my employee won’t stop pushing for a job she’s not qualified for by Alison Green on August 15, 2022 A reader writes: An employee I manage, Elizabeth, wants a job that’s open on another team. She has no experience and doesn’t have the education or certification required for it. If she were given the job it would be like hiring a person who never went to law school, never passed the bar exam, and […] Read the full article →
my employee keeps joking about getting fired by Alison Green on August 10, 2022 A reader writes: One of my top executives has been regularly joking about being replaced in her position within the company. As the owner, I asked her why she was doing this, questioning if it stemmed from a place of insecurity or from unhappiness in her position. She said insecurity — that she was not […] Read the full article →
my employee delivered a status update … in song by Alison Green on August 9, 2022 I’m off today. This was originally published in 2015. A reader writes: I am a newly promoted manager and am stumped on how to handle something bizarre that happened in a meeting today, primarily because my sense of humor is getting in the way. I asked one of my employees to explain the progress he’s […] Read the full article →
my new hire was secretly working a second full-time job during his hours for us by Alison Green on August 8, 2022 A reader asks: My company hired a person to start in January as a sales development rep. At the time, he told me he lived about an hour and a half away, but he’d be moving to be closer to work shortly. A few weeks in, he called me and told me he was going […] Read the full article →
I feel terrible performance-managing an octogenarian by Alison Green on August 8, 2022 A reader writes: I have a long-time employee who I’ll call Joe. I’ve been his line manager for the last five years or so. Before my time, Joe expressed a desire to wind down to retirement. The organization supported that with a part-time arrangement which went on for several years — well past Joe hitting […] Read the full article →
I own a game store with a terrible manager who I’m afraid to fire by Alison Green on August 3, 2022 A reader writes: I own a small (game store) retail business and the store manager I hired to run my business sucks. The store sales have been terrible. The orders he’s been placing of merchandise for our shelves have been terrible and he’s buying way too many items that we don’t need or won’t sell […] Read the full article →
what to say to employees who ask, “am I in trouble?” by Alison Green on August 2, 2022 A reader asks: I manage a team where, due to the nature of our work, I need to give our employees frequent informal feedback. We employ a young workforce; the bulk of our employees are 18-26 years old. Often when I approach these employees, they start the conversation off with, “Am I in trouble?” This […] Read the full article →
my new employee is getting bad advice from my older employee by Alison Green on July 27, 2022 A reader writes: I have a question about a team of people that I am managing. I recently got moved to a new department after their manager was let go. In general, my job involves managing a small (but growing) team of people and delegating work to make sure that our organization is reaching its […] Read the full article →
our remote staff want the same perks we give in-office staff by Alison Green on July 27, 2022 A reader writes: I work for a company that has both in-office employees and work-from-home employees. When we plan events in the office such as chair massages and catered lunches, we offer work-from-home employees the opportunity to work in the office and participate in whatever event we are having, though they rarely come in for […] Read the full article →
my employee keeps freaking out that lower-paid coworkers aren’t as productive as he is by Alison Green on July 27, 2022 A reader writes: I have an employee, Tim, who is a highly focused, highly productive member of the team. He frequently has personality clashes with others on the team that usually, but not always, stem from an imbalance of work. Tim has been our “old reliable” in his role, while many others have come and […] Read the full article →