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

1. My interviewer didn’t ask me any questions

I just had my second ever job interview (I’m a college student applying to a student job on an editorial team at a big media company). I feel pretty good about it. The atmosphere was nice and relaxed, they seemed enthusiastic about me and my experience, there were no major blunders.

However, what really surprised me was the lack of questions on their part. Most of the interview time was spent on them telling me about their processes and the duties I would have on the job. I was asked one (!) question by one of the interviewers and it was a very general one. He asked me to tell him about the internship I recently had at a related company and “about my life in general.”

I’m satisfied with the answer I gave, but … I prepared for so much more! I spent hours researching the company, thinking of possible questions and preparing answers to them. Now I feel like there were barely any opportunities to showcase my abilities and interest in the job.

What does the lack of questions mean? Is it normal? Is it a sign that they weren’t interested in me after all? Or, to the contrary, is it a sign that they’re already set on hiring me and didn’t feel the need to ask many questions? Please help clear up my confusion! (In case you’re wondering: This is the only interview / final stage, there will not be more interviews that could potentially include actual questions. They said they’ll get back to me with their hiring decision in a couple of weeks.)

It mostly means they’re a bad interviewer.

It’s possible they feel like the stakes aren’t that high with a student job and so they’re more interested in warm bodies and they figured they’d just tell you about the work and see if you want to do it — but I’d argue that also falls under the “bad interviewer” umbrella, because even in a very junior level job, there are great candidates and terrible candidates and everyone in between.

Sometimes, too, the person who is charged with interviewing student candidates is fairly junior themselves and doesn’t have much/any experience hiring and so they’re sort of winging it … but you can see this with more experienced managers, too.

Chalk it up to a bad interviewer.

2. Wedding gift for my boss

My whole team and few coworkers in other departments are invited to my boss’s wedding in August. I wouldn’t have RSVP’d yes except that everyone else at work who was invited is going, so I am too. It’s a weekend in a very popular midwest summer destination about six hours from where we all live, and the cheapest hotel is ~$400 per night with a minimum three-night stay. Honestly, the money is not an issue and my husband and I are not stretching the budget to attend. That said, I feel odd about gifting my boss cash? Especially with the above costs considered. But is a boxed gift appropriate? They don’t’ have a registry that I can find (it’s a second marriage for both and they have lived together for a very long time). Is cash in an envelope going to be weird when 1) it’s my boss and 2) I know that they make three times my salary? Mabye I’m overthinking but the dynamics just feel odd and I’d love some direction.

Yeah, don’t give an envelope of cash. Frankly, I think this is a case where it’s okay to attend a wedding and just give a card, because this is your boss and the rules about not feeling pressured to give upward are still in play, despite it being a wedding. But if you’re uncomfortable with that, can you and your coworkers go in on a group gift based on something you think your boss would like? Everyone else is probably struggling with this problem too and that would solve it for all of you. (Just don’t pressure anyone to contribute — ask other people what they’re doing and present it as an option if people want to.)

Also! You don’t have to go just because your coworkers are going. A minimum three-night stay six hours away is an enormous ask, and I wonder if she issued invitations without actually expecting most of her colleagues to make it! If you’ve already RSVP’d, you may feel locked in, but if we could go back in time I’d encourage you to feel comfortable having a conflict that weekend and just sending well wishes.

3. How to say I won’t work with a specific child again

I have been dealing with a difficult situation at work, and am considering presenting management with an ultimatum. I work in early years education and for the past few months a child in my class (A) has been hitting me, kicking me, throwing water at me, etc. A has additional support needs and is young enough that they cannot injure me (although I did have one bruise that took two weeks to fade). I am one of several teachers in the class but this energy is only directly at me. We’ve had weeks with no incidents, or up to four incidents in one day. The stress of this has caused me to break down in tears several times, once so badly I went home for the day.

I was just informed I will “probably” be teaching A’s class again next year. I do not know if I will be able to return next year if this is the case. Management have said the right things to me about ensuring my safety and that I can take time away if I need to, but the only measure that’s in place is I write down the details of the incidents when they occur and to my knowledge no one has ever looked at this. I have had to fight for acknowledgement that this is a serious problem that requires action and am feeling burnt out and unappreciated. After months of my complaints, the school has started arrangements to hire a shadow teacher to support A but there is no guarantee this will stop this behavior.

I have worked here for several years with consistently glowing performance reviews. I am also uniquely valuable as I possess desirable niche skillset X but without common qualification Y which would entitle me to a 50% higher salary. These things are never certain but I believe they’d be willing to do a lot to keep me. I’m also in the fortunate position of being able to survive financially without this job, although I adore it and would be very sad to leave.

My question is about how to approach this. I read an old letter about presenting an ultimatum and you advised against over-explaining. I agree with this, and am lucky in that there’s not really a middle position, just don’t make me teach A anymore, which makes things a lot simpler. I work for an extremely small school, there’s no HR, and I suspect the reaction I’ll get will be confused sympathy. I don’t feel that anyone understands how stressful the months constant vigilance and random attacks have been and therefore my threatening to quit will make me look overemotional and unprofessional.

You don’t need to go straight to “I will quit over this” — just ask directly for what you want. For example: “I am not comfortable teaching A again for safety reasons and would like them to be placed in a different class.” You might also point out that since A hasn’t attacked anyone else, they might be more likely to thrive with another teacher — but either way, clearly state that you are requesting to have A moved.

If they refuse and you’re willing to quit over it, the next step would be a statement like, “I want to be up-front that this is something I am considering leaving over. Is that the best solution or is there anything else we can do?”

Caveat: I don’t know enough about early years education to know how often this kind of behavior comes up and if it’s something people working with young children are expected to be willing to work around (or for that matter, what the right steps are for the school to be taking, although I imagine other steps do exist since young children are essentially feral creatures). If they see it as something that anyone working with this age group needs to be prepared for, they may feel like the issue is bigger than the situation with A and that it’s more of a mismatch with the work. That doesn’t necessarily change anything about how you should proceed, but it’s something to include in your thinking too.

Related:
how to say “I’ll quit over this”

4. People keep asking me for unpaid consulting after I say no

I’m taking three to six months away from paid employment. I want to move into a new field that’s significantly different — for anonymity, let’s say teapot making to space tech. The only way to focus sufficient time and capacity to achieve this is to take time out from full-time employment. I’m making good progress, and one of my actions has been to reach out to my network to see if they have space tech connections or leads. Sometimes they ask for my resume which, while weighted heavily towards the experience I’m building in space tech, also references teapot making.

What I have found is that some connections interpret this as me being available for unpaid teapot consultancy. I am highly experienced in my old field (30 years) and if I was to consult, I’d charge and earn high fees. However, what is most important right now is time. I have a full program of professional activities to build my space tech reputation and knowledge. I am not looking for teapot projects (paid or unpaid) to fill in time.

I state clearly to these connections that I am fully focused on space tech for the next two months and will not take on other projects until then, but I’ll bookmark their project and if I decide to refocus on teapots after that, I’ll get back in contact. This message does not seem to get through. I get persistent requests to continue to be involved in teapot startups — like emailing me details of a project (which I haven’t discussed or agreed to support) on a Sunday and texting me wanting to speak the same day, then texting me again on Monday morning following up. I’ve had similar experiences where I decline a project and the requestor keeps asking, or behaves as though I’ve agreed to do it when I have said no.

Is this usual in business? Do I need to just to keep reiterating the message that I am focusing only on space tech for the next two months, or is this a culture/communication difference and other wording would be more effective? I want to remain professional and keep the option for future business open (if space tech doesn’t work out), while also communicating clearly without appearing abrupt or rude. Are there any insights or scripts you can provide?

No, it’s not usual, which makes me think something about your wording might not be as clear as it needs to be (although it sounds pretty clear!). I would stop saying that you’ll bookmark their project and get back to them if something changes, since that may be muddying the message. Instead, just say, “I’m not currently taking on teapot projects so can’t help, but best of luck with it.” If you can refer them to someone else instead, you can do that. But otherwise stick with “I’m not currently taking on this work” and don’t get into whether you might change your mind in the future.

After you do that, if someone continues to ask for your involvement, say this: “I apologize if I wasn’t clear: I am not available to assist with this. I hope you can find someone who can help!”

5. Can my job make me close the store five nights a week?

I am a key holder closing the shop three days a week and the other days I do restocking, customer service, etc. Now my bosses are trying to give me five days to close, which I don’t want because it is a lot responsibility and I burn out. Can they force me to do that?

Yes, they can make it a requirement of your job. But you can try pushing back, by explaining that you don’t want to or you’re not available at those hours that many nights per week or whatever makes sense. They can still decide it’s a job requirement for you now, but you can have a discussion about it where you attempt to change their minds. If they want to keep you, they should have at least some incentive to try to find other solutions (if they exist).

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

1. Do we need a dress code because one employee’s skirts are too short?

I work in a small marketing office and am part of the leadership team. It shouldn’t matter for this, but I am a woman. We have no written dress code and it is pretty casual. To give you an idea, leggings and tracksuit bottoms are not that uncommon, nor are hoodies and shorts. But I’m not sure that means we have actually no rules. At the extreme end, swimwear and booty shorts would not be okay, nor would a t-shirt with swear words on it.

One staff member, Barbara, stands out a bit in how she dresses — think very short dresses (with tights underneath) and sometimes low-cut tops. I personally don’t care (and have always mentally marked this as a choice but not one that impacts my assessment of her work, which is good, or her character). Another member of staff, Lisa, has asked whether we need to consider tightening the dress code. (I think Barbara was doing something during a break that meant her dress had ridden up, and Lisa has raised it off the back of this.)

One option of course is to do nothing. And maybe that’s fine. But there is a line — no one should have to see their colleague’s underwear. Should we talk to Barbara about this? If we do, how can this be phrased in a way that isn’t awful? I don’t think we want to try to construct an entire dress code because of this either, especially if it were aimed solely at women or solely at “too short skirts.”

I know you don’t want to construct an entire dress code because one person isn’t following it, and you don’t have to — you could just talk to Barbara and let her know that at least one outfit recently exposed her underwear and ask her to ensure she’s wearing clothes to fully cover her undergarments.

But I’d argue that it’s a kindness to spell out more formally what isn’t okay. So far, everyone but Barbara has picked up on it, but given that your office does have some expectations around dress, it’s not ideal to rely on people figuring out those expectations on their own. You might be thinking, “Most people look around and figure it out” — but as you’re seeing, inevitably some of them will get it wrong. Since there is a playbook that you expect people to use (just an unwritten one), it’s kinder to everyone — and better management — to spell it out.

It doesn’t need to be any more proscriptive than the current expectations. It could simply spell out what you’ve spelled out here — no swimwear, booty shorts, or t-shirts with profanity, and clothes should provide enough coverage that undergarments aren’t exposed.

Someone still needs to talk to Barbara; you shouldn’t just roll out a new dress code without explaining to her what she needs to change. But ideally you’d do both.

Related:
our interns are clueless about our office dress code

2. Construction noise when you’re working from the office

I work in a hybrid environment, and our office is located in a multi-tenant building. For the past one to two months, another suite in the building has been undergoing a major retrofit for a new tenant. About a quarter to half of the time, this has involved very loud construction work (concrete boring rather than light drilling), and we occasionally feel vibrations as well. I’ve reduced my in-office days to the minimum required, and when I am on site, I rely heavily on noise-canceling headphones throughout the day. This has helped but I still notice the construction.

How much and for how long is it reasonable to expect office staff to work in conditions like this? Management seems sympathetic to the disruption but hasn’t suggested increasing our work from home days. Management did say they requested that the most disruptive building work be done outside of normal office hours. Is this enough? Should I be expecting more?

Are they actually doing the most disruptive work outside of normal office hours now? If so, that may be the most you can expect if your work really does require you be in the office X number of days this week. If it doesn’t really require that, then it’s reasonable to ask if you can increase your work-from-home days until the construction is done (or at least until the loudest phase of it is done). That request will be stronger if it’s based on “the noise is giving me headaches” or “I can’t hear people on the other end of my call” rather than just “I still notice the construction even with headphones.”

It’s also reasonable to ask about what the timeline is likely to look like, since it’s probably easier to tolerate if you know this is the final week versus if you know it’s going to be like this for months.

3. Blessing the food at an event with employees at my home

I supervise a team of about eight people across multiple offices, and recently, when everyone happened to be in town, I invited them all to my home for dinner. I was explicit that this was an optional, after-work event. I encouraged people not to bring anything (although a few brought desserts, as people will do). When it was time to eat, I offered a brief blessing on the food, a tradition in my faith (and something I think we’ve never skipped in our home, although I’m confident the deity I worship would get over it if we did for one meal).

No one seemed uncomfortable, but after the fact, I wondered whether that was an overstep. On the one hand, members of the team are of different faiths (or no faith at all), and I certainly wouldn’t want anyone to feel uncomfortable. I’d never bring up religious issues in the workplace, and I have no desire to proselytize to my supervisees. On the other hand, this was an event in our home and we were (briefly) observing our usual customs. In future, what would you advise?

Yeah, ideally you’d avoid it when it’s a work gathering, even though it was at your house. But how overtly religious was the blessing? If it was an “in Jesus’s name we pray” type blessing, that’s much more likely to make someone uncomfortable (and be inappropriate for a work gathering) than if it was a fairly general appreciation for the food without any mention of specific sacred figures or texts.

4. I keep missing a morning meeting because of a medication side effect

I work on a team of three. Until a year ago, my team all worked mostly or completely remote. My boss, Rachel, still does, as she lives in a totally different time zone. The third member of our team, Phoebe, and I would do separate check-ins weekly with Rachel. But our company moved to a new location and started requiring all employees within a certain radius of the office to come in on a hybrid basis. Employees outside that radius are allowed to stay fully remote. Phoebe and I are hybrid, and Rachel is remote.

We started doing team check-ins, with Phoebe and me in a conference room and Rachel calling in. Except Phoebe and Rachel are both morning people, starting work at 7 am my time (Rachel is often online even earlier because she is in a time zone ahead). I am … not. I tend to arrive to work closer to 9:30–10, with 10 being the latest allowed by the company. We compromised on a check-in time of 9:30.

Fast forward a few months, and I am on a medication that has a side effect of fatigue, which has hit me badly. I’m still in the office by 10, so I am within the bounds of company rules, but there have been multiple occasions where I have fallen back asleep in the mornings or overslept and missed the 9:30 call. I have explained several times it’s a medication side effect and apologized profusely. But I can tell Rachel is annoyed, even though she always says it’s okay.

I missed the call again today. Phoebe is on a sabbatical right now, so it is just me and Rachel. Rachel’s temporary solution is to have me take the call from home at 9:30, then come to the office, but we’ll need to figure out a more permanent solution when Phoebe returns in a couple months. Rachel has noted she and Phoebe prefer early check-ins, and it doesn’t really make sense to return to separate ones since Phoebe and I will be in the office together.

I know I am the problem here. I am the one who keeps missing the call. And I feel like a child every time I have to say I overslept or missed an alarm again. But I have talked to my doctor and there isn’t much she can do without putting me on a different medication that runs the risk of even worse side effects. I feel like I’m not being heard that this is something that has a very easy solution. If we moved the call an hour later, this would not be an issue. How can I lay this out and make it clearer I need a later check-in time? At least until I figure out a solution that helps me get out of bed in the mornings.

Approach it as a medical accommodation: “I am as frustrated as you that this keeps happening and because it’s medical, at this point I want to ask if we can move our meetings to 10:30 as a medical accommodation, or a later time if you prefer it? I can talk to HR about a formal accommodation if you think I should, but I thought I’d check with you first in case you don’t think going that route is necessary.”

5. Working a full-time job and a part-job for the same employer

My organization allows full-time employees to hold a part-time position within the same organization. I don’t understand how the organization does not get in trouble for violating the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) with regards to non-exempt full-time employees.

If I work 40 hours this week at my full-time job, how is it allowed that I could then come back and work another 12 hours on the weekends as a part-time position doing something completely different and not accrue 12 hours of overtime pay? It is the same company, and the same pot of money that pays each person. Am I missing some crazy loophole?

Nope, that’s illegal.

If an employee is non-exempt (meaning not exempt from overtime) their employer must pay overtime (time and a half) for all hours over 40 in the week, even if the employee is working two completely different jobs for the same employer. That’s true even if the part-time job on its own would be exempt; if their “main” job is non-exempt, then the additional work gets treated as non-exempt too. (The only exception to this in the law is for government employees, and only if the part-time job is only occasional or sporadic.)

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

1. I was fired for charging customers’ cash purchases to my credit card

Started my part-time summer job (I am retired) a few weeks ago, working at small convenience/snack/candy store near a local free tourist attraction that opened up for the season. Got fired yesterday.

This year, the store went to a “no cash” payment system. Small sign on the door, another by the register. Problem is, not all people carry other forms of payment besides cash, mostly older folks, plus who wants to use their credit card for a 50 cent piece of candy? To help these customers out, especially ones who don’t have another form of payment available, I accepted their cash, then ran the transaction on my credit card. I asked if this was okay with them before hand and printed off a receipt that I kept for my records to keep everything on the “up and up.”

The owners noticed the number of receipts with my name on it and questioned me. I explained what I was doing and why and they fired me on the spot for “violating company policy.” I asked them to show me the policy and they could not. I asked them what specifically I was doing wrong, they could not give me an answer.

I understand “employment at will” so they can let me go for any reason, but I may file for unemployment because they didn’t have a “valid” reason for firing me and that is why I am writing. Was what I did wrong?

Yeah, it wasn’t wise. You were overriding the store’s payment policy; you basically created your own means for customers to pay, without first checking with your employer. I think they overreacted by firing you — they should have just told you to stop doing it — but you should have asked your manager first if it was okay to do it, especially before doing it multiple times.

Most importantly, having a bunch of receipts with an employee’s name on them is likely to raise red flags from an auditor. Beyond that, though, a customer could come in when you’re not working and expect a different cashier to do the same thing you were doing, and then be upset or frustrated when they refuse. It also opens your employer to accusations that they’re accepting cash from some customers and not from others.

2. New boss keeps questioning how I’m doing things

When I started this job about 10 months ago, my old manager made sure to give me positive feedback, even when I was new. Any negative feedback became a conversation instead of something accusatory, and she noted in my performance reviews that I was doing great but needed more confidence. My old manager made me feel heard and like I could talk to her about any troubles I was having at work.

However, she left the company, and our team’s new manager isn’t as great. It’s only been a few weeks but I constantly feel questioned as to why I’m doing things the way I am. What’s worse is that I don’t notice her asking similar things to my teammates. I feel like I’m being singled out and I’m the youngest with the least amount of experience. I never get positive feedback from my new manager, and it’s taking a toll on my self-esteem because I can’t accurately judge if I’m good at the job or not.

Do you have any advice for me? I really like the job and with my old manager, saw myself staying for years. Now I’m contemplating if I want to stick around more.

It’s possible that you’re being singled out because you’re the least experienced, but it’s also possible that you’re being singled out because your new manager finds you the most approachable or thinks your explanations are the clearest or shortest or she likes your way of doing things. It’s also possible that she’s asking your coworkers and you just don’t see it. Or, yes, it’s possible that she’s doubting your expertise.

But why not ask her? You could say, “Do you have concerns about the way I’m doing things like X or Y? You’ve asked me a lot about it, and I wasn’t sure if you’re just interested in the way we do this or if you’re concerned by anything about how I’m approaching the work.”

3. We give raises to salaried workers, but not hourly workers

I work for a private college. They annually give cost-of-living raises to salaried employees, but hourly employees in the department I oversee and in comparable departments have stayed the same for the last eight years. I’ve spoken to my manager, who is a very nice human but doesn’t want to be seen as challenging and struggles with negotiations in any setting.

I’m trying to prep him effectively to argue that if both merit and cost-of-living raises are the norm for salaried employees, then even if part-time roles are capped on a pay scale and even if merit raises are not an option, if the company recognizes the need for cost-of-living raises for salaried workers, this logic should be applied to anyone working for the organization. Would love some input.

What on earth. If an employer recognizes cost-of-living raises are necessary to keep up with inflation, there’s no logical basis for excluding hourly workers from that (unless there’s some really odd and extenuating circumstance, like that somehow all the salaried workers just happened to be dramatically underpaid and none of the hourly workers are, which seems pretty unlikely). Are they just completely uninterested in retaining the hourly workers and unconcerned by the costs of finding and training replacements?

In your boss’s shoes, I’d start by asking for the reasoning for excluding hourly workers from salary adjustments to keep up with inflation and go from there (next, presumably pointing out that hourly workers face the same cost-of-living increases as other employees, and that turnover from not retaining them will be disruptive).

4. How can people get my attention when I’m wearing headphones?

I work in an open concept floor plan, with my desk facing (gloriously!) a window. To cope with the noise and to be able to focus, I wear noise-cancelling headphones that really block out everything.

People often come up behind me and want to get my attention. I was wondering if there was any technology gimmick that I could use — something like a button they could press for a light to turn on at my desk, or something to push a notification. The sillier, the better! I am not shy about putting together something custom. Any ideas, or even keywords that I could search, would be amazing!

Right now I am trying to use a mirror, which is probably the best low-tech option, but I’d love to know if there’s something more fun I could do.

There are earbuds that allow you to hear human voices over music — but it sounds like you’re purposely trying to drown out human voices most of the time.

There’s also tech that was initially developed for deaf users that will trigger a visual alert like flashing a desk lamp. The search term you want is “alerting devices.”

5. What are employers doing about high gas prices?

I’m curious if your readers are hearing anything from their employers regarding the exorbitant gas and oil prices right now? I haven’t heard anything from my employer, but I’d love to know if (and how) other companies are communicating about this. What can (or should) we expect when transportation costs are this high?

My sense is that the majority of employers aren’t doing this, but some companies are offering gas cards or cash stipends or temporarily increasing mileage reimbursement rates. Some are also increasing work-from-home options or temporarily suspending return-to-office mandates. Here are some articles about what specific companies are doing: 1, 2, 3