my boss is getting rid of everyone’s favorite part of my program, fired for refusing to use AI, and more

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. My boss is getting rid of everyone’s favorite part of my program for no good reason

I manage an educational program that is part of a larger organization. My boss is medium crappy. He’s not abusive, but not a good manager or leader. Thankfully he doesn’t interact with my program more than occasionally.

Right now, he is making me get rid of the most popular part of my program. For the sake of anonymity, let’s say it’s a small bouncy house (it’s not). Adults and kids love the bouncy house. People comment on it walking by. It takes minimal money to run. Admittedly it requires some daily labor, but I’m on site anyway and have been managing it just fine for years. It massively makes up for the work with goodwill and engagement.

My boss has been unable to give me a sound reason why he wants to get rid of it. He has brought up some reasons that I refuted, and shrugs his shoulders and says we’re doing it anyway. You’ll have to trust me that there’s no good reason other than he feels like it, which tracks for him. I am have remained professional but am upset. I’ve told him calmly and straightforwardly that I think it will damage the program and I am feeling demoralized.

He’s my boss, so he can make this decision if he wants to. I need this job to live and am not going to quit over it. Where I hope from guidance from you is that SO MANY PEOPLE are going to ask me about this. The bouncy house is right out front and I am going to have to deal with so many disappointed folks, especially children. They are going to ask me why it’s gone.

I am sad and angry and am worried about how I’m going to manage this. I would never trash talk the decision, but I also don’t support it and I am very tempted to say, “You’re welcome to ask boss. Here’s his contact info.” There’s no real reason to give besides boss said so. I’d love your guidance on how I can be professional without endorsing a terrible decision.

You should ask your boss! “People are going to be really upset that the bouncy house is gone and are going to ask why, especially kids. What should our messaging be to explain it?”

If he offers crappy messaging — like “just tell them it had run its course” or something — you can say, “I can say that, but I worry about the community relations implications. Is there any way to give a reason people will be more likely to accept, like the cost of maintaining it, insurance, or anything else I could share with people?”

From there, it’s really his call. If people are upset, they’e upset. It’s fine for you to say something sympathetic-sounding like, “I know, we miss it too!” Most people will probably accept the decision; someone sounding sad that it’s gone is not the same thing as someone being outraged, and people like to express disappointment when something changes but that doesn’t mean they won’t get over it. And you explaining that it’s gone doesn’t mean you’re endorsing the decision; you’re just relaying it.

But if anyone does seem unable to let it go, at that point it’s not unreasonable to say, “The decision was made above me, but I can pass your feedback along.” And if anyone is really stuck on it, sure, offer your manager’s email address — not in a “here, he can deal with this” way, but simply because that’s a reasonable thing to do when a member of the public is very upset about a decision from above you.

2. Coworker is taking up a collection for the boss’s pet loss — but not anyone else’s

I’ve been working in the same office for over 10 years, and we’re all reasonably close. I work in a creative industry where the boundaries around work can be a bit blurry, and management rather prides itself on running a “cool” office.

My boss recently lost his puppy after a short illness. It was quite unexpected, as the dog was still fairly young. What’s been bothering me slightly is that one of my boss’s colleagues (not my direct supervisor) emailed the entire department asking everyone to sign a card and contribute to a fund for a comfort basket for him.

It’s been a difficult year for pets in our office, and several people have lost theirs, myself included. As far as I’m aware, none of us received a card or any sort of gift, aside from condolences from colleagues on Slack and the like.

I’ve already replied to my boss’s message on Slack to express my sympathy for the loss of his dog, but I’m wondering whether I’m really expected to do anything more. Am I being a bit of a bad sport because no one organized a comfort basket for me?

No, you’re right to notice the inequity. It’s not cool to take up a collection for one person’s life event if it’s not done for others. I’d argue against doing it at all — because people work to earn money, not to spend it — but if you’re going to do it, it needs to be equitable, not special treatment for the boss. And frankly, if anyone were going to be left out, it should be the boss — because gifts at work should flow downward, not upward, because of the power dynamics involved.

You can just quietly not contribute if you want. But if you feel like you have the standing to say something, you could talk to the colleague who’s organizing it and say, “I know this is coming from a good place but I think it will land badly that we’re only doing this for Gavin and not anyone else who has lost a pet since there have been several this year. I think if Gavin realized that, he’d probably be uncomfortable with it too. Can we stick with just the card?”

3. Can I get unemployment if I’m fired for refusing to use AI?

I’m facing a likely inevitable end to my job, and have a question about whether it would be treated as a layoff or a firing. I know from past posts it is perfectly legal for companies to change job responsibilities and expect employees to take it or leave. In my case, if my supervisor makes AI use mandatory for my job and I refuse to use it, if I get terminated for it, can I still apply for unemployment?

You can always apply, but you’re unlikely to get unemployment if you were fired for refusing to do a requirement of your job, even if it’s a new requirement. While it’s true you can sometimes get unemployment if your job changes in a drastic way that a reasonable person in your position would feel forced to leave over (like if you were hired to be a manager but told to work as a delivery person or you were permanently moved from day shift to night shift), this is likely to be seen as more akin to refusing to use a new software.

However, you could certainly try negotiating with your employer to see if they’d be willing to categorize it as a layoff and not contest unemployment.

4. Job applicants are hounding me on LinkedIn

This past year I joined a new organization, and we’re now expanding and hiring for some new entry-level roles. I will likely participate as an interviewer in the hiring process and there’s potential for me to be managing some of the new hires’ work.

I have been shocked at the amount of LinkedIn outreach I personally have received for this position. I’ve had several people connect through LinkedIn and ask for tips/application suggestions/calls to discuss the position. I’m generally very supportive of outreach from early career professionals because I remember being in that position and want to help however I can. However, I want to make sure that I’m not giving anyone an unfair advantage in the application process, so I try to provide pretty generic input on the role and wish them luck in their job search process. How would you recommend navigating these outreach interactions to avoid providing an unfair advantage? Is there any point/benefit in scheduling time to talk or is that just disadvantaging other applicants who didn’t reach out? Am I overthinking this whole thing?

As a general rule, I wouldn’t make yourself available to just any candidate who happens to message you; otherwise, you could spend a ton of time taking to applicants who don’t even end up moving forward to an interview, and getting to know them is really what the structured application process is for. But if someone seems like an exceptionally strong candidate, it might be worth making time to talk; that’s part of doing recruitment when you’re involved in hiring and want to ensure you end up with a strong hire.

Otherwise, though, I’m a fan of saying something like, “Thanks so much for your interest! As a first step, I’d encourage you to use the application process described in the posting (here’s the link). Because we get such a high volume of interest for our openings and many requests for these calls, we’ve found that the best way to get to know people is to steer them to the process we’ve created. But if I’m off on what you’re asking about, please let me know.” You can also “In part, this answer is a result of having a packed calendar right now.”

5. Is a reclassification set in stone?

My team (internal help desk) has just had our jobs reclassified from exempt to hourly. This comes with several unpleasant changes, including needing to clock in and out and having to work an extra half hour a day, due to being required to take a half hour of unpaid lunch. Our managers had previously always taken the approach that they weren’t going to micromanage our time, they just cared about the work getting done. That obviously won’t hold with time clocks.

To say that everyone on the team is deeply unhappy with this would be an understatement. Our direct management is supportive of us and also not thrilled with the situation. The structure of how we work, which includes a wide range of problems that can take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours to resolve, means that a strict time structure with no unapproved overtime is problematic. Even if management is flexible if calls run over, the team is scattered across time zones, so getting the okay to continue a call that runs unexpectedly long could be difficult. The alternative is cutting off a call in the middle, also problematic. Plus, our managers don’t like that their whole team has had a blow to morale. They’ve pushed back on HR, but HR has been very cagey as to exactly why this is happening and what the criteria is for their decision.

Our team is generally very well-regarded (our surveys come back with top scores) and has worked hard to do an excellent job supporting a large company. Do we have any ability to push back against this reclassification? Or is this the kind of situation where the requirements for exempt vs. hourly are set in stone (despite the fact that the position has been exempt for decades) and there is no wiggle room? Before this, the job was pretty fantastic, as jobs go. Now, everyone is unhappy and we very well might lose some of us if this works out as poorly as we suspect it will.

Whether a job is exempt or non-exempt (meaning exempt or not from overtime) is determined by government regulations, and there’s not a lot of nuance to it. Companies still often get it wrong (less because the law is difficult to understand and more because they just haven’t paid enough attention to it / didn’t think they needed to) and only correct it once they’re called out for it (which can come with hefty fines). Also, it’s not illegal to treat everyone as non-exempt (meaning paying them overtime) even if their roles would qualify for an exemption, so with jobs that do seem more grey, a company might choose to err on the side of caution and make you non-exempt. They won’t get fined for treating you as non-exempt if you don’t need to be; they will get fined for treating you as you exempt if you can’t be.

That doesn’t mean there’s no room to push back; if the law doesn’t actually require you to be non-exempt, your managers could point out the negative impacts of changing your classification. But it sounds like they’ve already tried and gotten nowhere, so unless you have reason to think they did a really ineffective job of it, this is probably the way things are going to stay. But you could certainly look at the government definitions for yourself and see how clear-cut your particular jobs are.

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