coworkers are having an affair - should I say something?

A reader writes:

Our office is rife with gossip regarding a married man in our office and young single co-worker. The man has a brand new baby at home and knowing that he is having an affair behind his wife's back is rather upsetting to some of us on moral and character grounds, but also it is making us uncomfortable (wife drops in sometimes) and is a distraction. They are not in a boss/reporting relationship but are peers.

In addition they seem to take long lunches, are constantly using email and microsoft communicator company software for endless chat sessions even though it's not permitted for private activity. It's bad for morale for all of us to be working full stop and see them goofing of a good part of each day.

Does HR care about such things? If they can't be reprimanded for being causing full blown gossip epidemic, they could at least be disciplined for wasting company time? I am on the same work team with them and have difficulty looking them in the eye sometimes.

You have two different issues here: (1) Your coworkers' affair is making you uncomfortable, and (2) your coworkers are slacking off. You need to treat them as two separate issues.

Regarding the affair, if your company doesn't have a policy against fraternization, then these two probably aren't violating any actual rule. And I'm not sure their affair is really their coworkers' business -- if indeed there even is an affair; it sounds like no one knows for sure, although they're displaying the signs of at least an emotional affair.

You can certainly keep a chilly distance from people whose behavior you object to, but I wouldn't recommend confronting someone you don't seem close to about something that you don't know for sure is happening and which really isn't your business if it is.

I suppose if you're determined to address this in some way, regardless of the above, the best way to do it might be to tell the man (since he's the married one) something like: "Hey Bill, I wanted to give you a heads-up that there's a lot of gossip going around about you and Beth. I'm sure there's nothing to it, but that kind of thing can really affect someone's career, to say nothing of rumors getting back to your wife, so I wanted to make sure you knew."

The slacking off is a different issue. If it's impacting your own work, you should talk to your manager about what you've observed. If it's not -- well, if your management team is at all competent, it's going to be noticed and addressed at some point.

But again, if you're determined to address it in some way, you could just be straightforward with the two perpetrators: "Hey, we're working our asses off over here, and it's starting to feel like you're on a date. Could we get some help?"

But overall, I think you want to be clear in your head about what is and isn't your business. Sometimes things are irritating and offensive, but still not necessarily ours to get involved in.

employer won't give job references

A reader writes:

I have recently been on two interviews with a company. "When can you start" and "will this salary be acceptable" have been discussed.

My issue is that my former employer of 12 years has a strict reference policy that only allows them to confirm dates of employment and salary. I provided additional references at the potential new employer's request, one former employee of my former company who now runs his own company, and a current client and current supplier of my former company, as well as a former co-worker of my former employee.

It seems that my potential employer is not aware of this growing trend of strict reference policies and we keep going back and forth: "I still haven't heard back from this person, or that person you provided." "Can you provide more?"

I've been searching for a year with no results and I fear my references situation may be part of it. I did not leave my former employer on bad terms, just felt I need to move on and better myself.

What can I do? I feel like I'm being held back because of this procedure of my former employer and this will affect any future tries at employment. I feel stuck and not sure how to proceed. Can you advise me?

I'd be concerned if a candidate couldn't get a former employer to give her a reference. Yes, many companies do have the type of policy you described, but I've never -- and I mean literally never -- had a problem getting someone at those companies to give a reference anyway. HR may stick to those policies, but the actual managers usually don't. And I would be very surprised if a former employee who shone on the job didn't have past managers jumping to help her.

Have you tried reaching out to your former manager(s) directly, despite what the company says its policy is?

Also, you said that the new employer is telling you they haven't heard back from the references you did provide. That's not a good sign either. Have those references told you that they're able to provide you with a good reference? And that they're available this week (as opposed to out of town, for instance)? You want to prep your references beforehand, to make sure they're going to speak well of you, as well as simply willing to return the calls promptly.

If a candidate told me that they weren't able to get any past manager to serve as a reference (despite the reason) and the references they did give me either weren't getting back to me or weren't in a position to be able to really speak to the quality of the person's performance (which can be the case with peers), I'd consider it a red flag.

I think you do have a reference problem here. I don't know if it's because your references aren't particularly enamored of you or if it's because you haven't been hands-on enough in managing the process, but I recommend being more aggressive in figuring it out. Specifically:

1. Contact your former manager(s) and tell them your job offer is contingent upon the company being able to speak with them. Ask for their help.

2. Contact the other references you offered and say, "The employer is becoming concerned because they haven't heard back from you, and my job offer may be on the line. If you're not able to serve as a reference for me, would you let me know so I can find alternatives?"

3. If all else fails, ask the new employer if they'd accept (hopefully glowing) past performance reviews in lieu of speaking with your manager.

Good luck.

what can't you not do, part 2

I once wrote an article in Maxim called "The Best Damn Pick-Up Guide Ever."

It was quite bad, filled with terrible advice and embarrassing animal metaphors (required by my editor). And if a young man ever approaches you in a bar by "accidentally" hitting you with a pool cue, he might be following my advice and I apologize.

I enjoy, though, thinking about the way many people find that certain threads are constantly present throughout their professional lives: in my case, a certain bossiness about whatever happens to be my area of expertise at that stage in my life.

I wrote about this in a post a couple of years ago:
What can't you not do?

What about you? What are the common threads that keep popping up in your professional life? Are you taking full advantage of them?

job seekers: stop sharing an email account with your spouse

Are you one of those people who shares an email address with your spouse (like JohnAndAngela@email.com)? I don't understand why people do this at all. (Email accounts are free, after all, and even if you don't care about privacy, maybe your friends who are emailing you do.)

But if you're job seeking, you really should open your own account, with a name that doesn't sound like I'm emailing two people when I correspond with you.

Prohibitive? No. Slightly odd? Yes.

how to deal with inappropriate, annoying coworker

A reader writes:

An acquaintance recommended me to his boss who, after several interviews, brought me on board. I really enjoy my job and my colleagues and I have received a lot of positive feedback from my boss. However, I am starting to have concerns about how well I am dealing with my (now) co-worker who passed my resume along.

1) He takes a lot of small liberties (taking stuff from my work space without asking, sitting on my desk while talking to other people, reading my emails over my shoulder, playfully yanking my pony tail) and occasionally bigger ones (failing to tie up loose ends, fully complete projects, and help out with office wide initiatives and then becoming really openly indignant when asked to follow through or pitch in). I don't see him taking those small liberties with other co-workers, however everyone in the office has had to deal with the some sort of fall out when he does not pitch in when needed.

2) He's made comments to suggest that he feels I owe him. Whether it's because he thinks he secured my position for me (in a conversation completely unrelated to these concerns, my boss explicitly stated that she made the hiring decision independent of his input) or because we knew each other socially before we began working together, I am not sure.

I think he's a smart, albeit eccentric, guy with good intentions who just lacks self-awareness. I feel he should be more respectful to me as his co-worker, but I am worried that if I call him out on it, I will look uptight and uncooperative or petty and over dramatic. In the past, I've gently reminded him that we are co-workers and our relationship/behavior needs to reflect that, but he just laughed it off. Am I being overly sensitive? Is there a graceful and firm way tell him that he needs to cut this out?

Well, some of this sounds like stuff you could ignore if you were determined to. But I can also see how it could get really annoying. (Yanking on your ponytail? Really?)

If you do choose to address it, you have two choices for how to go about it: You can do it all in one catch-all conversation, or you can just ask him to stop every time he's doing one of these things.

If you do the big-picture conversation, you'd say something like this: "I know I've mentioned this a couple of times, but I think you didn't realize that I'm serious about it. You do a number of things with me that I don't see you doing with anyone else in the office, and it makes me uncomfortable. I'm talking about things like sitting on my desk, reading my emails over my shoulder, and even pulling my hair. I'd like you to stop." Then, if it continues after that, you say it again: "Bill, I asked you to stop doing this and you've continued. I'm serious about wanting you to stop it."

Or, alternately, you can skip the big-picture conversation and just be assertive each time he does this stuff. For instance: "Bill, would you mind not sitting on my desk? It makes it hard for me to focus." .... "Please don't read my emails over my shoulder." "Bill, you're reading my emails again, and I asked you not to do that." (Followed by turning around in your chair and staring at him until he stops.) .... "Don't pull on my hair." (On that last one, if he gives you a hard time about objecting, you may need to point out that unwanted physical contact, after you've asked for it to stop, really crosses an inappropriate line.)

I get that you don't want to come across as uptight. But his behavior is so inappropriate, and he apparently is so oblivious to that, that he's forcing you into being more direct. Most people would have taken your hints already and stopped. Because he's chosen to ignore you and laugh about it, he's the one causing the situation to become a bigger deal. So you shouldn't feel weird or guilty about telling him assertively that you're not okay with this. (By the way, this is a very common tactic of pushy/aggressive people -- by ignoring lower-key comments, they'll force you to eventually say something rude. They're counting on you to not want to be rude and thus to let the behavior continue.)

Now, on the issue of his performance problems -- not completing projects and so forth -- that's a performance problem that needs to be dealt with by his manager. If it's affecting your work, you should mention it to her. Otherwise, that's his own performance that's suffering.

And regarding him possibly feeling like you owe him because he recommended you for the job -- let him think it. You know it's not true, and so does your boss, so don't worry about what he thinks. But don't let that make you more accommodating of his bad behavior. Stand up for yourself.

5 reasons to turn down a job offer

In this economy, it's easy to feel like you should jump at any job offer that comes along. But doing that could land you in a job that would make you miserable and could even harm you professionally. Over at U.S. News & World Report today, I discuss five reasons to consider turning down a job offer. Please check it out!

taking notes in an interview

A reader writes:

I have an interview next Friday. Is it weird or considered rude to take notes?

When I'm interviewing, I am desperately trying to stay alert, listen, take mental notes, and think of my response to the dreaded behavioral questions (I HATE those!) at the same time. I am pretty darn organized -- I love my notes, calendars, and lists. I always come prepared to any interview with a physical list of questions, I've just never actually written down notes because I didn't want to seem like I was too stuffy or wasn't flexible, which I definitely am. Most people seem to like that I come with a little notebook, but still being unemployed for so long, you start to wonder if even little things like that might hinder you getting a job you're well qualified for!

I think taking notes is great, as long as you're not doing it at the expense of the natural flow of the conversation or causing long pauses while you write. (Presumably you don't want to write down every single thing, though, but rather just those things that you want to use in some way later.)

I suppose it's possible that some interviewer out there might not like this, but that would get into the realm of interviewers who are going to penalize you for other perfectly reasonable behavior, and you don't want to work for them anyway.