Hello Madeleine, I have read your articles, and I wanted to reach out to you. I have an equal business partner with whom I have successfully run a restaurant for six years. While I have 30 years of experience in the industry, my business partner had no previous knowledge about restaurant operations. I have used…
Dear Madeleine, I work for a giant real estate company and have been selling houses in a big metropolitan city for a long time. Over the years, I’ve been heavily recruited and this is my third company. I never wanted to be in management as I really like working with clients. I’ve had terrible managers,…
Dear Madeleine, I’m a tech founder and have developed a tool called “burnout tracker,” which is embedded into our 1:1 tool. Without going into too much detail, the tracker is able to predict when a support conversation between manager and employee is needed. Here’s my challenge: What is common sense to me seems to be…
Dear Madeleine, I manage a small team in a big company. Here is my problem. I start my day at 7 a.m. with a meeting, and then my entire day is back-to-back meetings. Almost every meeting generates work for me to do or to delegate to someone on my team—which requires another meeting. When am…
Dear Madeleine, I work for a large publishing company. I started here because my dream is to someday be a published author, so I thought I would at least be in the industry. I have been here for four years. I started in marketing and am now an editorial assistant, which sounds a lot loftier…
Dear Madeleine, I am a mid-level manager in a global software company. I have been working here for about ten years and I lead three teams. Right now I am working with my manager on our goals for 2024 and I can already tell that there is no way my teams are going to be…
Dear Madeleine, I was recently promoted and I am drowning. I am still supporting the person who took my former job while trying to get my head around my new job. My new team is huge, and I didn’t know any of them until I stepped into this job. I couldn’t get through my email…
Dear Madeleine, I recently graduated from college and started my first job. The job I was offered was the one I wanted, but on my first day I was moved to a different department and given a job that does not come close to the description of the job I signed up for. The person…
Dear Madeleine, I report to a CHRO in a large global manufacturing company where I’ve worked for 15 years. About two years ago our company was sold to a group of investors, and they installed a new CEO. At first the CEO said all the right things about how important the people are—but over time…
Dear Madeleine, I am an EVP of sales for a US-based fitness and weight loss website that is in hypergrowth. I started with the company about eight years ago and rose through the ranks, figuring things out as I went. About 18 months ago, my regional counterpart (I was East, he was West) quit suddenly…