\nI work as a middle manager. My department is quite large, but most people report to me only a small percentage of their time (that is, they spend four hours of their week working in my department, and the rest at their primary job).<\/p>\n
Last year, my supervisor told me that my coworker (Alf), who is at the same level but on a different team, was experiencing burnout and wanted to step back. Alf’s team works in a related area to the one I currently supervise, but actually more matches my background and professional interests. There are also three full-time reports in his unit (or four with Alf returning to the team as a regular employee). I’m interested in becoming more involved in managing the work of that unit, and my supervisor and I came up with a proposal to combine the two units under me (and eliminate some other parts of my work that are not my favorites to ensure I have a reasonable workload). I love managing people and have been told many times that I am good at it and that the organization would be excited to have me in this new role. I thought things were pretty set to change this summer.<\/p>\n
But now Alf has said he wants to remain in his current managerial role after all. However, our director (my boss’s boss) wants me to take on this new role anyway and Alf steps down. Alf is a good manager, but he is not a big picture thinker, which is what we need because of the big changes coming to our region. My director feels that I am the right person for the job at this time. Still, I feel extremely weird about this. I agreed because I thought Alf wanted to step down. I don’t want her to feel like I’m stealing her job against her will. To make things more complicated, Alf was my supervisor for about seven years before I got my current job.<\/p>\n
This is the kind of organization where people stay for their entire careers, so I will likely need to work with Alf for some time. It is also possible that he may continue to work in one of the two units that I oversee. Any advice on how I should contact them? Admit that this is weird AF? Reassure her that I wasn’t trying to steal her job? Let her feel her very understandable feelings for a while before getting closer? We are friendly, but we don’t talk regularly anymore because I don’t report to him.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
The primary messaging on this should really come from your director, who needs to be transparent with Alf about why this change is happening and what it means for his career.<\/p>\n
Once that happens, your approach with Alf should be positive \u2013 you’re excited to work with him, he should let you know what he needs, etc. i will do that No<\/i> Say something about her being weird or reassure her that you weren’t trying to take her job; There’s too much risk that it will make things more awkward for her rather than you keeping things positive, factual, and forward-looking. Give him some time to adjust to the change and work as usual Absolutely<\/i> He will adjust; If it doesn’t, you’ll have to address it at that point, but it’s kinder to her to move on without anticipating\/assuming awkwardness if you can.<\/p>\n
3. HR thinks I completed the engagement survey, but I didn’t<\/strong><\/p>\n\nMy organization recently used an outside company to conduct an employee engagement survey. I was on the fence about completing the survey because of the way it was handled last year. I opened my unique survey link to click and read the questions, but never submitted it.<\/p>\n
At various points during the survey period, HR sent emails regarding survey completion by department. In one of these updates I saw that my department’s completion rate was 100%. I’m the head of the department, so I thought maybe my own survey wasn’t meant to count here and maybe brought it up to leadership instead, but no one in the other categories seemed to understand where my survey would count. I assumed that the results of my survey would go down the drain and decided not to submit it.<\/p>\n
Today, I had a meeting with HR to review the survey results. He started the meeting by saying that five people in my team, including me, were invited to participate in the survey and all five, including me, did so. I didn’t want to admit that I didn’t do it because I didn’t want to derail the entire meeting or get a slap on the wrist for not attending, but I couldn’t help but think that the results couldn’t possibly be accurate.<\/p>\n
Should I have told them? I am questioning whether there are other issues with the survey or its analysis based on my information that what is being presented to me is incorrect. What could possibly have happened?! Is it fair to be scolded by HR for my mistake in highlighting problems with the survey process?<\/p>\n
Separately, what is your opinion on employee engagement surveys? Are they valuable? Do organizations\/companies make meaningful changes based on the feedback thus provided?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
As a department head, yes, I think you should have flagged it. You are part of the organization’s leadership and if you are aware of major inaccuracies in the survey, you should say something. It doesn’t need to be a big deal – just, “Are you sure this is right? I didn’t actually get my work done – I’m happy to talk about why if you want – so I’m worried it might indicate that our numbers are off in other ways.”<\/p>\n
And then if they wanted to know why you didn’t complete it, you could explain the email stating that 100% of your department had already assumed you were not being counted and therefore didn’t need to. Or you could talk about all the issues that made you hesitant about doing it in the first place, if it was something you were willing to get into.<\/p>\n
As far as the value of these surveys goes, they vary In encompassing manner<\/i> by the company. If your company is a place that welcomes disagreement and takes feedback seriously, they can be meaningful. If they are not, they usually only create skepticism and in some cases can make alienation worse if feedback is sought but is always ignored.<\/p>\n
4. My contact’s advisor thinks we’re dating, but we’re not<\/strong><\/p>\n\nA former co-worker asked if I would do an informational interview to talk about my work and the company with someone he was mentoring who was applying for an open entry-level position in my division. Of course, I’m glad to meet him.<\/p>\n
Except that I asked about this position, including our division head, who said he didn’t know what this job posting was because we weren’t hiring. I’m not sure how it got posted or if it was posted to the wrong division, but we are not hiring for any positions at this time due to budget issues.<\/p>\n
I would still meet with this person, and perhaps they should still apply to join our system and perhaps they would be considered for an actual opening in another division. How transparent should I be that my understanding is that we are not actually hiring for this role? The job market is tough enough so I don’t want to give false hope or waste anyone’s time, but I’m not really authorized to speak on recruiting like this.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
There’s nothing wrong with saying, “As far as I know, we are not currently hiring for this position. Where did you see the posting?” And if you want, you can ask your manager if it’s okay to officially tell them that your division is not currently hiring; They may be okay with it.<\/p>\n
5. What questions should I ask a recruiter in an interview?<\/strong><\/p>\n\nI’m looking for a new job and after being out of the interview process for several years, I’ve noticed that many of my first round interviews now take place over brief phone screens with HR recruiters rather than conversations with the hiring manager. I know it’s important to ask thoughtful questions at the end of an interview, but recruiters often don’t have a deep knowledge of the day-to-day responsibilities or team dynamics of the role. What types of questions are most appropriate and effective to ask in that setting? Is it still important for recruiters to ask questions?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Yes, you should still have questions \u2013 and if you think about it you probably have things you’d like them answered!<\/p>\n
It’s true that any specifics about the job or team are best saved for the hiring manager, but recruiters will be ready to answer what qualifications and experience are most important for the role, the size and composition of the team, and why the position is open, as well as anything logistical, like salary, remote vs. hybrid vs. in-office, potential timeline for hiring, and what they expect the process to look like.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
These are five answers to five questions. Here it is\u2026 1. Should you fire someone you wouldn’t hire right now? I recently attended an event where a speaker said that if a manager is evaluating whether to let go of an underperforming employee, they should ask themselves, “Would I hire them now?” And if the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6410,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[11153,151,1304,231,2549,152,3370,6407],"class_list":{"0":"post-50625","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-daily-bread","8":"tag-anymore","9":"tag-changed","10":"tag-coworker","11":"tag-fire","12":"tag-hire","13":"tag-mind","14":"tag-wanted","15":"tag-wouldnt"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50625","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50625"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50625\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50626,"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50625\/revisions\/50626"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christiancorner.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}