It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. Am I old-fashioned about lateness?
I feel it is non-negotiable that — except for cases of emergency, sick kids, traffic jams — employees should be at work on time the vast majority of days. This means getting to work about 10 minutes early in time to hang up a coat, use the bathroom, etc., and be at one’s desk/station when the hour begins. I feel like most employees and many managers do not so much care about this or, if they do, they don’t say anything to late employees. I have worked with colleagues who regularly show up 10-20 minutes late and no one seems to care. I’m not talking about flex-time jobs. Are my standards old-fashioned?
Not just old-fashioned, but genuinely out-of-date!
In lots of jobs, it just doesn’t matter if you’re at your desk at 9:00 or 9:10 because it has zero impact on the results you get. There are other jobs where it does matter — for example, if you cover the phones and you’re not there at the start of business hours so someone else has to answer them for you — but they’re increasingly in the minority these days.
The only relevant question is: Does it affect the person’s work results or someone else’s work? If yes, then you address the specific impact it’s having. But if the answer is no, then you’re adhering to an outdated idea of what excellent work should look like. And hassling someone who’s performing well over 10 minutes — or god forbid, for using the bathroom or chatting with a colleague before they sit down — is a good way for managers to demonstrate that they don’t value the right things and send them in search of a manager who does.
2. Should managing an entry-level staffer be this much work?
I work for a consulting firm that deals with a flurry of client demands and ever changing deadlines. I’ve needed extra support for a while, and we recently hired someone to support my portfolio. I was thrilled to get this person on board but here’s the issue — this staff member is entry level. They had strong references and great internship experience but I really underestimated how much time I would need to spend managing this person’s work. I figured we’d spend a lot of time on training but they’ve been working for me for months now, and I end up having to redo their work all the time. The one time I tried to take a step back from the heavy editing, my client called me to complain about the quality of work. Somehow, since we’ve hired this person, I’m now working longer hours than ever and frequently spend my evenings redoing their work and then the next mornings trying to explain my edits, and then my evenings reviewing their latest versions and finalizing it for the client. In between all of this, I’m still trying to stay on top of my own tasks.
Is this normal for managing entry level staff? If so, how can I manage my expectations? I’m just so stressed and overwhelmed that I wish I had never asked for additional staff.
No, it’s not normal. Managing entry-level staff is a significant time commitment; they’ll need training, supervision, feedback, and regular check-ins. But if the person was hired to give you extra support, then after an intensive initial period, it should produce a net time savings for you. Otherwise, there’s not much point to doing it.
It could be that the person just isn’t the right match for the work you need done (maybe hiring someone inexperienced wasn’t the way to go, or maybe this particular person just wasn’t the right one), or it could be that they need more/different training than what they’ve had, or maybe you’re giving them higher-level work than is suited for the role and you need to re-envision what they can help you with. If you have a decent manager, ideally she’d be helping you figure out what’s going on and where to go from here — but the outcome shouldn’t be that your support person means you’re doing more work than ever.
3. Disclosing dyslexia at a new job
I’m dyslexic. Early in my career it caused me a huge amount of stress — people were constantly getting upset and lecturing me about typos (stuff that spellcheck can’t capture, think “form/from”) that I literally couldn’t see. I never mentioned my dyslexia and it took a lot to overcome the perception that I was sloppy. Despite that, I advanced in my career and it became less of an issue because of my seniority. But it wasn’t until my current position that, for a combination of reasons (my boss, a copy editing team, etc.) it stopped feeling like something was handing over my head. I also, a couple years ago, started mentioning to people on my team that I was dyslexic and that has made it even easier to deal with.
Now I am contemplating a new, even more senior role with a new organization and I’m finding myself very nervous about it becoming an issue again. I don’t feel like “are you going to think less of me if there are typos in some of my emails?” is a question I can ask in an interview process. But is there anything I can say or do when I start to get ahead of this? I’m hesitant to mention I’m dyslexia to people who don’t know me well, because people tend to associate it with not being smart.
I think you can be very matter-of-fact about this once you start a new job! For example: “I’m dyslexic, which means I often can’t spot typos in my work. In the past I’ve handled that by having anything I write that’s important or for an outside audience be proofread. What’s the best way to go about that here?” And: “That also means you may see typos from me in informal, internal emails. I want you to know up-front it’s not lack of care.”
Most places will be happy to accommodate you on this — especially in the more senior roles you’re in now. A lot of senior people rely on others to proofread or edit their communications (because their skills are often in other areas); that’s not unusual at all. Your accomplishments in getting you to this senior role will speak a lot louder than the dyslexia will.
4. When to tell my office I won’t be returning when they reopen
I have been at my current job for a decade. Under normal circumstances it’s a job that would require my physical presence at my workplace at least 75% of the time, but with the pandemic and people not congregating in spaces, the nature of my job has changed and it’s all remote.
I’m currently working from a different city that is not within regular commuting distance of my job (which my office knows; I’ve been staying with family for child care assistance and extra space). My partner and I have recently decided that we will move here permanently. We’re currently in the process of buying a house and putting down roots here. At the moment that doesn’t interfere with my day to day work, but when my workplace eventually reopens I will inevitably have to resign.
At what point should I let my job know my plans? Do I wait until they start requiring people be in the office (that’s a moving target and could be January or it could be June)? Once we move into our new home (which may become evident on video calls)? I’m inclined towards something sooner but then am not sure how to word it. While I’m excited at the prospect of a new job after 10 years, I’m also not eager to job hunt in a new city during a pandemic and would like to stay on as long as it’s reasonable for my position.
The concern with raising it now is that if they know you’ll be resigning once they reopen, you risk being pushed out earlier than you want to leave, especially if they need to make cuts at some point. And they’ll need to hire your replacement, which might not be on the timeline you’d prefer. Given that, I’d be very cautious about announcing anything that makes it clear you won’t be continuing in your job once they reopen.
And really, it’s okay to keep this to yourself for now — just like you wouldn’t need to announce that you were planning resign in six months for grad school, or wouldn’t need to announce you were job searching and planning to leave as soon as you found something better. You’re entitled to wait until there’s a reopening date that looks real and give them notice at that point (and it won’t need to be “we moved permanently three months ago”; it can just be “we’ve decided to stay here”).
But I also understand wanting to be transparent. If they treat people well and you have no reason to worry they’d push you out earlier than you’d want to leave, that’s something of a counter-weight to the above … but I’d argue that at this particular moment in time, it’s extra important to be cautious when something could affect your income. Ultimately, though, you have to decide how concerned you are about that risk.
(If it were possible for you to continue remotely when they reopen, this would be a completely different answer but it sounds like that’s not the case.)
5. Keeping in touch with a coworker who got laid off when I didn’t
A small group of us in my department were told we were being downsized. I’d been at the company over five years but was not very close with anyone on the team except for one person, “Zoya,” who’s been there as long as I’ve been alive. She and I worked together on a number of projects and I even gave her training on a couple occasions. She was such a ray of sunshine in the office, always happy and enthusiastic, and before our individual meetings with HR, I sent her an email telling her I’d miss her and asking for a personal email address so we could keep in touch.
Now the awkward part. When I went into my meeting about the layoffs, HR told me I could choose a transfer and a promotion to another department, due to a frankly miraculous serendipity that had someone retire out of this other department just as our department was being downsized. I had the option to accept severance, but in addition to the stability of guaranteed employment, the new job actually fits my degree and qualifications 100%.
I’d like to contact Zoya, and certainly don’t want her thinking I only asked for her email as a pure formality, and I had also suggested she find me on Facebook. Trouble is, of course, if she does, she’ll see that I got to keep my job while she didn’t. And if I just email her, it seems like it has to come up as I update her on what’s going on with me. As I mentioned, she’s been at the company my whole life, and most of the team knew I was fresh out of grad school when I started and was technically overqualified. I don’t think she would be shocked, least of all hurt, by this turn of events, but I’m very socially awkward and just keep coming up blank on how to initiate contact with her in a way that won’t be somehow hurtful. She was near tears at the announcement that we were all being let go, and especially with the uncertain times we’re in, I almost feel guilty over my good fortune. Yet I really don’t want to ghost on her, either.
All you can do is be straightforward! For example: “I wanted to check in and see how you’re doing. (More here — about how you’re doing, updates on things you’ve shared, or so forth.) I also wanted to let you know that I ended up staying on at (company). At the last minute, they ended up moving me into the X role in the Y department, so I’m still here. It’s obviously a relief, but I miss our old team. I’d love to stay in touch; you were always one of my favorite people to work with.”
You don’t need to dance around the news or feel guilty about it; it’s okay to just come out and say it.Even if she has a moment of “why not me?” she’s likely to be glad for you. (And if she’s not, you still don’t need to feel guilty; you didn’t lay her off, and no one would expect you to turn down the job out of solidarity.)
why are people so relaxed about lateness, should managing be this much work, and more was originally published by Alison Green on Ask a Manager.
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