May 2018

why do so many parents give terrible work advice to their kids?

It’s undoubtedly true that some parents, somewhere, give their adult children excellent guidance on jobs and work life. But based on the letters I get at Ask a Manager, I can say with confidence that many, many parents are steering their kids oddly astray when it comes to navigating work life. Sometimes this takes the […]

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how to take feedback gracefully, without getting defensive

I’m off for Memorial Day, so here’s an older post from the archives. This was originally published in 2007 (and was one of the very first posts here!). If your manager takes the time to give you feedback, looking petulant and defensive and perhaps even outright pissed off is not a useful response. It’s not that you just […]

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weekend free-for-all – May 26-27, 2018

This comment section is open for any non-work-related discussion you’d like to have with other readers, by popular demand. (This one is truly no work and no school.) Book recommendation of the week: My Ex-Life, by Stephen McCauley. Two former spouses, one gay and one straight, reconnect decades later when both of their new lives […]

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Ask a Manager in the media

Here’s a round-up of Ask a Manager in the media recently… * An interview on the BBC’s Business Matters * An interview with Gretchen Rubin about happiness * Some answers for Girls Night In about self-care at work * An interview with the New York Post about embracing fear at work * Five questions with […]

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open thread – May 25-26, 2018

It’s the Friday open thread! The comment section on this post is open for discussion with other readers on anything work-related that you want to talk about. If you want an answer from me, emailing me is still your best bet*, but this is a chance to talk to other readers. * If you submitted […]

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update: my mother is a destructive force in my professional life

Remember the letter-writer a few years ago whose mother was contacting companies on social media to tell them to hire her daughter, despite our letter-writer asking her to stop? The first update is here, about how the mom was financially controlling the letter-writer on top of everything else, and here’s a new update. I was thinking […]

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