Dear Businesslady,
I am currently working as a copy editor at a company where I have been for almost a year. I got this job through a staffing agency, and am still employed by them. I generally like everyone I work with, and my boss here is great for the most part. However, I feel that my generally agreeable nature means I’m doing a lot of grunt work that isn’t in my job description. I am not one to complain…I enjoy being busy at work and I don’t mind helping people out or working on projects I’m not assigned to. But I do feel that I have begun to be taken advantage of.
For instance, my boss asked if I wouldn’t mind helping to transcribe a few interviews. I didn’t mind; I have experience doing this in previous jobs, even if I didn’t enjoy it very much. But “a few interviews” has turned into a shit-ton of interviews that have to be done in a very short timeframe. One day I had to complete five 40-minute interviews in one work day on top of my regular duties. And my wrists hurt so badly after that work day I wanted to cry.
I don’t want to complain and I definitely don’t want to have to go through getting staffed again at another place, because working here really isn’t that bad. Is it kosher for me to recommend they hire a professional transcriber? I know for a fact they are just doing this to save money. Is this wrong? Should I be getting paid separately to do this?
Sincerely,
My Wrists Really Hurt
Dear Wrists,
I’m so glad you asked this question because I relate to it a lot and I bet I’m not alone. Even if you’re not afflicted with Must Always Make Everyone Like Me Syndrome (which I definitely suffer from, even though I’m trying to keep it in remission these days), anyone trying to move forward in their career is going to feel a certain pressure to agreeably take on as much work as they’re capable of doing. The line between “happy to help out” and “being a doormat” is often both fine and blurry.
While everyone has different tolerances for various tasks and workloads, it’s pretty much inevitable that we’ll all eventually need to push back against a request—whether it’s from a peer or a higher-up. But figuring out when that’s appropriate can be really tricky, and actually declining to do something can be even harder. And to further complicate things, sometimes your “really, I absolutely cannot” is going to be met with “well you have to,” while sometimes the thing that you have to gather all your courage to say “no” to is met with “oh, sure, no problem.”
There are so many variables at play that it’s hard to give a straight answer about whether or not doing this would be “kosher” in your situation—your boss may be a nice guy, but he might also be unwilling to pony up for transcription assistance when he knows you’re theoretically capable of handling it. Anytime you raise the issue of “I don’t want to do this thing” in the workplace, you’re opening up the possibility that, eventually, you’ll reach an impasse of “it’s part of the job and if you don’t like it, find a new one,” regardless of whether that ultimatum is fair, reasonable, or even ethical. That harsh reality is why it can be so difficult to even begin to broach the topic in the first place.
But while there may be some tyrannical managers who’d start threatening your job security if you dared even suggest dialing back your workload, in most instances you should at least be able to have a conversation about reshuffling your responsibilities. If something’s a dealbreaker for you, then it’s better to know sooner rather than later whether it’s an inherent part of your position going forward, and leaving for a new gig due to a shift in job duties isn’t the end of the world—if anything, it gives you an easy answer for “why are you looking to move on?” at interviews.
On the flip side, there may be some circumstances where you’re truly willing to go far above and beyond, even if there’s a case to be made that you’re being exploited in the process. I don’t want to suggest that it’s fine for organizations to demand unreasonable things of their employees, nor do I want to say that it’s healthy in the long-term to do your office’s grunt work (or “Charlie work” for It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia fans) indefinitely. But if you’re checking in with yourself periodically to make sure you’re still hanging in there, and if you feel like your extra efforts are paying off, that’s your choice to make. (And for a different take on this calculus of competencies vs. career trajectory, see the second letter.)
With those generalities out of the way, let’s get back to your inadvertent assumption of your office’s transcription duties and look at the case to be made against detaching from that particular task. Point the first: you don’t like doing this. In my mind that’s a worthy argument in and of itself, even if it might not be enough to leave the job over. The more experience you have, the more leeway you have to say “hey, I despise this; can someone else do it instead?” This is especially true if you’ve been taking on more and more responsibilities—your time is limited, and if you’re going to have to shift things off your plate, you might as well try to move away from the things that you struggle with or dislike the most.
But point the second goes beyond that: you are actively IN PAIN as a result of all this transcribing, and that’s also reason alone to stop doing it, even more so than it not being your jam. I’ve done transcription and I know how hard it is, so I’m especially sympathetic here. (On that note, pro tip for anyone who finds themselves having to do this: I find it really helps if you can manage to play things back at reduced speed, which is possible via Windows Media Player and I imagine other programs/devices as well. And as an added bonus, it makes everyone sound super drunk, which is frequently hilarious.) But anyway, 3-ish hours of interviews means at least 4 hours of work if not more, unless you’re way better at transcribing than I am. And either way, that’s about half your workday just to get through the recordings at regular speed, so it’s not like you’re being a prima donna about pitching in on one tiny little extra thing. If your regular duties haven’t already started suffering, they will soon enough.
So. I’d approach your boss during a regular meeting when you know there’s no time crunch that would preclude an extended conversation. Ask if you can talk about some concerns you have about workload, and then lay out everything you’ve said here—but organized in a hierarchy of “things that matter most from a business standpoint” vs. “things that matter from a humanitarian standpoint” just to make your case as compelling as possible. That means: 1) you’re having trouble keeping up with your other work as a result of all this transcription (and hit this point the hardest, with concrete examples if you have them—like, is it maybe harder for you to copy-edit effectively when your brain’s all fatigued from trying to quickly process audio info and get it to your fingers?), 2) it’s causing you severe physical discomfort, 3) you only agreed to it because you thought it’d be an occasional thing, and 4) it’s affecting your job satisfaction.
Don’t go into this discussion all “HOW DARE YOU, SIR”; keep your tone friendly and the overall vibe one of “I’ve noticed this problem so let’s solve it together.” You can wrap up with something along the lines of “so do you think it would be possible to hire a freelancer to handle this going forward?” And if you want to soften things further, you could offer to remain on call in the case of an unexpected transcription emergency—but you can leave that part out if you’d really rather not do it ever again if possible.
Given the fact that this was a “one-time thing” that slowly oozed into something ongoing, it seems unlikely that you’ll be told to like it or lump it. If your boss is all “nah, you can do it, so I’m gonna make you” (rude), then at least you know that your job isn’t as great as you thought it was, and you can decide whether the hassle of getting placed elsewhere is worth it if it means being freed from that burden. Plus if it is a condition of the job going forward, it seems as though it might be worth raising this impasse with your staffing agency as a starting point, since I could see them objecting to the fact that you’re taking on duties beyond those stated in their original agreement with your boss (although I’m not super familiar with staffing agencies so I could be off base there).
The bottom line is that your boss’s seniority over you doesn’t extend to total control over your workplace activities, and if you’re being asked to “help out” by doing something that’s a hardship, there’s no obligation to keep cheerfully accommodating that request indefinitely.
—Businesslady
Hi Businesslady!
How can I apply for jobs that I’m overqualified for? My issue is this: I have a Master’s degree and 10 years of experience in [scientific field] research. My current position is running out of funding, and I’m being let go. I’ve known for six months, and I’ve been applying to everything I’m reasonably qualified for to no avail (grant funding is pretty scant these days). My alma mater has a posting for “executive assistant to the dean” for a department that I have no background in—I know I can do this type of job, and do it well, but I feel like any hiring manager is going to write me off based on my resume. I imagine it would seem like I’m going to jump ship as soon as something better comes along—which I wouldn’t! ….Although realistically I’m not going to stay in an assistant job for the rest of my career (the pay will keep my budget afloat, but it’s not great). How can I approach this?
Tangentially, but kinda related, my partner and I were hoping/considering having another baby next year. I really hate to start a new position and then go on maternity leave within a year, but I need to bring home some bacon for my household so I can’t just put off getting a new job. AHH I’m super stressed about this!
Thanks,
Looking for the Right Fit
Dear Fit,
Your question is full of specifics that are unique to you, but in some ways it’s also a distillation of the issues everyone grapples with in the course of a job search: how to triangulate the available opportunities, the income you need to survive, your future life plans, and your skill set (in relation to the work you actually enjoy, as your compatriot Wrists can attest). You’ve figured out that an executive assistant role would make sense for you right now, so the next step is making yourself an attractive candidate.
I don’t dispute the fact that you’re “overqualified” for an EA position in a certain sense of having extensive training above and beyond what that job requires, but I think it’s more accurate to say that your science background makes you tangentially qualified. That’s actually probably less insurmountable than if you were trying to scoot several rungs down a particular career ladder—“I wanted to shift gears” will make more sense to employers than if you were a former CFO trying to explain why you wanted to run the mailroom.
Obviously you’ll have to address the fact that you’re applying for a job in a different area than what you’ve been doing, but that should be secondary to conveying this: “I know I can do this type of job, and do it well.” And like so many other instances where you’re trying to convince a hiring manager to consider you, that’s where a good cover letter will be key. How have you excelled in assistant-type roles previously? How have your more recent positions helped you maintain those skills so that you could hit the ground running on day one if they hired you? Why (besides “I need to pay my bills”) are you interested in pivoting from the research realm to a more traditional office structure? It’s true that an application from someone with your profile might raise eyebrows, so the cover letter should try to preemptively address that skepticism in a confident and engaging way.
If you make it to the interview stage, you can probably anticipate a question or two about your long-term goals and how this position would fit in with them. It’s doubtful they’re looking for a lifetime employee (and if they are, you’re not the only one who’s going to be out of the running on those grounds). But it’s reasonable for them to expect a commitment of at least a year or two, so you should make your peace with that and proceed accordingly: “While eventually it might be nice to use some of my training again, for the next few years I’d really like to be part of a well-functioning office support team.” If you’re burned out from the pressure of constant funding applications or any other aspects of your research job, citing those things will help lend credence to the idea that you know what you’re getting into and are happy to be an EA for a while—although you’ll want to be careful that you don’t sound bitter or frustrated about the fact that your previous position is no longer available.
As for your other extracurricular aspirations of expanding your family in the nearish future, leave those aside for now. True, getting hired and then immediately decamping to babytown isn’t ideal timing, but people have found themselves immersed in parenthood at inconvenient moments since time immemorial. If you go on maternity leave right away and then never return, your former colleagues will probably grumble whenever your name comes up. But the chain of if-thens leading to that scenario is sufficiently complex that I wouldn’t worry about it just yet.
There are no guarantees in hiring, just as there are no guarantees when you send applications out into the ether. But if you make the case for being capable of a given job, and the folks on the employer side think they’d like to work with you, then your past career history and future plans are less important than the immediate obligations of your new role. And at the same time, it’s nice to hire people who have interests and abilities that go beyond the requirements of a given position, so candidates like you just need to articulate how their previous experience has helped prepare them—even if that preparation is a bit unorthodox in terms of the duties at hand.
Good luck on the job-searching and kid-having and whatever other adventures are on the horizon for you!
—Businesslady
Re: Wrists’ letter, coming in from a staffing agency can actually make it harder to push back against employers overworking you–your staffing/temp agency usually asks the employers to review your performance and use that assessment in determining where/if they place you in the future, so there is more pressure to do everything they demand and do it with a smile. (I temped for a few years and it was sometimes rather rough to try to juggle this.)
It can help to speak directly to your staffing agency about your concerns so that they know where you’re coming from, depending on the kind of relationship you have with your agency. Also that can help them find jobs that will suit you better!
Yes, this. Absolutely speak to your staffing agency FIRST. Remember: you work for them, not the company at which you have been placed.
I recently had to cease my volunteer work for a program on campus here and it’s hard to quit stuff like that even if you’re doing it because you offered. All my support and good wishes to the LW1 for getting out from under those “additional duties as assigned” from a manager. It’s a tough place to be. Be strong, LW, and don’t be afraid to throw out questions regarding your office’s worker’s comp policy for physical therapy should you damage your wrists. A friendly query phrased like “does this office recommend any particular local physical therapists for job-related repetitive stress injury?” can go far.
I’m not sure how initial paperwork was handled through the first letter-writer’s staffing agency, but if there’s a job description for the position that lists expected duties that may be helpful to reference when discussing this with a supervisor. Of course, it may be deliberately vague and therefore no help – I’ve had several positions where the description ends with, “… and any other duties, as required.”
LW#2 here! Since writing to Businesslady late last year, I did get a new job! Hooray! And also got pregnant! Hooray again! But my due date is about two weeks before my 12-month work anniversary. I think this means that I’m just not protected by FMLA at all? So, I’m really worried about losing my great new job. It’s still early in the pregnancy, but I have a call set up with HR this week to figure out what the options are :-/
Speak softly to the baby every night about being two weeks late? That’s a reasonable request!
(I hope your office gives you a decent maternity leave situation, even if they are not legally required to do so.)
Hahah – I would gladly suffer through 2 extra weeks of being heavily preggo if it meant I didn’t have to worry about my job security during maternity leave!
I am hopeful but worried about what will happen – my supervisor and the director of the department both seem like they would work with me on this (especially since I’ve been doing a great job and they’ve both said so to me) but the CFO is a real by-the-book hardliner, and I’m scared she’s going to put the kibosh on anything outside the letter of the law.
But the letter of the law doesn’t say they have to can you if you’re not covered by FMLA! Just that it’s a thing that’s possible. (Not every pregnant woman got fired pre-FMLA but one is too many!) If your bosses want to keep you, they can and will, I’m sure.
Good luck with everything!!
Great user icon, LW#2.
Not knowing LW#2, I still would make the case for all the career EAs out there (myself included) that she is probably underqualified, if anything, for that role.
The Executive Assistant is not the low man in the office (in any office I’ve ever worked in, at least) and usually a strong partner to the CEO/executive they work with, and as such an extension of their authority.
Sure, most people are qualified to get coffee and schedule meetings, but most people are also unqualified in terms of maturity, demeanor, and judgement required for the job. You have to be able to schlep lunch one minute, and be sending emails for your boss the next, and reminding them it’s time for their next meeting, and also “can you remind me who was the guy I met with last week? You know, the tall one?” And be ready to know who that is.
Not to mention drafting memos and/or reports and knowing the intracicies of various policies, particularly the EA (like the one in the letter) is in academia and reports to a dean or higher.
A couple of my friends who are career administrators (either EAs or the ranking official to whom s/he reports) have recently expressed frustration with folks who are turning to admin because they perceive themselves as out of other options. The point above about “tangentially qualified” is a good one, and search committees are very good at distinguishing between applicants who enjoy that kind of work and would be in for the long haul and applicants who show any sign that the position is a second choice/best available situation. It would take a pretty strong pitch or administrative/managerial experience in another position to convince a committee — especially without a background in the field/department.
Yep. This is actually a pet peeve of mine. I’m a lawyer, and I can say with confidence that a good number of my smart, capable coworkers are not qualified for such a job. Many of them could acquire the skills, but they do not currently have them. The maturity thing, though–I don’t know that I’d say that most people in the working world aren’t mature enough for it (unless by that you mean they aren’t experienced enough in that kind of role, and I’d agree with that).
I’m giving the LW the benefit of the doubt that she does have experience that would make her qualified.
Another EA here — I just want to say that I appreciate your comments and the assertion that EA work is not easy or something to do when out of other options.
I DEEPLY WISH “I need to pay my bills” WAS AN ACCEPTABLE ANSWER TO WHY DO YOU WANT THIS JOB.
Outside of high level industry-specific positions, a person very rarely is DEEPLY PASSIONATE about whateverthefuck they’re interviewing for. This is esp true for entry level jobs, or standard office work. Lets all revolt from this elaborate fiction of capitalism!
/endrant
“An oak.”
“What?”
“I’d be an oak.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t follow.”
“You asked me one of those if-you-were-a-tree-what-kind-of-tree-would-you-be questions. They are all pointless and filler, so I just give the one answer. I’d be an oak. Specifically, a live oak. They throw good shade.”
At least, that’s how it goes in my mind when I am asked those sorts of questions in interviews. Lazy interviewers ask them because they don’t know how to figure out if the applicant is qualified and/or the right fit for the team.
My actual answer is to talk about the position in terms of the challenges it will pose, and to try to seem like someone who will be a good team player. But of course the real answer is “I need to pay my bills, yo.”
“I need to pay my bills and also sleep at night and this position seems like it will allow me to do both”.
“I also enjoy eating and having shelter, and this job will give me the necessary resources to engage in those activities as well.”
I think the only reason you ask someone why they want this job is if they’re apparently happy in their current position and you want to know what’s making them leave. Asking it of someone who’s unemployed, for example, is cruel and insulting. And even when the question makes sense, there are better ways to ask it, such as what interests them about the industry and what specific tasks they want to spend their time on.
I don’t know, I’ve been in an interview where the candidate answered truthfully that she wanted the job for vacation time and health benefits. In a way I appreciated her honesty, in another, I wanted her to care enough to b.s. a little. There are tactful yet truthful ways to answer that question and this was a position that required a certain level of tact. She did not get the job for other reasons (though the person we eventually hired turned out to be a NIGHTMARE) but found another position at the company. So I guess it worked out for everyone?
Careers adviser: I know how deeply, deeply frustrating that question is, but it is still a hugely important one. Realistically, if I’m running a coffee shop, and my choices are between Mr “I need to pay my bills” and Ms “I need to pay the bills, and since I like chatting to people and I like being busy, working in a coffee shop is a good way to do it!”, the latter definitely seems like a better bet. Even when your choices are between two minimum wage jobs, it is still helpful if you have the self-knowledge to be able articulate why cleaning suits you better than factory work, even if it’s just the shift patterns or the location rather than any intrinsic quality of the job.
I know it feels like a shitty question, and if you’re unemployed then an interview feels like a referendum on your worth as an individual under capitalism and it’s REALLY HARD not to take it personally. But from the employers’ point of view, the question is simply “can you do this job better than the other four people whose applications I have”, and that question is pretty helpful.
Well, I just think “Why do you think you’re best qualified for this job?” or “What do you think you can add to the team?” would address a lot of these questions, and the tone is more about how you contribute than less thoughtful phrasings, which frequently come off as: “why are you seeking employment here” / “BEG FOR THIS JOB PEASANT”
If you’re really asking “can you do this job better than our other applicants” that’s a different question from something like “would you be more suited to this job than to some other job” or “how do I know you won’t leave in six weeks when something better comes up?” Asking “Why do you want this job?” isn’t necessarily the best way to get at the heart of any of these questions. It’s not that people necessarily feel you’re judging their worth as a person; they just aren’t going to know what you’re really asking if you’re not clear about it.
#1, talk to your recruiter! Their job is to make money from the companies at which they place employees, and if you’re unhappy and want to leave, the task of placing you elsewhere will cost them money, so it’s in their best interest to keep you happy. They could a) be the ones to suggest the company hire a transcriber (that they would recruit and, therefore, make even more $$ off of!) or b) negotiate for more hours/a raise for you in exchange for the additional work you’ve taken on.
If you work for the staffing agency, talk to your staffing coordinator! (I assume you have one.) You’re often not supposed to do work that’s outside of the the duties that they told they agency about. You are technically an employee of the agency, so you talk to them first. (That’s how it works at the one I work for, anyway.) If it’s a good agency and a good coordinator they will have your back in this.
This probably wouldn’t work for a temp/staffing situation, but I used to have a boss who, when asked to take on a large new responsibility, would say: “Sure. What do you want me to stop doing so I can do that?” — making it clear that she already had a full-time job’s worth of responsibilities, so something would have to go to make room for this new one. It was effective.
Another version of this question I find helpful is to ask about where that task fits in by priority with your other assigned tasks, and following up with a discussion of when that task needs to be done (and maybe reminding them about X, Y, and Z projects with near due dates or obviously higher priorities). Often that leads to a supervisor rethinking whether they want *you* to do it, or at least a putting it in a longer time-frame where you’re not, say, doing hours of that painful, boring task in a row. But if you keep doing a task well and on time and never saying a peep about it, you’re just going to get more of the same.
So how would Ms. "I need to pay the bills, and since I like chatting to people and I like being busy, working in a coffee shop is a good way to do it!" compare to Mr. "People are wonderful and awesome and I just love coffee!"? Because let's face it, Mr. just loves coffee probably wouldn't be applying for this job if he didn't also need to pay the bills, he's just not admitting that fact, only the "why this job not that one" part.
Not to mention drafting memos and/or reports and knowing the intracicies of various policies, particularly the EA (like the one in the letter) is in academia and reports to a dean or higher.
A couple of my friends who are career administrators (either EAs or the ranking official to whom s/he reports) have recently expressed frustration with folks who are turning to admin because they perceive themselves as out of other options. The point above about "tangentially qualified" is a good one, and search committees are very good at distinguishing between applicants who enjoy that kind of work and would be in for the long haul and applicants who show any sign that the position is a second choice/best available situation. It would take a pretty strong pitch or administrative/managerial experience in another position to convince a committee — especially without a background in the field/department.
"I also enjoy eating and having shelter, and this job will give me the necessary resources to engage in those activities as well."
If you're really asking "can you do this job better than our other applicants" that's a different question from something like "would you be more suited to this job than to some other job" or "how do I know you won't leave in six weeks when something better comes up?" Asking "Why do you want this job?" isn't necessarily the best way to get at the heart of any of these questions. It's not that people necessarily feel you're judging their worth as a person; they just aren't going to know what you're really asking if you're not clear about it.
And that's why it's never good to copy edit your own work. 🙂
There's a big difference between 902 years of experience and one year of experience repeated 902 times.
Yes, this. Absolutely speak to your staffing agency FIRST. Remember: you work for them, not the company at which you have been placed.
Me too 🙂