Ask a Manager

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

1. Can I suggest that my employee rethink her career path?

One of my direct reports, “Mindy,” has worked for my organization since college; she’s now 31. I joined the staff three years ago and enjoy her a lot as a person: she’s smart, has a wonderful attitude, is very diligent and organized, and brings her best to every project. The problem is that I don’t think she’s on the right career path.

Right now Mindy does communications work. but the issue is that she’s not a very good writer, which is a fundamental skill for the job. We do a lot of writing and it has to be done well, and her pieces require lots of rewriting. After nearly a decade of writing projects, LOTS of coaching from me and her previous manager, plus related degrees, her work still needs endless rounds of revisions and is just overall not good enough.

She wants so badly to do a good job and have a thriving career in this field, though! She has so much potential and I want her to succeed as a professional … but she flat-out doesn’t have some key fundamental skills needed.

However, I think she’d be great at marketing. She’s very good at analyzing and planning, and marketing jobs don’t require the same need to constantly produce really high-level written pieces. I’ve worked in marketing in the past and her strengths would be huge assets for that type of work, and it’s a career that wouldn’t involve the skills that she hasn’t been able to develop. It’s not a job that exists at my organization, though.

We have a good relationship and talk regularly in our check-ins about career growth. Is there a way I can diplomatically tell her that while I don’t think she’s suited for a career based around writing, I think she’d make an excellent marketer? I want to navigate this carefully with her so that she feels supported and respected, even if it means essentially telling her she should consider eventually finding a new job elsewhere.

Bonus related question: I’m at the point where I’m going to outsource a large annual project Mindy is usually very involved with. The quality of her work is poor enough that it will be faster, much less stressful, and will turn out much better if we hire a consultant to do it. Is there a respectful way I can explain that she’s not going to be working on that project anymore because of the quality of her work? Should I even tell her that? I know I wouldn’t be doing her any favors by hiding the reason for hiring the consultant, and I’ve been consistent in addressing her work quality, but I have no idea how to approach that conversation.

Yes, please tell her! In fact, you could use the outsourcing of the annual project as an opening into that conversation — first “here’s what I’m doing and why, and here’s what the issues were when you worked on this in the past” and then “I’ve been reflecting on where you’ve been struggling, and I want to be honest with you that while I know that you’ve been working extremely hard — and frankly you’re a pleasure to work with — I haven’t seen the level of writing that we need for this role. I see your strengths as more ABC, which I think would make you fantastic at projects like XYZ.”

I do think there’s another question here, which is whether you’re going to be able to keep her on at all if she’s not able to work at the level that you need. Ideally, of course, you’d have this conversation, she’d reflect and come to agree, and she’d move in that direction on her own. But if she doesn’t, you’ll need to figure out whether the issues rise to the level of something that jeopardize her current job or not. (Based just on your short letter, it sounds like they may. If that’s the case, since it sounds like you have an excellent and supportive rapport with Mindy, I’d try to do it through a series of candid and supportive conversations that end in a mutual agreement that she will move on — but I’d also be thinking about how you’ll handle it if that mutual agreement doesn’t occur.)

2. Hickies revealed in the locker room

This is more of a philosophical question than anything else. Is it okay to have visible hickies at work if they are normally covered by clothes and only seen when taking off your shirt in the locker room? Technically my coworkers might see that I have a sex life, although locker room etiquette is of course that everyone becomes invisible until their clothes go back on. Still: is this something to avoid?

No one in a locker room should be paying any attention to the parts of your body that are revealed while you’re changing clothes.

That said, there’s a difference between “should” and “will.” If part of your body is covered in what look very much like sex-related bruises … well, assume people may have thoughts about that, so proceed accordingly. They certainly shouldn’t say anything to you about it, but is that info you want your coworkers to have in their heads about you? If it’s a single small bruise, it’s almost certainly a non-issue, but I can imagine things that would be significantly more revealing than that. (For example, if your ass bears evidence that you’re into spanking, it’s better for everyone if you use a non-work gym that week.)

Related:
is it unprofessional to have hickeys at work?

3. Wearing pimple patches at work

I want to get your take on wearing pimple patches at work. I have a new employee who is Gen Z who wears pimple patches on her face, sometimes multiples of them, at a time. Our workplace is corporate with a semi-strict dress code, but it often goes fairly ignored. For example: the dress code says no leggings, but people often wear them, including my boss. Also, the dress code says no sneakers but people often wear stylish sneakers.

I wear pimple patches all the time, but wouldn’t wear them myself at work. We frequently conduct meetings via Zoom, and I feel like this comes across as unprofessional, but I could be off in terms of whether this is acceptable to another generation or other cultures.

It really depends on the office, but the culture has definitely moved toward seeing pimple patches the same way as bandages (i.e., fine to wear at work).

Particularly if they’re clear or flesh-colored, I’d mentally categorize them as bandages and ignore. If they’re brightly colored, it gets more into questions about your particular office culture (and if you’re unsure how it’s playing there, I might ask someone senior to you whose judgment you respect if it feels out of sync in your particular office).

4. My boss keeps using WhatsApp, Signal, and texts to contact me

I have a new boss (about two months) who pretty much never replies to emails. She’ll WhatsApp/Signal chat me instead. This is definitely not the culture, and I personally find it really annoying as I usually only use these apps for personal reasons or if there’s an urgent issue. She’ll also text me after hours / on weekends for not time-sensitive stuff. Sometimes it is actually urgent so I can’t mute her and check on my own schedule. Having to monitor three channels of communications with her is exhausting, especially as someone who’s trying to keep better work/life boundaries, and logistically annoying because if I’m trying to refer back to something, it’s not as easy as just searching one platform for the conversation. That said, she’s not aggressive or scary like some other bosses who text at all hours.

Is there a way I can ask her to stick to email unless it’s time (or otherwise) sensitive, or as the lower in the hierarchy do I have to just accept her way as a new annoyance of my job? I am pretty senior in my organization but she is clearly above me in the hierarchy There are other issues with her management style which I don’t find to be the most strategic, but not to the level of my considering quitting over.

Yes, you can say something! I’d frame it this way: “I don’t really use WhatsApp or Signal so I’ve been missing messages when you contact me there. Could we stick with email so I can be sure I see everything you send me?”

And the next time she texts you after-hours, wait a while before responding (to reinforce that it’s not work time) and then say, “I’m going to move this to email so it’s with our work messages; I’m trying to keep work stuff off my phone. I’ll email about this shortly!” Do that enough and it might retrain her.

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

1. Our marketing team refuses to do projects for us, then complains if we do them ourselves

I’m one of several who create new educational resources for our target audience. Like most companies, we have a graphic design/marketing department that designs and approves anything that’s going to be seen by the public. Well, they’re supposed to.

Most of my work is in response to current events, so I might make a new guide for our customers who want to learn more about XYZ. I’ll do the research and most of the formatting, and I’m supposed to send it off to the marketing department so they can make it look nice and uniform with our branding before advertising/publishing. Makes sense!

Not once have they ever “had time” to work on my team’s products. We always end up reformatting off of a years old template so we can get things out in time. We then get grumbling complaints from the marketing department that we didn’t do it right. But of course we didn’t! We don’t even have access to Adobe Suite, let alone the training to do actual graphic design!

This is not a timeline issue either; we always send out heads-up and check-ins on these projects weeks or months before we need to deliver them. They don’t respond, say they don’t have time, or send an older version of the product for us to update ourselves.

I have gone as far as escalating this issue to the CEO in the past. The projects I’m working on often come directly from them, and so I report these struggles all the way up the chain. Nothing has ever been done about it no matter how many times they agree with me that it’s “necessary.” I feel crazy and don’t know what communication strategy could possibly make a difference here. Please help!

You need to escalate it again. When whoever you escalate it to agrees that some kind of intervention is “necessary,” you should say, “Can we talk through exactly what the next steps are? In the past there’s been general agreement that it needs to change, but it hasn’t been resolved. I’m concerned that everyone agrees this is a problem, but it doesn’t get fixed and it continues on.”

You could also try saying that since you can’t get what you need from the marketing team, you want to be able to start sending work out to an external designer. Who knows, maybe they’ll let you — in which case, your part of this could be mostly solved. If they say you can’t do that, then you can say, “If that route isn’t possible, then can you intervene with the marketing team so that they will agree to do the work we need? Or is there a third option I’m not thinking of?”

Worst case scenario, continue with doing their work yourself (as you have been) and when marketing grumbles about how it looks, you can say, “I agree, I would have had your team do it but you continually say you’re not available. Given that, what do you suggest we do differently?”

I do want to be clear that none of these may solve the problem if your senior management is unwilling to act, but they’re all reasonable routes to try. (I also am assuming that you’ve sat down with the head of the marketing team directly and talked through the issues you’re having. But if for some reason you haven’t done that, that would be step one.)

2. I’m having second thoughts about the new job I’ve already accepted

I was offered a job in January with a partner organization after a quite long recruitment process (I had started interviewing when it seemed my current role was more at risk; now it is safer). I signed the offer letter, pending contract negotiation, with a start date of May 1. I had been very undecided about taking the job, but I thought the decision would be better taken with the contract in hand and everything on the table. The new role has been sending welcome emails about onboarding, pretty much since January. It’s been an excruciatingly busy time at my current role, and to be honest I was slightly too stressed to think much about it. I have to give my formal notice today, or at least this week. Last week I asked for a delayed start date — mid-May — and they said yes. (They still haven’t sent a contract.)

I know if I pull out of the new job now it will absolutely burn a bridge with a close partner organization, and with people I will have to see/work with regularly. But having made the decision to leave almost by omission (which is absolutely my own fault), I don’t want to leave. I love my colleagues, they have been nothing but supportive, I really like the organization, and my manager is wonderful and kind. Even through all this leaving chaos he has been kind — he’s said that after I give my notice, if at any time I feel I change my mind and want to stay, that’s fine (and welcome), until I actually leave.

I have no clue what to do. I am not sure why I’m finding this so difficult (the new job is more money, a decent promotion, and likely less stressful than my current job), but for the last weeks I’ve been having near-panic attacks thinking about leaving. I feel a lot of shame about the way I’ve handled this, with regards to both sides, and I am not sure what to do — whether it’s better to burn that bridge (and maybe regret not trying something new?), or just try to own the decision and go. My current role won’t be able to be recruited (we’re in a financial crunch, and there’s a hiring freeze), and I’m dreading telling colleagues in other teams that the work we’ve been doing together, that my role supports, will now no longer be happening. (Slightly tortuous analogy, but say we’re a teapot company, and I’m one of three people liaising with the international teapot convention to promote our teapots, with primary responsibility for red teapots. Now our teams working on red teapots will have less support, and the red teapot parts of the international teapot convention will not have our organization’s participation).

You haven’t really said much about why you’re suddenly reconsidering the move! Is it just that you’re feeling sad about leaving a job and people you like (which is very normal, even when leaving is the right move), or are you have doubts about the new job/company/manager? To figure this out, I think you’ve got to really dig into that more in-depth and sort out whether this is fear of change or if something about the new job is giving you pause. If it’s that you accepted the new job solely because you thought you needed a new job, and now you realize that you don’t … well, it’s not too late to undo that.

If it’s really just that you dread telling people you’re leaving … that’s not a reason not to go. But if leaving is no longer in your best interests, that’s a whole different thing. You’ve just got to figure out which it is.

3. Should I escalate my coworker’s misuse of a contact list?

I run a pretty popular newsletter out of our overall company. Mine happens to be tailored to specific topics and has a few different versions — for anonymity, let’s say they’re all about llamas, and each version is about a different aspect of llamas, like grooming, feeding, health, etc. A bunch of people run various newsletters out of the same account of the software we use because at one point, we were all in the same department. This particular coworker has moved to a different department, but still uses that account because her contact lists are still housed there and she still has to send her same newsletter notices out. It’s never been an issue — we all do our own thing with our own lists and leave everything else alone.

I recently discovered that she sent one of her notices to her own list and one of my lists because the topics somewhat overlapped and her lists don’t have many subscribers. Say one of mine focuses on grooming, but only on specific brushes. She was sending out a grooming newsletter notice, and wanted it to get to more people, so she included my contact list as well.

I’m … really uncomfortable with this. It’s technically within the law because the same entity gathered their info (at least I think so), but they didn’t sign up for her notices. They specifically signed up for my newsletter which is pretty niche. I’ve worked hard to both procure and keep my subscribers — I have a very high open rate (more than 70% in 2024!) and a very low unsubscribe rate. I’m very careful to not email that list more than the monthly email that they originally signed up for.

But ultimately, the information she sent does technically apply to them and it’s good information for them to have. It’s just not what they signed up for. She and I both have excellent reputations in our company, and we definitely aren’t adversaries in any way, but we also just never clicked that well so I don’t feel that comfortable talking to her about it myself. My supervisor knows about it and I don’t think he liked it either but he couldn’t really do much since she’s no longer in our department. I could let our department lead know, and I think he’d agree that’s not something we should be doing and would have her department lead talk to her, but I can’t decide if it’s worth escalating. Ultimately, there’s no harm done, and I didn’t get any unsubscribes from her doing it.

I guess I need a vibe check. Am I overreacting and should just let it go as no harm done, or should I bring it up because really, it’s a misuse of information that we should not be doing?

You’re not overreacting, and you should escalate it. It’s not about getting your coworker in trouble for using your list; she may not even have done anything wrong. Rather, it’s about needing protocols for how lists should be used and when one list can “borrow” another’s subscribers. It’s in your company’s interests to have policies that make it clear what can/can’t be done in that regard, so people aren’t left to decide on their own — and this incident highlighted that currently there’s not enough direction about that. Raise it as a concern and suggest clarifying rules for when/if/how this can be done.

4. Coworker’s microphone doesn’t work well

This is really a small stakes question. My coworker has a microphone that always takes 2-5 minutes to “warm up.” That means when she speaks, her voice is not really audible to anyone on the call for several minutes. The issue always resolves itself with time— it doesn’t seem like any sort of manual intervention or troubleshooting is necessary. This has been going on for a year. It just seems like an inefficient way to start calls consistently. She is in a role where she often leads meetings or is expected to chime in on calls.

I’m not her boss or lead, I’m just a coworker. In the hierarchy, I would say we’re at the same level in different departments. Due to a departure, her manager is currently a really high-up VP who 1) I really don’t think wants to be involved in mic management and 2) likely doesn’t meet with my coworker enough to notice the issue.

Would it be rude of me to suggest she get a new headset/ microphone/ etc. ? My company is cheap, so it may end up being an out-of-pocket expense (I paid for my own headset/ mic because the ones IT sent me to use were used and unclean in a concerning way), but I feel like decent mics don’t have to be wildly expensive these days. I splurged a bit on mine because I also use it for personal use.

It wouldn’t be out line. Just be matter-of-fact: “I think your mic may need to be replaced. I’ve noticed we consistently cannot hear you for the first 2-5 minutes of every call. It seems to eventually warm up and fix itself, but we can’t hear what you’re saying at the start of calls so I suspect it needs to be replaced.”

You don’t need to get into whether she needs to buy her own or not. Just alert her to the issue and let her take it from there.

5. Injury while off the clock but on a work trip

I was recently on a work trip for a conference in a tourist destination. I had some time to kill between the end of the conference and my flight home, so I went to do some sightseeing. I narrowly missed being hit by a car while crossing the street — it was a close call but thankfully no harm done! It got me thinking though, would I have been eligible for workers’ comp had I been injured? Yes, I was there for a work trip but was doing personal stuff for fun that I didn’t log that time on my timesheet.

I’m not an expert in this area but from what I can tell, there’s not a clear-cut answer. Some sources that say that it depends on whether you were acting within the scope of your employment, and others say simply by being on the trip you were acting in furtherance of a work-related activity. So I suspect it will depend on the specific facts of the case.