a reader writes:
My husband works as a teller at a local bank. even before covid he worked in a very slow branch. when he started, he was assured that although they had very little traffic in the lobby, the bank made a lot of revenue from local businesses, so his job was secure (they needed at least two tellers at all times to open the vault, etc.) . /p>
Because there is so little traffic (5-10 customers a day), my husband has been spending his free time reading books, writing or watching the news on the computer. He has literally gone through every internal training module available to him and also keeps the lobby tidy. he tries to avoid using his phone and is very attentive to customers. (he only receives positive service surveys).
You are reading: Read books at work
Recently, he decided to start pursuing his master’s degree in a different field. he planned to study part-time online and kept his supervisor informed of him throughout the application process. she didn’t say anything negative. she started classes this month and has been enjoying it. she used some of her downtime at her job to read her textbook.
His supervisor (who has only been working as a manager for a year) called him into his office yesterday and told him he couldn’t do anything school related at work as it counted as a second job. he could read, but not textbooks. She said it was just a friendly warning, but this morning she received a letter from HR asking her to sign a formal verbal reprimand.
he got a call from hr and he was really confused because all this happened in the last few days and it has been contrary to what he had been told for the last year.
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the HR rep was harsh and said no one could read during downtime. (she used hyperbole like “didn’t you put two and two together?”) he had said that she had read all year and her supervisor had never had a problem with it. (she literally works the checkout line with him). the human resources representative did not believe him and reiterated that he was not allowed to read or anything other than work.
has been formally reprimanded and is upset. he is extremely diligent at work and hates being penalized for something that led him to believe he was okay.
I know that in most positions, reading on the job is obviously not appropriate. however, in situations like this, what do employers expect you to do all day? there is literally nothing else to clean, sort or count. his desk is hidden from the public and no client has ever suffered because he was distracted. Are you supposed to sit and stare straight ahead for six hours straight? Is this due to your supervisor for not clarifying expectations? Or is it just a rule that if you don’t have anything to do, you get paid to work and when you don’t, you just… sit?
This depends very, very much on the workplace.
There are jobs where you’re 100% fine if you read, including textbooks, when you have down time, as long as there’s nothing work-related you might be doing instead.
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There are jobs where it’s fine as long as there are no customers around.
And there are jobs where it’s just not allowed, usually for fear of looking bad for… someone. sometimes the worry is that it will look bad to clients and sometimes the worry is that it will look bad to superiors or other colleagues (who may not know that there is nothing left for you to be doing and instead you might think you’re just slacking off, and yes, ideally there should be a way to counter that, but not all managers are willing to put capital into that).
The weird thing here is that your husband’s employer is okay with him reading in general, but not if it’s a textbook. And that’s because… Is studying for school like doing a second job at your first? that is strange reasoning and makes no sense. she is not earning money with another job while sitting at her desk. he’s just…reading.
And what about your manager telling you he was just giving you a friendly warning, but then you get a formal reprimand from hr the next day? I guess it’s possible the manager didn’t know he was coming, maybe he contacted HR for guidance and didn’t realize they were going to contact him directly, but not great.
has your husband talked to his manager since your meeting with hr? if not, it might be worth letting him know that hr was really hard on him and said she wasn’t supposed to be reading anything at all, and ask if she can clear that up. depending on how that conversation goes and how strongly he feels about it, she might ask him to add a note to her file clarifying that the policy had never been communicated before.
but I wouldn’t worry too much about reprimand unless your employer has a rigid “x reprimands and you’re fired” policy. I would especially worry about her relationship with her manager and how much she can trust her in the future.
As for the larger question of what are you expected to do all day now that you’ve been told you can’t read anything (which, I agree, is silly in a context like this), you might get a idea by seeing how your colleagues spend their downtime, and especially your manager. You could even ask your manager directly what options are allowed. but if there’s really nothing you can do except stare straight ahead for potentially hours, and now reading has been 100% banned… well, there are some jobs like that. they are shitty jobs though! and I’d take it as a big blow against this one.
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