My colleagues keep interrupting when I’m working. What can I do?

Each week, Dr Kirstin Ferguson tackles questions on workplace, career and leadership in her advice column, Got a Minute? This week: Dealing with a loud staff room, redundancy devastation and being underbilled.

Setting boundaries with other staff members is important.Credit: Dionne Gain

I’m a teacher at a large high school. When I’m not in a classroom, I’m in a loud, poky office space with 10 other staff members. I’m considered a more experienced teacher in my current team. This means less experienced, often anxious teachers ask me for advice multiple times a day. Some of them are quite loud and do not respect my boundaries when I say I need a break during lunch. During my planning time, I struggle to get work done, and I’m interrupted when I’m in the middle of writing resources or marking which means having to work longer hours. How do I respectfully ask to move to a quieter smaller office space?

It sounds like your staffroom needs some basic open-plan office etiquette. It is fairly commonplace to have agreed ways of working in offices that use open plan, and it might help to overcome the issues you raise (my guess is you getting your own office space will be far harder to achieve).

Why don’t you speak to your colleagues and see if others find the open-plan office space challenging? See if you can all agree on some basic principles, like being conscious of noise, paying attention to cues (such as if someone has headphones on or is deep in concentration) and not interrupting. The only way to deal with this challenge will be to do it together.

After 33 years in a high-level executive role, I was made redundant following a recent government restructure. I am completely devastated. During my career, I earned international recognition for my team’s work, yet people with less experience and questionable performance were retained. I can’t shake the feeling that my immediate supervisor felt threatened by me and played a role in my dismissal. When I asked for feedback, I was told it was due to budget cuts and nothing personal. This has left me feeling angry and uncertain about how to rebuild my career. How can I move on from this experience?

I understand why you might be taking this decision personally. Your reaction is completely natural. As hard as it is, you need to remind yourself that it was your role that was made redundant, not you. You have not lost any of the skills, experience and achievements you mention. Your last boss may or may not have felt threatened by you, who knows? But right now, what happened to cause your role to be made redundant is not as important as how you view yourself.

You are a highly accomplished executive with many decades’ experience. Any future employers will understand government departments restructure all the time, often losing incredibly talented people in the process. You won’t need to mention any other factors like your former boss. Focus on what you have, and will continue, to offer your new employer – loyalty, hard work, recognition and experience – which has not changed. While what you have been through is incredibly tough, the scar tissue you now have will make you a better leader and employee in the future. Take care.

I work part-time on an employment contract under an award wage. As a fee-for-service company, all client work is recorded on a billing platform. Despite being required to log on most days from 9am until 4pm (and often into evenings for client meetings), I am only paid for the hours billed to a client. So, if I’m asked to attend a meeting between 2pm and 3pm and the meeting finishes earlier, I don’t get paid for the full hour despite my inability to line up another client task or meeting. I don’t feel like this is set up fairly. How should I approach this with my boss?

I agree, this doesn’t seem fair. Before you go to your boss, gather data from a full week of work that shows how much time you were online and available but not paid, compared with how much time you were actually paid. Explain why you are finding this situation difficult and suggest a solution. If your boss is not prepared to listen or adjust, you might just need to look for a new role where you feel you are being appropriately rewarded and compensated for the full amount of work you do.

To submit a question about work, careers or leadership, visit kirstinferguson.com/ask. You will not be asked to provide your name or any identifying information. Letters may be edited.

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