This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. A reader writes: One of our staff, Leonard, runs to work. Given our local climate, this often results in him arriving damp and/or cold, which has caused issues: • Our offices/meeting rooms have glass walls, so he uses the shared washroom to change on arrival – tromping through in muddy shoes or bare feet, washing ..read more

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. A reader writes: A junior employee I manage writes rude emails. He will send three emails in 15 minutes, and then respond rudely when I answer the first one, as I haven’t gotten around to the other two or hadn’t seen them in my inbox yet. He’ll respond quoting his previous emails I haven’t had ..read more

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. A reader writes: I recently landed a job offer at a large global company after taking a year off. The job search was a tough one, but after some bumps in the road I was pretty excited about this company and accepted their offer. I ended up negotiating for additional vacation time (four weeks) to ..read more

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go… 1. Unauthorized visitor won’t leave our cafe I work for a university research department, and we have run into an issue with a stranger repeatedly remaining in our office cafe/kitchen space, and it is proving surprisingly difficult to resolve. The building we are in houses many ..read more

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: Long Bright River, by Liz Moore. It’s SO GOOD! It’s the story of two sisters, close as children but estranged as adults. When ..read more

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 me, emailing me is still your best bet*, but this is a chance to take your questions to ..read more

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. It’s four answers to four questions. Here we go… 1. How can I advocate to work from home in an interview when it seems against company culture? I have been a full-time remote employee since late 2017. This organization has always been fully remote and I have thrived in this environment. I do good work ..read more

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. A reader writes: I have an extremely low-stakes question: Is there a way to say “did you receive my gift?” that doesn’t come off as aggressively asking to be thanked but instead expresses what I really want to know, which is, “FedEx/etc said it was delivered but was it really? Or do I need to ..read more

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. It’s “where are you now?” month at Ask a Manager, and all December I’m running updates from people who had their letters here answered in the past. Remember the letter-writer whose new boss treated her like his assistant … which isn’t what she was hired for? Here’s the update. I did follow your advice and ..read more

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. It’s the Thursday “ask the readers” question. A reader writes: I’m a woman job hunting right now and desperately want to buzz my hair. It’s a pretty strong look, and I think it would have the same effect on my search as a bold hair color. I’ll probably do it. But it got me thinking ..read more