updates: the flirtatious manager, the unhappy coworker, and more

Here are three updates from past letter-writers.

1. A senior coworker keeps calling me my manager’s “girlfriend”

It got back to “Jane” I was uncomfortable with what she was saying, so she pulled me aside and asked in the future if I could come to her directly with any issues I have with her. She apologized for making me feel uncomfortable but she meant no harm as she could tell I had a crush on “Lucas.”

After your advice and the comments, I tried pulling back from “Lucas” but it was difficult; every time I would, his flirting would intensify. At this point I must own my actions and feelings because “Lucas” was the first man I was truly interested in romantically in years. Our flirting and his favoritism towards me intensified. Just about everyone left it alone or would use it to their advantage, asking me for favors because they knew Lucas would do it for me. The only person annoyed by Lucas and me was the newly promoted shift leader, “Bill.” He and I clashed on the nights he’d be in charge after the manager would go home because he had new ideas on how things should be run despite the fact that they went against company standards. I told our general manager about it. When Bill was called in to talk about it, Lucas told the general manager he was staying out of it because he knew everyone would automatically assume he would take my side and that wasn’t fair to Bill. Bill did get in some trouble and he decided it was my fault.

A couple months later, on a night Bill was in charge, I ended up having a very difficult customer who kept saying awful things to me and who I couldn’t please no matter what. I finally snapped and said something I shouldn’t have. The customer started yelling at me and it caught the attention of Bill and I was sent home. Bill called our general manager about the whole thing, and my next three shifts were canceled. The general manager fired me over the phone.

I was so upset, mostly because this was not how I wanted things to end between Lucas and me. A few days after I was fired, I stopped by in the evening and “Jane” was working. She gave me a hug and asked what happened. Turns out neither the general manager or Bill told anyone what happened, despite their asking where I was. She said I needed to stop by and see Lucas, so I did. I told him my side of what happened and he said the whole thing was stupid that if he, or Jane, or even the other manager had been on, I would have just been written up.

Since he was no longer my boss, towards the end of the conversation I asked if he wanted to get dinner at the restaurant he was always talking about wanting to go to but never had the time. He said he appreciated the offer but it was going to be a no. I was crushed. I have spent several months getting over him, upset and confused. I have never had a man show so much interest in me, flirt with me like that, only to say no. A lot of my friends tell me it sounds like he liked having me enamored with him and the thrill of it being off-limits and able to toe the line with flirting and banter, but the moment it could be official it wasn’t interesting.

Work-wise, I’m doing good. I finish my master’s this semester, and I have a part-time job in the field in which I’m getting my master’s. They are working on getting me a raise and more hours, knowing I am going to look for a full-time job after I graduate. I know I’m not completely over “Lucas” but I will be eventually. The hard lesson is don’t flirt at work. And don’t be pulled back into it after you pull yourself out.

2. How to apply for a job (internally) that I am not sure is even open (#5 at the link)

I am the office clerk at a law firm who was asking how to ask about moving to a legal assistant position.

The update is that I had a semi-regular checkin with my boss (office manager) and asked how I might go about getting a legal assistant position at some point with the law firm I work at. I didn’t know this checkin was going to happen when I sent the letter in.

Anyway, she said that I would need to get certified for this specific role. Without it, I won’t have a shot – there is not a lot of “learning on the job” in terms of this position, I guess. I don’t know if other firms also require certification, but I imagine if not, it would still look better.

She did not mention the legal assistant who is moving to a new position, so either she really doesn’t know or can’t say anything. I wonder if they’ll be distributing the work to other assistants rather than opening the job up. But if I were certified and all that and a job sis open up at the firm, I would go to HR and talk about it, hear more about the role, etc.

But I already have an MLIS and really don’t want to go back to school of any kind (even for a couple years) so unless that changes, I am kind of stuck in the role at this firm. I would ask if the firm would reimburse tuition of some kind, but that wouldn’t really matter, I just don’t want to go back to school for an extended period of time (a monthly class or something for fun is obviously different).

Update to the update:

I was talking to a couple of my coworkers, and I mentioned that I was told that I need to have a certificate or something like that before I could be considered for the legal assistant position. One of my coworkers, who was a legal assistant at a different law firm, said that in in the state where we work, a certificate is not required. (But I assume law firms can make their own requirements?) I like to think I could channel my prior experience into the legal assistant role, but it sounds like I wouldn’t even be considered without certification.

I also heard through the grapevine that a prior clerk had asked about transferring to another role (not legal assistant) and was blocked. The reasoning might have been for legit reasons (experience-wise) but now I can’t help but wonder if they’re now blocking clerks from moving because they don’t want to train replacements. I heard other prior clerks have moved on to paralegal assistant positions and they don’t have certificates. So I wonder what the deal is. This job does a little bit of everything in the firm, for better or worse. But I’m going to ask about where boundaries are in what tasks we clerks get assigned to help with, because if they’re not going to pay a legal assistant’s salary, I don’t want to be doing a legal assistant’s job. (I welcome tips on how to bring this up!)

Either way, it sounds like there’s no way up from this position.

3. Can we encourage our unhappy coworker to leave? (#2 at the link)

We got a new group lead, who told the colleague to knock it off. She calmed down a bit, but still made it very clear that she was unhappy and that wouldn’t change.

In late 2024, the group had to reduce the number of employees, and Angry Colleague volunteered to be the one to leave (with a generous severance). The mood in our department has since been ambivalent — half happy the complaining stopped, half worried because having to let people go makes us wonder if the company is struggling. There have been several rounds of restructuring, people changing departments, and everything feels a bit unstable right now.

I don’t know if Angry Colleague has found a new job since, but I wish her all the best. It’s a tough market right now, but she’s an expert with a decade of experience so I hope she’ll be fine.

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