It’s four answers to four questions. Here we go…

1. How do I fire someone humanely when management ignored years of underperformance?

I’m a manager at a small product company and I’m facing a role elimination that’s keeping me up at night.

I joined this org a bit less than a year ago and inherited a team, including one person who has been here for eight years — the only job he’s ever had since college. The role has always required strategic thinking, synthesis, and independent problem framing. He has never fully met that bar, but when I arrived, the work happened to be more execution-focused and predefined, so the gap was less visible. Now that the work requires what the role always demanded, the gap is undeniable. Some of what he does can also now be handled by AI, which makes the role increasingly hard to justify.

He has no professional network and has never job searched as an adult. When I try to picture him navigating interviews or knowing where to even start, I genuinely can’t. I think he’d struggle a lot with the social performance aspects of interviewing. Beyond that, this type of role, which is the only one he’s had his whole career, is dwindling across the industry, and he doesn’t have the fundamental skills to do the job elsewhere. On top of that, I know enough about his personal situation to know that losing this job would be devastating.

The people who hired him and let this go on for years are still at the org. They all agree something needs to change, but the work of handling it has fallen to me, the newest person in the room. My boss told me that this employee has been underperforming for years, and when I asked if the employee knew that, my boss said, “Probably not.” I’m angry at my predecessors for not addressing this when the job market was stronger. Now he’s facing this in a brutal market, and I feel like he’s going to pay the price for their inaction.

What’s the right path forward for someone in his situation — how much notice, what kind of severance, and what support? And is it appropriate that I’m the one doing this when the people who created the situation are still here — and should I be pushing back on that?

Yeah, that’s horrible. Your organization’s management let this go on for years and is now poised to let him go in a particularly awful market. That doesn’t mean you should keep him on (there are other people who need work, perhaps just as desperately, and could do the work you need done) but it does mean that the organization has a very strong obligation to act with care. That means talking to him as soon as possible about the deficiencies in his work so that he’s not blindsided, offering him any training and support that might be reasonable (if any exists; realistically, it may not), and being prepared to offer sizable severance to help give him a softer landing. Exactly how long that process should take depends on specifics I don’t have, but if he’s never heard before now that he hasn’t been performing at the level needed, I’d say at least a few months from when you first talk to him about the issues or a severance package large enough that it makes up for less notice.

It would be a kindness to make it a layoff rather than a firing, framing it as “the needs of the job have changed” (which is arguably true — if nothing else, he’s being held to a different bar now, even if it’s the bar he always should have been held to).

It’s unfair that you’re the one getting stuck with it, but it also sounds like he’s better off with you handling it, because you can be direct when other people there apparently won’t be.

2. Coworkers ignore my availability and then get angry when I’m not around

I’m the shipper/receiver for my university campus, and I’m regularly the only one who works the dock on any given day. There is the occasional part-time help that comes in two or three times a week in the afternoons to help prevent me from drowning in the volume of stuff I receive for my campus every day. My day generally consists of receiving in the morning and distributing everything I receive in the afternoon. Due to some limitations from the health and safety department, I’m not allowed to distribute some of the items (think liquid nitrogen, compressed gasses, new large appliances, etc.). For those items, I have to email or call the person to come pick them up from me. And some items that I usually deliver have to be picked up as their recipients are located in secure areas I don’t have access to.

When I send those emails, I specifically say to come by the dock during my morning operating hours before lunch, as I need them to sign out their stuff from me for tracking purposes. And the deliveries I do in the afternoon keep me away from the dock all afternoon. I only return for a few minutes at a time to get a new cart of deliveries, so I spend maybe 15 minutes of my four hours in the afternoon at the dock.

There’s been a large uptick in people who are just straight-up ignoring my availability. Lately, all the pickup requests I do are met with a decisive response of some variation of “I’ll be there at X time in the afternoon” and nothing else. I reiterate that I’m not available to sign out their items to them in the afternoon and to come by in the morning. But lately they just show up in the afternoon regardless, then get extremely annoyed, and sometimes bananapants mad, that I’m not there to sign their stuff out to them when I very clearly said that I will not be around to do so.

I’ve even had complaints to my boss that were essentially, “Receiver wasn’t at dock to sign stuff out to me, do something to correct it.” My boss has dismissed them as pointless. But when those complaints go nowhere, they get escalated if these people are feeling vindictive enough. Thankfully nothing has ever come of it, at least not yet. So while my bosses know of the issue, I think I need to ask them to help me deal with it in a formal request. How would I even go about that?

First, if you don’t already have it, ask for some type of official and very visible signage at the dock that clearly states what the pick-up hours are, so that people who come by in the afternoon see that rather than assuming you’re just AWOL (and so it looks like the dock’s official policy rather than your own). And similarly, you might revisit how you’re relaying those hours in your email; it clearly needs to be big, bold, and set off from the other text so it’s harder to miss.

But behind that, just lay it out for your boss: “As you know, there’s been a large uptick in people ignoring my availability and, even though I clearly tell people that they need to pick up their shipments before noon or I’ll be away on deliveries, they show up anyway and then some of them complain that I’m not here. Sometimes those complaints have been escalated and, while nothing has come of it so far, I’m concerned about having complaints filed against me. Can you help me figure out how to fix this?”

3. My coworker keeps falling asleep while I’m waiting on work from him

I have a coworker who is going through it. Like, just one hit after another. I feel bad, and our team has really stepped up to support him.

However, I notice that he’s been falling asleep a lot during the day. If I message him at 2 pm, he will respond at 6 saying “Sorry, I fell asleep.” I am assuming there is not much I should do here, my manager is well aware of what’s going on in his life. However, he also took last week off to deal with some personal matters and left a bunch of time sensitive work unfinished. And when he falls asleep, I’m also usually waiting for a response for something I need to close the loop.

Do I just chalk this up to “Dang, this guy is going through it” and work around that? Do we need to have a larger conversation with the team about what to do when this happens? I want to be sensitive to what’s going on in his life, but I also don’t want work to fall through the cracks if it doesn’t have to.

Can you talk to him about it directly? For example: “I know you’re having a rough time right now. What’s the best thing for me to do when I’m waiting on a response from you in order to move forward with something and can’t reach you for a good chunk of the day, or when something looks like it might have gotten overlooked?” Even just asking that might nudge him into realizing he’s got to do something differently (which obviously wouldn’t be making his life magically fall into place but might be setting alarms during the day so he’s not sleeping for four hours while people are waiting on him or talking to his boss about managing his workload differently during this time).

If that doesn’t work and it’s causing problems in your work, at that point there’s not much more you can do besides talking to your boss about managing the team’s workload differently while your coworker is (presumably temporarily) less available.

4. Should I ask for a promotion?

I’ve been with my company since 2013. In 2021, I made a deliberate shift out of an area where I was a well-established subject matter expert to join a different division. I started as an entry-level associate in Tech Ops and, within about 18 months, moved into Business Operations Analytics.

Since then, I’ve consistently rebuilt my reputation as a go-to expert. I’ve created processes, documentation, and training materials that were originally designed for a team of about 20, but are still in use today as the organization has scaled to 200 employees. After several reorganizations, I was placed into a smaller, specialized team of eight. For about a year, I operated in what was essentially a “Lead” capacity without the official title. Eventually, I was formally given the Lead title, but I’m compensated at the Business Operations Analyst II level, higher than the traditional lead role.

Over the past three years, I’ve received “exceeds expectations” on every performance review, which is extremely rare at my company. While that has come with merit increases, I’m still positioned around the mid-range of the pay band for my role.

From a results standpoint, I’ve driven measurable impact. The work I’ve led has contributed to an approximately 84% increase in resolution success across my department (my team plus two others). During my last review, my previous director stated in front of my current manager that my performance is “bar none” and that I’m more than ready for the next step in my career.

Given all of this, do I have a strong case to formally push for a promotion? Is it better to wait and see if my manager advocates for me organically, or should I take a more direct route and clearly communicate that I’m seeking advancement (and may need to explore other opportunities if that’s not possible)? I want to handle this professionally and strategically, not emotionally or impulsively. At the same time, I don’t want to continue operating at a higher level without corresponding title and compensation if there’s no path forward.

It sure sounds like you have a strong case for promotion. You should talk to your manager about it proactively rather than waiting to see if she advocates for it on her own. She might, but not every manager is good at doing that, and some don’t even think about it until an employee explicitly raises it. So yes, talk to her! Say that you have a track record of excellent results in your current role and you’d like to talk about what a path to promotion would look like.

You don’t need to spell out that you’d consider job searching if you’re not promoted; that’s always the subtext to conversations like this, without needing to be explicitly stated.

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. Coworker threatened me and HR isn’t doing anything

Last fall, a coworker made an inappropriate comment toward me (called me a “ho” out of nowhere) and also made a statement about using a gun on me. She made these comments in front of several coworkers, who reported the incident. Around that same time, it had been announced that she was receiving a promotion, which added to the confusion.

The following week, we were told this employee was no longer with the team. About a month ago, we learned she had actually been on leave and has now been reassigned to a different team within the organization.

While I have not had direct contact with her since the incident, I feel uneasy knowing she is still employed here, given the nature of what was said. Leadership and HR have not communicated much about the situation, and I’m unsure what protections or boundaries are in place.

I have asked for support from HR to avoid interaction, but they have been less than helpful. My manager is also frustrated with HR and has offered to help me come up with our own safety plan, which I appreciate, but I’m not sure what that should realistically include or whether that responsibility should fall on us.

What is a reasonable course of action here? Is it appropriate to push HR more directly for clarity on safety measures, or to formally request that I not have any interaction with this person? How much responsibility should I or my manager be taking on in creating a “safety plan” in a situation like this?

When things are at the point that you need a safety plan, the person really shouldn’t still be working there — not unless there are extenuating circumstances that mitigate what happened (for example, a medical issue that has been treated, combined with compelling reason to believe that whatever caused the original threat won’t be repeated and sincere contrition).

It’s absolutely appropriate for you and your manager to push HR very directly for a clearer answer about how you can feel safe at work. Ideally your manager would take the lead on advocating for this … and also should have a conversation with HR, the company’s lawyers, and her own boss about the company’s legal and moral liability when an employee has threatened to shoot another employee.

2. Can I wear earbuds to drown out diet talk?

Recently, I’ve been wearing two earbuds at the office with music or podcasts in the background while I work. Typically, this isn’t something I like to do because I think it can come off as unprofessional. Especially because I’m in my 20’s — I think my generation can get a reputation for constantly being on our phones (and to a certain extent I understand that reputation and it can be true), so that’s another reason I try to avoid it.

Recently, everyone in the office has been talking about their diets – weighing themselves, the amount of calories they consume, the foods they’re cutting out, etc. As someone in recovery from an eating disorder, hearing these things can be difficult for me. For a while, I was in a really good place where, yes, it was annoying to hear these conversations, but I could try and zone it out. Lately though, the repetition of these conversations has hit more closely and makes it more difficult for me to focus on my work and maintain my recovery. I would love to ask my coworkers to not talk about these things during work, but I’m not sure it’s my place do that given that it’s a “me” issue that I have to work through. My solution has been to wear two earbuds while I work to drown out those conversations. Is this a happy medium compromise, or do you think it would come off as too unprofessional?

It’s pretty office-dependent; in many offices, it would be a non-issue and completely unremarkable. In others, it might feel out of sync with the culture but still be fine to do (especially if you explain it helps you focus). In a minority of others, it would feel out of sync with the culture in a way that could affect how you were perceived there.

So, first: does anyone else wear earbuds? Do you need to be able to hear people talking to you unexpectedly? If you’re still left unsure, ask your manager about it! It’s fine to say, “I’ve found some of the chatting in the office distracting and realized I focus really well with headphones on — is it okay with you if I keep doing that?” There’s a pretty good chance you’ll hear it’s fine. (And if you don’t, you could potentially approach it as a formal accommodation if you’re willing to disclose what’s going on.)

But also, you do have some standing to ask people to lay off on the diet talk, and there’s advice here on how to do it.

3. Is there a polite way to offer editing services?

I am a very active member of an online community for a particular hobby and would love to work for this community. I have years of experience as a writer and editor, and I have noticed that the site could probably use one — they put out a lot of content and quite a few errors get missed. I also want to add that I’ve been interviewed by the owner of this community, so I’m not a complete stranger.

I’m struggling with a polite way to say to them, “You need an editor. Would you like to hire me?” *Is* there a polite way to say this? Any suggestions?

It probably isn’t going to be a super high priority for an online hobby community, which likely has limited resources and may rely mostly or entirely on volunteers. But you can offer! It’s okay to be straightforward about it: say you’re a fan of their work and active member of the community, work professionally as an editor, have noticed their content not infrequently contains editing errors (you could include something like “understandably, since I’m sure the people creating it have lots of demands on their time”), and you’d love to talk with them about what an editing arrangement could look like if that’s something they’re interested in. Assuming you’re not offering to volunteer your services, you’d want to make that clear (probably by stating your rates up-front or mentioning that you’d be open to discounting them if you are).

4. What to say to a worker who was striking when we last spoke

I work for a company that provides vendor services to an industry that has a fair amount of unionized workers. A few months back, I contacted a client to check in, only to be told rather awkwardly that his department was on strike so he wasn’t sure how things were going. Such news typically doesn’t make it to a national level for this industry unless it’s very large or there’s some unusual circumstance. I’ve been doing this job for over half a decade and this was my first time speaking with a striking employee. At the time, I just wished him luck and well wishes, and ended the call.

It’s clear from the notes on his account that he’s now back at work, so today I reached out again. I got voicemail this time, but if I had gotten him on the phone, should I have said anything about the strike? Google doesn’t tell me much about how the strike was resolved, so for all I know he’s not happy about it, and it’s not appropriate for my role to get involved in those discussions. Overall, this feels pretty low-stakes but I’m curious about your thoughts.

You don’t need to reference the strike. It would also be fine to say, “Glad you’re back” or “Glad the strike didn’t have to last very long” (if it didn’t) or “I hope the strike was successful” or otherwise express your support.

5. How to explain my recent layoff

As a result of some reorganization in the department, I was recently made redundant after only a year and a half on the job. Leadership made their decision based on shifting strategic priorities and it had nothing to do with my performance. How should I think about explaining this redundancy to potential employers as I begin to apply for new positions? The “reason for leaving last position” question is bound to come up on applications and in interviews and I’d like to have an answer prepared.

Being laid off is a completely routine and unremarkable reason for leaving a job and you won’t need a lengthy explanation! You can simply say, “Our team had a reorg that significantly changed our priorities and my position was eliminated as part of that.” If multiple positions were cut, you can say, “A reorg eliminated multiple positions on my team, and I was laid off as part of that.”