I think my coworker is trying to 'soft fire' our team intern.
By @remyyy · Work
My coworker, who is supposed to be managing our summer intern, has started giving her impossible research tasks and then CC'ing our director on the emails when she can't deliver. I'm not in this intern's direct reporting line, but it feels wrong, and I don't know if I should say something.
The full story
We have a summer intern on our team, a college student who's really trying her best. The coworker who's officially her 'mentor' for the program has been acting weird for weeks. At first it was just being short with her or giving vague feedback, but now it's escalated. He's started assigning her tasks that are way above her level, like asking her to pull and analyze data from a system she doesn't have full access to, or asking for a competitive analysis deck in two hours that would take me a full day. When the intern (predictably) can't complete it perfectly or on time, he sends these passive-aggressive emails and makes sure to copy our department director. He'll write things like "Per my request, attaching the incomplete draft from our intern for your visibility." It feels like he's intentionally building a paper trail of her 'failures' so he can justify not giving her a return offer or maybe even ending her internship early. I'm not her manager and I'm technically junior to this coworker, so I have no authority here. But I see what's happening and it's incredibly uncomfortable. The intern looks defeated. Do I go to my own manager? Do I try to talk to the coworker directly? Or do I just keep my head down? I don't want to cause a huge issue or make myself a target, but watching someone sabotage a college kid's first corporate experience is awful.
How people voted
- Side A — 27% (59 votes)
- Both — 41% (90 votes)
- Side B — 32% (69 votes)
Readers are split: “Both” leads with 41% — 218 votes and 5 comments so far.
What people are saying
@ididntmeanthat — Are we sure the intern is actually as good as you think she is?
@brynnkay — bruh
@codymaybe — Soft.
@hankactually — report him this is a lawsuit waiting to happen
@oopsmybad — Have you tried talking to the intern directly to see if she wants you to get involved?
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