The Workplace Stack Exchange
The Workplace Stack Exchange

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1500 questions
69
votes
4 answers

Coworker screwed up side-job I hired him for

I have a co-worker who does car maintenance on the side. After getting a positive recommendation from other co-workers, I hired him to repair the A/C on my vehicle. He screwed up in two ways. He didn't replace some optional items that he said…
Kevin
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69
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8 answers

How can I get out of a bad job assignment without quitting?

I'm a software developer. Recently, my boss has told me my upcoming project assignment will be doing manual quality assurance on a web site some colleagues are building. I feel that spending 6 months doing this instead of coding is both a waste of…
Eden
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69
votes
7 answers

Why do interviewers ask leadership questions even for "follower" positions?

I remember trying out for choir in college where I had to go through an interviewing process. The director asked me questions like "How did you form, lead, and manage a singing group?" as if I was supposed have done that. I applied for a sales…
Mickael Caruso
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69
votes
15 answers

How to motivate people to participate in a company hackathon?

I’m working for a software company and am part of the committee organizing an internal hackathon. I’m not a manager. Ideas I suggest are discussed by the committee and if we agree they are good, we try to make them happen. I am basically looking for…
JohnSomeone
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69
votes
11 answers

Employer wants us to tweet (etc) about them; what should I consider?

I work for a large multinational company. Lately they've been encouraging (not requiring) us to "go social", to talk about their products, services, conference talks, etc on our personal social networks. (This would be in our words, not marketing's…
S Abrams
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69
votes
11 answers

Why do interviewers focus so much on why you want the job?

I am in the final year of my undergraduate degree and so I have been applying to PhD positions and job vacancies that I find appealing. At first I thought the interview application process would be similar to applying for a degree, i.e. that the…
gfv
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69
votes
5 answers

Interview question: Why did you leave your previous role?

I am currently in the job market for a leadership role, and could use some advice on how to answer this question objectively. My previous position was in many ways a dream job. The company was having explosive growth, I had been promoted three times…
kmunky
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69
votes
10 answers

How can I deal with a disgusting coworker?

My cubicle neighbor belches, farts, chews his food with his mouth wide open and makes moaning noises when he eats as if he was having some private time with himself. And he is about 10 years older than me. I have told my boss about it. He replied…
user3207
69
votes
7 answers

What's the most appropriate time in the recruitment process to reveal that you're transgender (in the UK)?

I am a transgender person looking to switch jobs from the one I am currently in to one where I can work as a woman, completing the set of places I need to be accepted in order to live full time as my correct gender. At some point before arriving for…
Toni Leigh Porter
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69
votes
19 answers

Interpreting a negative self-evaluation of a high performer

I have a direct report that I consider to be not only my best performer, but one of the best performers in my entire organization. Recently, our organization decided to implement a detailed self-evaluation as part of our performance review cycle. I…
questformore
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69
votes
11 answers

Boss is suggesting I learn the codebase in my free time

I was hired by an investor to solely work on an angular/Firebase CRM/ERP system. The project was built by an unknown number of people before me and it took 7 years to develop the system from scratch. When this investor offered me the job, I was…
מיכאל ברגינסקי
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69
votes
13 answers

How to avoid previous employer who is nagging me to do their job?

I used to work for a very small family-owned startup with minimum wage, zero benefit, and it was very exploitative and toxic in nature. The family had other businesses and they used to run the startup on the side, more like an experiment. My…
X5010
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69
votes
10 answers

Is it unusual for an employee to be denied knowledge of where the company's funding comes from?

An engineer begins work at a 3rd-year startup. He inquires about how it is funded. His boss tells him, "You will never know that. Why do you want to know that? The funding is legitimate. That's all you need to know." Is this unusual? Is it…
DJG
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69
votes
15 answers

Employee effectively not working during notice period

Location: Germany We have an employee that was laid off because his performance was unsatisfactory. His notice period is 3 months. We were hoping, he would at least do some trivial, but time-consuming tasks in that 3 months. However, it looks like…
Danubian Sailor
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69
votes
9 answers

Is it okay if I tell my boss that I cannot read cursive?

I am working as a part-time grader. Some students hand in their assignments handwritten. Here is the problem. As an ESL1 speaker, I was never exposed to cursive handwriting. Not only I can't write in cursive but it also takes me forever to…
Mhy
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