Edit: Of course this is the post where I’ve made a typo in the title. Lol.

This is someone who was hired before I came on as a manager and worked here for a few years. English is not their first language and the way they write comes off very strangely - it’s hard to describe because it’s not always grammatically incorrect (although maybe 10% of the time the grammar is off) but the closest thing I can compare it to is that it feels like you’re reading a spam email. Their language swings between an almost poetic cadence or very high level and academic like a textbook or thesis paper. It can also take several reads of what they send to fully grasp the meaning because of the writing style.

Considering they’re in an external facing role and the average American needs everything written in a short, standard English, this is an issue that has previously caused friction with customers. It’s also caused issues with other coworkers fully being able to grasp what they’re trying to say.

I want to be culturally sensitive in how I explain it to them that they need to change their writing style. While I’ve searched for professional development resources to help with this, like a “writing for business” kind of course, I haven’t really found anything we can use within our professional development budget. I’ve suggested over and over again that they use AI, which they do sometimes but I think they’re prompting it more to check grammar than anything else.

Thoughts on how you’d approach this?

We are a team of experts who work in different countries. We are hiring and ramping up to handle additional business. What would you say is an excellent onboarding experience? We have the team meet and greet along with the basic business items. What else is good? Big thanks.

I've been thinking about how managers actually improve (i am a manager of 100 people).

Most of us get promoted, get maybe one training day per year, and then figure everything else out alone. Difficult conversations, underperformers, giving feedback, saying no to your own boss. There's rarely anyone to practice with or ask.

So I'm curious:

- When you face a hard management situation, who do you talk to first? Your own manager, a peer, HR, nobody?

- Have you ever used ChatGPT or similar to prep for a difficult conversation? Did it actually help?

- Would you use a dedicated AI coach you could talk to (voice, not just text) before and after tough moments? Or does that feel pointless compared to a real human coach?

I sometimes use Claude to get advice when I can't ask a human, or just to think out loud. It does help in the moment, though I'd rather talk than type. But it's not consistent, it doesn't remember my situation or my team, and it rarely pushes back on me.

Happy to hear your thoughts.

Performance reviews are coming up. My initial objectives cover 28 KPIs over 8 categories, is this a reasonable amount?

This is new to me so looking for a realistic benchmark.

I have an employee that is actually pretty dang good. She gets her job done and does it well. There’s just ONE problem with her and it’s seriously becoming an issue. She goes into the one, single stall bathroom we have in our office for employees only and camps in there for honestly 30-40 minutes at least once a day, most days it’s twice a day. I know she claims to have issues, and that’s ok, especially since she does do her work. I’m fine with her taking care of what she needs to do.
That being said, I sincerely doubt that’s actually what’s going on - I strongly think she’s playing on her phone. My main issue is that she’s taking up the only bathroom we have for employees. There is a bathroom just around the corner from our office that is public - she could use that one but chooses not to. I have asked her to use that one if she’s going to be a while because this one is for our staff to not have to go out there all the time and disrupt the office flow (we are a physician office, so we don’t really want patients running into the doctors out there and asking them questions, etc)
What would you guys do or say to her??? This is one of those sensitive type issues - don’t think I can write her up, and I honestly don’t want to! I need ideas!!

Nobody to blame but myself. I hired this guy because he came across as incredibly proactive in the interview. He went to great schools, and I even convinced my boss that while he wasn’t the strongest candidate, he was good enough. I genuinely thought I could get good work out of him. I also thought I had a decent read on people.

I couldn’t have been more wrong.

I regret this hiring decision so much and honestly can’t wait until his internship is over. It feels like it’s damaged my team’s trust in my judgment. I know there are bound to be growing pains as a first-time manager, but this one stings very much. And in this job market, it’s especially frustrating to think we could have given the opportunity to someone who was genuinely qualified and eager to contribute.

I've been in my field for 15+ years and at my company for 5+ years (high IC, within different departments). During that time I've worked hard and built a strong reputation, and have historically been trusted to lead high-visibility work and cross functional programs and loop leadership in as needed.

A few months ago my director (who was absolutely amazing) got promoted, and I got a new director ("C") who got promoted into the role from another part of the organization. I genuinely like C as a person, but he's only managed one person before and has a much more hands on style, to put it nicely.

One thing that stood out to me early is that the other person he manages has worked for him for years, and seems to be content in the background doing execution while C remains the strategic lead and face of the work both internally and externally. If that dynamic works for them, great. It just made me wonder if that's naturally how he manages.

Since taking over my team, instead of actually helping our team and removing roadblocks and letting us do the work, it feels like C wants a hand in almost everything. He wants to know every little detail, join meetings I've historically owned, present work I would normally present, and insert himself into projects that were already moving. It feels like every high-visibility project/initiative now needs his involvement.

For example, I recently had to present a business update to our VPs for work I own. C and I had several working sessions beforehand where we discussed the strategy and deck ahead of time and worked through the content. Then after our final meeting a day before the meeting, he substantially reworked the presentation himself without ever making that feedback live.

I honestly don't care that he has a different opinion or wants to try to do things differently - what bothered me was that he didn't really provide that feedback in any of the working sessions we had, and I didn't get a chance to work through it myself. Instead of saying, "Here's what I think is missing, take another pass," he just completely overhauled himself.

Another example: we have an upcoming in person client meeting that our team is flying out where I've historically led from my department's perspective. It's not some executive leadership meeting where it would make sense for a leader to attend, just a normal working session in person. During one of our 1:1s, he casually mentioned flying in and attending (as if it was a given) so he could present our team's strategy himself.

I want to be clear - I don't think i'm too good or above being managed. I just know myself and I learn by doing, getting honest feedback, and being hands on. If someone else is doing the strategic thinking for me or taking those opportunities, I don't really grow. I also want to take work off of C's plate so that C and level up too, and I feel like with him being so involved in my projects that's not happening.

My concerns are really twofold:

• I'm worried I'll stop getting the opportunities that helped me develop and build my reputation in the first place.
• It feels like more and more of the high-visibility work is being pushed to become manager-led.

Part of me thinks this is just a different management style and I need to adapt. Another part of me can't shake the feeling that he's trying to establish himself and prove value by being involved in every high-visibility initiative, whether his involvement is actually valuable or not.

I want advice since I know I'm probably not looking at this objectively. Is this just a "pick your battles" situation? If you were my manager, how would you want an employee to approach this conversation without sounding territorial or resistant to change?

I was told off really badly by my manager on monday via email, and i don't know what i could've done better.

On sunday night at around 1am, i suddenly fell extremely ill. I don't know why, i was fine the whole day. I was struck down by a severe migraine, i vommitted several times, i was burning up and sweating so badly that my bedsheets were soaked, and i kept sneezing and having coughing fits.

I woke up the next morning at 7am. I was much better, but everytime i tried to stand up and get ready for work, i was overcome by nausea and repeatedly vommited again.

I decided to call in and cancel my shift

However, i got a scathing email from my manager around lunchtime about how i needed to hand in notice two days before i called off a shift.

How could i have predicted a sudden illness like the one i had? I couldn't help it!

I am a new retail store manager of a beauty supply store who was honestly not nearly ready for the promotion I received, but here I am (trying my best). I have a brand new full time team and as we all settle into our roles, a few red flags have come up that I am struggling to handle. The most concerning one is one of my assistant store manager’s temper and inability to de-escalate. Whenever we have any kind of customer issue, it nearly always turns into a screaming match and he is convinced it was the customers fault and that they’re crazy. However, almost always it was his becoming defensive and clearly angry almost immediately.

Example: A customer comes in wanting to make a return and they don’t have the receipt. Our company requires a receipt to do any kind of return or exchange, but we are expected to use all of the tools at our disposal (of which there are many) to find the receipt before denying the return. He almost always denies the return before even trying to look. If a customer asks him to use any of the tools we have to look up receipts he will say that we only use them for extenuating circumstances, which is completely untrue.

We have spoken about my expectations for escalated customer issues and customer service in general. Both my and my managers’ expectation is that we are doing as much as we can to make the customer happy (within company policy of course,) but I am still hearing him turn away returns and raising her voice when he is slightly inconvenienced.

In the short time he has been in role, he has gotten 3 complaints against him. Clearly another conversation needs to be had and I know I will need to be extremely direct to get the point across, but I really do not see this going well. He is much older than me and has been working retail for much longer than I have which is both confusing and anxiety producing for me. I’d love some direction on the best way to approach this conversation so that it is productive and does not involve yelling lol. TIA!

I want to start by saying I’ve been a manager at this company for a few years, and have management experience before that. I think every member on my team is super. My team are strong and I’m not currently concerned about anyone’s actual ability to do the job. My boss is a nice person, I don’t hold any issue with them as a person. Our work styles help each other get better, but I do find myself picking up after them sometimes.

We’re going through a temporary phase of absence of ownership right now, and it has amplified a lot of the roadblocks I deal with as a manager as I have been left with little agency to fix certain problems (no communication on new hires, no credit card info for emergency purchases, no plan or guide as to what they’re taking with them and what I’m taking on, I’m getting random calls from people I’m supposed to be meeting with but it was never put in my calendar) - I’ve basically been left as if ownership has been kidnapped without a trace in some ways.

We usually manage and focus on one team each (with a small bit of crossover) but their team - while capable and strong at what they do - do not get the leadership or organisation they need. My boss is not strong in leadership, organisation or communication (and they would acknowledge this himself) but they give me freedom to change things to make sense for the workplace environment. Because of this, my team doesn’t often see or deal with the mishaps from the other team. They usually get a lot more communication and support (from me or each other)

The thing is I warned my boss about this absence being a potential problem, and no matter how much time they had to prepare for this (with my help too - we had months), my boss still did not prepare. And it left me with more work and more responsibilities then I’m equipped to deal with on my own. It’s not that I can’t do it - but I’m not being given access to aspects of the business that would make management doable. It’s a mess. I do most of the main running of the company, so for the most part we’re hanging on. My team is fine - it’s their team that I’ve been left to organise the chaos for.

I consider myself a fairly reasonable manager, but it is getting to the point where it’s hard to maintain standards when I’ve been given no roadmap and expected to be the communication point for everyone. If anything, it seems like their team is hoping that me temporarily taking over, I can ‘clean up’ some of the mess the boss has left. And frankly, I’m not being paid enough.

Here’s where the issue really lies for me: my main team is seeing how busy I am and starting to work a bit more solo. It’s good to take initiative - but the problem isn’t that they’re taking initiative, they’re just not doing some things to the standard I hold them to on a usual basis and doing their own thing. It partly feels like I’m being ignored, but we have a good work relationship so I would hope it’s not that. I have had to repeat myself more than usual the past few weeks, and while nobody is being directly disrespectful-I can feel (and understand) them distancing themselves over “the small things”.

I’m definitely a small overwhelmed and I don’t usually show it, but when I’m not being listened to, I’m not sure how what more I can do without coming off like a micromanager or bad leader. Maybe I’m holding myself and others to too high a standard. But sometimes it’s feeling like I’m the only person who is keeping a ship afloat and I’m unsure how to get people back on track.

Cross posting since this may be a more relevant sub:

So at work I’ve taken on more of a leadership role. Not necessarily in the org chart, but my duties mean I need to train and manage (to an extent) the people in my department. The team is aware of this as I’ve been working in this way for pretty much this whole year. Basically I’m in charge of them but not their boss per se.

My issue is that I will have conversations with coworkers that are more personal, but can affect work. Like one coworker talks about how stressed they are or how exchange rates are affecting their pay, etc.

These are things I really do need to bring up to management since I work directly with the Execs and it heavily affects my department.

However, I don’t want to betray coworkers’ trust in me. How do you handle this?

So far it has been trying to be vague to the executives and not give more details than necessary.

Hello all,

There are actually many layers to this issue, but as the title says, I’m struggling with how to address performance issues that I don’t have concrete evidence of.

I work in manufacturing and I am in a classic situation where a bunch of leadership roles (department head and multiple floor supervisors) were consolidated into my one position. This leaves me in a frustrating spot where I am booked nearly wall to wall with important strategic meetings that I can’t blow off, so I am not able to be present on the floor nearly as much as I (and the team) want. I am also not able to delegate any of these meetings as the only relevant SMEs need to be on the floor due to inadequate staffing (despite my best efforts to rectify).

I’m working on those issues, but currently I’m dealing with a temp worker who is “seemingly”underperforming. They are not doing anything that would affect the final product (at least not yet) but what is being reported is that they are exceedingly slow and are making mistakes that vastly delay the team (but also not to the point that they have unplanned overtime). I’m getting this info second-hand from a frustrated high performer but I don’t have the bandwidth to be on the floor all day to observe so I haven’t seen these things for myself and I’d realistically have to spend the whole day observing to catch these (if at all as she puts on her best behavior when I’m around). I can’t just fire them as I need the body, plus I wouldn’t get an extension of the contract from my higher ups so anyone else brought in would only be for a short amount of time. And training another new person would be an additional drain I don’t want to needlessly subject my people to, especially if it’s only for a short time.

I’m inclined to just ride it out and wash my hands of them at the end of the contract, but I also feel like something needs to happen now to placate my permanent high performer.

Any suggestions?

I’m a relatively new manager and I’d really appreciate input from people with more management experience because I’m trying to learn from this situation.
For context, I manage employees at a consulting firm that primarily does industrial hygiene work.
One employee started in January. She received onsite training, multiple one-on-one training calls, and I created several cheat sheets and reference guides specifically for her. Initially we had a great working relationship. She even told me she enjoyed working for a younger manager (I’m 28, she’s 34) because I was direct and straightforward.
After I returned from maternity leave, something seemed to change.
I gave her a fairly straightforward assignment (think copying data from a report into Excel). She made several significant mistakes, enough that I couldn’t rely on the final product and had to redo it myself. I sent her an email explaining that the work wasn’t acceptable, that I had to redo it because of the errors, and that I needed her to pay closer attention to detail in the future. I was firm but professional and focused only on the work.
The next day she told me she was upset by my email. She said it made her feel like I thought she didn’t pay attention, that she wasn’t stupid, and that the mistakes were because she hadn’t been trained well enough. I explained that my feedback was about that specific assignment, not about her as a person, and that my goal was to help her improve—not criticize her personally.
From that point on, things felt tense. I continued treating her professionally and actually became more careful about how I worded feedback because I didn’t want her to feel attacked.
A couple of weeks ago she was assigned to a two-week project. After the first day onsite, she called my boss crying uncontrollably, saying she wasn’t trained, felt stupid, and wasn’t going to continue. Both my boss and I tried to problem-solve with her and find ways to make the assignment work, but she booked a flight home instead.
At that point, rather than terminate her employment immediately, we placed her on a Performance Improvement Plan. The main issues identified were:
Difficulty working independently and making decisions based on her training.
Difficulty adapting to changing project circumstances.
Professional conduct.
I reviewed the PIP with her on Monday.
On Tuesday, she asked me when she should schedule a project. Since we’d just discussed that one of the goals was for her to make routine decisions independently, I told her the dates she proposed didn’t conflict with company needs, but that she needed to make that decision herself.
Three hours later she resigned. She told my boss that I was the reason she was leaving and that she didn’t want to speak with me during the offboarding process.
I’m genuinely asking because I want to become a better manager: Is there something I could have handled differently?
I’m not looking for validation. If I missed opportunities to coach differently, communicate more effectively, or de-escalate the situation, I’d honestly like to know. At the same time, I’m also wondering if there are situations where a manager simply can’t coach someone through issues involving confidence, resilience, or accountability.
I’d appreciate perspectives from managers who have dealt with similar situations.