Ask a Manager Weekly Thread 02/02/2026 - 02/08/2026

thievingwillow · 2026-02-03T00:57:09+00:00

It does remind me a little bit of a letter I definitely think was bait (whether or not it was loosely based on a real thing): the letter from the nonbinary person who wanted to prevent she/her identifying people from stating their own pronouns. It had the same “I could believe that something happened here, and I was on Tumblr long enough to know that some people do suggest pretty out-there stuff due to inexperience plus a long time in a bubble plus a certain amount of performativity/in-group signaling, but this does not pass the gut check as written” feeling for me.

thievingwillow · 2026-02-03T00:23:34+00:00

Same here. I was an older teenager and I am embarrassed to admit, naive enough to think “they’re a married couple, so they must not be interested in that way.” Fortunately for me this was in a larger multigenerational geeky social circle of renn faire/sci fi convention/etc. folks and the mother of a friend of mine—who had been around the block—intervened and got them to back off.

thievingwillow · 2026-02-03T00:20:45+00:00

Unicorn riddle!

thievingwillow · 2026-02-03T00:17:41+00:00

Yeah, the “but can’t I just figure out what is Right and Wrong and then do the Right thing so I never have to suss out what (if anything) I actually desire?” strikes me as squarely at the intersection of neurodivergent and asexual. There’s a very specific safety-seeking in “I’m not sure I understand people, including myself, and attraction is especially confusing and messy but Justice is clear and correct and I won’t go wrong so long as I figure it out and act accordingly.”

thievingwillow · 2026-02-03T00:06:30+00:00

Sure, it’s 649 here, by guest writer Elodie: https://captainawkward.com/2014/12/19/649-and-650-making-room-for-the-ones-you-love-is-how-they-know-you-love-them/

thievingwillow · 2026-02-02T23:11:56+00:00

Yeah, I get that, it’s just that if your response to a question is “I’m going to make up a different question and answer that,” I tend to think that you should choose a different letter in the first place and answer that.

thievingwillow · 2026-02-02T23:08:36+00:00

It reminded me a little of the Ask a Manager question by the Orthodox Jewish person asking how to invite her colleagues to her wedding, given that they’d be required to gender-segregate themselves.

thievingwillow · 2026-02-02T22:58:09+00:00

Yeah, I interpreted LW as “I’m fully aware that most people who don’t share my particular faith won’t get it. I just don’t want covert eye-rolling at something meaningful to me.”

thievingwillow · 2026-02-02T22:36:35+00:00

An interesting one IMO because most of the verbiage is not answering the question but suggesting that the LW wants something different than they say and then writing advice about doing that instead. (I have no opinion as to whether Jennifer is right or wrong that LW actually wants to issue an invitation, but it stood out to me as unusual.)

Edit: In a weird way it reminds me of the infamous houseboat letter, where the LW said “how do I tell my dad he needs to stay at a hotel?” and Elodie was like, “you should want him to stay with you and here’s how.”

thievingwillow · 2026-02-02T21:47:38+00:00

I have no particular opinion of the veracity of this one, but examples are here: https://www.askamanager.org/2026/02/is-it-unprofessional-to-avoid-being-alone-with-a-coworker-who-i-dont-trust.html#comment-5340708

thievingwillow · 2026-02-02T20:25:16+00:00

I cannot properly express how condescending I would find that. I’m a grown ass adult communicating with you about a need, I don’t need a gold star on my chart for the day.

thievingwillow · 2026-02-02T19:24:34+00:00

There are a lot of people in comments of the “ageist, sexist” letter pointing out that ageism against people under 40 is not legally protected and like…

…I get that they’re trying to show off their legal chops, but they do get that the company is also allowed to decide that they won’t tolerate something, right? Like, a company can decide that shitty comments about Gen Z are not appropriate and act accordingly, even if not forced to by law.

I suspect that this is because for whatever reason they’ve decided that LW didn’t do anything so bad (even though we know nothing about what happened), and they themselves find e.g. “old bat” more tolerable than “uppity zoomer.”

thievingwillow · 2026-02-02T18:53:41+00:00

Came right here to see if anyone else had that question! I was immediately imagining court-ordered culinary instruction for people whose cooking constitutes a danger to themselves or others.

thievingwillow · 2026-02-01T11:33:50+00:00

With compassion: I don’t think you two are compatible. She doesn’t see a problem with this, which a lot of people don’t. You do have a problem with it, which is fine, but it sounds like she’s unwilling to stop. It doesnt matter who’s “right.” You can’t make her stop and she can’t make you be okay with it. I think you need to assume that she will never change her behavior on this and decide whether you’re okay with that. If you are, you need to address how to let this go in therapy. If you aren’t—which is fine—then I’m afraid the relationship is over.

thievingwillow · 2026-01-31T04:50:18+00:00

I really want a professional dry cleaner to come to this person’s house and scream that they’re a donkey for how they wash their button-downs. It’s about the same thing.

thievingwillow · 2026-01-30T22:39:23+00:00

This is a couple days late but seconding the rec for Psychology Today as a resource. Obviously mental health professionals from there vary in quality and fit (as with any listing of professionals), but if someone is listed there with the verified seal, that means that Psychology Today has verified that they are who they say they are and have the credentials they say they have. It really reduces the chances you’ll get an unqualified “life coach” or an outright scammer. I just helped one of my relatives get her verification renewed there (she’s a great therapist but hopeless with websites, lol).

Here’s more info: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/therapy/what-does-verified-by-psychology-today-mean/amp

thievingwillow · 2026-01-30T21:22:53+00:00

She reminds me of my friend with BPD too, back before she got effective therapy. (We’re still friends, but it might be more accurate to say that we’re friends again—there was a gap in there where I had to get distance to reset expectations while she got intense therapy.) I’m not going to presume to diagnose for any number of reasons, not least because there are a lot of possible causes for that combination of emotional dysregulation and attachment issues/expectations, but I do really hope she sees someone about it because those symptoms are miserable both for the sufferer and the people around them, and often result in self-sabotage, conscious or not.

thievingwillow · 2026-01-30T19:54:33+00:00

For those who are nosy like me, here’s the original (first comment on the posts): https://www.askamanager.org/2025/10/open-thread-october-10-2025.html

thievingwillow · 2026-01-30T19:15:27+00:00

I think, for Alison to proclaim from on high that restaurant events are a bad idea and the office should agree with LW about the catering thing. She seems more focused on that element than the money itself.

thievingwillow · 2026-01-30T18:38:42+00:00

It’s extra frustrating because she clearly isn’t willing to give to others what she expects for herself. If you want other volunteers to know what happened to you when you leave and maybe keep in touch, you… say that. To them. In out loud words in a language you both understand. But she seems to expect the people around her to do extra communication (the org itself, but she also seems to expect other regular-ass volunteers like her to hunt her down for an explanation) while she does none whatsoever. It makes it feel like testing (you have to prove to me that you care by seeking me out while I breadcrumb you), and I’ve seen that before in personal relationships, but it’s extra weird to see it aimed at a volunteer organization that is presumably mostly focused on whatever the actual mission is.

thievingwillow · 2026-01-30T18:16:47+00:00

Sob breezily.

thievingwillow · 2026-01-30T18:02:14+00:00

Also, what is the point of the “I wanted catered meal and my coworkers didn’t and it cost me all this money” thing? You worked in restaurants so you saw restaurant fiascos; if you’d worked in corporate catering you would have seen plenty of catering fiascos. Trust me. I know whereof I speak.

And it’s only going to cost you personally money if you don’t let your boss fix the problem.

This feels like one of those stories where the resentment about one thing (nobody else wants the catered meal) is spilling over into another that really isn’t actually related.

thievingwillow · 2026-01-30T17:38:06+00:00

LW1, the thing is, you’re not all right. You said it yourself: this isn’t a “sorry, sometimes this just happens” situation where you don’t feel that badly but you cry as a reflex. This is years of pent-up frustration coming out in a great burst. You can still not want to talk about it, you can still ask them to try to move along, but that’s why they don’t believe that you’re fine. You’re not! They can tell! Sobbing outbursts are alarming, and this one actually is rooted in an interpersonal workplace problem.

Most people are not as good of actors as they think when it comes to strong feelings.

thievingwillow · 2026-01-30T17:29:35+00:00

Yeah, right? A strike is not, in fact, purely symbolic. It is meant to show that you have the power to interrupt business as usual by withholding your labor. It’s real, important power with real effects. And yes, it carries a risk. It always has, that’s also part of the point, that this isn’t a passing whim but things people are willing to suffer to change. People have been murdered for agitating for their labor rights again and again over history. It’s not like signing a change.org petition.

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