coworker cheated in Jeopardy, a sumo wrestler calendar at work, and more

Update season is over and now we’re back to regular content! To kick us off, it’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. Coworker cheated in our virtual Jeopardy tournament

A couple years ago, just for fun, a coworker started a virtual Jeopardy tournament which anyone in the company could participate in. It was the usual setup: three contestants (with cameras on), the coworker hosting, and an audience tuned in once a week.

One contestant, “Kurt,” was the reigning champion. The man could not be beat. Until, after a few weeks, there was some speculation that Kurt was not abiding by the honor system and had Google up on his screen. The theory was finally confirmed when there was a question about an obscure national bird. After a pause with some suspicious arm movements and his eyes darting around the screen, Kurt answered just in time with obvious hesitation, and mispronounced the name of the bird to boot. The host called him out then and there. Kurt (unconvincingly) doubled down, but the jig was up.

I’m not in Kurt’s department, nor even in the same state, so I didn’t witness the personal/professional fallout from his duplicity (he’s still employed here), but I am curious: if you were his manager, would this incident compel you to take any action? This gameshow was held during office hours and attended by dozens of employees, but it wasn’t official company business. You’d assume, though, that if Kurt was willing to break his coworkers’ trust in this scenario, he couldn’t be trusted in general, right?

Yeah, it would make me look harder at his integrity. I wouldn’t take any official action since this was just a game, but would it make me question things that I otherwise might have trusted implicitly and do more checking to be sure I could rely on his honesty? Absolutely. And if I had a certain type of relationship with Kurt, I might have pointed out to him that that was a natural consequence (not just on my end, but presumably for other colleagues too).

2. Can I have a sumo wrestler calendar on my wall at work?

I’m a big fan of watching sumo wrestling! Can I put up a wall calendar of sumo wrestlers in my office at work? Sumo wrestlers don’t wear very much clothing…

I think a sumo wrestler calendar is fine. Sumo wrestling photos don’t tend to be sexualized (I mean, I’m sure someone sexualizes them, but that’s not the cultural connotation around them), and the skimpy clothing is more athletic uniform than anything else.

3. Incompetent coworker asked me to be a reference

A coworker on my small tech team recently asked me to be a reference for him. I have worked closely with him and I have seen him firsthand be bad at our job. I’ve worked with him on projects and I have been left to do all of the work and then he feels guilty about that and says he doesn’t want it all to fall on me. I’ll say, “Oh, do you want to take this on then?” and then he gets super noncommittal and barely ever does anything. I dont think he understands what our role is and how to do a good job. He also loves talking endlessly about totally irrelevant things. Plus he’s somewhat often checking out women or just generally being weird (he once sent me a photo of animals having sex).

I was talking about this situation with my roommate and he suggested I give my coworker a glowing review so that he will leave our office.

On the one hand, I don’t want to lie if the job calls — for several reasons, such as my reputation and not wanting to screw them over and having a hard time lying. On the other, I also don’t want to be the one responsible for tanking his chances by stating what I think about the quality of his work, because I think he is infuriatingly bad at our job and should do something else.

When he asked me, I told him he could put me down but asked him to think about if there might be someone else who would be a better reference due to my short length of time on the job (I previously worked with him before I was promoted). He told me he’d get back to me but never has.

If I do get a call, my plan is to keep the convo short and state some positive things and some critical things to them but not go over the top either way. What do you think?

You should give an honest reference, or at a minimum a lukewarm one. Otherwise you’re actively misrepresenting his work to someone. If you’re not comfortable doing that, you should go back to him and tell him you’ve thought it over and don’t think you can be a reference, in part because he hasn’t pulled his weight when he’s worked on projects with you and so you can’t speak positively of the things a reference is likely to ask about. That’s a reasonable thing to say! If he tries to dispute that, you can say, “I don’t feel positioned to give you the kind of reference you need, so it is in your best interest not to suggest my name.” From there, it’s up to him whether he still lists you or not.

Also, part of the problem here is your management, in keeping this guy on without addressing all the problems you listed. It shouldn’t be on you to grapple with whether to give him a misleadingly positive reference to get rid of him; it should be on them to do their jobs and manage him more appropriately.

4. Consequences for secretly working two full-time jobs at once

A coworker was recently fired when it was discovered that he was secretly working full-time at both my company and another in the same industry for two years. He has already lost both jobs. What other ramifications, legal and otherwise, might he face?

He’s unlikely to face legal consequences unless the circumstances are extremely unusual (like if he works in a patient care role and was negligent in one job because of his focus on the other and that negligence endangered someone). He might have a hard time getting another position in his field if word gets around or employers contact the previous jobs for references. And he won’t be eligible for unemployment benefits. But other than that, there aren’t really other ramifications other than, you know, losing the jobs.

5. Gift-stealing jokes with power dynamics

We had a white elephant gift swap at work for the holidays, and several people joked that stealing a gift from a manager could hurt their performance evaluation or, conversely, that stealing an undesirable gift could help them. I am certain this was a joke and none of our people managers would ever abuse their power in such a petty way, but am I wrong to think you shouldn’t even joke about that?

Eh, it’s a pretty typical office joke — which is to say, often repeated and not terribly funny. I’d stay away from it as much on the grounds of it being tired and worn-out as anything else. Obviously if there were a whiff of truth to it because your managers were known to engage in petty favoritism, that would change things, and it would be in poorer taste if a manager themself made the joke … but otherwise it’s primarily offensive on grounds of just not being very funny.

The post coworker cheated in Jeopardy, a sumo wrestler calendar at work, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.