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Part of doing any job well involves getting feedback, and that’s also true for my position as the Work Friend columnist for The New York Times, which I have been for the past six months. Over that time, I’ve received dozens of incisive, critical, thought-provoking and sometimes even vaguely insulting responses, most of which have made me think — and in some cases rethink — my answers to questions that I’d chosen to respond to in this column.
For this last column of 2024, I thought I’d do a little something different and share some of that feedback from readers — good and bad — not just about my answers, but about some of the questions themselves.
A column that prompted one of the biggest responses was my very first, published on July 7 (“Dropping In Just to Say Hi!”), in which a questioner expressed discomfort over a colleague’s habit of initiating conversations on Slack with just a “hello” and no follow-up. My response empathized with the letter writer’s frustrations — I even called the practice of saying “hi” accompanied by silence “creepy.” And a lot of readers had something to say about it, much of it smart.
Said one:
“I have to say that I found it comical that neither the advice seeker nor you thought to simply prompt the ‘hi’-writing colleague to elaborate on the purpose of his greeting, rather than just letting it “languish” with no response. What happened to common civility? If someone says hi, you say hi back! Or you can say, ‘Yes, how can I help you?’ Or ‘Did you have a question?’ Perhaps it’s his way of checking to see if you are busy. And if no response he assumes you’re not available to chat. Or perhaps HE feels put out that everyone else ignores his attempts to connect! He doesn’t want to be annoying and keep pestering people who don’t reply. So he doesn’t follow up. Has anyone tried to just ask? There is no need to be snide.”
Said another:
“Just wanted to note that when you send a message to someone via Teams or Slack it is proper to say ‘hi’ and wait for a response before putting your full request or comment in the message. This is to ensure the receiver is ready to receive the message which may be confidential. If they are sitting with a colleague or in a meeting they may not want to be interrupted or have another colleague see the contents of the message. If there is no reply to ‘hi’ the sender can assume the receiver is busy or not available to receive the message. Just thought I’d pass that along.”
Another column that prompted a flurry of emails was the July 21 column, “Thanks but No Thanks.” In it, I answered a question from a young woman who said she was made uncomfortable by the monthly tradition of her company’s chief executive of inviting junior employees to lunch. As she put it, their conversations over a midday meal — 90 minutes’ worth — often dovetail into discussions about their personal lives, which make her uncomfortable. (“I find him to be brash, immature and annoying,” she added.)
Well, a lot of people disagreed with her — and with my advice that she simply refuse to go to lunch with him. One respondent pointed out, quite sensibly, that going to a regular lunch might be insurance against a layoff, among other things.
“It’s learning about leadership opportunities. It’s venting about difficult clients or customers (within reason). It’s proposing process improvements. It’s learning about the company’s and C.E.O.’s strategic vision, and how that might affect you. Ninety minutes! I’d pay real money to get 90 minutes even with the most brash and immature S.V.P. at my workplace. If it’s none of those things, slap a fake smile on your face and get through it, and treat it as another opportunity, this time to learn how to deal with unlikable people.”
Another writer explained that, in his own role as a leader of a team, he invited subordinates for a regular coffee to get to know them better.
“I want to get to know more about the 40 people in my office,” he wrote. “I wanted to get them to express their goal and opportunities in their careers and how I could help them get there. I was surprised when many people said that this is the first time anyone from upper management asked them about their career goals and how the office might help that.”
And then, to me:
“I guess there’s a reason why you’re only a writer and not a leader.”
Ouch!
Not every response to every column is negative, of course. Lots of readers have written in to share their own stories about surviving a difficult job while on the cusp of retirement (“How Do I Survive the Last Mile to Retirement?” — Sept. 15); about being an “older” worker on the job hunt in an ageist society (“Help! I’m ‘Older’ and on the Job Hunt.” — Sept. 1); and about gossiping at work (“Tolerating the Office When It Feels Like High School” — Sept. 29).
Said one about the retirement dilemma:
“You correctly diagnosed that the root of the problem was the person’s attitude, but you did not offer any encouragement toward a way to improve that attitude. My point is, saying ‘Improve your attitude’ is about as helpful as telling an angry person, ‘Just relax!’”
Not surprisingly, some of the most strident — and scathing — emails came in response to the Sept. 29 column, which explored a letter writer’s questioning the appropriateness of a decision to announce, via a sticker by her desk, that she’d had an abortion. (I was sympathetic to the letter writer’s description of the sticker as “a totem of safety” to the women she worked with. And no, I’m not going to quote the emails I got in response.)
But most emails over these six months really made me think. One correspondent, in response to a letter in the Oct. 13 column about an employee who wanted more eye contact with her boss during meetings, offered these suggestions:
“1. Reinforce your message when you speak up in meetings with vocal power and body language! I don’t mean volume, rather intonation and subtle but emphatic hand movements.
“2. When answering a question from the boss to the group or you personally, start with his name, pause, look him in the eye, then proceed with a confident answer.
“3. Develop a style that conveys the power of your ideas yet is subtle enough to not create a scene!”
Lots of readers weighed in on my Dec. 8 response to a woman’s query about disclosing her cancer treatment to colleagues who might be confused by the difference between the employee’s appearance on a video chat and her visage on her team photo. It’s no one’s business, I said. I still believe that. But a few Work Friend readers, many of them with personal experience with a breast cancer diagnosis, had this to say:
“I am a two-time breast cancer survivor and, like Anonymous, continued working through my chemotherapy treatments (also resulting in complete hair loss!). Similar to Anonymous, I was in contact with colleagues on a daily basis. As such, I did not keep the reason for my obvious baldness (sometimes covered by a hat or cap) a secret. On my first appearance with individuals who had not yet met me or seen me since my hair loss, I took a few minutes to explain my situation, adding that I was feeling well enough to work. I also expressed gratitude to be able to continue working, as it took my mind off my current health situation.”
Another:
“People that are going through breast cancer feel very alone and not supported, and to pretend like you don’t have it feels really weird. I think it would be better if she just — matter-of-factly — told people that she was going through chemotherapy and that she’s OK. Rather than pretending like she’s just wearing a hat or a scarf because it looks good. Ha! It does not look good! Or feel good.
“There’s nothing wrong with having cancer and being open about it, and it’s good for the person to receive support. Normalize it! I went through breast cancer 10 years ago while being a professor, and I told my students about it as I went through it — we learned together.
“Please reconsider your advice or talk to some people that have had cancer to see what they think. There are all kinds of ways of being in this world, and one of them is living while going through chemotherapy. I don’t think it’s anything to hide.”
I don’t, either.
One of my favorite responses from the past six months came from a grandfather who took issue with the use of the phrase “trash talk” instead of “insult” in my Nov. 24 column (“Trash Talk at Work? Uncool in Any Language.”), which included a letter about a sticky situation involving strain between two co-workers, one of whom didn’t know the other understood the overheard Spanish.
“I’m probably old-school; however, for many years I’ve told friends, and they’ve always agreed, that trash talk is a form of affection. If the comment ever leaned into an insult, it is no longer trash talk, it’s an insult. If pulled off successfully, everyone smiles a little bit.
“That makes it something quite difficult to pull off. Think of it as two truths shared at the same time that are completely or at least somewhat incongruous.”
Noted! And thanks to everyone who writes in week to week. Your emails — positive, negative, generous and judgmental — do not go unnoticed or unappreciated.
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