interviewee left and never returned, employee announced (rather than asking for) a schedule change, and more
It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. Interviewee left and never returned
I had a strange occurrence during an interview and I wasn’t sure if I handled it correctly. My boss and I were interviewing a candidate for an entry-level professional position over Teams. I thought the interviewee was doing well, and then I asked them a question about their writing skills. They thought about it for a minute, didn’t provide an answer, and then were suddenly gone. We waited about 15 minutes for them to rejoin the meeting, and they never did. They also never reached back out to explain what happened.
Should we have tried to email them or otherwise reach out? Our thought is that they should have tried to contact us if they were having some sort of technology issue. Also, maybe they had some sort of emergency, but I would have thought that they would have at least let us know what happened (it’s now been several days). We assumed they just weren’t interested in the position, but why would they just leave without warning (the interview was only supposed to be about 30 minutes long and we were almost done, if that makes a difference)?
Most likely it was anxiety or nerves. They wouldn’t be the first person to get overwhelmed with nerves during an interview and handle it by just … dropping off without explanation.
If it were anything else (like technical issues or a moose suddenly charging into their kitchen), then yes, I’d assume they’d contact you afterwards to explain that. You weren’t obligated to try to get back in touch with them, although there wouldn’t have been anything wrong with doing that if you’d wanted to (although frankly, if it was nerves, they probably appreciated that you didn’t).
2. Employee announced a schedule change, rather than asking about it
I’ve been in my first supervisory role for a year and a half. One of my employees has always very openly resented me asking for status updates, reviewing her work, or basically managing her in any way. I’ve focused on not taking it personally, picking my battles, and sticking to clear expectations, but haven’t directly addressed her rudeness. It’s not just me; her behavior has made other employees upset enough to change their in-office days to avoid her.
She emailed me today: “I need to change my in-office schedule from Tuesdays to Wednesdays. My son is starting school next week and will be needing transportation. Kind regards, Employee Name.”
We need to coordinate which team members come in which days to ensure someone is always here to greet walk-in customers (and her son is an adult). I think her proposed schedule is fine, but the way she talks to me is part of a larger unprofessional pattern.
I’ve tried to talk to her in 1:1s about how her palpable irritation bothers people and ask what I can do to help her better adjust to having me supervise her. I think I’m having trouble discussing it head-on because I’m younger than her and still feel relatively inexperienced in management. What can you do about staff members with politeness/professionalism/communication problems? How do you address this?
I think you’re falling into a very common manager trap: this employee is clearly problematic in multiple ways and you’ve got to address that more assertively, but this particular email isn’t the thing to focus on. I know you’re reading it as “she should be asking me that, not announcing it” — and that’s reasonable, but since you’re actually fine with her proposed schedule change, that’s not worth focusing on. At most you could reply with something reinforcing that you do need to consider and approve schedule changes (for example, “I’ve taken a look at our coverage needs and I can approve that starting next week”) but don’t get sidetracked on it. The far, far bigger issues are the other ones in your letter, particularly whatever she’s doing that’s causing people not to want to be in the office with her. I’d take your reaction to this email as a sign that you’ve erred in not addressing those issues more head-on previously and move to start doing that.
It’s hard to give specific advice about how to do that without knowing exactly what her behavior looks like but these may point you in the right direction:
my employee has a bad attitude
how to manage a difficult employee who does good work
my employee is snippy with people and dramatic about stress
my employee identifies proudly as a grump
employee gives me the silent treatment when I give him feedback
3. Would working as a receptionist at a legal brothel affect my job chances?
I’m currently a university student who is studying towards a government finance job and/or a high finance job (think Wall Street or ultra high net worth firms) and I’m wondering if doing part-time work as a receptionist at a legal brothel would impact my chances of getting into them. Even if I do not write it in my resume, they might come up during background or credit checks. Is this something that can jeopardize my chances of getting into internships or huge firms/government jobs?
Unfortunately, yes. Legal or not, working at a brothel is still seen as way too edgy for conservative fields like finance.
Related:
interview with a former receptionist at a legal brothel
4. Is this a bad raise?
After an “outstanding” first year in an administrative position at an Ivy League university, I received a “merit increase” of just over 3%.
On the one hand, given the current political environment, the fact that layoffs occurred in our school (but not our department) last fall, and life just generally being too expensive, I’m appreciative.
However, I came here from a state school in an economically depressed area with a staggeringly lower cost of living where I never got a raise lower than 5%. Prior to that, I worked in a field where raises were generally 10-20%.
However x2, this is technically my second raise of the year. HR didn’t want to give me my raise all at once, so I received part starting in June and part in September. Thus, I’ve technically received an 8% raise, which is more reasonable.
However x3 … who splits raises? I led some pretty strong projects and initiatives. If they want to recognize that monetarily, shouldn’t I have received two “good” raises vs this split one? This place is strange sometimes.
For what it’s worth, our HR and management are notoriously … less than capable. But the job and team are fantastic. I’m just trying to decide if staying means I can continue to afford non-recalled bread.
The average annual raise in the U.S. is 3% to 4% so a 3% raise in a year that also had layoffs isn’t bad at all. And an 8% raise spread out over the year is excellent. None of this seems problematic to me! I think you’re being thrown off by comparing it to your former field, which is very much outside of the norm.
5. Talking to my boss about my memory issues
I had a medical incident that affected my memory three years ago (a stroke that caused damage to the memory part of my brain when I was 28) and I have combined-type ADHD, which affects my memory in different ways. Five months ago, I changed career paths (going from a site management type role into an individual contributor analyst role) and I’ve found that the combination of learning new skills/processes/new industry with many clients and due dates, etc., combined with my memory loss and ADHD processing, is leading me to become more and more forgetful. I’m medicated, I’m working with a psychologist on techniques, and it will improve somewhat as I get more comfortable in the role, but there is no real fix, and things like fatigue will always make it worse.
I’ve missed two important due dates lately and forgotten some small but important details. I’m trying very hard to use my techniques (Kanban planning board, writing everything down, developing double checks), but it’s a what-you-don’t-know-you-can’t-catch type situation. I want to sit down with my manager and say something like, “I know I missed a couple of things lately. I want you to know I’m working very hard on developing techniques, with external support, to prevent it happening again, but it’s not a lack of care or capability; it’s actually my brain damage and there isn’t an immediate fix.” My manager has never been angry with me and is a really great supporter, but I’m still concerned it will influence his perception of me and my capability. However, I feel that not saying anything could also do that by making him think I’m just careless/forgetful. Should I tell him? And if so, how should I word it?
It’s useful to say “I see this and I’m working on it,” but I would be less specific than your proposed language. It’s enough to just say, “I know I’ve missed a couple of things lately, and I want you to know that I’m aware of it and working to ensure it doesn’t keep happening.” If you want, you could add, “Part of it may be medical and I’m working with external support on that. Mainly I just wanted you to know that I’m aware of it and focused on it.”
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