Coffee Break: Arielle Pump

91 Comments

1. How do you know when it’s time to quit a job with nothing lined up? If you do that, how do you explain it in subsequent job hunting?

   1. When you’ve exhausted all of your available leave and you must quit to protect your health; when you’re independently wealthy and don’t need a job; or just don’t do it.

   2. Can you plausibly say “after working through the pandemic I just needed to take some time off [and a sabatical or PTO/FMLA wasn’t feasible]”?

      1. That is a terrible idea. Your interviewers will wonder why you weren’t tough enough to stick it out, since they had to themselves.

         1. Probably in before times. Now maybe is when you can catch a break? Who knows if you had to take a frail family member out of a COVID-choked nursing home or had your kids’ schools close for a year (or both)?

            1. No this is very naive thinking.

            2. Eh, again, all the female interviewers will have faced similar challenges and not quit.

            3. Yeah pretty much every working mom has dealt with daycare or school closures over the last year and a half and most of us didn’t quit. I can empathize with others, but it’s hard to hear someone say “I quit because X” when you also experienced X and didn’t quit. I wouldn’t give school closures as a reason – if you’re going to dive into details it needs to be something more unique so people will believe you couldn’t keep working.

   3. When what is happening is so outside the norm that you can easily explain it to another perspective employer. I’ve done this and it was fine.

      1. I’m not so sure that companies would be receptive to an honest explanation. I worked for a raging abusive alcoholic (he frequently broke things, puked in the office, and even gave himself a concussion from a fall) yet none of this was PC to say in an interview.

         1. In my experience, they are receptive to a short, honest explanation when the workplace is beyond the pale. I had a script: good things about the company, red flag (woman before me quit after 3 months), problem, what I did to leave on good terms (wrap up Big Project I was leading, give notice).

   4. Having to care for family during a health crisis is a universally accepted reason to step out and rarely does anyone press for details. It’s not a lie – you’re part of your family and are having a health crisis that requires your own care.

      I would scale way, way back before quitting. Just be the sh!tty employee who forgets deadlines. It usually takes months to get fired and you can usually quite before it comes.

      1. This! I’ve been this employee for almost 2 years now and do not appear to be close to getting fired. Even if I get fired tomorrow I’ve saved a lot of money in these two years.

      2. Agree with all of this. I have interviewed a couple of people who had gaps on their resumes and said it was due to having to care for a family member. One went into exhaustive detail about the situation that I didn’t ask for and frankly would rather not have known given it was about a complete stranger’s health situation; the other said “I would like to protect my relative’s privacy but can answer questions you have about the situation within some limits” and I just said “thanks for offering that” and didn’t ask for details. Her references were all fine and she ended up being a great employee; I did not need to know the specifics of her situation.

         I also agree with the “scale back before quitting” and have done that myself, in a situation where I knew the job was going nowhere and I was definitely leaving, but just needed the right opportunity to come along. I made sure to “meet expectations” but stopped going the extra mile or doing more than the baseline requirements. I stopped answering emails at night and on weekends, I quit the internal committee I was on, I went out for lunch every day instead of working through, I left at 5:30 every night instead of staying late, I took PTO whenever I felt like it, etc. It took me about six months to find the right new job (got a couple of other offers but held out for something I really wanted to do) and during that time no one said anything to me about my performance. And in fact, my boss from that job has since hired me to do side consulting for her new employer. So my mediocre performance level must not have been that bad; it certainly didn’t leave the terrible impression I had been warned about. Sometimes it’s not about hitting the brakes, but about putting the car in neutral and taking your foot off the gas. And you will be way more aware that you have done that than anyone else, most likely.

   5. I will counter some of the “never quit without something lined up” hysteria. I have done exactly that several times over my career, and each time I found another, better job, for more money, fairly quickly. Some points to consider: I have savings specifically set aside for this scenario. 6 months worth. I’ve never come close to using it all up. My job is one where my experience and title translate easily between industries, and I have a very strong resume. Since almost every company has people in my role, there are usually good opportunities available all the time. I have never had an interviewer give any indication that my being “between jobs” was an issue that would impact the decision to hire me. So basically, with good savings and a strong resume for a role with opportunities in your area, feel free to jump.

   6. This is a pretty specific scenario, but if you’re looking to get into public interest-oriented work and working at a non-public interest oriented job, the public interest jobs are understanding of the “I realized my previous job did not align with my morals/priorities” explanation. Provided, of course, that you have some other demonstrated commitment to more do-gooder work either before or after the corporate job.

      1. I work in a public-interest area and this is not true. “I wanted a job that aligned with my priorities” is a plausible explanation for leaving the private sector to take our lower pay, but if you say that to explain a resume gap you will sound like a self-righteous, asinine flake who will be difficult to work with. Unless you left an evil tech giant with no job lined up, in which case no explanation is needed.

         1. Sorry but the “evil tech giant” isn’t going to fly in the Bay Area if you’re there.

         2. Yeah, I 100% agree. “I want a job that aligns with my morals” is a good reason for accepting a lower salary or a longer commute or some other reduced benefit. If you say you left a prior job with nothing lined up because the job didn’t align with your morals, you sound like….well I can’t really think of a better description than the previous poster’s term: “self-righteous, asinine flake.” It signals that you expect perfection out of a job and will walk away at the first hint of misalignment, which is a huge red flag to employers.

            The only circumstance in which it makes sense to me to say is if your previous position was with an obviously evil corporation (like Big Tobacco evil, not Big Bank or Big Tech evil) and even then I would be confused as to why you took a job there in the first place.

   7. You don’t unless you have health insurance through other means and enough savings to keep going for many months. And even then you give good pause since usually being unemployed ends up being more stressful than simply coasting until you find something better. (If a variant were to start tomorrow and shut everything down again, do you really want to be unemployed?) Instead, take care of yourself in other ways if you can–get enough sleep, eat well, make time for friends. If your foundation is solid, it will help you weather tough times. Start building in an hour every day for your job hunt–it will remind you their is a way out soon and also give you some perspective. When you do find something, negotiate a late start date. If you do have to explain a gap, then don’t make it about your mental health or the crummy situation you’re currently in–that’s introducing baggage that can hurt you. Instead, I’d say it was time spent trying out freelancing or looking after family or something else that won’t render negative judgment.

   8. I would say avoid it at all costs unless you seriously need to protect your health. I’m currently interviewing for a new hire, and I don’t even interview anyone who has quit their job without anything else lined up (unless it was for a specific reason such as caring for an ailing family member). It’s too much of a red flag for me. That said, these are associates who have quit BigLaw, so perhaps if someone had quit a small toxic firm it would be different. My recruiting department is telling me that lots of people quit during the pandemic without anything lined up, and that it should be less of a red flag now. But if I know that you couldn’t hack it at another similar firm, then you’re not going to do well at our firm either.

      1. How do you know someone quit without a reason unless you interview them? Or does that get asked at the phone screen?

         1. Usually we can tell from the recruiter’s cover letter. Or if I can’t tell where (if) the candidate is currently working, I’ll ask my recruiting team to confirm with the recruiter. I also check that they are still on the website for the law firm they say they’re working at.

      2. I love your assumption that these people quit BigLaw because they “couldn’t hack it” and only think small firms are toxic. It’s very on-brand and I am not surprised at all that you have been elevated to a position that includes hiring.

         1. LOLOL non-lawyer over here eating popcorn

            1. Lol ditto. BigLaw people are so impressed with BigLaw, aren’t they?

   9. Hard disagree from someone who did it.

      I took a job with inadequate due diligence and quit 4 months later (and borrowed money from my parents for the first and only time in my adult life). My boss was a classic narcissist, screamed at me, revised documents and then blamed me to my face for her errors, and once yelled (literally) at me for doing something she told me to do in writing. It was making me miserable, sick (I lost 10 pounds in a month), and impacting my family. So I gave my 2 weeks notice and walked with no other job lined up except the promise of contract work from some friends.

      It took six months but I found another job with a better firm and a boss who is actually a sane and decent human being. As long we you do not have a history of switching jobs, it is not a death sentence. When asked I said “it was not a good fit so I decided to move on” (to make it clear I was not fired). I asked during my interview if screaming at co-workers was acceptable at the firm – both because I wanted to know and to make it pretty clear why I left. My new boss later told me that he thought it meant I was strong enough as a person not to put up with being treated badly.

2. I am wondering if I would ever again wear heels. Maybe for a restaurant meal where I am arriving by car and then going straight home?

   I am super into hygge everything now. Like my office is cold and after a year of being able to bundle up with abandon, I am just wearing turtlenecks under most dresses or layering a sweater / jacket thing over them (J Crew Juliette). I just don’t care. If it’s not totally laughable, I’m doing it. I get that we are a casual office, but we did casual so that it wasn’t ever comfy. It needs to be comfy.

   1. I like your style.

      And I don’t ever see myself wearing heels again. Eff that noise.

   2. I wore heels out for the first time in two years a couple weeks ago, and whooooo boy did I regret it.

   3. I wore heels out for the first time in two years a couple weeks ago, and whooooo boy did I regret it.

      1. I’ll say, I DID enjoy getting dressed up all fancy and having a night out. It was just the blisters the next day that I regretted. And they had previously been by far my most broken-in and comfortable heels. So I think I just have to get used to them again.

3. I need new evening shoes–too bad these are smooth leather and not something fancier. I can’t decide whether I love the style because they look vaguely like something Meghan Markle might wear, or hate them because they are a one-way ticket to old-lady frump city.

   1. I think they’d be tricky to style – not really fancy enough for a party, but maybe too fancy for some workplaces?
      I do like ankle straps on heels because I walk out of them, but to me an ankle strap =/= strappy.

   2. I learned from experience that these styles are best on a slim foot. My giant triangle feet would stretch this out into an ugly mess.

      I have a soft spot for anything asymmetrical like this, though.

   3. I mean, I don’t think those are frumpy at all but if you want similar items in a patent leather or another fabric, I’m sure you could find something similar. It really comes down to how high your arch is and if you are comfortable in the straps.

4. I’m pretty senior where I work. That’s not always apparent when people are working remotely, especially with people I’ve never met.

   Advice on how to handle a person who is just out of school e-mailing me to give me same-day turnaround deadlines on her projects (who mentioned none of this yesterday or last week or like ever)? Talk to her? E-mail? [Person is WFH still; I am in an office, but it is a different office.] Talk to her boss? I have been ignoring, but it is starting to annoy me and I imagine that this will get worse with a holiday this week and a big one next month, each of which seems to ratchet up other people’s perceived needs and curtness. [It’s like I am aware that you are (on no advance notice) demanding priority attention to your problem, but I’m in the middle of operating on someone else who had planned to have this spot on my calendar and am not going to break away b/c I could then drop the ball on what I’m doing, which in pre-holiday craziness, is a legit concern.]

   1. Are you a paralegal and is this person a first-year associate?

      1. That’s how it reads to me too.

      2. Totally getting this vibe too

      3. Would it make a difference if I were? I’m not; I’m a partner.

         1. Nonsense. If you’re a partner it is very obvious you are senior.

         2. If you’re a partner, shouldn’t you talk to her yourself? If you were a paralegal, I would have an attorney put her in her place.

         3. You’re a partner. Use your words!!

            “Associate, I am not able to accommodate that turnaround time. My estimated timeline on XYZ is ABC. Moving forward, please [insert what you want her to do moving forward.]”

         4. Of course it would make a difference. All attorneys are senior to all staff in law firms. Years of work experience doesn’t matter.

            1. I don’t think that that is true. We have some who are assigned to do various SEC filings and if a first year came in and demanded that someone drop that to pull good standings . . . there would be a problem.

            2. A first year should not be directing a paralegal off an urgent matter to work on her non-urgent matter, that’s true. But that’s an issue with the associate’s priorities and interfering with directions paralegal received from another attorney. Associates have authority over paralegals at every law firm I’ve ever worked at.

   2. If I were in her shoes, I’d appreciate you kindly but firmly explaining the situation. (Or, if that feels weird, saying something to her boss so they can give her feedback). Lots of young grads just aren’t sensitive to reasonable expectations, especially for senior staff, and it will save your sanity (and make her a better staff member).

      1. +1. Or she honestly might have the wrong info about you and your role. If ignoring it hasn’t solved the problem I think you do have to address it.

         1. I think you have to address it, let her know your availability and reasonable turn around times, and then maybe say something about how Partner’s typically are/are not staffed in your office. I’m not in law so I don’t know but I would imagine that if a partner needs your help they would ask you and not send a first year associate to bug you? Any chance her boss HAS thrown her under the bus and told her to bug you and doesn’t care that she’ll be the one facing the blow back?

   3. I think it’s a kindness to gently say that you appreciate her enthusiasm and dedication, blah blah blah, but the bigger picture is that [insert bigger picture] and in future, would be best if you could have a heads-up of X amount of time to do Y. I would take the opportunity to coach her. I’d leave the holidays out of it; I think this is a coaching opportunity that is relevant no matter what time of year.

   4. I think the problem with what is happening is that it is just crazy to announce a quick new deadline to people who may have left for vacation, be in transit, be birthing a baby, be otherwise unavailable and if you’d reached out and possibly talked to them (or known they were unreachable), you’d know that you were risking the ball getting dropped and re-plan accordingly. Like who works that way and thinks that it will all come together in the end? It’s kind of begging for the inevitable disaster. WFH =/= full 24/7 availability as if people are sitting around just waiting for your e-mail to land in their inbox.

   5. I would address it with her without referring to your standing in the office. “For future reference, I will need more advance notice for these kinds of turnarounds, preferable [x] days.” If she has a problem with that, let her ask around or speak to her manager about the issue–and hopefully the manager says, “yikes, Anon is a VIP, of course you shouldn’t drop these things on her same day!”

   6. If you’re so senior you should know ignoring her or going straight to her boss without respectfully explaining expectations isn’t good enough.

   7. Does your title not reflect your seniority? Is the issue that she is assigning you work or that her same-day expectations are not possible? If you want her to give you more time, you need to tell her that—just say that you are busy with other work but will respond in x number of days, and that you need more than one day notice as a general rule.

   8. How did you get to be senior without being able to handle this already?

      1. That’s kind of what I was thinking, too.

      2. Yeah my take too.

      3. Yup. This is super strange coming from a partner. Or even senior staff.

      4. Yeah, I’m trying to imagine a scenario in which a first-year associate doesn’t know who the partners are, and is assigning deadlines to people willy-nilly, and I’m just… not understanding.

   9. Is it possible her boss is telling her to ask you for things with the quick turnaround but she’s leaving for the part where Boss asked her to ask you? Otherwise nothing about this makes sense…

      1. *leaving off the part

   10. First, I would coach them on acceptable deadlines – have a call and ask why this is such a fast turnaround, how long have they had it, who is the assigning person, and offer to intervene for them with their boss to get a better workflow. It’s a softer way of establishing the pecking order – tell them you will interface with their boss as a peer since they don’t feel they’re in a position to do it.

       Then, once you establish reasonable deadlines, delegate. I’m a law firm partner and when I get a request to do something low level or with a too-fast turnaround, I either direct them to an associate (if I know they’re available) or to the practice chair to find an associate for them. If I get repeated requests from the same person, I facilitate a relationship between them and someone who can do the work, so they go to that person directly and not through me. But establishing reasonable deadlines is important to protect your people.

   11. When I was a paralegal, one of the attorneys would always ask *me* to give assignments to one of the paralegals who had been there as long as I’d been alive. I was super uncomfortable telling her what to do so I spoke to my direct supervisor and asked her how to handle it. She said she would.

       I too struggle to understand how you’ve gotten to this level without dealing with this before. I’ve seen a few young (mostly male) associates who just don’t realize how expensive the time of people the next step up really is and have to be put in check about how much of their time can be committed to meetings or whatever, but they weren’t giving assignments as much as wanting someone to spoon feed them how to get things done. But that’s a habit that gets broken fast, especially if they try it on anyone above a mid-level associate.

       My first piece of advice is to start adding your email signature to your internal emails so that it specifies your seniority. Then talk to whomever this associate’s direct report is and let them know what they are doing and that it is inappropriate.

       But you also should be able to tell a more junior employee, “I am managing multiple cases (or projects or however you want to describe it) right now so if you need a response from me, you need to give me [reasonable amount of time] to respond. If it is an emergency or if I don’t respond in that amount of time, you can check back in, but I cannot be at your or this case’s exclusive beck and call.”

       1. That should say that she was a case manager, not a paralegal, so our relationship on the org chart was complicated. But still, I wasn’t comfortable assigning work to someone that much more senior than I was (at the time or even now).

5. Peleton’s Black Friday special has my attention – $150 off the Bike package that comes with shoes/mat/weights. I’m thinking of pulling the trigger but I’m wondering if they will go even lower in the new year, based on the news from their Q3 earnings report. Thoughts?

   1. Possibly, but if you’re really interested, I would just get it. Let’s be real here, with inflation, the price just won’t fall that much.

6. What party shoes are people wearing this winter? I need to dress up for a holiday party (patterned dress, black tights) and can’t remember how to dress my feet. I prefer flats or a low heel. What shoes would you wear?

   1. Dressy pointy loafers, or dressy/festive ankle boots.

   2. Loafers! 1″ heel, a metallic, or with bows or trim, or sequins, or patent leather. Black to match your tights.

      1. Thank you both!!

7. Can anyone point me to your favorite stuffing recipe? It’s just two of us and baby for Thanksgiving, so we’ll probably do a roast chicken, but I started thinking today that the only thing I really want that is Thanksgiving related is stuffing. And maybe some apple pie.

   1. This always gets massive rave reviews:
      Onions & Celery (saute until translucent)
      Italian Sausage (pre-cook completely)
      Fuji Apples
      Craisins
      Mix all with bread cubes
      Season generously with poultry seasoning, Salt & Pepper.
      Add enough chicken stock to make moist (but not soggy).

      I am also going to make the same version w/ a Wild Rice blend this year instead of bread cubes as one of my holiday guests avoids gluten.

   2. I did this one last year (or maybe the year before), and it was great. Never going back to Mrs. Cubbison’s! https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/simple-is-best-dressing

   3. Ok I don’t use a recipe really but

      Cut up some good bread today, into cubes, and let it dry. Short of this you can buy bread cubes at the store. I do not prefer the seasoned ones. While you’re at it make some homemade stock or buy some top quality low-salt broth.

      Thanksgiving day slowly sauté one or two chopped onions and several stalks of celery in 1/2 to 1 stick of butter. Season with salt and pepper. Let them get good and tender. Add some garlic if you like it (but you don’t want this to be overwhelmingly garlicky), chopped fresh sage and fresh thyme leaves. When all of that is nice and soft, add to a big bowl containing your bread cubes and toss. Now add enough stock to moisten the bread but not to make it so wet it’s pasty. Taste for salt and pepper.

      Turn mixture into a buttered casserole, dot butter on top, cover with foil (butter the underside if it’s touching the stuffing) and heat in oven until warmed through. Take off the foil for the last 10 minutes. I usually do this all while the turkey is resting for 30 min.

      This is a basic classic thanksgiving stuffing that no one is going to complain about. You can fancy it up a bit by using fancier bread (I like sourdough, some people like challah or cornbread) and adding one or two things to it – if you were doing a turkey and had giblets, you could have cooked and diced those (not the liver tho) and added them to the stuffing. But everyone will be happy with this one as-is. Enjoy!

   4. I make this one and everyone loves it.

      https://www.williams-sonoma.com/recipe/bread-and-sausage-stuffing.html

8. I posted the other day about wanting some comfy velour, corduroy, or velvet pants that look enough like pants to wear out of the house but as close to comfy pajamas as possible. And I wanted navy blue, not black.

   I ended up ordering Hue corduroy leggings. They’re kind of like jeggings, with jeans type pocket stitching, but I wear a long top with them and that stuff doesn’t show. The legs are tight but not tighter than skinny jeans. I really like them. And most importantly the navy blue, not black, is a really nice, rich midnight blue so they feel very holiday/ festive to me. I recommend them!

   HUE Women’s Corduroy Leggings https://www.amazon.com/dp/B098KJSLYP/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_0NG4GPVPBPYK8PS1MBY3?psc=1

9. Apropos of the discussion above about quitting vs. coasting, I am wondering why some people feel they have to quit rather than coast. If a job is so dreadful that you want to leave, why do you still feel you either have to give it your all or quit?

   I get it if going to the job is causing actual physical/emotional/mental damage, but if it just sort of sucks, I would totally coast. I think it’s true that it can take a while to fire and employee and I feel like at most places even if you are doing just the minimum, you probably won’t attract attention and get fired (I am not talking about going full Office Space here). Do people still feel that they “owe” their employer their best work all the time, no matter what? Because most employers would jettison you without a second thought if they needed to.

   1. I think its very related to being an “over achiever” — being socialized that we have to be “responsible” and “do a good job”

      I have leaned out somewhat recently and have realized that the extra 10-20% of performance that puts me in the “exceeds expectations” for performance reviews takes around 50% extra effort.
      Actively interviewing and may be in a new role by the new year.

   2. I feel like there’s “not doing anything at all and effectively stealing your salary,” which I woulyo’t be comfortable with, and then there’s “doing the bare minimum,” with which I am perfectly fine. I don’t think you owe your employer a superstar performance under all circumstances.

   3. I think this really depends on the job. For me, doing the bare minimum doesn’t hurt a company, it hurts the people I work with (think patients, students, etc. ). I think it’s much harder to coast in a helping profession without feeling guilty, which just makes the burnout worse.

      1. +10000000. There it is. I can’t scale back how hard I try for my patients. I’m only comfortable coasting on aspects of the job that don’t affect patients… but that’s very few tasks.

   4. I quit because I had too much work assigned to me and every effort to reduce it wasn’t helping, and management made it clear they didn’t care (as the culture was 12 hour days and weekend work). I couldn’t coast with no consequence as it would have meant regularly missing external deadlines. I was also burnt out so when I did have interviews, wasn’t in a great headspace or able to prepare. Quitting gave me a few weeks to decompress, and when I was interviewing, I found that my precious company was known in the market for being that way and I never even had to explain the situation.

      1. I’m the OP in the above thread. This is me to a T combined with the poster above — public interest job, so dropping the ball is letting down real people.

         Got yelled at by a judge today for missing a deadline. I missed it because I was working like crazy on other things, but that’s irrelevant in the moment. Days like this are just so hard.

         1. Can you tell your firm that you want to go part time in the new year? It may give you a chance to off load some cases and buy some space to look for a new job. And if you aren’t planning on staying, then it should not matter if part time is frowned on / not promoted at your firm. Then at least you won’t have a resume gap.

      2. I quit because some of the way my boss abused me was to heap completely unreasonable expectations on me and literally SCREAM if I slipped even a little bit. I have never worked harder in my life and was getting reamed out every day. I went to HR multiple times; that made my boss even more furious.

         Things like, the day before Christmas he sent me something at 9 am with a 10 am turnaround time. Email went out to multiple higher ups promising 10 am. It took 40 hours to complete, so my holiday was wrecked, I looked incompetent to other people, and I was a miserable wreck.

         Suing him was awesome.

   5. I agree with your general sentiment, although I do think it’s industry and profession dependent. Some professions it’s probably really hard to even do the bare minimum (or I guess another way of looking at it is the bare minimum is a lot). In other professions like mine you can basically do nothing and not get fired, at least not for a long time.

10. So is it a last ditch effort to get an acquittal, or her hubris – thinking she can get jury sympathy or talk them into doing what she wants that drove Elizabeth Holmes to take the stand? After the listening to the books and two podcasts, it’s my impression she’s a sociopath, or at the least, extremely gifted at manipulating people to her side and completely without remorse for any of the outcomes of her actions. She obviously wants to avoid jail, but unlike Rittenhouse, she doesn’t have to cry on the stand, she just has to charm. Yes, yes different trials for completely different reasons, but there may be strong similarities in the strategies here.
    I’m hoping the defense can reveal her for whatever she actually is. I’m curious as to what opinions and thoughts anyone else has on this turn of events in her trial.

    1. I am curious what people think also, so please post the question again in the morning thread tomorrow so it gets more visibility.

       I think she’s such a narcissist that she legitimately thinks she can charm the jury the way she charmed all those old white guys she got to invest in the company. It worked for her for years, right? Why wouldn’t she think it would work again?

11. This is probably a very stupid question, but how do you get the smell of smoke out of clothes?? I can’t stand it, but people smoke (outside) at many work events I go to, and as I’m a mere intern, I can’t ask them please not to.

    The clothes in question are business formal, (expensive for me), and dry-clean only. I’ve tried airing them out after events, but I was wondering if anyone has other tips?

    1. Run a hot bath in your bathroom, and hang the clothes from the shower rod. When the tub has a few inches of water in it, add 1 cup of plain white vinegar. Let the clothes sit for a while in the vinegar steam with the bathroom door closed.

Comments are closed.