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Unshelved strip originally published on Mon, 12 Jan 2015
Jul. 2nd, 2025 12:00 am![[syndicated profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/feed.png){kind=small}
unshelved_feedThis classic Unshelved strip originally appeared on Mon, 12 Jan 2015.
unshelved_feed
askamanager_feedA reader writes:
We have friends/acquaintances who own a horse farm. They give riding lessons and various other things they charge for. I’m sure they’re not making a ton of money, but as far as I know they are not a nonprofit. They often post “volunteer hours” on social media or send emails and post photos of people “volunteering” at the farm to help with various chores, including horse care, etc. I’m pretty sure this is technically illegal, but in some ways, should it be?
(I’m curious about this, but I’m not planning on doing anything about it.)
You’re right that for-profit businesses can’t legally accept volunteer help (unlike nonprofits, which can). Businesses are required by law to pay people who work for them at least minimum wage. That’s true even if the volunteers in question are happy to be volunteering and want to waive their right to be paid. (There are some exceptions to this. The Fair Labor Standards Act doesn’t require the minimum wage for workers who perform services for an “amusement or recreational establishment” if it doesn’t operate for more than seven months in any calendar year. That’s intended to cover seasonal activities like amusement parks and sports events.)
That said, despite the law, it’s not uncommon to see arrangements like your friends’ in certain fields — for example, yoga studios that have members work at the front desk in exchange for free or discounted classes, for-profit events that are partly staffed by volunteers (in exchange for free attendance or getting access behind the scenes), theaters that use volunteer ushers, etc.
People who do this generally look at it like bartering: they’re trading their labor for something else of value to them. But employers still have to comply with wage and hour standards, keep strict records of all hours worked and payments made, and provide itemized wage statements to employees, and the value of any in-kind trade needs to be reported and taxed. (Also, some states, like California, don’t allow that at all.) One exception: if someone could be legally classified as an independent contractor — meaning they’re not subject to the type of control employees are subject to and otherwise meet the legal test for independent contractors — they could choose to barter for their services, but the value of the goods or services received would still need to be reported to the IRS and taxed.
Now, you asked whether this should be illegal. Personally, I think it’s fact-dependent. One advantage of the law as written is that it prevents for-profit businesses from pressuring people into working without pay for “exposure” or to “get a foot in the door.” That’s a good thing; it prevents people who otherwise would be vulnerable to exploitation. (Or at least it’s supposed to prevent it. In reality, it still happens.) On the other hand, many people who enter into these agreements feel they’re being compensated in ways that are sufficiently valuable to them and that it gives them access to things (like classes or riding) that might otherwise be unaffordable.
Ultimately, different people will come down in different places on this.
The post should people be allowed to volunteer for a for-profit business like a horse farm or yoga studio? appeared first on Ask a Manager.
an employee started a false rumor that her manager was having an affair
Jul. 1st, 2025 04:29 pmaskamanager_feedA reader writes:
I am a manager of a handful of front line managers. One manager, Emily, approached me the other day to say that one of the receptionists, Jane, told her there was a rumor going around the office that Emily was having an affair with a coworker, John, and that she hoped the behavior would stop. The behavior in question? They joke around with each other.
Emily investigated where the rumor was coming from and found it originated with Jane. She went through a rough couple of days when she felt completely blindsided and sick about the whole thing. She is happily married and so is John. I have seen them interact many times and it’s only ever seemed like two colleagues who banter back and forth together. I have never seen or heard anything that would raise concern. Moreover, I have worked with Emily and John for a long time and their character is above reproach. I am not concerned at all that there’s anything to the rumor.
Jane has been at the center of office gossip before. In fact, before she was concerned that Emily and John were having an affair, she felt like another coworker and John were getting “too close.”
I have heard for the last few months that Jane feels she would be a better manager than Emily, and I wonder if this is her way of trying to get rid of Emily. I have never wanted Jane to be a manager. She has never shown that she would be good at it, so she isn’t on my radar when it comes to any kind of succession planning.
I plan on speaking with Jane about unprofessional behavior and the company policy about not gossiping, and I plan on giving her an official warning on this subject. Is there anything else I can do? How should I word my conversation with her? And, should I in this same conversation tell her that she will never be a manager under my downline? Or would that just be piling on?
I answer this question over at Inc. today, where I’m revisiting letters that have been buried in the archives here from years ago (and sometimes updating/expanding my answers to them). You can read it here.
The post an employee started a false rumor that her manager was having an affair appeared first on Ask a Manager.
my coworker has a horrifying WWII artifact at home
Jul. 1st, 2025 02:59 pmaskamanager_feedContent warning: this is upsetting.
A reader writes:
I am a member of a union. Our local chapter dispatches us to jobs. We can get work through the union either as full members (myself) or as registrants (my coworker Gertrude). Some of these jobs also require us to be registered as employees of the site, so we have a second line of authority. This particular job has a third line, an outside vendor at a very corporate venue (the second line).
Gertrude has always come across as very naive and sheltered and not very smart. At work recently, she told me and another person (Alexis) that she has, from a German relative, a doll whose hair is from Jewish victims of World War II. None of the three of us are Jewish, and this was in a “here’s an interesting family story” tone. Alexis and I were shocked, and our first response was to tell her to call a synagogue and surrender it immediately. We were firm but not yelling, and Gertrude seemed genuinely shocked at our response. We left work shortly after, and I wasn’t able to really this process this until the next morning.
I have received guidance on better avenues to pursue for the respectful disposition of the doll (assuming it is legitimate) and will be working to convince her to surrender it to me (outside of work). I have no idea how this will go.
The advice I need is how to approach this with my union, the employers at the venue, and the company. I have reason to believe that my union will take it seriously. A while ago, a woman (Jane) suddenly yelled “we need to build that wall!” to a group consisting of at least one woman of Hispanic descent and a woman whose first language is Spanish, among others. Jane was never dispatched with us again.
Gertrude’s membership vote is coming up next month, and I will be talking to our leadership about why I think it’s inappropriate to talk about your Nazi death doll at work, and why I think a person who thinks it is should not be a representative of our union (we are still actively and vocally supportive of DEI). I am not so confident about the corporate entity, but I think that as a member of a protected class (not Jewish, but one the Nazis also targeted) I can mention the EEOC, but I am on much shakier ground here.
I am not concerned about blowback on me. I have the support of my spouse and I spent my one day off in nine straight days figuring out how to deal with this on a personal and professional level, so I am furious and very tired. I also have a reputation as being both very good at my job as well as kind of an unlikable weirdo (neurodivergent). This isn’t about me anyway, but I feel like this should be said.
It’s absolutely disgusting that your coworker has a doll made of murdered Jews’ hair, but it’s probably not a work issue.
If your coworker were bringing the doll into work or talking about it all the time, then yes, definitely. But one comment in casual conversation isn’t going to rise to the level of what the law considers workplace harassment (which must be “severe or pervasive”) and isn’t something your company is likely to take action on. The fact that you’re a member of a protected class won’t come into play.
We can safely conclude Gertrude is at best a … deeply problematic person, and at worst an active anti-semite. It rightfully should affect the way you see her. But unless more happens at work, your company isn’t likely to get involved in what horrible genocide artifacts an employee possesses at home.
You can certainly try to educate Gertrude if you think she’s genuinely coming from a place of naïveté rather than something worse, but unless something more comes of it, it’s not really a work issue.
Thank you for speaking up and not letting it pass, though.
The post my coworker has a horrifying WWII artifact at home appeared first on Ask a Manager.
The Big Idea: Matthew Kressel
Jul. 1st, 2025 01:50 pmscalziwhatever_feed
Hop on board for author Matthew Kressel’s newest ride through the galaxy, Space Trucker Jess. In this Big Idea as he takes you through not only his writing process for this particular story, but on a journey through a high-concept sci-fi world viewed through the eyes of a teenage girl.
MATTHEW KRESSEL:
I was a feral kid. Both my parents worked full-time jobs, and I’d come home to an empty house. I had no supervision. I went off with friends and we, ahem, did things. Stupid things. Really fucking stupid things. And when I look back on those days I’m like, How the hell did I make it out alive?
But that freedom was glorious. You could do whatever you wanted. Go anywhere. You had the feeling that anything could happen. And it often did. The good and the bad.
That’s the kind of feeling I hope to evoke in Space Trucker Jess. The joy and spontaneity of discovery. In my childhood, we got into trouble all around the neighborhood. In my novel, Jess gets into hijinx across the galaxy.
Like Jess herself, I began the book with a simple premise: Screw the “rules.”
In my past stories and novels, I labored over every paragraph, sentence, word, and punctuation mark until I’d wound myself into a Gordian knot a million words long. In Jess, I felt the need to loosen the bridles, to let my idea run wild, like that feral kid who got into trouble around the neighborhood. What emerged was Jess, a take-no-shit foul-mouthed kick-ass teenaged girl who’s smart as hell, caring and empathetic, who solves problems not with violence but with brains and determination. Though too often for her own good, Jess’s curiosity gets her into trouble. Big trouble.
Think Natasha Lyonne narrating 2001: A Space Odyssey.
There’s lots of high-concept SF, and, yeah, Space Trucker Jess has all the tropes: starships and FTL travel, alien gods, missing planets, galactic secrets. But I wanted to tell the story a different way. Not from an omniscient or a dry and distant third person, but from deep in the point of view of a sensitive and expressive girl who’s journeyed across the Milk and back a thousand times and who knows more about starships than most people know their own nose.
And so you get high philosophy and fart jokes. Orthodox religion and irreverent sacrilege. Weird inscrutable aliens and deadbeat dads. All told from a foul-mouthed over-confident, wicked-smart and sometimes willfully naive girl who just wants, at the end of the day, to be left the hell alone.
Space Trucker Jess is also about identity. I wrote a good chunk of the book during the first Covid lockdowns. Cut off from friends and family, from work and all the many inter-personal relationships I took for granted, I felt my sense of self drifting. Without those external interactions reflecting my identity back to me, I didn’t know who I was anymore. It was very disconcerting.
A lot of that experience makes its way into the book. Jess’s worldview expands enormously throughout the novel, sometimes suddenly and violently, and she is forced to reckon with a new sense of self and a greater awareness.
Also, Space Trucker Jess is about family. Jess loves her deadbeat dad, and she and him have been grifting their way across the galaxy for years. But she knows he’s an asshole, he knows he’s an asshole, but she just can’t let him go. The relationship is, from the start, highly dysfunctional. Jess just wants stability, away from him. But getting away is harder than it sounds. Without getting too personal, I had a lot of turbulence in my childhood home, and I wanted to explore the contrasts between the family we’re born with and the family we choose, and how those dynamics can alter the course of our entire lives, for better or worse.
So if you want to go on a fun adventure alongside a bad-ass genius girl head-firsting her way through the galaxy who’s just looking for some peace in an uncaring universe, while encountering alien gods, missing planets, galactic secrets, and more, well then, Space Trucker Jess might just be your ride.
Space Trucker Jess: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Bookshop|Powell’s
refusing to work for a customer for moral reasons, a horrendous bathroom problem, and more
Jul. 1st, 2025 04:03 amaskamanager_feedIt’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. How can I refuse to work for a customer I have moral objections to?
As a field technician, how do you refuse, professionally, to do work for a customer that you have deep moral objections to?
I work for a company that provides essential building services (think fire alarm, plumbing, HVAC, electrical) and believe that everyone deserves to have a safe, healthy, and comfortable work environment, which I work hard to maintain. Whoever you are, if you have a problem, I’ll do whatever, wherever, to try to fix it. I will always be polite and professional, but I refuse to support, let’s say, customers that kidnap others off the street without due process, or their detention facilities, or logistical support, etc.
It hasn’t come up yet, but it might, and I won’t know until I’m dispatched. I might not even know until I walk in the door. Is this something I should bring up proactively or wait until it happens? What’s the best way to deal with it if I suddenly find myself the very last place I want to be?
In some jobs, you’d be able to talk to your manager ahead of time and say you’re not comfortable serving those clients and ask if there’s a way to ensure you’re not sent to them. In others, that would be a no-go. So it’s going to depend on what your company culture is like, your relationship with your manager, and how much political capital you have there. They might say, “We’ll do our best but we can’t guarantee it; if you’re the one available then, you’ll have to do it.” They also might say, “You can’t pick and choose your assignments that way at all.”
So you might need to decide how firm a stance you’re willing to take — or, more to the point, what consequences you’re willing to accept for that stance. Are you willing to lose your job over it? If so, that gives you a lot of freedom to simply refuse, knowing that you’ve thought through the potential repercussions and are willing to accept whatever they might be. If you’re not willing to lose your job over it and they send you to one of those customers, you don’t have much room to maneuver, unfortunately.
2. Quitting when I work for a (difficult) friend
I work as a front of house manager for a sports bar owned by a good friend. I have previously tried to get out of the service industry, and got sucked back in three years ago when she bought the place and gathered her professional friends to help her evolve and step up the place. We’ve made great progress, but she’s not a manager and I’m tired of hand-holding her and the employees.
I manage the employees with a fair hand. I trust them to do their jobs, let me know when they’ll be late without judgement, actively tell them to not tell me the reason for off days, and help close or serve when busy. She takes lateness personally, has exacting expectations for everything, “helps” by taking over, and there’s a general increasing sense that she doesn’t trust us. I will not be able to change how she thinks of managing, as she has similar problems with parenting her children and dealing with her husband and mother-in-law.
I want to start applying for jobs that are more technical, and step down as manager. I have no current reason to flat-out quit and would enjoy continuing to bartend on weekends. I quit working for her once before when she had a side hustle cleaning houses. She was absolutely livid, not at me, but the person who recommended the job and went to bat for me as a reference. I don’t know how to word stepping down. I want to stay in some capacity, but I’d rather give her a heads-up before leaning into true job-hunting.
Ideally with a friend you should be able to say, “I’m realizing I want to step down from the manager role sometime this year, although I’d be happy to stay on to bartend. I’m going to start looking around and I wanted to give you a heads-up so you can start planning.” But if you don’t feel you can say that to her ahead of time, you’re not obligated to; you can let her know once you have firm plans in place and are ready to formally give notice. And really, if she was livid the last time you quit (even if it wasn’t directed at you), she’s forfeited her right for much advance notice this time. So: do you feel comfortable using language like that? If you don’t, that’s a sign to just wait until you have firmer plans.
Also, be ready to reconsider staying on to bartend if she handles this badly. Some people are better left as friends rather than colleagues, and definitely rather than bosses.
3. My coworker’s bathroom visits are horrible for us all
I work for a small IT company. There are only two technicians, two managers, and an accountant/bookkeeper. My coworker, Chad, claims to have a laundry list of medical issues, and one of them is constant pooping. I don’t know any other way to put it. This man goes to the restroom up to five times a day to poop. For context, we’re in a nice but small building. It looks like a house. The men’s restroom is right next to the back door, which is where we all enter and exit. The women’s restroom is close to the front door and right next to the CEO’s office. The restrooms were previously the opposite. The assigned restrooms were recently switched, which is perfectly fine except for the fact that the CEO switched them so he wouldn’t have to constantly hear loud, violent pooping right next to his open office door. You can hear everything and he doesn’t even try to hold back.
I am the type of person for whom the thought of making any poop noises loud enough for someone to hear makes me want to lay down in traffic, so the fact that he doesn’t take any over-the-counter stuff like gas relief pills or Imodium or anything is insane to me. He just expects us to deal with it, I guess. He even brings up his stomach issues during meetings as a form of updates with good news from his doctor like, “My doc said I’m eating too much fiber, so now that I know my issues should be over!” only to take a ridiculously loud poop right after the meeting and multiple times a day every day after that. I could care less how long he spends in the restroom, and I promise I’m not judging him if this is indeed something he can’t do anything to avoid.
I understand some people aren’t fortunate in health and have digestion issues, and I feel for him. However, I am incredibly uncomfortable hearing the abominations coming from the restroom. It’s distracting and so gross. We even have a couple of white noise machines but they don’t drown the noise out enough. Our manager is aware of the issue, since he reassigned the restrooms to avoid hearing it so loudly, but he can still hear it even after the men’s restroom has changed to the other end of the building. Can nothing be done? I’m really frustrated by this as it’s every single day without fail. I dread hearing him walk to the restroom. What can anybody do in this situation (or should I say shitutation)?
Chad has expressed that he appreciates people being bluntly honest with him, but I am just someone who cannot be blunt to anyone, no matter how badly they get on my nerves. I just deal with them as best I can and hope the behavior stops because I have no backbone and have never been able to stand up for myself.
Oh no, I’m sorry. There likely isn’t anything anyone can do about this; it is sometimes an unfortunate reality of working with humans.
If it helps, I wouldn’t assume that the reason Chad doesn’t take over-the-counter meds is because he doesn’t see any need to and instead is just blithely and explosively pooping away when a gas relief pill would stop it. Especially since it’s clearly something he and his doctor are actively working on, it’s more likely that he’s tried those options and they haven’t helped or there are other reasons why he can’t use them. Obviously you shouldn’t get so far into his medical business that you would know that kind of thing (despite his apparent frequent updates at meetings!) but it’s always useful to keep possibilities like in mind; often when there should be an easy solution for a medical problem, there’s a reason the person isn’t using it. (And because of that, even if you were someone who did feel comfortable being blunt, I don’t think bluntness would help.)
The one thing that seems like it would help and is within your office’s control is better soundproofing. Since the CEO is obviously aware of the situation shitutation, why not propose (ideally via a group of you) installing better soundproofing in the bathroom?
4. Can you fire someone who physically can’t do part of their job?
I’m curious about the legalities around accepting/denying candidates (in the U.S.) based on physical/health requirements.
I am not in a hiring position but work in an elementary school, and something I have seen come up a lot is hiring support staff (for special education classrooms with students who have significant needs) who struggle with the more active aspects of the job. These are students who sometimes need to be chased or blocked in order to stop them from leaving the school building or behaving in unsafe manners, for themselves or other students. On several occasions, I’ve seen staff members who are unable to do things like chase after runners or help with safety situations due to (from my perspective) age or health reasons. I’ve also worked with a staff member who self-disclosed some form of narcolepsy, who fell asleep multiple times to the point where their students were placed in unsafe situations (leaving the classroom, leaving the building, etc.).
Is it legal to let staff members go when their health or age leaves them unable to perform these necessary aspects of the job (keeping high-needs special education students safe and supervised)? None of the schools I’ve worked at have been overstaffed enough to have extra people to step in when these staff members are unable to perform the full extent of their roles.
When someone is struggling to perform some of the duties of their job for health reasons, the Americans with Disabilities Act requires employers to engage in what’s called “the interactive process,” where both parties try to figure out if there’s an accommodation that will allow the person to perform the essential functions of their job. Employers are required to make those accommodations as long as it doesn’t cause them “undue hardship” (the bar for which is fairly high). If the task is a minor or infrequent one, the accommodation might be simply reassigning it. If that’s not possible and the task is important, and there’s no other accommodation that would allow them to perform the job, at that point the position would not be protected.
5. Should my resume note that I was laid off?
I’m trying to update my resume and not sure how to represent the time I spent with [Company Name] now that I was laid off. Would it be accurate or appropriate to list the dates as “Dec 2023 – May 2025 (Laid Off)” to provide context?
You can include “(laid off),” but you don’t need to. Sometimes it makes sense to do that if you’re trying to explain a choppy work history, but otherwise there’s really no need — hiring managers who want to know why you left the job will ask.
The post refusing to work for a customer for moral reasons, a horrendous bathroom problem, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.
Unshelved strip originally published on Fri, 09 Jan 2015
Jul. 1st, 2025 12:00 amunshelved_feedThis classic Unshelved strip originally appeared on Fri, 09 Jan 2015.
Close To Home: Grist
Jun. 30th, 2025 08:47 pmscalziwhatever_feed
Have you ever had one of those places you want to go to, but never get around to checking out, and suddenly a year has passed and you’ve still never been? That’s how it was for me and Grist, a restaurant in downtown Dayton that I had heard about from so many people and had been meaning to get out to for literal months. Well, I finally made it happen, and I’m so glad I did.
Bryant and I were going out to dinner, and I asked him what kind of food he wanted. He picked Italian, which, in my opinion, is the hardest cuisine to get around this area. At least, good Italian, that is. There’s always Fazoli’s, and TripAdvisor has the audacity to label Marion’s Pizza as the number one Italian spot in the area, so pickings are slim for Italian ’round these parts. But I wanted something nicer than Spaghetti Warehouse.
Eventually my searching led me to Grist, which was labeled as Italian, and looked pretty dang amazing from the photos provided. Plus, I’d heard from numerous Daytonians in the past that they liked Grist, and I trust my sources. So, I made us a reservation for that evening, excited to try somewhere new.
Located on Fifth Street, it’s just down the street from the Oregon District, and close to the Dayton Convention Center. There’s a parking garage right across the street from it, and some street parking, too.
Upon walking in, the first thing I noticed was how bright and open it is. The large wall of windows let in so much natural light, and you immediately get to see all the baked goods in their glass display case.
I immediately loved the decor and vibe in Grist. It was like sort of rustic but nice at the same time. Like fancy Italian farmhouse vibes? It was really cute.
And there was even a selection of wine for purchase:
I didn’t get a shot of their other indoor dining area or their little patio, but it does have a super cute patio.
Grist has casual service, so you can either place your order at the counter or order at your table using your phone, and they bring the food out to your table. I chose to use my phone because there was a pretty steady flow of people ordering to-go stuff from the register.
Here’s what they were offering on their dinner menu:
It’s basically a law that you have to try a restaurant’s bread. The bread a restaurant offers is a window into all the rest of their food, and also into their soul. So we split the half loaf of rosemary and parmesan focaccia:
Bryant and I both loved the focaccia, and there was more than enough for both of us. The outside was just a little bit crispy and the bread inside was soft and chewy. It wasn’t overwhelmingly herbaceous, and was definitely worth the six dollars in my opinion. The only acceptable reason to not try this bread if you visit is if you’re gluten intolerant.
We also shared the house-made meatballs:
I can’t say I’m like, a huge meatball fan. I don’t really eat them that often and they’re not something I crave regularly or think about all that much. However, these meatballs were really yummy! I was impressed that there were five of them, and they were quite sizeable. I think the portion size is honestly pretty good. They definitely tasted like they were made fresh in-house, and had just the right amount of sauce on them. I would be more than happy to have a meatball marinara sub made with these meatballs.
And our final appetizer was the mushroom pate:
First off, I love how toasty the ciabatta was, it’s like the perfect shade for toast. The mushroom pate was packed to the brim with mushroomy, umami flavor. Total flavor bomb, and a little goes a long way. The pickled shallots added a wild contrast, and there was a lot of interesting textures. It was seriously delish.
To accompany the starters, I decided to try their sweet wine flight, which came with three wines for fourteen dollars:
I can’t remember what the red one was, but the two whites are a Riesling and a sparkling Moscato. I did not care for the red at all, in my opinion it wasn’t even remotely sweet, but I generally prefer white anyway so maybe it just wasn’t my cup of tea (or wine, I suppose). Normally I like Rieslings but this one was kind of a miss for me, too. The Moscato was the bomb dot com though. I loved the bubbles and the sweetness level was perfect. It was so smooth and delish, I ended up polishing that one off but didn’t really drink the other two.
Choosing an entree was pretty dang tough, but Bryant ended up picking the Cacio e Pepe Orecchiette:
I absolutely loved the presentation of this dish, and I’m a huge risotto fan, but I honestly didn’t care for this dish. It just really didn’t taste like much to me, but then again I only had one bite and Bryant said he really liked it, so maybe it was a me issue. I’m glad he enjoyed it!
I opted for the Sweet Corn Agnolotti:
I actually wasn’t sure what type of pasta agnolotti was, but it’s basically just a stuffed pasta, kind of like a ravioli. These little dudes were stuffed with a delicious, creamy filling that I totally burned the frick frack out of my tongue on. They had a great corn flavor, you could definitely tell it was sweet corn. I noticed on the menu it also said it had black truffle in it but I actually didn’t notice any truffle flavor at all, so that’s kind of odd. I really enjoyed my entree, and I think next time I’d like to try the squid ink pasta since I still have yet to try squid ink.
Of course, we had to save room for dessert, and you can’t eat an Italian dinner without ending it with tiramisu:
Funny enough, Bryant’s favorite dessert is tiramisu, so he definitely wasn’t gonna pass this up. He was kind enough to let me try a bite, and I feel confident saying it’s a pretty good tiramisu! It was creamy and rich, and honestly didn’t have any sort of alcohol-y boozy type flavor. No complaints, solid tiramisu.
I went with the apricot and passionfruit tart with pepita crust:
Oh my DAYS! This bloody thing was loaded with flavor. Holy cannoli this thing literally punched my tastebuds into next week! The passionfruit flavor is absolutely bonkers on this sucker. Don’t get me wrong, it was delicious. It was sweet and tart and the crust was awesome and the meringue on top was fantastic and wow. Seriously wow. It took me three separate tries to eat this after I took it home, because I would take one bite and be like, okay that’s plenty for now. But don’t misunderstand me, it is very good!
Before leaving, I simply had to get one of their incredible looking cookies to take home, and I picked the white chocolate pineapple one:
This cookie was dense, chewy, perfectly sweet with pieces of pineapple throughout, and the flaky sea salt on top really was the cherry on top, or I guess it was the flaky sea salt on top (I know, it’s not a funny joke). Definitely pick up a cookie on your way out, you won’t regret it!
Grist is open Tuesday-Saturday for lunch and dinner, with a break in between the two. You can make reservations for dinner but not for lunch, and you can order online for lunch but not for dinner. While I was there I learned that Grist also hosts cooking classes on Sundays, so that’s neat! I’d love to check one out sometime.
All in all, Grist was a great experience. Though we didn’t have waiters and whatnot, the service we got from the people at the counter and from the chefs that brought our plates out was extremely friendly, and also the food came out really quickly. We both really loved the food and the vibes, and I also like the prices. I definitely want to come back and try pretty much everything I didn’t get to this first time around.
Have you tried Grist before? Which dish looks the best to you? Do you have any recommendations for nice Italian places in Dayton? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day! And be sure to follow Grist on Instagram.
-AMS
my company says I have to give 60 days notice when I resign
Jun. 30th, 2025 05:59 pmaskamanager_feedA reader writes:
I’m a senior individual contributor. I’m not management, I’ve never been management, but I’ve been in my field for 25+ years. Recently, the large company I work for gave officer titles to pretty much everyone in senior-level non-management roles. Let’s say I’m now a “corral director” as well as a senior llama reporting specialist.
Today, we all got an email that lists the new officer titles and a required notice period for each. Stall directors, the lowest title, are expected to give 30 days’ notice. Corral directors like me, 60 days, Ranch directors like my manager, 90 days, and so on. This notice ends with vague threats of legal action if these notice periods are not followed.
I’m just a reporting specialist with a lot of experience in the industry. No other company is going to wait 60 days to onboard me if they offer me a job. Is this at all enforceable? I get that if I decide to leave and give the usual two weeks’ notice, I probably won’t be eligible for rehire by this company, given this rule, but can they actually impose legal penalties on me for not giving them quadruple the standard notice? I’m in the U.S.
Ha, no, they cannot. But they’d clearly like you to believe they can.
The only way a company can enforce a notice period is with an employment contract. That’s not what you have, because this info was delivered in an email announcement rather than via a contract that you were asked to sign. They aren’t interested in giving you an actual contract, because that would also bind them to terms like giving you X amount of notice if they ever decided to let you go, or paying you severance in lieu of that notice, and they don’t want to commit to that. They want to keep your employment at-will (meaning they can fire you or lay you off without notice) while making you think that you are bound to give you the exact notice they’re refusing to offer on their end.
They can implement other consequences for not giving them the amount of notice they’re requesting, like saying that you’d be ineligible for rehire. And if you’re in a state that doesn’t require unused vacation time to be paid out when you leave, they can make that payout dependent on providing a certain amount of notice. But they can’t bring legal action against you, because you haven’t entered into a contract agreeing to their terms. (And if they try to say that by accepting continued employment in your job, you’re agreeing to their terms, the law disagrees with them.)
At whatever point you resign, give a standard two-week notice (or whatever amount you decide to give). Don’t say, “I know you asked for 60 days.” Just give a normal amount of notice as if of course that’s a reasonable thing to do, because it is. If they say you were supposed to give 60 days, just reply, “The job I’m moving to was firm on the start date and this was the most I could negotiate.” Done, end of story.
And perhaps consider discreetly sharing this post, or this advice, with your colleagues.
The post my company says I have to give 60 days notice when I resign appeared first on Ask a Manager.
where do you start when you inherit a bad employee?
Jun. 30th, 2025 04:29 pmaskamanager_feedA reader writes:
My company has a challenging employee, Norman. Norman has many years of experience, which he takes as evidence that he’s good at his job. But he’s … not. When he works on a project, he gets caught up in weird details — like trying to build features that the client didn’t ask for and that don’t work properly — and then does a sloppy job implementing them. I believe (but can’t prove) that he sometimes skips our quality control process. He has submitted work in the past that is honestly embarrassing. Norman also regularly makes offensive jokes and comments in the office. We tell him when a comment is inappropriate, and he’ll stop in the moment, but then he says other inappropriate things later.
Previous managers have not addressed Norman’s performance systematically, and he has never been on a formal improvement plan. Possibly as a result, Norman does not believe that he has performance issues.
A new manager, Elaine, is about to take over this department. Elaine has previously worked on this team as a peer to Norman (she is being promoted to manager) so she is aware of the issues with him, and she’s committed to addressing them. But where do you start with an employee who has been underperforming for a long time? What does that first conversation look like, and when do you have it? Which of Norman’s issues should she address first?
I answer this question over at Inc. today, where I’m revisiting letters that have been buried in the archives here from years ago (and sometimes updating/expanding my answers to them). You can read it here.
The post where do you start when you inherit a bad employee? appeared first on Ask a Manager.
our customer-facing staff keep calling out or leaving work because they’re too stressed
Jun. 30th, 2025 02:59 pmaskamanager_feedA reader writes:
I work in HR for a community bank with over 500 employees and 50+ locations. Our supervisors are asking for help in navigating the more regular requests from customer-facing staff (think tellers) for mental health days. Or employees arrive for work but ask to go home because they are stressed/have anxiety/simply cannot do it.
In the cases that we are concerned about, it is happening semi-regularly – two to three times per month. If it happened once per year, our answer in HR would be easy – everyone has times when they are overwhelmed by life, and we need to allow an employee a day off without repercussions.
For employees who are eligible and have the ability to provide a medical certification, we go through the FMLA process and provide time off as is appropriate under the certification. We struggle, though, with the semi-regular requests from employees when supervisors feel that an employee is not really trying … and where FMLA does not seem to apply.
We have limited mental health resources, but we do have an EAP with a 24-hour hotline number and our medical insurance covers mental health needs. We provide reminders about these resources regularly, and especially when we are working with an employee who reaches out to HR or their supervisor. As a HR practitioner, I empathize with the employees who are struggling. Yes – sometimes, an employee doesn’t appear to be trying, but let’s listen to our employees and consider that they are truly in a situation that is overwhelming to them at the moment. I also understand how hard it is to staff a branch location when an employee does not report for work and there are customers who need assistance.
We will be offering some training around this issue for our supervisors. This will give us an opportunity to remind them that if the frequency is an issue, FMLA might apply. If FMLA does not apply, we do remind our supervisors that everyone needs grace sometimes. Our supervisors, though are trying to take care of our customers, and they are caught in the middle at times.
Can you help us with some scripting for our conversations with the supervisors? And also for their conversations with employees who are missing work? I have worked in HR for many years, but I am struggling with finding the right balance for these conversations.
First, I think you need to get clear on how many of these last-minute absences you can accommodate when FMLA or the ADA isn’t in play.
A handful of times a year shouldn’t be a big deal. But “I just can’t handle work today” happening two to three times per month is a lot, and past the point most customer-facing, shift-based jobs could accommodate without a legal protection in play.
The conversation to coach supervisors to have with employees who fall in that category is: “We do rely on you to be here reliably, outside of the paid time off we offer. While I fully understand that sometimes something can hit without warning, it’s happened so frequently lately that I want to make sure we’re on the same page about what we need in terms of reliable attendance, so that you can figure out if this is a job that works for you.”
That completely removes the “supervisors feel that an employee is not really trying” part of this. They shouldn’t assume they can assess that with accuracy — but more importantly, they don’t need to. They just need to focus on a clear, transparent conversation of “this is what we need, let’s figure out if this can be a match for our respective needs or not.”
But also, is there something going on that’s behind all these requests? Are employees being overworked or treated poorly (either by customers or managers)? Multiple people “simply not being able to face work” two to three times a month is unusually high, and I’d want to find out what’s behind that.
The post our customer-facing staff keep calling out or leaving work because they’re too stressed appeared first on Ask a Manager.
Girl Genius for Monday, June 30, 2025
Jun. 30th, 2025 04:00 amgirlgenius_main_feedThe Girl Genius comic for Monday, June 30, 2025 has been posted.
people don’t like my face in the morning, waiting for a new boss to turn things around, and more
Jun. 30th, 2025 04:03 amaskamanager_feedIt’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…
1. My manager said people don’t like my face in the morning
During a 1:1 with my supervisor, she said something that did not sit well with me. Before saying it, she looked away and told me she couldn’t look at me because it was stupid. Finally, she said that I need to work on being less bitchy when I come in. This threw me off completely, as I’m never bitchy when I walk in. So I asked what she meant. She said it’s not my attitude. It’s my FACE. My face is what other staff members find issue with.
I was beyond confused, so I asked her what that even means. She said that the look on my face when I come in is the equivalent to resting bitch face. This bothers people. So they decided to make a point to mention this to her, and rather than tell them no, she thought it was okay to bring to my attention. Should I bring this to upper management, as it strikes me as horribly unprofessional for my supervisor to say?
If she thought it was so stupid, she could have exercised some independent judgment as your manager and not brought it to you. By sharing it with you, she’s indicating that she thinks it’s something you need to act on. It’s a hallmark of a bad manager to pass along feedback they don’t stand by (unless it’s to say, “I don’t agree with this, but you should be aware it’s come up because of Political Reason X”).
But is there any chance there’s more to it than just your face and she’s just communicating badly? For example, if the culture in your office is to greet people when you pass them in the morning and you’re not doing that, or if you seem like there’s a storm cloud over you until you’re settled with coffee, it’s possible that’s behind it. But if it’s really just your face and nothing else, this is BS.
Either way, you could back to her and say, “I thought about what you said about my face when I arrive in the morning, and I’m not sure how to act on that. My face is just my face — I’m not glaring at people or giving dirty looks — but I’ll make more of a point of saying good morning to people and hopefully that will solve it. Is your sense that there’s something else specific I should be doing?” That last part isn’t there to imply you’re willing to have a face transplant, but to hopefully make her realize that so far what she’s said hasn’t been actionable at all.
2. What’s a reasonable amount of info to expect from a college student seeking an internship?
I’m the point person for internships for my healthcare-adjacent organization. The vast majority of those are masters-level graduate students, and those internship requirements are pretty heavily regulated by the schools and by state law. When someone writes to me asking if we have any opening for graduate-level internships, I know pretty immediately what would be required in terms of the type of work the intern would be doing and the amount and type of oversight that would be required.
I occasionally get emails from undergrads asking about internships. We do not have any sort of formal undergrad internship programs. I would like to encourage people to get into this field (especially since we’re facing a national shortage). However, any interns would not be working with me directly, and so I have to sell the internship, basically, to any of my peers who might be willing to oversee an intern. I can help with some of the supervision, but most of it would fall on other managers.
None of the students who write in on their own can give me any details or direction about what they need or want from an internship. When I ask, I get a lot of “Anything would be fine,” or “Anything in your field.” We are extremely understaffed, I have a hard time getting any managers to agree to even the very structured internships because of the amount of time the supervision and training would entail. I’m frustrated by the undergrad inquiries and I find myself thinking, “If you can’t even give me the number of hours you want to or need to complete, the timeline you desire, and some sense of what you want to accomplish, and any restrictions or requirements from your school, you are likely going to require way more hand-holding than we can do.”
Am I holding undergrads to an unrealistic standard? If they could provide me with more details, I’d at least be willing to try to see if I could find them something. I’m not sure how much hand-holding or back and forth I should be doing, and if my assumption that my needing to do that is a red flag or if it’s just what I should be expecting from undergrads.
I don’t think it’s a red flag; by definition the undergrad students have less experience in the work world (and are probably getting less guidance from their programs) than the graduate students who approach you.
In your first contact, try spelling out very clearly what you need from them. For example: “We don’t have a formal internship program for undergrads, but we’re open to creating internships under the right circumstances. Please respond with the following information: the number of hours you would like to complete (this can be a range), the starting and ending dates you’re seeking, any requirements from your school, and an idea of specifically what you would be seeking to accomplish during the internship. Please note: we need all of this information in order to move forward, and cannot consider applications without it.”
If you spell it out that clearly and they don’t come back with the answers you asked for, don’t put more energy into it. But try spelling it out first.
3. How long should I wait for a new manager to turn things around?
I have been working in the IT department of a company for a little over 1.5 years. We have always struggled with understaffing, but it feels it has gotten worse over the last few months. My new manager started a few months after I did and we have worked together to make some great projects happen, but the workload of the department has skyrocketed without staffing keeping pace. I have been pointing this out for over a year. Unfortunately, things move slowly and while he has been fighting to get more staff approved, it has not happened fast enough, never mind that even if/when it’s approved, it takes forever to fill the slot and train someone.
I am approaching burnout quickly. I like my projects, I like my team for the most part and I like the money and the freedoms I have, so I would hate to quit. What is a reasonable amount of time to wait for new management to implement changes before throwing in the towel?
Over a year is a long time to wait, particularly when you say you’re quickly approaching burn-out and there are no real signs of impending change. Why not start looking now? Since you otherwise like your job, you can be picky and don’t need to jump at the first thing that comes along, but getting options in the mix will give you a lot more control in the situation.
4. I was asked to sign an NDA before talking about a job
I recently was reached out to by a CEO of a company that I had previously done some consulting for. It had been over a year since I had talked to them and they wanted to set up a meeting to reconnect. Since we last talked, I began working full-time again and no longer consult. I was open to connecting and could at least forward their questions to other industry contacts.
When we connected, they mentioned they liked working with me and wanted to talk about a vague high-level position and the networking call turned into an unplanned hour-long group interview without any chance for preparation on my side. The company provided no details about the level of the position or what it would require.
Before the company provides a job title or description, they need me to sign a NDA. Since they reached out to me to recruit me and are not providing even the basic details, this is a big red flag to me. What is your wisdom on this?
I don’t think it’s a particular red flag. If you’re open to hearing them out and don’t object to the terms of the NDA, sign it and see what they have to say. It doesn’t obligate you to continue beyond that. If you’re not that interested, let them know you’re not currently looking for work and leave it there! The fact that they reached out to you rather than the other way around isn’t really a factor in navigating it (and doesn’t make their request appreciably weirder).
5. What’s the deal with recruiters?
I see people talk about “recruiters” all the time, but I don’t really have an understanding of what that is. What industries use recruiters, and at what levels? Are they qualified to do things like mapping one’s skills and experience onto jobs, or is that more of a job coach thing? When someone has a resume of things but is open to switching sectors/industries, do they call a recruiter for help?
I have this image of someone in tech getting headhunted, but it seems like “recruiter” can mean a wide variety of things.
Lots of different industries use recruiters; in fact, I’m not sure there’s an industry that never uses them, particularly at more senior levels, although they’re definitely more common in some (like tech) than others.
The big thing to know is that recruiters work for employers, not job seekers. Employers hire them to fill jobs, and then they seek out candidates for those specific positions. They mostly don’t do things like helping you figure out what your skills and experience might qualify you for (unless they look at your resume and realize you’d be a great fit for something they happen to be hiring for). That’s more of a job coach thing.
The post people don’t like my face in the morning, waiting for a new boss to turn things around, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.
Things I Was Not Expecting Outside My Hotel Window Last Night, Fireworks Edition
Jun. 30th, 2025 12:15 amscalziwhatever_feed
July 4 is most of a week away, so I was not anticipating that outside my hotel window last night would be a full-fledged professional fireworks display. But it turns out the hotel I was at, was next door to a Masonic Temple compound, and I guess they had some premature patriotic fervor. Inasmuch as I got a free fireworks show I didn’t even need to leave my hotel room for (and it ended early enough that I didn’t lose any sleep over it), I suppose I can’t complain.
Back at home now. Not anticipating a fireworks display tonight. We’ll see if that prediction holds.
— JS
Unshelved strip originally published on Thu, 08 Jan 2015
Jun. 30th, 2025 12:00 amunshelved_feedThis classic Unshelved strip originally appeared on Thu, 08 Jan 2015.
