Posted by Ask a Manager

https://www.askamanager.org/2025/12/boss-told-me-to-write-the-same-sentence-500-times-as-punishment-student-employee-lied-on-his-resume-and-more.html

https://www.askamanager.org/?p=33493

I’m on vacation. Here are some past letters that I’m making new again, rather than leaving them to wilt in the archives.

1. My boss told me to write the same sentence 500 times as punishment for a mistake

I’m a currently an office manager, and I recently messed up and did not submit some health insurance forms that were required and cost my boss $1,000.

I have been here for four years and never made a mistake, but for some reason my boss wants me to write 500 sentences stating, “I will not screw up another insurance case.” Is this even something she can do?

She can, but it would be really, really weird — and overstepping and degrading — to require an adult to do that. (I think it’s also really weird and degrading to require a kid to do that, but at least there’s some cultural context for that being A Thing that some parents and teachers used to do.) Any chance she’s not being serious and was instead just making a bad joke about wanting you to understand the seriousness of the mistake?

If she’s serious, it’s ridiculous — condescending, insulting, and really poorly thought out. She also shouldn’t ground you, wash your mouth out with soap, or send you to your room for a time-out.

I’d take a broader look at how she treats you in general. It’s hard for me to imagine someone who thinks this is reasonable treating you respectfully in other ways.

– 2015

2. Our intern wants us all to give a coworker a “World’s Greatest Dad” mug

A birthday came up for a person in the department named Bob. He is the oldest in the department and has been with the company for over 20 years. He is loved by many and is seen as a welcoming person to the department. He has a particularly jovial relationship with one of the interns I supervise, and they jokingly refer to each other as “dad and son.” The intern showed me the birthday gift he bought for Bob and it was a “World’s Greatest Dad” mug. He said he wanted the entire department to write loving messages to Bob that would go into the mug and be presented to Bob at a later date.

I recognize the intern bought the mug with his own money, but I feel uncomfortable promoting the “Bob is the department Dad” mentality to the entire department. I do not know why exactly, but I do not think it sends the right message. (Also, we already celebrate Bob’s birthday with a happy birthday banner signed by people in the department)

I have no doubt that many in the department will love the intern’s initiative, so I have been thinking about letting it go. However, I am curious if it is more appropriate to redirect the intern to make his gift a personal one for Bob and leave the rest of the department out of it.

Yeah, the “dad” thing is a pretty weird and problematic message to promote as any kind of official department gift. It’s asking people to buy into a label for the relationship that probably won’t resonate with some/most of them, and it’s age-focused in a way you don’t want any even quasi-formal gifts at work to be. If Bob and the intern want to jokingly refer to each other as dad and son, that’s their own (odd) thing, not everyone else’s.

I’d say this to your intern: “That’s your private joke with Bob, so the mug should be your own gift to him. Ultimately, though, these are professional relationships, warm and friendly as they may be, and I don’t want to promote the ‘dad’ thing more broadly.” Frankly, that’s not a bad message for your intern to hear anyway.

(This episode of the AAM podcast takes on a different version of this — an admin who positions herself as everyone’s mom and literally calls them “my kids.” Not everyone is thrilled.)

– 2018

3. My husband says he can’t call the daycare run by my employer

We’re enrolling our children at the daycare that is run by the hospital where I work. We had a question about the kids’ physicals for the enrollment, and I suggested that my husband call the daycare since he had some free time. He said that he didn’t want to do that because the daycare is a benefit provided by my employer, and it would be comparable to me trying to set up health insurance through his employer. He went on to say that they would wonder why I wasn’t the one calling and that it could get back to my manager and reflect poorly on me.

I thought this was crazy, and no one would think any more than that this is a dad with a question about his kids’ daycare. It wasn’t like he would be asking about payroll deduction or anything related to my job. Which one of us is right?

You are.

This would be like if your kids were insured through your husband’s work plan and you thought you couldn’t talk to their doctors or take them to medical appointments because the insurance was through his employer.

This is a daycare. It would be really strange if they were only supposed to talk to one of the parents of the kids in their care. It’s 100% fine for him to contact them. If it somehow got back to your manager (which would be odd to begin with, because why would anyone take up your manager’s time reporting to her on the minutia of her employees’ daycare arrangement?), she would care precisely zero amount. Tell him to make the call.

– 2018

4. My student employee lied on his resume and said he was a director

I managed a student employee, Benjen, for about six months. Those were a tumultuous six months where we had a lot going on, absent directors, etc. I got a new job and Benjen, a part-time grad student, had to step into my old role more than he should have had to. I was happy to stay in contact with him and help him where I could after I left. Benjen was in way over his head and it wasn’t his fault.

When he left a few months later, I was happy to help with his resume. He was a great employee! Well, after a few revisions he sent me his final resume … and he claimed he was the director of the department for the ENTIRE job duration. He was never even full-time, and I wasn’t even a director. That was two levels above me.

I dropped the ball in responding to his last resume, which was months ago. I was so mad at his self-promotion that I just didn’t respond.

Now I’ve been contacted by someone for a reference on him and it turns out I’m still angry and I’m not sure how to give a reference. HE WASN’T A DIRECTOR!

Tell the truth. This is the whole point of references — as a way to verify the information candidates are self-reporting and to learn more about them. Talk to the reference checker and be very clear that he was a student employee, not a director. (And if you can only speak to the six months where you overlapped, be clear about what those dates were. If there’s any chance he was actually given the director title after you left — which sounds very unlikely — you want to be clear about that and careful to say that you’re only speaking to the time period you were there.)

Frankly, it also makes sense to write back to Benjen now and say, “I’m wondering about the title you’ve listed. You were a part-time student employee while you worked with me, not a director. You definitely can’t send it out with this on it.”

– 2018

The post boss told me to write the same sentence 500 times as punishment, student employee lied on his resume, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.

https://www.askamanager.org/2025/12/boss-told-me-to-write-the-same-sentence-500-times-as-punishment-student-employee-lied-on-his-resume-and-more.html

https://www.askamanager.org/?p=33493