194
Ahh, the issues when you leave your own country.
I have experienced this situation many times when I first moved to the country I live in now. There are two local languages that are spoken...neither of them English. (I am now a multilingual, but English is my first and native language). I mastered (whatever that means) the main official language of the ...
173
How can I give my coworker the training in the time I have left?
You don't, this is your boss's job to assign not yours. When you resign from the company, your boss will decide who ( if anyone ) will be trained to fill your role. They will also decide if you will be the one doing the training or not.
160
My opinion is that is a predatory practice and it is unethical. And it's the case that any decent moral or ethical system worth its salt is occasionally going to demand that you take a hit. It's easy for me to be an armchair quarterback and say, "Stand up for what's right and take the consequences." Still, that's what my advice is.
I did this once. I ...
143
Ask if you can be reassigned to another project.
I already had some question in interview such as "would it be ethically ok for you to work for a military project?". Some companies do care about this kind of things, and could therefore reassign you to another project. After all, it's in their interest to make sure you are happy and motivated with your ...
101
I'm afraid that you're trying to achieve two goals at the same time, that are contrary to each other.
To live and work in a country where the local language is different from your native language.
To not have to learn the local language.
I'm not going into whether your reasons for not learning the local language are valid or not. Even assuming they're 100% ...
94
Call the treasurer. Sometimes email gets lost in transmission, or automatically marked as spam: she could be simply not receiving your email! It's best to resolve this simply if it's a simple problem.
Stop performing work for this organization until they've paid you for the outstanding invoice(s).
Send a final email to the Treasurer and copy the President ...
86
Present the training activity to both the trainee and your managers as improving the bus factor. It is prudent to have at least two people capable of doing any job.
Talk to your manager first, so that you are certain who they want you to train.
Training the wrong person could create an extremely difficult situation when you resign. Training person X would ...
49
Any advice for me, please?.
You tried sending emails to the Treasurer already, and you have already 2 months due of payment (!). This is what I suggest you do:
Sometimes emails aren't as effective as picking up the phone and calling this person. You can also stand up and walk to their office/cubicle if possible. These ways are more efficient in getting a ...
30
Start working with the person where you can
Several answers suggest dishonesty. I would however stay away from that if you can, especially since it may not even be needed.
If you have absolutely no opportunity to work with the person, or have no reason to ask them to pick up work, then you are pretty much out of options. However, otherwise look out for the ...
27
Though I would like to avoid him in any which way, should I report
this behavior to my bosses in company A or at the client directly?
This situation definitely needs to be worked through your direct manager. You don't want to take the chance of damaging the relationship with the client -- that could potentially get you fired.
At any rate you did your ...
27
Don't make plans for other people or assume you know what's best for them.
This includes the colleague you want to train to be your replacement, and your employer.
You've got good intentions here and that's commendable. But the fact is, your version of what people will want to do once they learn you're leaving is likely wrong.
For instance, it's very ...
24
How can I approach making improvements to his code without having to
argue (politely) for days to get it merged?
Based on the text of this question, you seem like a very reasonable person and have done the necessary things to try and be inclusive and considerate of the other developer when introducing new techniques.
At this point, I think you should ...
17
I also work in a place where Dothraki is spoken. At first, I was very excited to learn the language but, after being made aware that many Dothrakians believe in a Dothrakia for Dothrakians(DFD), my enthusiasm died out completely.
The company I work for is not Dothrakian and our contracts EXPLICITLY cover that fact that English is the official language (due ...
14
"Getting hit by a bus"
You're training someone to do what you do so that if you're out sick one day, get hit by a bus, or have some other emergency your company has someone ready and trained to fill in your role until you come back (or don't).
Its just a level of insurance that your company's management should see as a "good thing" not something to fear ...
13
The only time it is unethical to leave a job is if you made a promise to stay for a length of time and the party you made that promise to has kept all of their promises to you but you leave early.
It's totally unreasonable for you to expect your co-workers to never speak their native language around you. I recall reading an account by a guy who moved to ...
12
Like others mentioned if you have a good working relationship with your manager, you should be able to ask about it if you catch him at a good time.
A simple "Hey I have been hearing some rumors about a transfer to Y's team. Do you know anything about this?" should suffice. Since this is about the future of your work, yes, it is your business and you should ...
12
When an ethical concern comes up in the workplace there's a couple considerations.
First, we need to understand Ethical. Ethical is sometimes legal and sometimes illegal. So find out if it's illegal. If it's not illegal, then we're in the more difficult part of the conversation.
Second, decide how important your values are to you. This is difficult. Often ...
12
I worked for a Belgium company for 6 years in the UK, but with frequent travel. All the staff were multi-national and spoke various languages, the primary one being French.
There were times when discussions were held in the staffs native language as I believe it was often easier for them to quickly convey their points with each other and then revert back ...
12
Is it okay to do this, [scream at a subordinate], as long as you don't attack the person?
No, raising your voice is rarely acceptable in a professional environment. Increasing one's volume, especially to the point of yelling, is never acceptable except in cases where it serves a practical purpose (e.g., in a loud machine shop or in an emergency). Yelling to ...
11
Is it ok to be expected to open the door for these painters?
If management knows you are on site and have communicated to you that painters will be arriving and that you should allow them to enter then yes you are expected to open the door. If you have received no communication from management, I would not open the door. If the 3rd party has an issue with ...
10
As a slight frame challenge to the question, I have a suggestion. Step back from the argument, and determine what meaningful objective you and your team can focus on.
The reason why you're all disagreeing on how "good" the reports need to be is that there doesn't seem to be any correlation between report quality and any goal or objective you have. Ask ...
10
I am thinking of sending an email to the president to let her know I
have not been paid
You should send a reminder to the Treasurer, and CC to the President.
While the President paid you promptly, it's not a huge surprise that the Treasurer would manage vendor invoices more slowly. Still, you want to make sure you actually get paid.
10
What you should do depends on how much you value your code of ethics. If push comes to shove, knowing that your conscience isn't edible, are you willing to quit your job or be fired rather than work on the project?
You can voice your concerns directly to your manager and see if they would be willing to reassign the project. If you do happen to be successful,...
10
You mentioned in a comment that your primary goal was:
To work harmoniously but not being treated like this.
I think at this point the best approach is to wait and see what happens. Yes the internal employee was out of line but everybody does some crazy rubbish every now and again. He's apologized to you for that so I think at this point you just see how ...
10
How can I approach making improvements to his code without having to argue (politely) for days to get it merged?
Don't approach him anymore when making improvements to the code. You have already attempted this on multiple occasions and the results have not been desirable.
At this point, since you stated that his permission is not needed, simply go ahead ...
10
If I said something very direct like "Sending multiple one word emails in succession clutters everyone's inbox. Instead, let's use Slack for communications of that kind from now on. (Insert link to company's guide for installing Slack app and logging in)." Would that be too harsh or unprofessional?
Not at all.
It reads as polite as possible (in fact, it ...
9
This is an excerpt taken from UK GOV Website (noticing the UK tag)
The general notice period for taking leave is at least twice as long as the amount of leave a worker wants to take (for example 2 days’ notice for 1 day’s leave), unless the contract says something different.
Unless your employment contract states otherwise (which it does - and is in fact ...
9
Is giving negative feedback based on anonymous hearsay acceptable for a manager ?
For your manager, it was not anonymous. Someone said this to him in some way, so he knows who that person was, but was refraining from disclosing that information to you (which was good, as to avoid to make it personal).
Chances are that this person is someone your manager ...
8
If the email you received hadn't mentioned time charging, this would be simple: you just don't ask the question. You've been given something nice, just enjoy it. Personally, I'd still take this approach.
However, as the email did mention time charging, you could send something like this to your boss:
Hi boss.
Thanks very much to both you and the ...
8
Just a quick congrats on your stance and ethics. I'm the same as you and have a blanket rule that I will never work for a company that produces gambling software (huge industry where I live - Australia). Stand your ground, nothing wrong with not wanting to take part in destroying lives and tearing families apart. Its more than "their money their choice", it ...
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