair degree of latitude in the way we conduct our activities.

Alison, thank you again for taking my question. I’m glad I was able to provide a happy update to a fraught query.

The post update: how do I live down a reputation for being “extra”? appeared first on Ask a Manager.

https://www.askamanager.org/2025/12/update-how-do-i-live-down-a-reputation-for-being-extra.html

https://www.askamanager.org/?p=34567