BA QA: My Boss Is Being Shady

He'd only been in his job for a couple of months and he got another opportunity that was going to pay him something like twenty percent more, and we answered the question I don't know like a month like I don't know a few weeks later. It was pretty quick turnaround for us, and THEO slid into my DMS last week and was like, I know you guys never answered my question, but I wanted to give you an update. And I was like, wait a second. THEO, I remember

your name, and I showed him his episode. I'm like, we answered it in September, and he had had no idea, but he was so sweet. He gave us an update and he said, I'm writing in to update you since I accepted my new job offer last September, which increased my salary by twenty two percent. Listening to my question being answered on the show brought me so much joy and personal affirmation. I'm sorry didn't get a chance to

update you sooner. But the company I resigned for, because we had cautioned him, like, if you're going to quit after a couple of months, do it respectfully and understand they may be, you know, not happy about that. The company that I resigned from, he said, respected and understood my reasons to leave. In fact, the company president was

happy for me. He did say that he was hopeful I would last at least a year before departing, but he also said that they were in no position to compete with the new offer, Otherwise he would have extended a counter offer to try to keep me. Everyone congratulated me, and I worked my last two weeks before transitioning to the new firm. Now eight months later, I am expanding my experience and knowledge base as a oh A construction cost estimator. I don't know where Kevin the engineer came from.

what you said about him. I thought, just the way he's phrasing his email, I'm like he for sure a chemical come on, a chemical cost engineer. Estimator. Come on now. So that was from THEO. Thank you, THEO I hope you hear this episode before eight months go by, and congratulations on the on the money moves.

they don't. Am I overlooking the whole situation and should I let it go? Appreciate your expertise and feedback. Thank you, ladies, and keep up the good work. Love your podcast. Ooh many, who do you think?

management on the front. I do not think you're overthinking it, Fomo, I really don't I think that you're right to feel some type of way about being left out. The unfortunate thing is, like tiffany kind of muttered HR and got your back girl, like at least in this situation, First and foremost, HR wants to protect the company. And if you've already had great and if you've already gone to HR and they've shown you what they will do, I

don't want to paint HR with a broadbrush. I've had the experience of working with some HR partners who would like do the right thing and try to get the manager pulled aside by their manager and make it a situation that they could rectify, but you never know. So but in this case, they've shown you before what happens if you speak up and speak out about your manager

and it wasn't the result that you wanted. I think in this case, if you were going to speak up about it, I would probably go to the head of the department where your manager, like whoever they report to, and let them know your concern. But I wouldn't necessarily make it because I wouldn't say, you know, this is

because my manager, you know, manages our raises. I would say, hey, you know, I'm a little concerned because a social event was held and I along with other colleagues were excluded and it was not a pleasant experience, and I want to understand why it happened, and I'd like to know that in the future we'll be given the courtesy of either being invited or explained or you know, given candid information about why we were excluded, because like, as a

member of this team, it made me feel excluded, made me feel left out. That's if you care enough FOMO to try to make things better. The other thing I want to say is this is a classic symptom. I just wrote about this the other day of being quietly fired. Have you ever heard you heard that expression? It's kind of lame, but this is what people call it quiet firing.

Because of quiet quitting became all the rage. But poor management when they do not like an employee for whatever reason, when the employees work is not what they want, or they just have some beef with the employee. Bad leaders, poorly trained leaders, people who don't know how to give candid feedback to help develop talent. They will find these ways of quietly firing you, quietly icing you out and making you feel isolated. You know, making you feel like

no one's paying attention to you, they'll do it. This is one great example of being left out of an event. Another example is being forgotten from an email chain that maybe you should have been included on, being left off a meeting invite for something that directly impacts your team or your work, being left out of the loop for decisions that affect your everyday work and not given the

respect and courtesy to be brought into that. And the other major symptom of being quietly fired is if they are not giving you feedback on a regular basis, if your one on ones are getting rescheduled, if they're avoiding them, if they're limiting them, if you don't have them at all. Because what that opens you up to is all of a sudden, they can come to you and say, hey, you really screwed this up, and we're going to have

to put you on a performance improvement plan. And by the way, it's your final warning, which happened to one of my coaching clients, and I'm just like, and it's their cop out. It's what they do when they don't either they don't want to or they don't have the training themselves to properly manage someone and develop someone and

get the result that they need out of them. But what it does is like it makes you feel shitty, and then you end up quitting on your own, which takes away their burden of having to be the one to fire you and makes their lives easier, you know.

So this is what that's bringing up for me, and I just hope, like, if you've been experiencing this, then I would almost I would almost say, like why go through the trouble of trying to make them a better manager by bringing it up and wanting them to improve, then just like getting out of there, you know, which

is a shame because it's their fault. So it's really going to come down to like how bad you want to stay with the company, Because if you like the work you're doing, and you feel like you're doing great work, you like the company, you deserve to stay and you deserve to make it work for yourself, and you should, you know, talk to the higher ups and see if there's another team you can be honor, you know, see

what can be changed. But if there's other reasons for you to be moving on, like they're not giving you any reasons to stay fomo, so it might be time to go.

She's like I am, but it's light. She's like, I'm met with my director and they were like, oh, we don't have anything right now, and then she was like what a mint? And then sure enough, you know, I'm like about a month or so later she got let go, but because she was kind of like prepared, she started

to like stack a little, you know. So what I would do is, whether you're going to leave or you think you might be let go, you know, if you have not been seriously like looking at your emergency fund, just like turn your attentions there to be like, you know, is there? You know what can I do to put a little extra something here? And honestly I'd be reading to see. So for her, thankfully, she was able to her company the six days that you have, they pay

you for them. So she just started to really look at like what if I do get let go? Like what what is the money? And I kind of look like so I could start making moves, and she updated her her resume, her cover letter, so she was kind of like ready. So literally when her supervisor brought her in, so can we just talk, she was like, is this where you let me go? And she was They were like,

oh yeah. So she was ready. So she had her cover leather, she had her resume, she had stacked a little bit of money in a couple of months where she realized things were light, and so I would just prepare for the worst, hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.

very violent metaphor. When it comes down to it, the bottom line will be the company's success, the company's survival, and they will cut you, you know, so I think you have to. That's why I'm so grateful that I was laid off my first big girl job in New York, because it just was that wake up call that I needed to never really expect to be different and expect to be special, so special that I was one of

the lucky ones who wasn't let go. And so I totally agree to if you have to look for those signs and not take it personally, because it's really not about you, it's about the company. But then just do what you have to do to accept what you can control,

which is your money, your job, prospects, your networking. Like your friend did everything right in terms of like getting her LinkedIn her resume all up together and fomo, I'd be saying the same thing, like, don't make yourself really easy to find by recruiters and hiring managers in your field, so that you have other options besides staying at a place where you're dealing with this baby manager, you know, and then let the company see if they're willing to

retain you, and you know, if they want to, then you can be like here, here's what's got to happen. We can't be having any more of this, you know, exclode exclusion and you know, these behaviors from the manager that have made it really hard for you to you know, I feel like you're a part of the team. Yes, ma'am, but that's a good question. I'm glad you asked.

Stephanie says, what would you say to a friend and colleague who amplifies your ideas but isn't giving you credit for them? An acquaintance from college worked as a contractor on some projects from my business last year. We hit it off right away because we share a lot of the same values, and we both started businesses focus on helping other women and people of color. We no longer work closely together, but we've kept in touch and cheer each other on from AFAR by attending each other's workshops

and speaking events. Recently, though, I've noticed that she's recycled a lot of the content I've produced in her speaking engagements and on her social media pages promoting her business. For example, in a recent speaking engagement, she included an idea that I discussed with her, but she took credit for it and didn't even mention me. On Instagram, many of her posts are incredibly similar to YouTube videos I produce for my business page. Her website also appears to

have lifted language that original appeared on my website. My gut is telling me she doesn't mean any harm. She's the kind of person who often turns turns to me for advice and has said that my work inspires her. HM seems like it. Given that our businesses are targeting similar audiences, I would expect some overlap in themes and ideas, but this is making me uncomfortable. Now I've muted her on social media for my own peace of mind, but I'm wondering if I should address this directly with her.

I'd feel guilty about doing this, as she's gone out of her way to do favors for me in the past, and I've helped my career. What would you do well?

or my name is in Tiffany girl. Because at first I was like, I literally went to her and was like, so well because it was my sister, Because you know, the thing is you might block me from your email list, but like, my sister just random me on her email list, and she was like she literally said to me. She's like, I think someone's doing your literature challenge, you know, like just like you. I was like, well, I didn't invent financial challenges. She's like, no, but it sounds just like you.

I was like, let me say so. First I was reading it and I was like yeah, and then so I reached out to her and was like, hey, girl, so it's looking like your copy and paste and she was like, no, you know you're not the first person to ever do a challenge. I said, you're right. So I literally screenshotted where my name was still in it. And when I tell you, i'd never heard from her. It was like seven years and I saw her at an

event and she came to me and apologized. She like never wrote back after she took everything down, but she was so when I saw her. What she did say was, I was really ashamed. I'm so sorry. She blamed it on her her ADMIN from like another country or whatever. I was like, girl, but she was just like but I was really ashamed, and I didn't really know how

to like. So I accepted the apology and it was just like, okay, and someone else had done that before, and honestly, it's happened to me several times, and I will say that if it's egregious where it's literally like copy paste, I will reach out and just say, hey, this seems like a lot of my work. I just want to bring it to your attention, you know, you know, so I don't accuse, but just like, you know, this seems like a lot of my work, and I wanted

to bring you to your attention. Can we have a conversation. And then there's some people where it's not egregious, but it's enough where I'm like hmm, and I don't Honestly, I typically don't say anything because it's enough where if I say something, it could easily be like, well, girl, you're not the only one that ever said that. I'm like, yeah, but you know me, if you know me, you know, I love a turn of phrase, you know, and like I just make up my own and I'm like, you

don't even talk like that. And so every once in a while there'll be someone who I'm like, you seeing like my turn of phrases all the time or whatever, and I let those go. You know what I don't let go is copy paste. This is your work. But like mannerisms, turn a phrase or whatever. I kind of just let those goes because one of the things that my really good friend Cabral always reminds me is people can only ever do what you've already done, so they're late,

you know. And so that's what he reminded me when I complained to him about it, and he was just like, now, if someone literally copyright a copy paste, you know, girl, have your conversation, but these other things, you know, you've already done this thing and they can only copy. They cannot know one could be more Tiffany than Tiffany. So just continue to be yourself. And so that's what I

would say. You would have to decide how egregious it's been and if it felt like a direct copy and paste versus like this makes me feel uncomfortable, And it doesn't mean that you can't say anything, Like it doesn't mean you can't say anything, because I do believe that, you know, people should feel free to speak up, but just be mindful that, like, you know, there's nothing new under the sun, and you know, like how you should have that it's not accusatory, especially if it's not a

direct copy and paste. So that's what I would just say. But like gir, you know what she's doing and she know what she's doing.

to come out outright accusing her, but you can't. But if you if your spidy sense is telling you something, it could be a good lesson for her to at least know that you're seeing it and you want to have like a candid conversation about it, just as colleagues. And this is one of the reasons. So when I started doing my webinar, I have a nail yournegotiation dot com.

I have a negotiation webinar, And there wasn't really anything like it when I launched this last year, not anything in the way that I do it like specific to salary negotiation and stuff that I could see, and I did my competitor research. I think it's important for us to be paying attention to our peers. I try to do it in a healthy way to where I'm not

comparing myself and feeling bad or feeling like behind. But I want to have something unique, right, Like I want to create something that is different, and like tiff says, like there's nothing new under the sun, but our point of view, our take on it, our spin on it is what makes it different. And I know that there's lots of career coaches, but I want to have something unique. And I spent time going through my webinar and creating.

Like Tiffany, you have your sayings, I wanted to create certain I wanted to name it something, you know, so I have my five step maker method. I talk about something in my webinar called the compensation cupcake. You know,

like these kind of I coin these phrases. I coin these phrases that then if someone's like talks about a compensation cupcake, I'm like, it's probably that they got it from my webinar because I'm the only you know, I check on these things, and I make sure that i'm I don't know one a few or the first or whatever.

And I think it helps to make your titles and your like little like if you're gonna name a method or it seems kind of kitchy and cheesy, but I do think it helps differentiate you stick in people's mind and make it a little bit harder for people to just lift it, you know, because if I was going to call my my my method, like or not even have a method, but just say this is how you negotiate your salary, then it'd be a lot harder to say, Okay, someone has taken her method or copied and pasted it,

but I made it unique by calling it the five step maker method and having it broken down the way that I do, and from like an intellectual property standpoint, because I there sometimes it's so egregious and if it's really taking away your business, then maybe a lawyer is necessary. Probably not in your case, but what I've heard is once you write something and put it out there, it's copywritten,

like it's it's you have a copyright against it. If it's it's intellectual property that you created, you don't have to like go trademark and get every single thing that you produce copywritten, copyrighted, copyrighted. But you do want to like have a record of it and be able to at least say that I have ownership of it, because if you do want to pursue legal action, then you know to have that. To have those receipts is going to be important, you know, moving forward, because it's IP

is like the it's critical. It's the foundation of our businesses. I told you, like, our ideas are all we.

me me. So I didn't know what to do because I was so but thank God, baby Jesus, teenage Jesus, middle aged Jesus, and you know, could have been old man Jesus. Thank God that a friend of mine, like a year or two prior, was like, have you trademark Budganessa, and I was like, I don't have any money, and he was like, it's like I think at the time it was like seventy five bucks or one fifty something like that. He was like, put it on a credit

card and I will sit with you. And like, so we I didn't I couldn't afford to hire an attorney. So he sat with me and helped me trademark the Budganessa. Thank god, because and so I didn't even have to reach out to them within like twenty four to forty eight hours. Somebody must have done a Google search over there at the bank, at the big bank, because it was gone, you know. But I had this, like I trademarked the Budganessa, and they were using it in a

way that like that's how I show up. And so I just say all that to say to Mandy's point that, like, you know, like certain legal action maybe needed to be taken, may need to be taken. But what I love what you said, Mandy, which is true. I love that even if you are teaching like a budgeting system or a negotiating system or whatever, that's not new under the sun. But I love the fact that Mandy creates because I do the same creates, Like this is the cupcake system,

this is the Mandy money maker system. So if you hear it again, you're like, like Mandy, Like, that's why I my ten Steps to financial wholeness, Like right, I actually trademark the word financial wholeness or the phrase because that's something new. It did not exist before and no one was using it casually. So I wanted when you heard it again, you're like, well, one, Tiffany owns that,

and then two like that came from here. So I'm always looking for a way to remain like a normal thing into something that can be traced back to me, and so like, no, I love that, so like and honestly, the thing is people are gonna copy all the time. You're not gonna be able to chase down every single person.

So some things I just let go. And unless it's, like I said, super egregious to man point, there's litigious activities you can participate and in like having an attorney or you know, certainly you can confront them and say what the entire hell is wrong with you?

you know, unfollow. I think she was you know, I think I sent a DM to the person because I had, I think met them before something like that, Like this is really bad like, what's going on? And before we knew it, her page was private and kind of taken down, and you know, and DELI had her her attorney also sound like a cease and desist. Yeah, but yeah, so

in that case, I'm like, you can't. I'm glad that you muted her, but also I'm just like, keep one eye open for like, like Tiffany said, the Google alert, even having an admin like I would, it's actually smart. I could have my admin crawl pages and just check so that you're not really exposed to it. You're not in that comparison trap. But I do think it's important for us to keep tabs on what everyone else is doing,

just in case. Yeah, the legal hit lazy and sloppy, you know, because that we do conzone on legal hands. You know, so exactly. Well, not of us though, because we're your financial not your financial advice. We didn't say that part. Not your financial advisors, not your investment advisors, to assume them, not us.