Performance Tracking and Feedback

A reader writes: I recently made it through to the final interview round for a job I was very excited about. I’ve been in my current position without a clear path to promotion long enough to have been eyeing the exits for a while, and finally I found myself in a hiring process that felt like it was going really well. I was meshing with all the people who I would be working with at this company. The conversations we had about the vision I would bring to their team also energized me in a way that my current work hasn’t in quite some time. The final interview ended up being scheduled on the same day as a company party at my current job. I thought that was great, because it…

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: What Is Wrong With You? by Paul Rudnick. Both funny and poignant, it follows a motley cast of characters (including a former TV action star, a fired book editor, and a dentist in mourning) as they prepare to attend the wedding of one of their exes to a famous tech billionaire. (Amazon, Bookshop) * I earn a commission if you use those links. The post weekend open thread – November 1-2, 2025 appeared first on Ask a Manager. View the full article

A reader writes: You’ve talked about how inappropriate it is for employers to ask candidates about their salary expectations without giving out any info on salary themselves. I became a small business owner without having received training in that aspect of things, but learned early on when I am hiring to always ask the candidate their salary expectations before giving any information out about the range I am willing to offer. Why? Firstly, the money comes directly from our pockets and frankly if we can get away with paying $20/hour instead of $22/hour, why wouldn’t we? It also gives us room for raises, bonuses, etc. without taking too much of a financial hit. You alway…

A reader writes: I have managed someone, let’s call her Rachel, for over a year and a half. The majority of the experience has been negative — she’s rude, feeds on drama, and produces low-quality work. I’ve had several discussions with her on improving her performance. After a lot of painful experiences, she resigned while I was on vacation. She only gave a week’s notice, and since I’m on vacation we will only have two days overlap. I know as a manager I have the responsibility to be professional and courteous, but I can’t stomach the idea that we even have to interact at all on those two final days. I have even contemplated rescheduling our team meeting to the day afte…

I’m off today, so here’s an older post from the archives. This was originally published in 2014. A reader writes: I was in the awesome position of interviewing for two roles through recruitment agencies and receiving offers for both. Both roles were aware that I had another strong offer on the table, and negotiations started between myself and the two agencies. As I was available immediately, both roles wanted me to start ASAP and had suggested start dates that were within a working week of the initial offer. Within a few days, I made my decision and I outlined my choice in an email to the recruiter of the role I was turning down. The recruiter wanted to discuss the m…

A reader writes: Should you always call to let a candidate know that they won’t be getting a job offer? Here’s the context: I’ve gotten calls and emails letting me know when I wasn’t accepted for a position. And my colleagues and I all agree that we hate getting phone calls. It’s awkward! If you don’t answer the phone, you’re not going to get a voicemail telling you you didn’t get the job, you’ll get a voicemail asking you to call back. Which means you’ll get excited thinking you’re getting a job offer! And then you’re live on the phone with a hiring manager trying to manage an awkward conversation. I’ve taken to emailing rejected candidates rather than calling, for th…

A reader writes: I’m job searching, and I often come across jobs where alumni of my college currently work. If I don’t know the person/people, how would I ask for their help in getting an interview or anything else related to the job I’ve applied to? I think that would be very awkward, and I don’t know why they would be inclined to help, since they don’t know me. The idea isn’t to reach out to a stranger and say, “Will you help me get an interview?” It’s to connect as a fellow alum and ask for their guidance more broadly. For example: “Hi Jane! I’m a fellow alum of Sorghum State — class of 2019! I’m trying to break into the breakfast cereal field and am really intere…

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 me, emailing me is still your best bet*, but this is a chance to take your questions to other readers. * If you submitted a question to me recently, please do not repost it here, as it may be in my queue to answer. The post open thread – November 21, 2025 appeared first on Ask a Manager. View the full article

Most office routines aren’t exactly thrilling: you answer emails, survive meetings that could have been a Slack message, and silently curse your coworker for not saving the spreadsheet you need on the shared drive. But some offices have embraced the weird and wonderful, establishing traditions that range from hilarious to outright bizarre. At Slate today, I shared 15 of the greatest work traditions I’ve heard about from readers. (And it’s probably significant that all of these traditions appear to have developed organically! None of these stem from organized team-building or “mandatory fun.”) You can read it here. The post the 15 greatest office traditions you’ve never…

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go… 1. Vaping on video calls I work for Company A. We partner closely with Company B on a few projects. There is a power dynamic where Company B provides more resources and calls more shots than we do, and I am very new on the team. I was on a Zoom call with an important person from Company B recently, and she was vaping on the call. She probably used her vape device at least 10 times on the call, and smoke was visible. She didn’t mention it, and neither did I. I don’t know what she was using, and she appeared to be in her home, though I’m not sure. I was so shocked, as it seemed wildly unprofessional, but I didn’t say anyt…

Here are three updates from past letter-writers. 1. Employee gets special privileges because she’s dating an NBA player I didn’t have time to go to my manager regarding your advice because days after your response was posted, Cersei’s boyfriend broke up with her. As a side note, she lived with him in his very nice house. So I imagine it was a very painful breakup and was further complicated by the logistics of having to move out. Morale has slightly lifted but not by much because of the anticipation that special treatment for Cersei will manifest in a different way. It certainly leaves a bad taste in your mouth to know that her summer WFH status stopped because her rel…

A reader writes: I have a pretty low-stakes question but it’s been on my mind a lot lately: is it tacky to bring branded items from your old job to your new job? For context: I used to work for a big tech company, and I acquired a lot of swag over my tenure: jackets, mugs, travel cups, etc. At my old role, my colleagues and I would use branded items from competitors and no one batted an eye; lots of them would be free items from conferences and similar events, and hey, sometimes that branded travel mug from our competition is just REALLY nice. But I’ve switched to a more conservative industry (law) and I’m wondering if it would be weird to bring branded stuff from my o…

A reader writes: I’m a happily married woman who works at a company that somewhat blurs the lines between work and friendship. While working at this company, I have learned that I’m a social butterfly. I enjoy socializing with colleagues after hours at trade shows, company events, and informal gatherings, especially when we have out-of-town colleagues visiting from another part of America or another part of the world. My husband is an introvert through and through, and we’ve had to learn how to navigate our opposite natures when it comes to my work’s social events. Basically, he only attends the events that are very important to me or events that only have a small group…

A reader writes: I was recently out to lunch with my manager and a client we’ve worked with for many years. We were talking about how the shift to WFH has changed the way we approach certain parts of our job and how we feel our companies get more work out of us than ever before because we aren’t chatting with folks in the office/going out to lunch/etc. nearly as much – all standard conversation these days. Then my manager (with whom I generally have a good relationship) said something that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about: “I don’t believe that people who work from home should take sick days.” I was honestly flummoxed! I sputtered something about illnesses lik…

A reader writes: I manage a team of five younger professionals (all between the ages of 25 to 30). I have noticed that each of them prefers to communicate with me almost exclusively by text message or through the chat feature in our collaboration software. Conversations by phone, video, or in-person only happen when I initiate them. When I initiate an in-person conversation or phone call, my employees don’t seem opposed and typically are very engaged, but if left up to them it seems like all of the interaction with me would be via text or chat. In my own career, I’ve always valued being able to talk one-on-one with my manager, whether it’s during a formal meeting or imp…

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go… 1. Employee lied and said his mother had died (she hadn’t) Recently, I had to terminate an employee for lying about their mother dying, let’s call him Jeff. The “death” occurred over a year ago, but 13 months later we came across info that showed us that had been a lie. In fact, Jeff’s sister had posted photos of her and Jeff on an international vacation during the same days as he was supposedly in the hospital preparing for their mother’s passing. We had already been drafting a performance plan for Jeff, and we ended up letting him go over this. Is there anything that could have been done to prevent lying about somethin…

A reader writes: I often bake for my office. I just bring in the baked goods and leave them in the kitchen. I don’t solicit compliments and I don’t directly offer them to people, either. The only compliment I need is seeing an empty tray at the end of the day. I don’t even know who tried the baked goods and I don’t seek to find out. The baked goods generally go over well and I get thank-you’s and compliments, but I also get a handful of people coming over to thank me for bringing in baked goods but explaining that they can’t eat them for whatever reason — allergies, diet, whatever. This bothers me a lot and I don’t know if I’m justified. A generous reading is that they…

A reader writes: My question is around my work as a professional industry trainer. I do training sessions open to being booked for participants across the industry, as well as targeted training in webinar form for single businesses. These sessions are about key aspects of our work, including safety and legislative issues. The recent letter about students in academic settings whispering in class has really stirred up thoughts about a pattern I’m seeing in these sessions. Participants, often including managers or leaders within a workplace, despite being asked to put their cameras on and participate, keep their cameras off and don’t respond to questions and activities des…

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go… 1. How much should I expect to hang out with my coworker on a week-long work trip? I have an upcoming work trip that I’m feeling a little anxious about, mostly because I’m unsure how to handle the social side of things. It’s a week-long trip with just one coworker. They seem lovely, but we haven’t worked closely together before. I’ve traveled with larger groups in the past, and in those situations the unspoken norm seemed to be: do dinner together at least once or twice, and apart from that, it’s okay to stay in or go out on your own if you prefer. After all, there are others in the group they can spend time with if they…

A reader writes: Hopefully this is a non-issue very soon, but I was wondering what ideas you’ve encountered or heard of that might be helpful. I am a manager of a small to medium-sized federal office. We are in furlough but required to work. While most of my employees are okay financially at the moment, we have three or four (and probably one or two who are private) who are being hit hard, and with SNAP benefits seemingly going away this is going to be a real issue for them and their families. We have certain ethical boundaries we can’t cross, and I don’t want to single any one out. But I can’t let my employees go hungry. Have you heard of any creative ideas that I mig…

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 me, emailing me is still your best bet*, but this is a chance to take your questions to other readers. * If you submitted a question to me recently, please do not repost it here, as it may be in my queue to answer. The post open thread – November 7, 2025 appeared first on Ask a Manager. View the full article

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: Nobody’s Girl, by Virginia Roberts Giuffre. It’s an account of the author’s abuse by Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell (including abuse that simply took another form after she escaped them), and it’s absolutely harrowing. (Amazon, Bookshop) * I earn a commission if you use those links. The post weekend open thread – November 8-9, 2025 appeared first on Ask a Manager. View the full article

It’s four answers to four questions. Here we go… 1. I’m aggravated by my company’s giving-back program My company has a giving-back program where employees are asked to volunteer time or make donations to charity and in return there is a designated one-day holiday that the entire company gets off. Terrific, right? This year, my team signed up for a charity event that was centrally located, which then moved to a much less convenient location for everybody. Most of us opted to make a donation to one of the suggested charities since twice the commute was just too much time away from work. We then got push back to put on record how we gave back and when stated that we made…

A reader writes: I moved to a new state a year ago and, in the effort to find community, I joined a grassroots nonprofit as a volunteer coordinator (as a volunteer, not for my job). Since I’ve joined, we’ve had transparency issues with the board. Every few months, someone would either join or drop off the board, and volunteers wouldn’t hear about it until a week or two after the fact. We also never had the organization’s bylaws or constitution available to volunteers, and no matter how many of us explained why we needed this, select board members would always give excuses as to why we couldn’t. At one point, they finally posted them, but when the website went through a …

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go… 1. HR says I can’t use sick leave for a family emergency Recently, “life happened” and I took a day off from work because I needed to take care of some things and I wasn’t feeling mentally well. I emailed work in the morning and said that a family emergency came up so I needed to take a sick day. That seemed like the most honest description of what was happening at the time without giving too much detail. When I returned to work the next day, I submitted for sick leave. HR emailed me asking for details, saying that sick leave is provided for employees’ illness or injury, and that for other situations we need to use PTO. …