Workaholic for a boss

[Anonymous]

At a new job and my boss is a workaholic. Shes in her 40s married with 2 kids. She sends emails at all hours even on the weekends. Today we are all in a meeting from 11:30 to 3! Guess we don’t need lunch

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At a new job and my boss is a workaholic. Shes in her 40s married with 2 kids. She sends emails at all hours even on the weekends. Today we are all in a meeting from 11:30 to 3! Guess we don’t need lunch

Is the meeting on line? Cant you do both if home.

[Anonymous]

Does she expect you to respond to emails at all hours and on the weekends? Sometimes people send email when it works for them and it doesn't mean you need to respond.

- 40-something boss who's married with 2 kids and gets work done when I can, though if I'm working nights/weekends, I generally try to hold emails to my team to send during business hours

[Anonymous]

Ugh. She sounds incredibly undisciplined. I work a lot in the evenings and on the weekends. I guess you might say I’m a workaholic. What I’ve learned to do, which your boss would be wise to do, is to use delay delivery with my emails. I do not want any employee thinking they are expected to work outside of the workday simply because they got an email from me at 8pm. They’re welcome to do that on their own.

As for an 11:30-3pm meeting, please speak up. Say, “I see this is during lunch time. Are you providing lunch for us, or are we taking a break during the meeting?”

[Anonymous]

Do you have an unpaid lunch break in there or something?

I've been working for 18 years and have never had a lunch break so it's never been on my radar and I could accidentally be that boss I guess.

I also send emails at weird times. As a working single mom, if I can't sleep at 3am I might as well play catch up. However, I do literally have my email signature saying "Wellbeing Notice: Receiving this email outside of normal working hours? Managing work and life responsibilities is unique for everyone. I have sent this email at a time that works for me. Please respond at a time that works for you."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ugh. She sounds incredibly undisciplined. I work a lot in the evenings and on the weekends. I guess you might say I’m a workaholic. What I’ve learned to do, which your boss would be wise to do, is to use delay delivery with my emails. I do not want any employee thinking they are expected to work outside of the workday simply because they got an email from me at 8pm. They’re welcome to do that on their own.

As for an 11:30-3pm meeting, please speak up. Say, “I see this is during lunch time. Are you providing lunch for us, or are we taking a break during the meeting?”

I would be floored if someone said that to me. Can't grown adults figure out how to eat food around their daily itinerary?

[Anonymous]

I work with a woman who’s up and working by 4AM. She’ll take 3 flights instead of 1 to save $100. Why have a single hotel room for one person when two or three people can share? Why send a simple email when you can Teams, text, call, slack, and text again in a 3 minute period? She’s an insane workaholic who’s pennywise and pound foolish. She’s a decent person with a family but never stops working.

Thankfully she is not my boss!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ugh. She sounds incredibly undisciplined. I work a lot in the evenings and on the weekends. I guess you might say I’m a workaholic. What I’ve learned to do, which your boss would be wise to do, is to use delay delivery with my emails. I do not want any employee thinking they are expected to work outside of the workday simply because they got an email from me at 8pm. They’re welcome to do that on their own.

As for an 11:30-3pm meeting, please speak up. Say, “I see this is during lunch time. Are you providing lunch for us, or are we taking a break during the meeting?”

You’re spot on with this response. The boss is undisciplined. People in their 40’s should know better. Her team must hate her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ugh. She sounds incredibly undisciplined. I work a lot in the evenings and on the weekends. I guess you might say I’m a workaholic. What I’ve learned to do, which your boss would be wise to do, is to use delay delivery with my emails. I do not want any employee thinking they are expected to work outside of the workday simply because they got an email from me at 8pm. They’re welcome to do that on their own.

As for an 11:30-3pm meeting, please speak up. Say, “I see this is during lunch time. Are you providing lunch for us, or are we taking a break during the meeting?”

I would be floored if someone said that to me. Can't grown adults figure out how to eat food around their daily itinerary?

Time is money. Company does not pay enough for anyone to need to work around a lunch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you have an unpaid lunch break in there or something?

I've been working for 18 years and have never had a lunch break so it's never been on my radar and I could accidentally be that boss I guess.

I also send emails at weird times. As a working single mom, if I can't sleep at 3am I might as well play catch up. However, I do literally have my email signature saying "Wellbeing Notice: Receiving this email outside of normal working hours? Managing work and life responsibilities is unique for everyone. I have sent this email at a time that works for me. Please respond at a time that works for you."

OMG! I love your Wellbeing Notice! Well done!

[Anonymous]

These people are usually inefficient and disorganized and operate on the quantity vs quality principle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you have an unpaid lunch break in there or something?

I've been working for 18 years and have never had a lunch break so it's never been on my radar and I could accidentally be that boss I guess.

I also send emails at weird times. As a working single mom, if I can't sleep at 3am I might as well play catch up. However, I do literally have my email signature saying "Wellbeing Notice: Receiving this email outside of normal working hours? Managing work and life responsibilities is unique for everyone. I have sent this email at a time that works for me. Please respond at a time that works for you."

OMG! I love your Wellbeing Notice! Well done!

I don't. It seems a bit over the top. I already know I'm not responding outside of business hours.

[Anonymous]

I had a boss like this. It was horrible. she sent emails at all hours of the night was incredibly inefficient and disorganized. She made her emergencies everybody's emergency.

She would sometimes call a meeting at 4 o'clock in the afternoon with the intent of meeting a deadline the next day, which meant all hands on deck, but we would be working till 10 or 11 o'clock at night. Unplanned on our side because we did not know that she had this deadline looming.
Anyway, I left the company and I heard through the grapevine that pretty much the entire team left and then she was demoted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you have an unpaid lunch break in there or something?

I've been working for 18 years and have never had a lunch break so it's never been on my radar and I could accidentally be that boss I guess.

I also send emails at weird times. As a working single mom, if I can't sleep at 3am I might as well play catch up. However, I do literally have my email signature saying "Wellbeing Notice: Receiving this email outside of normal working hours? Managing work and life responsibilities is unique for everyone. I have sent this email at a time that works for me. Please respond at a time that works for you."

OMG! I love your Wellbeing Notice! Well done!

I don’t. Sending messages at 3am makes you look like you’re off your rocker and that you are NOT well. No “notice” is going to dispel that in my mind. I won’t be able to refrain from judging you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you have an unpaid lunch break in there or something?

I've been working for 18 years and have never had a lunch break so it's never been on my radar and I could accidentally be that boss I guess.

I also send emails at weird times. As a working single mom, if I can't sleep at 3am I might as well play catch up. However, I do literally have my email signature saying "Wellbeing Notice: Receiving this email outside of normal working hours? Managing work and life responsibilities is unique for everyone. I have sent this email at a time that works for me. Please respond at a time that works for you."

OMG! I love your Wellbeing Notice! Well done!

I don't. It seems a bit over the top. I already know I'm not responding outside of business hours.

A lot of people I work with use this too. I don't like it and think it's performative. Just delay delivery on the emails or save them in drafts, if you actually don't care about a prompt response.