It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. My employee goes to clients’ homes reeking of cigarette smoke
I have an employee, Susan. Susan smokes. She has tried to quit and has used vapes, but still smells like smoke. Her job is something like home health care, but not exactly. She goes to the clients she is assigned to. We have had multiple complaints from clients about the smoke smell.
Aside from the obvious concerns about her health and the secondhand exposure presented, what can we say to her about this? We do work for a company that has zero tolerance for smoking, but only directly on work property, not out in the community like this. This is a very large company so there cannot be a change to policy.
My general thought was that we expect employees to be clean and odor-free to conduct work, but I’m not sure we are even allowed to say that per HR. How can I address this with her?
You should be able to say, “We’ve had complaints from clients about you showing up smelling like smoke, so we need you to figure out how to stop that from happening. It might be a matter of keeping your work clothes in a smoke-free area or airing out your car, or maybe you have another idea to avoid it, but we do need you to show up not smelling like smoke because clients are unhappy.”
You’re not telling her she can’t smoke. You’re telling her she can’t show up smelling like smoke, just like she couldn’t show up to clients’ homes smelling like weed, or strong perfume, or motor oil. How she achieves that is up to her; it’s the outcome you’re holding her to, not the process of how she gets there.
If you think HR will object to this, by all means run it by them — but it’s very, very reasonable to require this. (And if you do talk to HR, make sure you stress that clients are complaining.)
2. Boss/friend degrees of separation
You’ve posted about the problems of friendship between supervisor and employee, and I wanted to know your thoughts on friends-of-friends and the like.
Presumably your boss’s spouse or direct family member is also a no-go? What about having the same close friend? Assuming that the office/where you live is large enough to avoid such things, practically speaking.
In an ideal world, you’d avoid working for or managing someone who is very close to someone you are also very close to, because that can still raise the same problems as direct friendship, or at least versions of those things: other people worrying about bias or special access, your boss hesitating to give you critical feedback, the potential for major impacts to the other relationship if your boss needs to fire you, etc. (Although I’d worry less about those if you just share a close friend than if their spouse is your BFF. The type of relationship and degrees of separation matter.)
In practice, sometimes it happens anyway, and the involved parties muddle their way through as best they can. Sometimes it goes fine! Sometimes it doesn’t. If you do have the option of avoiding it, it’s better to (on both sides).
3. Can I ask an employer to not list me on the company website?
I’m in the process of job searching in a field where most institutions publicly list all employees’ identifying information on their website (usually name, title, office building, and room number) so that it comes up easily in a web search for the person’s name.
I’m also roughly a year estranged from an abusive parent who has stalked me at my current workplace of several years (in the same field I’m job searching in) multiple times since our estrangement. This parent does not know my current home address and is blocked everywhere, so my workplace is the only place they still know where to reach me. The last time they came to my workplace, the police were involved and asked them to leave. This has deterred them from coming back, but I do not have a restraining order.
If I were to start at a new institution, would it be appropriate to ask for my information not to be posted on public-facing websites (ideally, also including being tagged in Linkedin posts, public announcements connecting me to the new workplace, and similar)? If so, at what point in the onboarding process would you advise bringing this up, and how much information should I offer as to why I’m asking?
Also, do you foresee potential professional consequences to not being searchable in this way (e.g., whenever it’s time for me to job search again)? My current position is listed on my publicly searchable Linkedin, and my plan was to add an end date for that role when I accept a new job and not add my next role. Does that create the appearance of a concerning employment gap the next time I’m job searching, and how/when in the process should I explain why I no longer have a work-related online presence?
I don’t want to start a new job by coming across as expecting special treatment, bringing personal baggage to work, or considering myself above industry norms. At the same time, I would love the peace of mind that comes with knowing that this person can’t find me anymore.
Yes, it’s absolutely appropriate to ask not to be listed on public websites for a reason like this and unless you have a job where public presence is a core part of it (like, for example, the president or a university or a public spokesperson), this is something they should be able to accommodate. Bring it up at the time of your offer; explain you have an abusive family member who has come to your workplace in the past and ask that you simply not be listed anywhere.
I wouldn’t worry about LinkedIn looking like you have an employment gap after this last position. Your resume will make it clear that you don’t, and a lot of people don’t keep their LinkedIn up-to-date. You could also consider making your profile not publicly searchable.
4. No one tells our new managers about budget or management policies
I am in an administrative/finance role at my nonprofit organization and work with several departments. In my tenure here, I’ve seen all the managers in the departments I work with turn over at least once. Some of them are internal hires who know the organization and are moving into management roles, and some are external hires. Every time a new manager starts, I have no insight into what their onboarding looks like, but I question what it looks like. While they seem to understand or learn about the core research product we put out, they seem to be completely unaware about operational tasks like budget and management policy. In fact, the internal hires who move into management seem less aware than the external hires. I don’t know if it is my job as the lowest rank staffer in the organization to teach and onboard managers about these things, but it often feels like it falls to me to do that.
Is this common for managers to not have actual managerial and budget onboarding when they start in the role? What can senior management and HR do to actually help managers learn about these important tasks? It feels like my organization prioritizes the research product over the budget/policy management, and it makes my role more complicated as I often have to be the bearer of bad news when I have to explain policy to them.
Yes, it is weirdly common. You are in a great position to raise what you’re seeing, though, and to suggest a more structured onboarding for this area. It sounds like it’s falling to you to do it anyway, so you could explicitly name the gaps you’re seeing and suggest formalizing training in that area (so people get that info proactively rather than after things fall through the cracks — whether it’s from you or from someone else).
5. Applying for jobs when the reason I took a break isn’t resolved
I find myself in a conundrum. I have loved and agreed with your advice to people who have had to take time off for illness or caretaking to address it in their cover letters, usually saying “a medical issue that is now resolved” or similar language. Due to some wild timing (finding a lump three days after starting a self-funded summer funemployment sabbatical) and the limits of American social safety nets, I find myself needing to find new work before my active cancer treatment is finished. My prognosis is good, my side effects so far have been negligible, and I’m in one of the best cities in the world for care, so in theory I can work. But at the same time, the overwhelming increase in life admin that navigating any serious diagnosis entails means I’m mostly looking at roles that are a step down from what I’ve been doing previously, so they will already be side-eyeing my application.
Do you have any advice for cover letter language that will get across, “There’s a good reason for the gap and for me wanting to take a step back” that doesn’t include “and the reason for that step back is that I have a lot of doctors appointments and will need major surgery soon that may be followed by more”?
Yes, in this case since the medical issue is ongoing, you shouldn’t yet use the “medical issue that is now resolved” framing. Instead you could say:
- “After a period away for personal reasons, I’m looking for a role with a narrower scope, where I can bring my experience to bear while focusing on [specific kind of work].”
- “After taking time away for family reasons, I’m excited to return in a more focused role centered on X.”
- “I’ve taken some time to assess what I’m looking for in my next role, and I’m intentionally seeking a position with a more focused scope.”
You also don’t necessarily need to explain the gap at all, if it’s not lengthy. In that case, you can simply talk why this particular job is appealing and why you’d be great at it.
The post employee reeks of cigarettes, boss/friend degrees of separation, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.
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