This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. This comment section is open for any non-work-related discussion you’d like to have with other readers, by popular demand. Here are the rules for the weekend posts. Book recommendation of the week: Case Histories, by Kate Atkinson.…

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. It’s the Friday open thread! The comment section on this post is open for discussion with other readers on any work-related questions that you want to talk about (that includes school). If you want an answer from…

It’s four answers to four questions. Here we go… 1. My new boss coughs all over me I’ve just begun a new position and as a result, have been working closely with my new boss as she trains me. Things are mostly going well — except she is constantly coughing…

A reader writes: I just saw the below post on LinkedIn, and I thought I’d send it along and get your thoughts on this strategy. After years of reading your blog, it makes me cringe so much. (Why would you write someone a reference if you weren’t their manager? Why…

my office is overrun with corporate buzzwords by Alison Green on January 30, 2025 A reader writes: Recently in my office, corporate buzzwords have picked up like crazy among my colleagues. Sometimes it feels like senior management’s entirely vocabulary is only buzzwords. In a presentation last week, for example, a…

I worked at an energy company that had, among other things: -delayed our January 2019 COL increases to August 2020 – (while we were still waiting on the above) tried to retroactively slash our wages by 20% for three months during COVID (illegal to do it retroactively, and a 20%…

the first person to accept the offer gets hired, reference checker asked how much sick leave an employee used, and more — Ask a Manager the first person to accept the offer gets hired, reference checker asked how much sick leave an employee used, and more — Ask a Manager

A reader writes: This is not a current issue, but it’s something that has been eating at me for a long time. I’m trying to figure out if I unwittingly helped someone embezzle money. I believe the statute of limitations has passed for this (potential) crime in the state that…

I remember one job where I grew to absolutely hate the performance reviews because no matter how I tried to prepare I always ended up having to comment on very vague criticism from often anonymous sources. Feedback and comments were not weighted by source. So an anonymous comment from someone…