It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. Recruiter quoted a salary that’s half of what was listed in the job ad
Is it common to be offered a much lower salary than is posted in a job listing? I applied for a position for which I have good experience and education that was listed as $24 – $32 an hour for full-time. A recruiter called me regarding it and said that the salary would be $24,000 a year to start. This is significantly lower than what was advertised and painfully lower than what I was expecting. I currently make $54,000 a year but I’m trying to move and this job is located where I want to be. Is it common to list a much higher pay? How can I handle this situation gracefully? The location I want to move to also has higher living expenses so my hope was to move and secure a position that paid better than what I’m making now. I am having a phone interview on Monday and I’m wondering if the hiring manager will bring up the discrepancy.
What on earth? That’s a massive discrepancy. It would be a problem if it were even slightly lower than the ad (because they shouldn’t be misleading people), but that’s such an enormous difference that I wonder if what you saw was a typo (maybe it was supposed to say $24K/year, not $24/hour).
On the phone interview, you should bring this up yourself if they don’t. Say, “I wanted to verify the salary with you. The ad listed $24-$32/hour, which is about $50,000-$66,000. But the recruiter quoted a much lower rate. Can you clarify the range for me?” If it turns out it’s really $24,000, you’d say, “That’s less than half what I’m making currently, so it sounds like we’re too far apart on salary” or “That’s significantly under-market for this work and would be prohibitive for me” or any other form of “no” that you’re comfortable with. (I’m assuming, of course, that it is significantly under-market, given your current salary. If so, don’t talk yourself into considering the job further.)
2. Why are you asking me to do that?
I am a mid-level HR director and routinely receive questions well outside the scope of my role. I understand that HR can end up being the catch-all for a lot of situations; however, I am not the team party planner, I do not know how to fix your IT issue, schedule your own meeting, etc.! My company views HR as a very strategic group, so I feel supported in my want to push back (and am in line with our culture) but I keep receiving requests well outside of/beneath my role. Clearly, some of this frustration stems from the fact that a lot of these questions treat me as a glorified admin or are individuals just trying to pass on the problem to someone else, but I am at a loss at how to respond effectively. Often, some of these questions are so out of my realm, I don’t even know who they should have asked in the first place.
Obviously, I don’t want to set the tone of being completely unhelpful and risk employees not reaching out in the future, but I am not hitting the correct balance of how to effectively communicate that. Perhaps, if I were in another department, I would feel more comfortable to respond in increasingly blunt versions of “this question is better directed to someone else, apologies!” to “why on earth did you ask me that?” However, in HR, I want to maintain a level of respect and trust with my teams. Any suggestions on how to better respond to and redirect these inquiries?
You can be pretty blunt about it and still use a warm, cheerful tone! Things you can say cheerfully:
* “Oh, we don’t plan parties! Your team would handle that themselves.”
* “That’s something IT would help with — unless there’s some HR angle that I’m missing?” (That piece at the end can be appended to some of these others too, to make a point in a polite way.)
* “We don’t handle meeting scheduling; that’s something you or your team would do.”
* “Hmmm, that’s not our realm! Normally I’d try to steer you in the right direction, but that’s so separate from what we do that I’m sure who to point you toward.”
As long as you’re warm and friendly when people interact with you, you’re not going to lose their trust for setting clear boundaries on what you do and don’t do.
3. When job candidates ask about company culture, what do they want to know?
As a new manager, I’m doing the interviewing, and some candidates have asked me about our culture. I typically start the interview by describing the overall program, staff size, typical development milestone timelines, and team roles and functions with the intent of providing context to the questions. What other information are the candidates looking for? It’s a large software development company, and all of the candidates are local, so there’s a certain set of processes and personalities expected in our line of work.
I usually answer by describing the composition of the teams and how work is assigned to teams and individuals. They’ll initially land on one of the 10 teams, but might rotate around periodically after six months. Are they asking for individual team dynamics? Any tips? I feel like I’m not answering the question fully, but I don’t know what else to add.
That stuff isn’t really culture! It’s processes and jobs. When people ask you about your office culture, they’re looking for information about what it feels like to work there and what types of people do and don’t thrive there. For example: Do people work very collaboratively or more autonomously? How formal or informal is the office? Is it more flexible or more structured? How social (or not) are people there? Is it fast-paced? Are people usually out the door at 5 or there until 8 or later? Do people answer work emails at night and over the weekends? Is decision-making very top-down or are there a lot of voices in the mix? Is risk-taking encouraged? Are people expected to find their own projects or wait for work to be assigned? What does “busy” look like, and how typical is that? How is conflict resolved? How are successes celebrated? What do people like about working there? When people haven’t felt like a good fit with the culture, what’s been the reason? What behaviors are valued and reinforced and what would feel out of place?
You’re (probably) not going to answer all of those, but that’s the kind of stuff to think about. It’s about the way things really work, not what’s in the handbook.
4. Should you hire employees to babysit?
I help supervise a group of about 20 student workers at a college. Most of them know I have a one-year-old and some of them really love babies (I sometimes bring him by during my non-work hours briefly to make their day). I’ve had at least two workers tell me they’d love to babysit. They’re good responsible workers, but I’ve been uncertain as to the advisability of that and haven’t followed up on their offers. This is likely to come up again as new students come in and learn I have a child. My gut says that babysitting (while paid) is more personal than a typical employment relationship and could blur professional boundaries or lead to an appearance of favoritism, so I should just kindly thank them for the offer and say we’re all set in that department. Is that the right call or am I overthinking this?
People sometimes do this and it’s fine, but if it goes wrong, it can be disastrous. For example, if you hire one of them and there are problems with their care of your child (say you find out they’ve been negligent or cruel), would you be able to keep that from affecting things at work? What if you have a dispute over pay? Are you comfortable leaving them unattended in your home? And you’ve also got to consider the power dynamics; even though they’re volunteering, there’s a risk they’d still feel obligated to say yes when you ask (or that they’ll be happy to do it once or twice but feel pressured after that). It can also make other workers wonder if you favor or give special access to the people who sit for you.
Some people do this and make it work, but if you want to play it safe, it’s wiser not to cross the streams.
5. Employer wants my identity documents and proof of car insurance
I’ve been in my position for four years, and provided social security card and driver’s license when I first got hired. We have a new HR person who is now requesting that all employees resubmit these docs. I am also required to provide proof of car insurance even though I do not drive or use my car for work.
Any idea why these are being requested? I don’t have any qualms about complying with the request, but I am curious about why we are being asked to do this. When I asked, the answer was these are required for a nonprofit financial audit, but I’m not sure that answer makes sense.
Resubmitting your social security card and driver’s license is likely an audit of I-9 forms, which employers are supposed to have all new employees fill out to verify that they’re legally eligible to work in the U.S. It’s possible that they didn’t keep the right records or that they weren’t consistent about doing it with everyone and so now they’re going back and ensuring everything’s in order.
The car insurance is odder and it sounds overzealous. It would be reasonable to say, “I never drive for work, so this isn’t documentation I’d normally hand over. Can you explain why it’s needed?” If the answer is again “an audit,” you can say, “But specifically what’s the reason for wanting insurance info from people who never drive for work? I’m not clear on why you’d need personal financial documents that don’t intersect with the work I do here.” There’s a decent chance they’ll either drop it or explain further if you push. (I know you said you’re fine with handing it over, but it’s good to at least find out why before you hand over personal info.)
recruiter named a lower salary than the job ad, what do candidates want to know about company culture, and more was originally published by Alison Green on Ask a Manager.
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