my new employee is “disappointed” with his job

by Alison Green on May 6, 2025

A reader writes:

I’m a new-ish manager in a small company. I have two direct reports. One is professional and a joy to work with. The other is a recent hire (he’s been here two months) who is right out of college, Jake.

In our most recent weekly one-on-one, Jake told me that he is “disappointed in the role” and the work is “not as interesting as he hoped.” I can understand how someone could find much of the work tedious. There’s a significant amount of data entry in the position. But I never hid this. I was clear with every candidate I interviewed that there would be tedious tasks and screened for people who seemed able to figure out strategies for handling that tedium.

I’m wondering where to go from here. Jake was not able to give me any clear idea about what he wants the role to be instead, and even if he could, I hired him for the job he’s doing now.

Part of me also feels like he hasn’t given this a fair shake. He’s only been here two months! A lot of those tedious tasks will start taking up less of his time as he gets better at them so he can expand other parts of the role, and I have told him that this is what I expect.

And lastly, I’m not sure how much investment I want to put into someone who has expressed such disinterest so early. He has also had a couple of attitude problems that I have been addressing (he can come across as entitled and arrogant, which is not a good look for the most junior member of our staff), but those by themselves, I felt were coachable.

I answer this question over at Inc. today, where I’m revisiting letters that have been buried in the archives here from years ago (and sometimes updating/expanding my answers to them). You can read it here.

You may also like:
{ 127 comments }

{ 127 comments… read them below }

  1. BW*

    Dear Jake: Welcome to the real world.

    My mother always told me, “Nobody said you had to like your job. You just have to be good at it so they pay you so you have money to do the things you like.” It sounds like Jake was expecting to be incredibly fulfilled and doing all the fun things that never actually happen in a job.

    1. Beth*

      This seems normal to me for a new grad! People go to college in part because they expect it to allow them to access a fulfilling career path. One aspect of that is money, but lots of people graduate hoping for interesting work that they like doing. People figure out what’s actually realistic as they do their first post-college job hunt, and that first role is often disappointing.

      Where Jake is going wrong is, you don’t TELL your manager the work is more tedious than you expected unless 1) you have good reason to think the work can change, or 2) you’re planning on leaving, so it doesn’t matter if you make your manager nervous.

      1. Antilles*

        Indeed. Even in careers where your degree is directly related to your job, there’s going to be plenty of time spent on stuff like “filling out paperwork” and “sitting in meetings” which weren’t on any syllabus and certainly not on your expectations for job duties.
        Given that the original letter is half a decade old, I would guess that Jake has figured out that this is just how jobs work and you just have to deal with it.

      2. Amy Purralta*

        I do feel bad for new graduates, you don’t really know what a job is like until you start it. I did a work placement as part of my degree and it showed me I did not want to be a teacher as I had planned. I then did a number of temp roles, these were useful as it showed me what type of job I did and didn’t like. I fell into my career and had no previous knowledge as such. I come from a working class family with no qualifications, so I had no idea what some none manual jobs were out there apart from the obvious Teacher, Doctor, Lawyer etc.
        I think I can count on 2 hands the number of people I know who actually work in the speciality their degree is in.

        1. Antilles*

          This is why I think students should be encouraged to do co-ops or internships if feasible. It’s not a perfect match for being a permanent employee, but you will at least get a decent look at what the role actually looks like.

    2. Sashaa*

      Yep, other ones I’ve heard are “that’s why they call it ‘work’ and not ‘fun’”, and “that’s why they have to pay people to do it”.

      Obviously you should try to find a job you don’t loathe, but not many people rush back from vacation, desperate to head back into work.

      1. Thin Mints didn't make me thin*

        A former boss used to say “This is why they call it work and not beer.”

    3. Dadjokesareforeveryone*

      I think people need to both accept that your job likely won’t be terribly fun or personally fulfilling, and that if you are actively unhappy with what you’re doing that it’s ok to find a different job that you can at least feel neutral about. Besides home work is the place people usually spend the most time at, that’s too much of your life to spend miserable.

    4. BridgeofFire*

      Or as I’ve also heard “It’s called work because it’s work. If it was something you truly enjoyed, it would be called a hobby.” Liking your job is all well and good, but there’s a REASON people expect to be paid for their work, rather than just doing it for the good of it.

    5. Kt*

      Dear Boomers,

      Welcome to the inevitable conclusion of the ‘dream job’ rhetoric you’ve been spouting at graduates for decades.

      1. I Have RBF*

        LOL. Most boomers know better than that. Generation Jones, at least, tells you “Get a job you can tolerate, save your enthusiasm for your family and hobbies.”

        1. Eldritch Office Worker*

          They know better than that for themselves, but they definitely led the marketing campaign.

      2. Esmae*

        If I never hear “Get a job you love and you’ll never work a day in your life” again, it’ll still be too soon.

        2. I Have RBF*

          Seriously. It was BS when it first came out, and it’s BS now.

          The fastest way to ruin a hobby is to make a career out of it.

        3. AJB*

          That saying also drives me nuts. I have a job I love but it is still work. Most days are enjoyable and I do feel like I’m making a difference. But some days are hard and there are parts of my job that are tedious.

        4. amoeba*

          “Get a job you love and you’ll never work a day in your life because you’ll be unemployed forever” is the version I’ve heard for some fields at least, ha.

      3. Retired Vulcan Raises 1 Grey Eyebrow*

        imo it’s not a particular generation that has been spouting that, just a privileged upper middle class group detached from the reality most of us face who like to make asinine pronouncements.

        For me (and all the fellow boomers I know), the aim was to find a career in a field I could tolerate for 35 years, paid for a decent standard of living and had good job security.
        We all expected to work “for a long time, not a good time”, like the jail quote.

        1. Disappointed with the Staff*

          Engineering school was full of (especially men) who wanted a reliable career that would let them do other things in their spare time. A well paid one, so they could do expensive fun things. It’s not supposed to be exciting, exciting leads to working outside office hours. The ideal job is a well-paid niche that’s somewhat interesting and has little competition despite being absolutely essential.

      4. GreenApplePie*

        I’ve met plenty of millennials telling me to “do what you love and the money will follow” or something similarly naïve.

      5. Millenial Buttercup*

        LOL, my father is a peak Boomer. When I was around 17, I told him I wanted a job where I could make a real difference in the world. He told me to find something that offered good health insurance instead.

        I feel for Jake, although this is an old letter now. A couple months after getting my first office job in a similar vein, I realized it was all kinda meaningless. Sure, I technically helped our office run smoothly, and that helped other people’s jobs run more smoothly, but I never had anything to point to say, “I did this!” I wasn’t creating, or building, or problem-solving. When I’d worked in food service previously, I knew I was meeting a need by feeding people. This was supposed to be “better” on the social & financial scale, and it just… wasn’t.

        I wasn’t looking for thrilling or important work, but the corporate rat race hits hard, especially when you’re on the low end and not making much money. I filed papers no one ever looked at again, did data entry that got used and then ignored in corporate board meetings, and mostly existed to be a scapegoat for my boss. That was a rough transition coming out of college where everything was about gaining knowledge and bettering ourselves.

        It’s been years, and I have a good work/life balance now (and decent health insurance – thanks Dad!), but that reality can be disappointing at first. I’m sure Jake is not the first or the last to be too honest about that at work.

      6. Christine*

        Uh, “boomers” are retired or near so. It’s not they giving career advice en masse, let alone bad advice.

        Besides, how is naming and shaming an entire generation helpful here?

        1. I Have RBF*

          It’s actually BS. “The Boomers” didn’t give that advice, a small group of arrogant influencer (marketing) types did. I assure you that as a late boomer, I just rolled my eyes at that BS, so people should keep their f’ing bus treads off of my back for that codswallop.

          1. Yours sincerely, Raymond Holt*

            Yep this!

            As an older millennial, I’d hate to be bundled in with all the terrible self help/pseudo psyche/etc evidence free garbage that others in my generational bracket have pushed out into the world…

      7. StarTrek Nutcase*

        Even assuming this was started by boomers, it was only ever an aspiration. The follow-up to it is, don’t expect to start in your dream job doing only thrilling duties. Getting to the “dream” takes hard work, dedication, and time. BTW since when does the next generation “really” listen to their parents much less grands.

        IMO it’s the same as grads saying I’ll never be able buy a house – when they usually mean one like their parents’ house, forgetting their parents spent years working their way up to it and also weathered recessions & inflation. And of course, ignoring unlike boomer guys, the new grad hasn’t spent years threatened by a draft.

        1. Generation Catalano*

          Sorry, I’m 43, have made above median wage since I was in my late 20s, have access to generational wealth that got me an incredibly generous down payment for my 600-sq condo in a large North American city with high housing costs that I struggle to handle on my six figure salary on my own and YES, when my younger coworkers say they will never be able to afford a house they are speaking the real truth.

          There are both hardships and smoother parts faced by every generation. AND 20-somethings today have some very serious cost of living challenges as wages have demonstrably not risen in line with cost of living in the last two decades, in a broad swath of industries.

          The “but what about…” ism in this entire thread that seems to suggest no generalizations can be made about broad demographic categories is honestly a lot. Generations are fake! And yet they can be used to discuss real trends at a broad level.

          Millennials and Gen Z were sold a narrative about work that hasn’t proven correct. Sure, it never applied to everyone and not everyone said so. But it is still A Thing and it is okay to discuss it in a broad way without taking personal offense.

    6. Pop Tart*

      It’s not for LW to help Jake “like” his job. It’s for LW to be a decent manager. He can move on if he’s so disenchanted.

    7. Pescadero*

      1) You don’t have to like your job.
      2) Management shouldn’t expect you to like your job, or engage in performative actions faking how much you like it.

      Basically – people shouldn’t expect to be excited and fulfilled by their job, and management should never expect them to ACT like they are.

      1. allathian*

        Yes, this. I’m definitely a work to live person, and while I enjoy my job well enough (40 or so hours a week is too long to spend doing something you hate), I don’t think I’m going to miss it when it’s time for me to retire in 15 years or so.

        I feel rather sorry for people who love their jobs because they’re setting themselves up to be abused by their employers. People who love their jobs often take even constructive feedback about their work as personal criticism because their whole identity is tied to the job. The boss says “The TPS report didn’t go out on time, what happened and what are you going to do to make sure it doesn’t happen again?” and the employee sees it as “I’m a bad person and my boss hates me, and I deserve no better.” Whereas a person who works to live usually has a more detached attitude, “I’m so sorry, the TPS report was ready on time but something came up and I forgot to send it. I’ll set up a reminder in my calendar from now on so it doesn’t happen again.”

        You don’t have to love your job. Save your passion for family, friends, and volunteering. If you work such long hours that you have no time or energy for anything other than work, you’ve fallen in to the live to work trap. If that happens, I’m sorry.

      2. Good Wilhelmina Hunting*

        But they do, and it’s getting worse in the corporate sphere. Once, all I needed to do to get and keep a job was turn up reliably, perform duties as assigned to the required standard, and collect a wage. Then it became very touchy feely, with unquantifiables like “engagement” and “team fit” starting to appear on appraisal forms. First rate skills and solid experience no longer got you an offer, you had to perform enthusiasm. “Must want, rather than need this role.” Yeah, I always wanted to shuffle paper around.

    8. iglwif*

      Yep.

      I used to hire interns in a past job, and when interviewing potential interns I was very up-front about this! I would say something like, “Interns are here to learn and also to help us out. The job is never just tedious grunt work, and but in this industry [publishing], every job has some proportion of tedious work, so you should expect some of that along with more interesting projects.”

  2. Christine*

    Oh, Jake. Right out of college. This is one of countless trials and errors you’ll learn about; in this case, over-sharing. No crime in finding work uninteresting, but the solution is to hunker down, make the best of things, and leave when you can, as cleanly as you can.

  3. Beau D Satva*

    You dont have to drink the ocean to say the water is salty.

    If the new guy feels this isnt the right place, help him redirect outside

    1. MassMatt*

      Maybe. It’s more likely his expectations are unrealistic and he will be disappointed by the next job after two months.

      Two months is really not a lot of time to get to know the job or coworkers.

      1. Annony*

        Maybe. But maybe he needs to learn that for himself. Also, it sounds like this job might be even less exciting than the average job if OP was screening for people who could handle tedious work.

  4. A. Lab Rabbit*

    I am wondering what he thought the role would look like and would ask him that. If there’s a possibility for him to move into that sort of role with your company, it would be worth laying out what he would need to do to actually get to that point. At least then he either has a goal (“Yep, I can do this!”) or a way out (“Nope, that would take too long to do here. Time to look elsewhere”).

    And if that kind of role just isn’t possible with your company, then it will help him come to the realization that either 1) this is just work life, and a lot of it sucks, or 2) it’s time to move on.

    1. pally*

      This is a very good idea! It will also show that manager is taking an interest in the employee. Sure, sometimes the result is the Jakes of the world leave for other jobs.

      2. Skytext*

        Is that the same guy who only wanted a job as an “ideas guy”? Where he got paid a big salary to tell them his super-phenomenal, groundbreaking ideas, but with no expectation of making him do any of the pesky “work” work to actually, ya know, implement these grand ideas?

      1. Citymouse*

        Wow, LW’s boss is awful. I really hope they were able to move on a long time ago.

        1. Momma Bear*

          Same. Sounds like the whole thing caused LW to re-evaluate their place in the company and move on. I can’t blame them.

      2. A Simple Narwhal*

        I hope there’s an update to the update! It didn’t sound like they ended up in a great place, I hope OP found a better place to work.

      3. MigraineMonth*

        Thank you!

        Oh dear. OP did everything right, and their boss just… *sigh*.

  6. Jennifer Strange*

    I feel this is common for someone right out of college. There is an expectation that working will be exciting and challenging – and sometimes it will be! – but in the beginning, when you’re still learning the ropes and mastering things, it’s definitely going to feel a bit tedious. That’s not to say Jake will work there another month or so and suddenly feel fulfilled in his work, but I do think he’ll either feel the work is fulfilling enough for the time being or decide that this kind of work isn’t for him and seek out something new (both valid resolutions!).

    1. OrdinaryJoe*

      Right out of college and into your first ‘adult’ ‘real’ job! It’s boring, low level, tedious and sometimes soul crushing to think about doing it for the next FORTY YEARS LOL But you get better and it gets more fun as you figure things out and find what you like. I remember feeling like this the first 5 or so years.

  7. Beth*

    Is it crazy for me to feel like, “No way Jake would want a planned offboarding”? Even when I’ve known a role was a bad fit and known that I want to leave, I’d be very nervous to agree that I’m leaving in 4 weeks or whatever. That’s not realistically enough time for me to guarantee I’ll have another job. Even when I have enough savings to support a period of unemployment, I think of that as a backup plan for layoffs or for such a bad fit that I’m anticipating getting fired–it takes a lot of work to save that much, I’m not going to volunteer to spend it if I don’t absolutely have to.

    Unless a manager is willing to offer a period of several months as a transition period, it seems really unfair to expect an employee who’s not at risk of being fired to ‘jump at the chance’ to set an end date for a bad fit.

    1. Corrupted User Name*

      But you presumably wouldn’t pointedly tell your boss that the job was “disappointing” and expect her to change that, right? All of the advice is predicated on the employee doing this. If someone is just low key unhappy but doing an ok job, they have a lot more control over their eventual exit – it’s the telling the boss their feelings that leads to a planned offboarding.

      1. Beth*

        That’s true! And from the update someone linked, it looks like Jake was in fact hinting that he’s leaving. I was just surprised to see Alison offering this as a path for OP as if most employees would be happy to receive that message.

    2. Cat Lady in the Mountains*

      Part of the short timeline here is likely because he’s only been in the job for two months. If it were a longer-standing employee I’d usually offer at least 2 months, typically 3, unless I was ready to let them go for performance reasons. But someone this new? It’s a big investment in additional training and oversight to keep them on for longer if it’s clearly not going to work out.

    3. Retired Vulcan Raises 1 Grey Eyebrow*

      With Jake being so unrealistic about work, he might indeed have jumped at the chance, expecting his dream job to roll around the corner the following week.

    4. Yours sincerely, Raymond Holt*

      I agree but I think this conversation would give someone like Jake an important shock, making them realise the implications of what they have communicated.

  8. old lady*

    Yes, welcome to the real world Jake. Any job is going to have tedious tasks. Was there any update for this one?

    1. Festively Dressed Earl*

      Beth posted it above. BLUF: Jake resigned on his own, but LW’s crappy manager rehired Jake P/T and he lingered until the end of the year. Then LW was stuck doing Jake’s work because crappy manager wouldn’t let LW hire a replacement.

    2. Busy Middle Manager*

      Sort of. A lot of tedium has been automated away. People have been inundated with articles and social media posts about how AI is doing all of these fabulous things and replacing jobs (which is a narrative I don’t believe yet, I see companies doing layoffs simply to save money). It’s highly likely it didn’t mentally click that the tedium was indeed real and “AI” isn’t doing the mundane stuff!

  9. Ashley Armbruster*

    Just reminder how when I was a recent grad (’10-’12), multiple bosses would have been like, “you don’t like it, there’s the door!” lol

  10. Richard Hershberger*

    Oh, dear. I find myself compelled to put on my Old Dude hat and start shouting at clouds. So here goes: Suck it up, buttercup. I had a friend in college who talked about being an insurance agent as the best job ever. What made it this way? He knew a guy who had been doing this for decades and had a substantial book of business requiring only routine maintenance. The came out as a very good income with only minimal effort. But of course it was no such thing. There was a lot of effort put into it. It was just that most of this effort had been in the past. He wasn’t handed this when he first started.

    What saves me from terminal Old status is that I don’t think that the Kidz are all like this nowadays, much less that this is anything new. There have always been kids who wanted to start at the top. Most figure it out. Most, both back in the day and today, understand that this isn’t how the world works. I would be interested in an update, to see whether this one figures it out. Because if he doesn’t, he is entirely likely to be disappointed in his next gig, too.

    1. MigraineMonth*

      I think there is a difference between wanting “interesting” work and wanting to “start at the top”. It’s possible that a data-entry role is a bad fit for him, but he’d do well at an equally low-paying entry-level job with a lot more variety, like wedding planner assistant or something.

      Yeah, he should have figured this out before accepting the job. On the other hand, I’ve been working for 15 years and I only just figured out that I’m really bad at sustained “attention to detail”; I always thought that was a strength of mine.

      1. Tea Monk*

        Yes. It took me a long time to realize I’m not really a work person. This is apparently his first job after college? It’s going to take some time to figure himself out.

    2. Busy Middle Manager*

      I don’t think grads necessarily want to start at the top; with the cost of living these days, you need a mid-career salary to barely make rent in the cheapest apartment, living the most basic lifestyle. I think they’re trying to climb quickly out of necessity/desperation

  11. Dust Bunny*

    Archives: We don’t really spend much time solving cold cases or rediscovering national treasures or whatever television has led you to believe. It’s mostly inventories. Which are pretty much data entry.

    1. Dinwar*

      I’ve read complaints about paleontology like that: “I thought it would all be digging up completed skeletons in the desert, but it’s actually a bunch of spreadsheets.” And in remediation, where it’s mostly adequately pulling water samples from wells.

      The ones that last understand that those tedious tasks build up to the fun ones. That a change in a squiggle in a trend line can be significant. The ones that don’t understand that don’t tend to last.

      Two months is pretty quick; usually it’s 18 months or so before folks really get upset about the tedium. That’s the point where you need to make a choice: to stay on and learn to embrace the process, or move on.

      1. Richard Hershberger*

        My teenager is considering studying archaeology. I have assured him that the Indiana Jones movies are documentaries accurately depicting the field.

        OK, not really. What I really told him is that the less it looks like Indiana Jones, the closer it is to real archaeology.

        1. Dust Bunny*

          One of my siblings is an archaeologist and, yes, when it’s not basically data entry it’s 105 degrees and poison ivy.

      2. Arrietty*

        When I read about STEM projects coming to fruition after five, or ten, or thirty years, I can’t fathom being one of the people working on it. Either you leave having never seen the outcome of your work, or you spend an entire career at the same job.

    2. Thinking*

      And when I come in with an inquiry, and the archivist has sooo much knowledge about the subject because of all those inventories, I’m in heaven. Pour your brain out into my ears, please. Thank you for the decades you’ve spent learning this stuff.

      1. Dust Bunny*

        Oh, I love me some inventories. Completing a really thorough, helpful, inventory is so deeply satisfying. But it takes a very high tolerance level for tedium to get there.

  12. Squaredler*

    I used to be involved with hiring for a position that was around 50% direct work with the public and 50% admin/paperwork. We got a lot of applicants that were passionate about the public facing part of the work, but hated the admin piece. I was very, very clear in interviews that the work had a 50/50 split (even to the point of making a sample schedule to show people the breakdown) and that the paperwork piece was vital and could not be skipped. The number of people who quit after a couple of months because “I didn’t realize there’d be so much paperwork” was maddening. I think some people just go into a job with rose colored glasses on, no matter how clear you are.

    1. Busy Middle Manager*

      I think this overlaps with a sense of purpose. My sister complains about paperwork, but that’s because it’s pointless. They write huge amounts of reports by hand for the slim chance the state audits them. Then only a few get cherry picked for an audit. Even if you like paperwork, it can feel tedious/boring if it’s not even being used.

    2. Sleeve McQueen*

      oh yeah – the number of times I’ve been blunt with people in an interview, “This job also entails a fair bit of X, are you ok with that?” and then told absolutely on;y to discover in reality, they were not ok with that. All you can do is warn people.

  13. The Ginger Ginger*

    I think in a situation like this you could also talk about what paths this kind of entry role can open for him. Obviously being clear that this is a year+ (or 2 year +) down the road. If there’s growth potential here where he won’t be doing as much of the tasks he’s less enthused about in a more advanced version of the role you can encourage him to work toward that (while being realistic about how long it would take). That gives you the chance to let him, what you’d look for from someone in his current role to get to where he wants to be, which would be incentive for him to buckle down on those parts he doesn’t love so he can advance beyond it. Letting him plan long term could help in this situation. But if it doesn’t, you’re still in the same spot where Alison’s advice is the right path.

  14. The Ginger Ginger*

    Man, I feel like commenter responses to this would be super different if the job market was okay vs the hellscape it is right now. The additional calculus I’m doing in my brain when I put myself in both Jake and the LW’s position because of the state of things right now is wild.

    1. Purple Stapler*

      I don’t really think so. From the current stories of friends who are HR or hiring managers, early career folks still have unrealistic expectations. And not just early career either. Heck, as I mentioned in comments on the letter about the person who wasn’t fulfilling the RTO requirement at her job, I’ve had friends recently who were fired for not complying with RTO requirements. They were well into their careers.

      1. The Ginger Ginger*

        yeah but in a different time, if I were Jake, I’d say – 2 months isn’t long but if it’s not a fit best to let it go and look for something else. Now? You see a lot of suck it ups in the comments, and I don’t disagree. It’s not a good moment to be unemployed. Do your best with what you have for the paycheck and maybe look for something else – because you may not find anything else, let alone anything better.

        As far as the manager, NO ONE is going to want to work toward a mutually agreed end point at the moment if there’s not a job waiting for them. If he’s good at the role regardless, it’s good info to have, but you can still work with him. If he’s going to be checked out and not give you what you need because of it, there might not be a way to give a softer landing, or YOU can, but don’t expect him to agree.

        The state of the job market and the economy is a HUGE factor in how this convo would go.

  15. Crencestre*

    If more colleges/universities – heck, more high schools! – would make it very, very clear to their students that almost all of them can expect to start in jobs that require a good deal of thankless grunt work then there might be fewer “Jakes” in entry level positions.

    It’s understandable that grads would want to leap right into jobs offering interesting projects and/or the chance to make a great and positive change in the lives of others – that’s normal and to be expected! But very few grads have the perspective and maturity to realize that they must first prove themselves capable, motivated and responsible in entry-level tasks before they’re trusted with the “juicy” projects that they covet. Preparing them for this eventuality – and emphasizing that doing that boring work well is necessary to win the trust and respect of their managers – would go a long way towards preventing the attitude that “Jake” displayed here.

    1. Beth*

      What I think a lot of new grads don’t realize is, it’s not just that they’re not trusted or responsible or motivated enough for higher level work. It’s that SOMEONE needs to do the grunt work–it’s necessary, it’s important–and it doesn’t make sense to ask highly experienced, highly skilled senior employees to spend hours on that when they could be focused on more complicated work where their skill and experience is needed. It makes more sense to hire reliable, trustworthy entry-level staff who are cheaper and need to build experience before they can handle those higher-level projects.

      ‘Proving yourself’ usually looks like being good and reliable and cheerful about the boring work for a year or two until you’re eligible for a promotion–not being a rockstar who gets promoted to a juicy project after 2 months.

      1. Startup fan*

        Jake should get out of OP’s business and go to a startup, ideally in the Bay Area. New startup employees get real experience early on. Even if the startup fails, it’s still a career boost.

        Political campaigns are similar to startups in this regard.

        1. Reluctant Mezzo*

          Of course, getting paid and getting health insurance might be a tad iffy in both areas.

        2. Arrietty*

          Jake is getting real experience. In real jobs, at companies that last more than five minutes, people have to do boring things sometimes.

        3. Yours sincerely, Raymond Holt*

          I don’t know about startups but political campaigns in my country involve *a lot* of grunt work. And people are often a lot less professional and polite about it, frankly, because there are so, so many people out there who want to do it, who will even volunteer to do it.

          Real experience does mean things admin and data entry. Real experience also involves learning about the reality of working life.

    2. Dust Bunny*

      I’m not sure that would help. Kids that age–and I’m sure I was no different–just don’t have a frame of reference to understand just how much tedium goes into the interesting stuff. it’s the gender-neutral professional equivalent of the emotional labor that you didn’t realize went into that super fun birthday party. Hollywood doesn’t help, either, with all its stories about whiz kids who get to jump the line.

    3. Trixie Belden is my hero*

      Just had this conversation with my niece (she’s 33) last weekend. She was interviewing new physical therapists for the center she runs and they wanted to only work 8-3 (center is open 7-7, you pick early or late arrival/departure). And they wanted a salary comparable with hers, she has 8 years experience. One wanted to work with athletes and she told him that he could and it was done on the later shift because the athletes got out of school 2:30 or later and he needed to stay til 7. He couldn’t seem to grasp the fact that this arrangement was not done on a whim and the athletes had to finish classes first.

    4. I Have RBF*

      My first job was as a lab assistant. My job was primarily to wash glassware – you don’t get more grunt than that without being outdoors. Think “busser in a laboratory”. I eventually learned sampling and minor testing. But my basic job was still to wash glassware.

      I had no illusions about doing fancy testing and complicated chemistry – I was hired as a lab assistant, not a principle chemist!

      Was it “makework”?? Absolutely not. If I was out sick, I came back to piles of unwashed glassware and complaining chemists. It was tedious, boring, and absolutely necessary.

      Jake needs to grow TF up.

  16. I see you Doris Burke*

    I don’t think anyone did anything wrong here – just a mismatch that was rectified pretty quickly.

  17. Pay no attention...*

    In general, just because an employee expresses disappointment doesn’t mean the manager needs to DO anything. Most entry-level jobs are sort of a disappointment so let him process his feelings about that himself. I don’t really think bosses need to manage their employees feelings — it’s very infantilizing. If he refused to do tasks or did them slowly or poorly, that’s certainly something to manage, but just “I’m disappointed,” if that’s the entirety of it, isn’t quite worthy of any attention.

    1. Busy Middle Manager*

      I think this overlaps with a sense of purpose. My sister complains about paperwork, but that’s because it’s pointless. They write huge amounts of reports by hand for the slim chance the state audits them. Then only a few get cherry picked for an audit. Even if you like paperwork, it can feel tedious/boring if it’s not even being used. I didn’t want people thinking we lied to new hires, if it wasn’t true!

    2. Peanut Hamper*

      I don’t really think bosses need to manage their employees feelings — it’s very infantilizing.

      Yes, very much this. Even in fields like teaching (which I used to do) we shouldn’t be managing other people’s feelings. At most, we can provide guidance on how to deal with feelings. I used to tell my students that they didn’t have to like school but it would help them if they at least appeared like they didn’t hate it. (Sad, but true, but outward appearances often affect how others view you.)

      In my current job, I both train and mentor people and I often use the phrase “It’s fun!” as a metaphor for 1) yes, this is tedious, 2) yes, it does eventually come to an end, 3) yes, you will feel so much better when you finally do get to the end, and 4) yes, other people will appreciate what you’ve done, even if they don’t express it. (And yes, I explain what I mean by that, and yes, it is fun.)

      But I do let them know that yes, it can feel like grunt work—because a lot of the time it is. And that’s okay. You can feel what you feel, as long as you get it done.

  18. Abogado Avocado*

    I once worked for an org with a very high public profile where we needed a back-office data entry person. After emphasizing interviews that we needed someone who loved data entry and that data entry was integral to our effectiveness, we hired someone who assured us that data entry was his metier and he really wanted the job. A few weeks later (thankfully, within the 90-day probationary period) he complained about how boring data entry was and said he had expected to be part of the more public facing aspects of the org. Which would have been impossible because he had none of the licenses or skills that were pre-requisites for those activities. So, we parted ways, with him saying he’d learned something about himself and us relieved that the parting was so easily accomplished.

  19. DEEngineer*

    I had an employee like this. I needed someone for a role that required data recording and documentation. I was upfront about the nature of the job. He thought that he would be promoted quickly and so wasn’t worried about the tedium when he took the position. What actually happened is that he procrastinated and was very slow at his work (and told me he found it boring). So he was terrible at his job and I was definitely not going to promote him. I had a conversation with him where I told him I was going to need to put him on a PIP and was getting the paperwork together, and to think about whether or not this was a good fit for him. He gave his notice less than two weeks later and left the company on good terms. I never had to follow through on the PIP, and he got to have a going-away happy hour with colleagues where they wished him well on his next step (coding camp).

    1. Criminally Competent*

      I recently inherited an employee just like this! He seemed so eager in the interviews and I know he wanted to move up. But then he barely does his current job, hence no one trusts him to do anything about else. I’m his fourth manager in three years and am finally doing something about it.

  20. AnonAnon*

    As a hiring manager I have noticed that so many people will talk a good game in an interview for a job they don’t want just to get their foot in the door. A lot of people really think once they are hired, they can move to the department they really want to be in.
    I screen for this and saw it so many times during the phone interview stage. All of their answers would be answered as if they worked in a different role in a different department. It was really weird.

    1. Yours sincerely, Raymond Holt*

      Interesting – how do you screen for this? I would love to be able to do that. Our organisation is quite high profile and exciting. People definitely they can get in and then move around.

  21. SB*

    In my industry, entry level jobs can be really difficult because they are often very tedious. And people without much experience believe they have mastered the tedious skill long before they actually truly understand it.

    The good news is that the tedious job often leads to the more interesting job. The bad news is that you can’t skip the experience of the tedious job. And the hard bit is younger worker trying to decide if there’s a fundamental mismatch with their career goals or if this is something that’s a stepping stone to what they actually want.

    But yeah….he shouldn’t have said he was disappointed. That’s not the best way to express that you’d like to develop more.

      1. SB*

        It would have been fine to say to his friends too. He probably could have gotten away with saying it to coworkers at his own level at a happy hour. But it’s not what you say to your boss, you know?

  22. Jan Levinson Gould*

    Maybe Jake never worked a parttime or summer job before which is why he is disappointed. The comment from OP that he seems entitled maybe alludes to that. My first few jobs out of college were crappy, but I worked plenty of lousy or at least boring and not exactly fulfilling jobs leading up to post-college life so I wasn’t disappointed with the first few jobs I had. Those first few stinky jobs were merely learning experiences and stepping stones to better things in the future. And lousy jobs help one appreciate good jobs.

    1. Retired Vulcan Raises 1 Grey Eyebrow*

      With Jake being so unrealistic about work, he might indeed have jumped at the chance, expecting his dream job to roll around the corner the following week.

    3. Retired Vulcan Raises 1 Grey Eyebrow*

      Jake may have expected – rightly – that professional jobs would be very different to summer retail/ fast food.
      Maybe he just totally overestimated how much more interesting and wellpaid his jobs would be, at least at the start of a professional career.

    4. GreenApplePie*

      It’s also possible that his internships have given him a skewed view of what entry level work is like (short term work just isn’t the same).

    5. Pescadero*

      Eh.. at 50 – I’ve worked since I was 12, and full time since 23. I’ve never been unemployed a single day in 27+ years.

      I’ve been disappointed with every job I’ve had… because working just inherently sucks.

      Now – I’m GenX, and we don’t have feelings – so I just shut up and work… but I’ll never appreciate working, or not be disappointed in having to have a job.

  23. Amaryllis*

    I’ve wondered if this is a product of university systems. I live in an area of a well known, huge university and I’m certain they really hype what students can expect after they graduate. A friend who works at a non profit said they have had several freshly graduated new employees express that they thought they were going to be moved to management right away and were hoping to get a director job soon. Friend has gone as far as to pull up the current director’s resume or LinkedIn to show them her experience and education, to the absolute shock of the new employees. I guess if you are asking undergrads to spend $100k to go to your school you need to make it seem like it will be worth it.

    1. Dust Bunny*

      I was certainly never told any such thing, but movies, etc., sure show enough plot lines about plucky young things getting skip-level promotions.

      1. Wayward Sun*

        I wasn’t told anything like that either, but I went to a state school. ;)

  24. FunkyMunky*

    I wonder if it’s truly generational – when I was in Jake’s shoes my work had a lot of dumb data entry I disliked. I used that opportunity to double down on automating the processes, to help myself and others to avoid having to key in a lot of information daily

    1. SunnyShine*

      I don’t think it’s generational as much as it’s office work. I’ve had coworkers in their 40’s who hated the tedious work. They were used to working in a different environment.

  25. Mesquito*

    It’s really interesting that so many people are saying that he just needs to accept it! In the update, he didn’t accept it, he resigned and was offered something that worked better for him to keep him on. He might still be arrogant and entitled but it sounded like management shared his estimation of himself.

    1. FunkyMunky*

      because it’s not normal to expect a cake walk at your first work position out if college unless you’re a nepo baby, I guess?

      1. Cosmic Crisp*

        I’m in no way a nepo baby, I’m pretty sure, but I said something very similar to my supervisor at my first “job” when I was 14 (library page). It can just be part of growing up, if this is a first job. My supervisor told me that was the job and I adjusted accordingly.

    2. amoeba*

      I mean, accept or resign are both valid options! Complaining to your boss, however, isn’t.

  26. merida*

    Hopefully this letter can also be a good PSA for any brand new, young employees out there – don’t overshare with your boss! Professionalism means having a filter, keeping a polite distance, and avoiding negative talk about your job with your boss. We’re not born knowing how to do that. It’s something we all learn, just some earlier than others. Back when I was in my early 20s, I had two friends lose their jobs because they expressed so many candidate complaints about their job to their boss early on.

  27. Scarlet ribbons in her hair*

    When I started my first job out of college, I learned on my first day that my hours would not be what I had been told – 9:00 AM to 5:30 PM Monday through Friday. Instead, they wanted me to work 9:00 AM to midnight Monday through Friday, plus 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM on Saturday, plus Sunday mornings if necessary. I gave notice on my second day. I should have walked out of there on my first day.

    At another job, I was specifically told that experience in the field was not required, that they would train me. They did not train me, and I didn’t know how to do the things that I would have known how to do if I had had the relevant experience. They started telling me three times a week that I should look for another job. When I found another job and gave two weeks notice, they were very upset. I was told that it was because I had been hired through an employment agency, and since I had worked there for more than three months, they owed the employment agency the full fee.

    At another job, I was hired as an admin and the back-up receptionist. On my first day, I was told that the receptionist had just quit, and until they hired a new one, I would have to be both the receptionist and the back-up receptionist. They never hired a receptionist. It was their plan all along for me to be both the receptionist and the back-up. I should have walked out of there as soon as I got my first paycheck.

    At yet another job, I was hired as an admin, but on my first day, I was told that the receptionist was on vacation, and I would have to fill in for her until she returned. A couple of days later, I was told that I was doing such a great job that I would now be the receptionist, and that when the receptionist returned from her vacation, she would be given another job. I gave notice three weeks after I started, but I should have quit earlier.

    Sometimes people have a valid reason for being disappointed with their new job.

    1. Wayward Sun*

      Heh, I totally had one of those “could you also cover this second position until we hire for it?” jobs. It was awful, but after that I learned to deploy the phrase “that’s not in my job description.”

      1. Scarlet ribbons in her hair*

        I would have liked to be able to say, “That’s not in my job description,” but I was given the bait-and-switch on my first day in the last two jobs mentioned above, and I wouldn’t have felt comfortable saying that on my very first day. I forgot to say that in the last job (the one where I was told I would be filling in for the receptionist who was on vacation), not only was I told that I was doing such a great job that I would now be the receptionist, there was no receptionist on vacation. It was the company’s plan all along to hire for an admin and make her be the receptionist. It was because they didn’t like the applicants who contacted them in response to an ad for a receptionist.

  28. Alienor*

    Oh, Jake. At this point in my career (25+ years in, middle manager) I sometimes fantasize about just having a pile of mindless data entry work and being left alone to do it…am I wrong?

    1. Peanut Hamper*

      No, definitely not.

      I had that once toward the end of my last job. The QC person had been collecting data haphazardly (sometimes by the hour, sometimes by the day, sometimes by the run). My task was to make it all by the hour (so day data divided by eight hours; run data divided by the length of the run), put it into a big spreadsheet organized by part number and only get rid of any data older than 180 days. It was actually quite enjoyable and a different change of pace from the frantic work I normally had to do and even my boss never bothered me with his usual yelling and swearing.

      At this point, I would love to do data entry, but that is considered entry-level work in most places and just won’t pay the bills, alas.

  29. Machine*

    Jane’s sister suffered real harm let’s not forget that. The coach goes on coaching with many accolades the university goes on recruiting. Selling the dream to many players. It’s impossible to know the exact implications but a couple points are imprtant athletic recruiting is different than general admission those decisions are made differently and athletics have lower requirements meaning coaches have some pull with admitting students. That why NCAA has minimum academic standards. Meaning the coach is a major agent for Jane’s sister and are to be believed as coaches of universities talk with high school coach. She turned down other offers potentially to take this one and scholarships are easily the difference between graduating debt free or close to it and graduating with lots of debt. The coach did not make a small error but one worth as much as tens of thousands over four years. It’s speculation I admit l, looking at the situation from these lens it’s largely justified. If you have legal grounds to potentially sue then you can talk about it on the internet. The coach said sorry even genially doesn’t do enough enough. Sorry doesn’t cut it if he was really sorry on Bella’s of the school and himself given Jane’s sister. Fair settlement. Otherwise it’s just talk. Especially if she was harmed, by having to play in a less prestigious program or other material damage the debate more should be how wronged was her sister than go from their. People end up highly publicized disputes all the time the question is how bad was the original action if it was bad it’s worth talking about. Flipping the argument on its head would leave many people especially famous ones out of a job because of their highly publicized disputes if the standard was to not hire people who had a dispute with someone else. This was on a forum likely hard to find. And the famous people in question aren’t always in the right of what they accuse others and sometimes get sued and yet there still employed.

    1. Arrietty*

      My guess is that it was on Reddit, which is not hard to find and has very strong Google rankings. Plus the coach didn’t offer the sister a place, he (wrongly) congratulated her on having one, thinking that she did. It sucks but I can’t see it’s grounds to sue.

  30. Jellyfish Catcher*

    95%+ jobs have tedium and paperwork and a few folks around that you don’t like.

    The best advice I ever got, as an 11th year high school kid was….your job or profession is not just that; it’s about all your life and how you want to live it.
    Figure out what type of life you want and what type of job would fit you enough to be happy and go toward that goal.

    Do you want lots of money, challenging, prestigious work, more time off or flexible days, or a job which is practical and available and needed widely?

    The other need is soft skills – which is not being “soft” but having empathy, integrity and communication skills to build trust.
    Alison is so good at that; read her for years and you can absorb so much.
    I, an introvert, realized that I needed to up my communication abilities and took some courses on communication, which really helped.

  31. rebelwithmouseyhair*

    “But if you want to stay, knowing this is the reality of the job, that’s great too.”

    I would just add, “just so long as you maintain a can-do attitude and get the job done to my satisfaction” because I’d be afraid that he decides to just take the attitude that it’s fine to do a bare minimum and let others take up the slack re the boring stuff he doesn’t like doing.

  32. Shawn*

    My first thought was, maybe Jake would enjoy an element of danger added to the role.

Comments are closed.