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

1. Leadership discussing weight loss during an accommodations meeting

I’m writing about a conversation that happened a few months ago in my workplace that is still bothering me, and I’m not sure if there’s anywhere to escalate it or if I need to keep working on letting it go.

I work in public service for a small city and am part of a union. I was in a meeting with the head of HR (who reports to the mayor), my boss (the director of our organization), and the union rep. The meeting was set up to discuss a medical accommodation I was asking for. I self-identify as a fat woman, but the accommodation in question had nothing to do with that; it was about mental health.

Everything was going fine, everyone agreed to the accommodation, we had it all in writing, etc. But towards the end of the meeting, the conversation went off the rails when somebody (I think the union rep, but I’m not sure) mentioned that they’re cold all the time because they lost 50 pounds. The conversation went on like this:

Head of HR: Congratulations, how did you do it?
Union rep: I do the shots.
Director: I am also always cold because I did the same thing and I also lost 50 pounds. I’m trying to reach my goal weight after baby and then intend to go off the meds.
Head of HR: Wow, you guys look fantastic.

And so on. By this point I had tuned out.

I found this topic wildly inappropriate and kind of offensive for leadership to be talking about in front of their employee, fat or not, especially when asking for a medical accommodation. I just kind of tuned out at the time, but it’s still bothering me that someone who is leading the HR department would bring that up with their employees, and that other people in leadership would continue the conversation.

I don’t know if there’s anywhere else to escalate this or complain about it, though. The next person up from both of these people is the mayor, and I can’t complain to my boss about the union rep since my boss was part of the problem. Is there anyone else I can complain to, and is it even worth it or should I just continue to try to let it go?

I get why it bothered you but yeah, you should let it go. People should be more aware of how they talk about bodies and dieting in work situations — well, in all situations, really — and especially at meetings that are on completely different topics, but it’s a reality of our culture that it comes up in all sorts of situations anyway. To them, they were just chatting, and it’s not inherently inappropriate for them to chat at the end of a meeting where the main topic had already been taken care of. Your objection is closer to (very legitimate) personal preference than to “an obvious rule has been violated and something should be done.”

2. My boss won’t tell me how I can get a higher performance rating

At the beginning of 2025, I, along with about 200 other people at my large organization, joined a brand new team to build and implement a huge new piece of software. With the project, I also took the opportunity to join a team that has a different focus than my old team. This meant that I had to learn an additional huge piece of software, gain programming skills with very little prior programming experience, and do light project management with at least a dozen vendors. I crushed all of my deadlines, and managers on other teams regularly reached out to my boss with praise for me.

I gave myself the highest possible rating on my annual self-review (“exceeds expectations”) and laid out plenty of supporting documentation. I sat down with my boss, who enthusiastically agreed with all of my points … and bumped me down to a “meets expectations.” Because my org has forced rankings in the past, I was prepared for this possibility. He went on to clarify (without my prompting) that the org did not force rankings this year and he appreciated me meeting all of the challenging expectations for my new role. I asked him how I could have exceeded expectations for 2025, and he rambled on about “it was a hard year for everybody” and “it would have been hard for anybody to get an exceeds.” That wasn’t really an answer, so I asked how I could exceed for this year. He went on about how impressed he was that I met the high standards for my role, then asked “do you think I’m being too harsh?” I replied, “Harshness isn’t the issue, but it’s disappointing to be told I didn’t meet certain criteria without getting examples of what that criteria might be.” He then explained that he doesn’t like providing targets for exceeding expectations because then “that becomes the standard” and “people get disappointed when they don’t meet it”!

This was a week ago, and I’m having a hard time letting it go. In nearly 15 years at this org, this is the first time that a boss couldn’t either provide ideas for improvement or explain that I missed the cutoff during a forced rankings year (I’m generally a chill employee, and I think I get picked for that because my managers know it won’t make me melt down). The project lasts for at least two more years, so there are loads of objective criteria for potential goal-setting. Am I bananapants for thinking that he’s unfairly managing based on vibes instead of fair, tangible criteria? I have a great relationship with my grandboss and am considering setting up time with her to talk about it, but is that too dramatic? What else can I do here?

Final notes: I’m the only woman reporting to this guy, and the rankings are tied to our annual raises.

You’re not off-base at all. He should be able to provide you with clear examples of what “exceeds expectations” would look like and why you’re not there yet, and if he can’t do that, you’re absolutely right to conclude that he’s managing by vibes rather than clear metrics. What’s more, your company should want managers to lay out clear metrics for “exceeds expectations” for a whole bunch of reasons — first and foremost that people are less likely to knock it out of the park if they don’t know what that would look like, but also because managers who leave that hazy are leaving the door wide open for the appearance (or the reality) of a whole bunch of kinds of discrimination, and the legal liability that goes along with that.

It would not be at all too dramatic to talk to your grandboss about this, particularly since you have a strong relationship with her. Frame it as a very reasonable desire to want to understand how your performance is assessed, why you’re not at “exceeds expectations currently,” and what you need to do differently to get there.

3. My job is posted for more than I earn

I just saw a job posting for my department, the same position as mine (because someone is leaving). The amount of pay listed is more than what I make. I have been here for 20+ years. What do I do?

Talk to your boss! “I saw the opening for the new X is posted at $Y. If that’s the current starting salary, I’d like to talk about adjusting my salary, which is currently below that, so that I’m not making less than someone brand new without my experience.”

It’s also possible that you shouldn’t just get a raise to $Y but instead should get a raise to something above $Y to reflect the amount of experience you have. I say “possible” rather than “definitely” because the number of years in a job doesn’t automatically equate to doing the work better, but it’s something you should at least be thinking about.

4. Do teachers own their lesson plans?

I’ve seen in your column before that anything you create for your job belongs to your company. Does that also apply to lesson plans written by teachers?

I teach 10th grade history. As you well know, teachers are ludicrously underpaid and one of the ways I supplement my income is by selling my lesson plans on a popular site for teachers. Is what I’m doing illegal? Can I get in trouble with my school if they realize?

My name isn’t attached to my online “store” but I suppose if one of my administrators took a thorough look at the site they could connect the lessons to what I do in my classroom.

Under copyright law, your school district owns your lesson plans because they’re deemed “work for hire” (work that you create in the scope of your employment) unless it has policies to the contrary (which it might, so you should check). Interestingly, before the Copyright Act of 1976, courts had generally assigned copyright for educational materials to teachers — but when the Copyright Act of 1976 passed, it didn’t contain a teacher exception.

But that doesn’t mean that you’d get in trouble with your school if they realize you’re selling them; it’s more likely they’d just tell you to stop.

5. How should I show I’ve had the same job in multiple locations?

I’ve had the same job title at the same company for the past two years, but in three different locations. My base location has remained City A, but I’ve been assigned to plants in different states for long durations. So since 2024, I’ve spent one year split between Plant B in City B and City A, and eight months entirely at Plant C in City C. All of these are in different states.

How should I show this in my resume? Right now I’m doing this-

MegaCo | City A
Teapot Controls Engineer | City A State, City B State, City C State |  2024 – Present
– Accomplishment
– Accomplishment

It’s fine to do it that way, but you probably don’t even need the “City A State, City B State, City C State” part and could just list it like this:

MegaCo | City A
Teapot Controls Engineer,  2024 – Present
– Accomplishment
– Accomplishment

The exception to that would be if the individual locations were significant in some way, like if it would strengthen your candidacy to show that you had experience in a specific location or type of location (such as one similar in important ways to the one where you were applying).

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

1. How can I politely dodge a coworker’s MLM product party?

How do you politely dodge coworkers’ MLM “parties”? I despise multi-level marketing schemes (MLMs). They’re predatory, cult-like organizations, and I refuse to support them in any way.

A coworker recently invited me to her cookware-hawking “party.” Putting aside the fact that I rarely cook anything more elaborate than spaghetti, I really just can’t bring myself to support this. The problem is, this is a colleague who I like a lot and collaborate with regularly. I don’t want to lecture her about the toxic nature of these companies but it feels rude to just blow it off. I’d claim to be busy, but it’s an online event. How do I politely turn it down?

“I don’t really buy cookware, but thank you!”

If she responds that you don’t need to buy anything and it’ll be fun just to attend: “They’re not really my thing, but thanks anyway.” (Or you could just say that from the start.)

If you were someone she knew to be an avid cook, you could also say, “I’m super picky about cookware and only have a couple of brands I buy” or “I’m trying to be disciplined about not buying any new kitchen things.” And if she pushed after that: “It’s not really my thing, but thank you.”

MLMs often train their salespeople in how to overcome objections so any of these answers could spur her to try to change your mind (which would be especially inappropriate to do with a coworker, but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen) but falling back on “it’s not really my thing” will work as long as you’re firm about sticking to it. (In fact, that’s often the case with boundaries — it almost doesn’t matter what specific you land on, as long as you are willing to stick to it.)

2. Manager is fixated on very old mistakes

I’ve been working at my current job in mechanical design for a little over a year and a half. An inherent part of the design process in my industry is very long lead times for client feedback and other departments doing their portion of the design, which means it can be months before a design I have finished actually starts being built.

My boss frequently calls me in to lecture me about errors in projects I worked on a year or more ago, when I was still brand new and had very little experience with how the company did things, but weren’t noticed until production began more recently. I know I’ve improved significantly since those early days, and would never make the obvious mistakes I did early on, but my boss talks about these errors in the present tense as if they are happening now, and dismisses any explanation I offer about how long its been and how much I have improved. My coworker who started the same day I did gets treated the same way, and the two of us have already gotten one email from our boss’s boss about the errors we “are” making and how it costs the company money to fix.

For the most part my job is very satisfying. I enjoy the work, the hours are very flexible and open to WFH if needed, and aside from this issue my boss isn’t bad; they answer questions and explain things when I ask, leaving me alone to work at my own pace otherwise. But it’s frustrating and demoralizing to feel like I’m being judged and evaluated based on an image that is very much not reflective of my current work and I’m constantly concerned about being warned or even fired because of those past errors. Aside from privately tracking my corrected errors, which suffers from the same long delay between design and production, how can I prepare myself in case the department manager continues to get an outdated impression of my performance?

Can you name it for your manager? For example: “You’ve pointed out a few errors to me recently that were from back when I first started, like X and Y, and I want to make sure you know that that’s not something I’m still doing currently — it was back from when I was learning the job and still figuring things out. I’m always grateful to get feedback, but I also don’t want you to worry that those are errors I’m still making.”

Depending on how that goes, you could also say, “Is there a good way for me to communicate than an error was from a year or more ago when I was still learning? I don’t want to sound defensive when you’re giving me feedback — I definitely want any feedback you have for me — but ideally I’d like you to know if it’s something from a while back that is no longer happening.” She may not have a good answer to that, but the act of asking it should help get it on her radar as a thing that’s happening.

3. Child care and hotel rooms when two spouses are attending the same work conference

I wrote in last year about my spouse’s company suddenly competing with mine (update here). My spouse and I still aren’t bidding on the same work (thank goodness!), but we do still work in similar roles for separate clients in different industries. Turns out, both of those clients use the same vendor who hosts an important annual conference. We now may both be asked to attend the same conference!

In our previous, child-free life, that would be no problem. But per my previous update, we now have a baby to consider! We can’t both travel to the same conference without a childcare option. Our options would be flying a relative out to take care of the baby while we are traveling or bringing the baby with us and seeking a childcare option during the day (and likely evening with busy conference schedules!). Do you think we would have any grounds to ask for our companies to pay for childcare during the travel days? I doubt it, but curious about your opinion of what’s normal in cases like this. I have nightmares of us bringing the baby to the conference and switching off care between sessions. I’m not serious about that one, but could you imagine how awful it would be to attempt nap time behind a booth or in some random conference room?

Separately, what would we do about a hotel? It would be weird for us to travel and get two separate hotel rooms, but I couldn’t ask my company to pay for half of a hotel room, right? Does anyone else attend the same conference with their spouse for different companies and run into issues like this?

You can’t really ask your company to pay for child care in a case like this; in all but the most unusual situations (where you have an extremely hard-to-find skill set and are wildly in demand) that would come across as out of touch. You’re generally expected to figure out child care or explain you can’t go. Is the latter an option for one of you?

But if you do both go, for the hotel one of you would just tell your company that you don’t need them to book a hotel room because your spouse will also be there and you’ll be sharing a room.

4. Backing out of a summer job if I get a better offer

I’m a college student who recently applied to several summer internships in my dream industry. I’m pretty confident in how I presented myself, but I also want to be realistic about this pretty competitive industry, so I also applied to some local businesses as back-up summer jobs. The problem is, many of these local places have responded to me expressing interest much faster than the internships. If I get into an internship, I’ll definitely take it, but I don’t want to turn down any of my back-ups before I know that for sure.

What do I say if I get a hiring offer from a back-up job while I still have a chance at the internships? If I accept and then get a better opportunity, is there a tactful way to back out of that job, without seeming disrespectful or damaging my credibility with the business?

This is a thing that happens with summer jobs. They won’t be thrilled, but they’re unlikely to be shocked or outraged either. You’d simply say something like, “Unfortunately I’ve had a conflict come up and I won’t be able to work with you for the summer. I really appreciate you offering me the opportunity, and I wanted to let you know as soon as possible. I apologize for any inconvenience this causes, and I wish you and the team all the best for the summer.” They might be loath to hire you in the future, but that’s just how this stuff goes.

5. Is networking required to get a job now?

I’m seeing a lot of stuff online saying that because the job market is so bad right now, the best way to get a job is through networking. On some posts you say networking is nice but not a requirement; you can still get jobs without it. Is that still true, or is networking now a must-have?

And if it is a must, what are some good ways to start networking with strangers? I’m job searching now but I’m not sure if I can rely on my current/former coworker network for jobs.

Networking is helpful but not a must-have. People get hired without networking all the time!

That said, it can make your job search easier, so it’s a good thing to do to whatever extent you can, because it can get your application an additional look that will help you stand out among a slew of qualified candidates.

Here’s some past advice on how to do it.

how to tell your network you’re looking for a job
how to send a networking email that won’t be ignored
how do I use alumni contacts in my job search?
I hate the idea of networking — it feels slimy
what does good networking actually look like?

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

1. Employees don’t participate in our community outreach activities

I’m a part of the “good will” committee for my office location, as well as the large committee for the whole company. Lately I’ve been feeling a struggle of getting other employees actively involved in our initiatives. Good will is a named tenet of our company, and we have a pretty healthy annual budget to go along with it.

We try and have one or two initiatives per month that have varying degrees of involvement. Sometimes it involved volunteering onsite (during work hours or directly after). Sometimes it’s asking for donations (gently used books or unexpired canned goods/shelf stable foods). We’re not asking people to go and spend their own money on things. The most successful ones are in-office, during office hours, but there’s only so many opportunities for those.

We also try and cover a variety of different areas — unhoused people, kids/schools, food scarcity, women, LGBTQIA+, community gardens and book depositories, animals, BIPOCs groups. We also ask employees about groups they would like to see us support.

I just feel like it’s been a struggle lately to get people involved. People never seem to have issues finding time for sporting events or happy hours, but no one seems to want to do a shift at the food bank. Shocking, I know. Any ideas on how to get people motivated?

They may not want to. Some people want to spend their limited downtime relaxing, and that’s okay. I’’m not sure it’s appropriate for an employer to try to change that.

People are exhausted right now, and they’re at work to earn money, not to volunteer. A lot of people who are charity-minded do their charity work on their own time, and don’t feel their employer needs to claim the credit for those efforts. If your company wants to do good in the community, that should mean it’s coming from your company’s resources — its money and its time (meaning that this should all happen on work time, not after hours, and other work needs to be moved aside to create space for it; the expectation shouldn’t be that people’s regular workloads don’t change at all to make room for it). If the company isn’t willing to do that, then this is just a value they’ve stuck on a list, not a genuine value they hold.

All that said, I think you have the answer when you say, “The most successful ones are in-office, during office hours, but there’s only so many opportunities for those.” If people aren’t interested in ones outside of that category, that’s feedback worth listening to! And if there are only so many opportunities for those, then maybe you stick to those because that’s what employees are up for.

Beyond that, talk to people! Survey employees on what they are and aren’t interested in participating in — both in terms of specific activities and general categories of activities (during work hours, 5-7 pm, drives where you bring items from home, etc.), and also ask how they’d like to see the company live out this value. That’s what ultimately should shape it.

2. Should I tell my manager about a recurring issue with a coworker?

I’m a receptionist at a small healthcare-adjacent company and would appreciate your advice on a recurring issue with a remote customer service representative, “Donna.”

Callers frequently report being hung up on a few minutes after I forward them to the customer service line. Almost every caller who tells me this has mentioned they were speaking with Donna when it happened, which is a problem I don’t encounter with any other representatives.

Because our work involves urgent health-related matters and long wait times, these disconnections can be pretty significant for our clients. Sometimes they’re sitting in the queue listening to hold music for 20 or 30 minutes before having to start over again because upon being transferred to Donna, they get disconnected.

Thing is, I’m hesitant to report this to our supervisor because the guy is a severe micromanager, and I want to avoid subjecting anybody to having to deal with him. I’ve been the subject of his ire before, and it’s not fun when his laser beams get trained on you. However, I’m growing concerned that Donna may be intentionally disconnecting calls, or has an unstable remote connection. How would you suggest I handle this situation?

You need to tell your manager about it. It’s a significant issue, and it’s got to be incredibly frustrating for your callers — and your position means you’re probably the only person (other than Donna) who’s aware of it. Your position does give you standing to raise it, because you’re partly responsible for the experience that callers have when they contact your company. (That doesn’t mean you’re responsible for whatever is happening once you transfer them, of course — just that when you have info about their experience that no one else has, you do need to make someone higher up aware.)

If that mean Donna gets micromanaged … well, some closer management might be needed here, because either Donna is intentionally disconnecting callers or is aware she’s frequently losing her connection and not bothering to ask for help to get that fixed. Or maybe she has, in which case she’ll presumably explain that to her boss — but either way, this is something you should escalate.

The subject line of your email to me was, “Is it appropriate to snitch on my coworker for this?” and this is not snitching. This is letting your manager know about a work issue that’s highly relevant to how well your organization is serving clients.

3. Disabled and losing access to parking

I work at a university that recently announced a major campus construction project that will eliminate a significant amount of central parking, including areas closest to my building. The announcement framed this as an exciting improvement to campus life, but for some of us, it creates a serious accessibility problem.

I have a disability that affects my mobility. Even now, I arrive over an hour early just to secure one of the limited nearby parking spots, and I still face a several-minute walk to my building, which can be difficult depending on the day. I am not the only one who does this in my building. There’s several of us who do this daily. With these lots closing, we are all extremely concerned that we simply won’t be able to access my workplace in a reliable or sustainable way.

This is the second time in a few years that staff parking has been reduced. In this case, the project will also remove several accessible parking spaces across campus, and they are not being replaced.

The university’s suggestion is to contact parking services for alternatives, but based on past experience, those alternatives are not workable for me. They typically recommend using a shuttle system, which is difficult for me to physically navigate, or parking farther away. Factoring in wait times and travel, that could add close to an hour to my commute each day. I also have religious commitments after work on Fridays, and this added time would make it difficult or impossible to attend. The shuttle isn’t always the most reliable. It’s also small and with more people probably needing to use this, it could add in well over an hour to my commute daily.

Another option is purchasing access to parking at a nearby institution, but that requires an upfront cost of over $700 annually, which is not financially feasible for most people.

My job could be performed remotely, but remote work is not currently offered as an option, and I worry that pushing too hard on that could negatively affect my job security.

I have not reached out to parking services, as I am not optimistic about the response they will give. Historically, the university has been resistant to feedback on parking and accessibility concerns or they ignore emails totally. Another colleague reached out to them with these exact concerns, but she’s certain she’ll not receive a response or they will not care as they have when there were issues with parking spots blocked off earlier last year.

At what point does this become an ADA issue? What are my options for advocating for reasonable accommodations in a situation like this? Would requesting remote work on days when I cannot access parking be reasonable, or am I better off pursuing a formal accommodation through HR or another route such as an anonymous ADA complaint?

It’s an ADA issue now. Under the ADA, employers with 15 or more employees are required to provide accessible parking as a reasonable accommodation for workers with disabilities, and they must engage in an interactive process to find solutions if spots are unavailable.

You should submit a request in writing to HR with the subject line, “official request for accommodations under the Americans with Disabilities Act.” Don’t go through parking services since they’ve been unresponsive; approach it as a legally required medical accommodation with HR.

4. Independent contractor vs. employee

I have a question regarding W2 vs 1099 contractor definitions. I understand one key legal difference is a contractor sets their own hours. Does that mean that no employment where I commit to showing up at a certain time can be a 1099? Like, let’s say I am a tutor. I choose my students and can let them go. But let’s say I sign on to tutor someone intensively for two hours once a week for a semester at a specific time slot, and I sign a contract to that effect, do they now have to give me a W2?

The IRS doesn’t use a black and white test for contractors where if you don’t set your own hours, you can’t be a contractor. Rather, they look at the totality of the circumstances. They look at three factors: (1) behavioral — does the company control or have the right to control what the worker does and how the worker does their job? (2) financial — are the business aspects of the job (like how the worker is paid, whether expenses are reimbursed, and who provides tools/supplies) controlled by the company? (3) type of relationship — are there written contracts or employee-type benefits (insurance, vacation pay, etc.) and is the work a key aspect of the business? The law says, “Businesses must weigh all these factors when determining whether a worker is an employee or independent contractor. Some factors may indicate that the worker is an employee, while other factors indicate that the worker is an independent contractor. There is no ‘magic’ or set number of factors that makes the worker an employee or an independent contractor and no one factor stands alone in making this determination. Also, factors which are relevant in one situation may not be relevant in another. The keys are to look at the entire relationship and consider the extent of the right to direct and control the worker.”

There are independent contractors who commit to working set hours. Doing that doesn’t on its own make you an employee.