misinformation after a tragedy in our building, someone cc’d my boss over a tape dispenser, and more

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

1. A client died in our building, and their family is upset with us

I work for a very small (fewer than 25 employees) U.S. social service nonprofit. Not long ago, a regular, well-known-to-us client suffered a catastrophic event while in our building and collapsed. My coworkers who were nearby at that time took all the right steps: emergency services called, CPR initiated, AED retrieved and used, other visitors quickly and calmly relocated to another area of the building for safety and privacy. (We have all been trained in first response steps and I’m proud of my coworkers for acting without hesitation.) The fire department arrived first and took over, followed by EMS, who took the client to the hospital by ambulance. From collapse to ambulance departure took 15 minutes at most.

Not long later we received the tragic news that our client had died. They were a familiar face for most of us here and it rattled us all the more deeply that they were so suddenly gone — and that it happened in our building. We are doing what we can to be there for one another while processing this. The problem arising now is that, in the way of many small towns, our client was related to several people with social/political standing locally, and they are stirring up social media outcry about the incident.

The criticism is that we (our workplace) haven’t made any kind of post acknowledging and mourning the client’s death (as of my writing this, no death announcement or obituary has been published yet either), that we “did nothing to help,” and that the local emergency services “took too much time” getting to our location, with the implication that we didn’t act in a timely manner calling them. None of these relatives were present for the incident itself.

I feel for them and the shock it must be for our client’s loved ones to receive a call about their sudden passing. I know they’re hurt and grieving and looking for someone to blame. (We have all been — correctly, in my opinion — instructed not to respond to any personal social media posts on the matter or to get involved in comment wars.) Some of my coworkers are outraged that the family would do this when we did all we could at the time, and the accusations about timeliness are patently untrue; others are worried about the community ramifications of “locally powerful” individuals criticizing us so harshly without any of the facts. My question here is twofold: when things like this happen, what is best practice for the organization with regard to the world of posts and public opinion, and what — if any — are the potential legal consequences for the place of business posting about an event like this before some kind of official announcement is made?

As far as I know, there are no legal consequences to sharing news of a death before it’s been publicly announced, but it would generally be seen as insensitive and highly disrespectful to the family to do that, particularly in the immediate aftermath.

At this point, ideally someone high up in your organization would reach out to the family with sincere condolences, offer to answer any questions they have about what happened at your site, and say that the organization would like to publicly remember the client but didn’t want to do that without the family’s blessing or before an obituary had been published.

2. My employee used AI to write their self-evaluation

We are in annual review season right now. I just sat down to review an employee’s self-evaluation comments and my spidey senses went up — I started to wonder if they had used AI to generate their responses. They were much longer than last year, sentences were more complex, and (frankly) the responses felt weighted with self-importance — everything was just a little overblown and overstated. There is very little genuine reflection.

I ran things through several AI checkers, all of which indicated that the writing was AI-generated. Now, I know those aren’t perfect (especially for those of us who are strong writers and use things like em dashes!), but combined with what I stated above, it feels fairly dispositive.

There is no policy, internal to our unit or at our broader organization, that addresses AI use in the context of performance management. On the contrary, AI is heavily pushed to employees, telling us ways it can make our work more efficient. I am, admittedly, a huge AI skeptic. I’ve seen too many incorrect things to put a lot of trust in it. I also have concerns about the short-cuts it enables in terms of thinking. In this case, I would argue that the process of reflecting, writing, editing, etc., is a huge part of why we do annual reviews.

I don’t really know what to do here, other than address the content itself. I’m also, admittedly, struggling with feeling like the employee is somehow cheating by using generative AI to do something that is supposed to be a personal reflection. How should managers and organizations be addressing this sort of thing?

Yeah, I wouldn’t like it either, for the same reasons as you — a self-evaluation is specifically asking for the employee to go through the process of reflecting on their work, and this isn’t that.

That said, a lot of people hate writing self-evaluations and are skeptical about how they’re used. Combine that your company heavily pushing AI on employees, and I can’t really blame this person for doing it … or more to the point, I don’t think you should read more into it than “a lot of people hate writing self-evaluations and this person used a tool our company is pushing widely.”

That said, you can certainly say to the employee, “I got the sense you might have used AI with this, and it’s not an ideal use for it because AI doesn’t have the real-life context, judgment, and emotional intelligence about your work that you have. For something like this, I really want your own self-reflection on these topics, and I can promise you that’s what you’re getting from me for my side of it. With that in mind, would you want to take another stab at it? Or just talk it through in person when we meet?” You don’t have to offer that last option if you don’t want to — but some people stress over writing these so much that it’s worth considering.

3. Someone cc’d my boss over a tape dispenser

I recently got a complaint sent to my boss over a tape dispenser that I borrowed.

I work at a college with two campuses. We have boxes on both campuses where students can donate their books at the end of the semester, and we sell them to an organization and use the proceeds for scholarships. The scholarships are designated for students who work in the bookstore and students who are involved in a student organization that I advise.

On the campus I work on, I have been packing the books and getting them shipped off. I get the boxes myself, but I borrow a cart and packing tape from the bookstore each time. On our second campus, the bookstore handles most of the process themselves with their work-study students. I just send them boxes and shipping labels. It’s been this way longer than I have worked at the college.

Well, I packed books yesterday, and I left the packaging tape in the library because the library was packing some of their old books for the fundraiser. The library staff said they would return the tape to the bookstore when they were done. Apparently, the tape wasn’t returned quickly enough, as I got an email from the bookstore asking where it was. I responded immediately and copied the library, who brought it back right away.

The bookstore then sent an email and copied my boss saying that we need to get our own tape dispenser for the student club to stop borrowing theirs as the tape costs them money and it is inconvenient. I’d be glad to have my own tape dispenser! But I am a faculty member, and I don’t order office supplies. Neither does my boss. I thought it was a bit aggressive looping in my boss to complain about me borrowing their tape dispenser … for a project I do in partnership with them.

I calmly wrote back that (a) I would be glad to have my own tape dispenser and (b) this is a project done in partnership with them that they benefit from. Then I asked how I would order a packing tape dispenser. She then responded that she would get one for us.

I am also a bit annoyed that I am on sabbatical right now, so I was volunteering my time to help out with this fundraiser when I would not normally be on campus. On the other campus, the bookstore takes care of this completely. I am coming in on my time off to do something the bookstore could be taking care of, and they are complaining to my boss over me using their tape dispenser!

Do I need to let this go? Or should I ask that they talk to me directly next time without copying my boss? I think that was unnecessarily aggressive, especially as I was immediately responding to their communication. I don’t mind helping out with the fundraiser to support students, but it’s frustrating getting complaints sent to my boss when I am helping out on my own time.

Eh, let it go.

Yes, their reaction was overblown and cc’ing your boss was excessive, but there’s no point in making it into an even bigger deal by getting into a back and forth with them about it. And you already made the point that this a project they benefit from. They were cranky but now they’re ordering you a tape dispenser, so the problem will be solved and everyone can and should leave it there.

4. Automated video interview asked about my current salary

I just completed an offline video interview; I videotaped answers to written questions and submitted them to a portal. There wasn’t another person or hiring team involved, just an automated system.

One of the questions was (paraphrasing), “What is your current compensation — base pay, PTO, bonuses? What compensation do you expect in this role?” Your advice for dealing with this question in face-to-face interviews has been to sidestep giving my current salary and just tell the range I’m looking for, but since this was asked so directly here I didn’t know what to do. I just went ahead and ignored the first part of the question and said something like, “The range I’m looking for is $75k – 85k base pay” and that was it.

Was that the right thing to do here? I kinda feel like I torpedoed my chances with this job because I ignored their instructions. What should I do in the future if this scenario comes up again?

I think that was the exactly right way to handle it. Your current compensation is none of their business (to the point that some states have made it illegal for employers to ask about it). You answered the part that’s relevant to them, which is what you’re looking for from them.

Related:
how to avoid giving employers your salary history

5. Can I ask the hiring manager if I’d be considered before I apply?

Can I directly ask “would I even be considered” before applying for an internal position?

There is an internal position open that I’m interested in (it would be a sizable promotion for me). The hiring manager is familiar with me, and I’ve worked directly with him on a few projects. I don’t have a strong handle on his opinion of my quality of work, though, and I’m not certain my application would even be considered, or if I would really be qualified for the role. Is it out of line to email him and ask if it’s a position I’d be considered for? Or do I need to just hit apply and hope for the best?

Since it’s an internal position and you’ve worked together before, you can talk to him before you apply! You could say, “I’m really interested in the X position but thought I’d talk to you before I apply. Is your sense that it could be a potential match, or does it not make sense for me to throw my hat in the ring for this one?” That gives him the opportunity to tell you they’re looking for candidates with a different type of experience or otherwise explain if he doesn’t think it’s the right match.

Also, if there are things in your background that would make you qualified that he doesn’t know about, mention those up-front so he’s factoring those in — like “one reason I’m interested is that I did X before coming here” or so forth.

If this weren’t an internal position and you didn’t know him, it wouldn’t make sense to do this; in that case you should just apply. But it’s different when you’re internal.

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