What would you do if you were me?

[Anonymous]

I recently moved under a new supervisor at work due to a shakeup. He has an enigmatic reputation. Very quickly I realized that he is running a side business out of the office during the work day. I was shocked by how openly he does it (second laptop open on his desk, audible, extensive phone calls with clients, unrelated business materials visible in his office).

I like my job and have a good worklife balance and flexible schedule. At first I decided to ignore it and just do my job as independently as possible. As times goes on I feel more and more frustrated because I am very busy, in fact overloaded, because he does does little job-related work and actively pushes his assignments onto me. Because he is so unengaged, he is not an advocate or any help. I also feel increasingly resentful that I am essentially abetting this ethically wrong situation by not speaking up. However, I don't know who I would speak up to, and if I involve HR, it is certain he will find out and could (will) make my work life much more difficult if they choose not to take action.

For what it is worth, I believe that HR and/or his supervisors are aware of his behavior to some degree, as he has been at the organization 5 yrs, although without much of a track record.

I am more and more frustrated and feel like leaving the job might be my best option. What would you do?

[Anonymous]

Wow. Sounds like it is more than tolerated by management. Tough call. I wonder if there was any sort of special arrangement he made at the time of hiring to permit this. Unless he had some sort of super-niche skills, I can't imagine who would ok that though.

Provided you can't talk to mgmt or HR, not sure there is anything you can do except figure out whether you can tolerate or not.

[Anonymous]

Let me guess. Nonprofit?

[Anonymous]

Op: Tis. Although I have been at nonprofits for years and never seen anything like this.