What do I do about a bad employment reference?

October 21, 2009 9:34 PM

What do I do about a bad work related reference? Its not as easy as just ignoring it as its a huge part of my employment history.

I've had two jobs in "recent" years. One which I worked at from 2005 to 2008 and my current job that's February of 2009 onwards.

I left my first job (if you must know, cellular provider call centre) after butting heads with my manager at the time. I ended up putting in my two weeks after a particularly bad one-on-one meeting.

My performance, in a call centre metric sense, was never stellar, but not poor enough to get me fired. I was also constantly told by my peers and former managers what an excellent job I did. I'd also get rave reviews from customers writing in to say what a good job I did.

Due to my falling out with my manager, he outright refused to provide a reference. He suggested I go to my former managers but when I did it seems he had talked to them because they wouldn't provide references either, stating they felt it "wasn't appropriate". I did confirm before I left that I was marked as re-hireable.

I was rash in my quitting, thinking I'd just land a job (I did not have one lined up). The market crashed and I found myself taking a retail job. I enjoy it but the pay is terrible and I need to get out on my own again. Since I did the retail job well (and matured at little), the managers are more than willing to give me glowing recommendations.

The problem is, I'm applying for tech support work and they don't care about retail references, they want a reference from my call-centre job. Specifically, manager references.

Up until now I'd kinda "faked" my reference by putting a senior (though not managerial) peer as my reference for the call centre job, as my peers all liked me.

What do I do? I can't just remove a huge part of my employment history by removing the reference. Should I be honest and say I didn't get along with my manager?

Do I call that manger up, a year later, and try to reconcile things in an effort to at least get a reference?

I'm kind of at a loss as I haven't worked all that many jobs and up until the call centre job, my references had always been good.

posted by Snuffman to work & money (7 comments total)

I should quickly note, nothing dramatic happened with said manager. We just didn't see eye to eye on the way things were being done. He had his own issues and wanted to place blame for another situation and felt he should place the blame on me. I felt this was out of line, but in a way I sense he was trying to muscle me into leaving, which I did.
posted by Snuffman at 9:35 PM on October 21

i think putting a senior peer for your reference- provided that they can comment on your work performance (hopefully favourably!) should be fine. as long as they know they are being named as a reference, and as long as they are aware they might be receiving calls from potential employers, it shouldn't be a problem. in the past i have used similar tactics, and it hasn't backfired on me so far.
posted by Philby at 9:37 PM on October 21 [3 favorites]

(FYI: I'm not native english speaking, so I might express mayself a little strange.)

I think you could both things that you suggest yourself:

> Should I be honest and say I didn't get along with my manager?
Yes, honesty is a good thing, and this way YOU tell them (good to hear it from you first and your version) and you can also state that "blahblah, my part in the problem was this-and-this, which I understand now, and today I am more mature and so on).

> Do I call that manger up, a year later, and try to reconcile things in an effort to at least get a reference?
Yes, it's a worth a try, maybe he/she sees the whole thing in a different view today, tell him why it's so important for you.

Good luck.
posted by anna_b at 11:42 PM on October 21

People always go for honesty, etc etc. In my opinion, with job interviews, it's over-rated. I'm not saying to fabricate things you don't/can't do, but if you have a colleague from the same company who's prepared to go on record with their name etc. and state that you were good, leave it as is.

Companies almost never never call your previous workplaces beyond the one reference on that piece of paper, don't worry about it. Just make sure that one name can cover your bases.
posted by smoke at 3:31 AM on October 22 [1 favorite]

A lot of employers refuse to give references, no matter what your job performance. A good number of companies prohibit their managers from giving any types of references, because of the fear of lawsuits, and have all calls sent to HR, where dates of hire, separation and salary information are the only pieces of information given.

It's also often the case that the people you worked with at a particular job don't work there anymore, so there's nobody to call for a reference, beyond the basic information about employment dates and salary.

Don't sweat it. It's not going to look all that odd to a prospective employer that you don't have that particular manager as a reference.
posted by xingcat at 4:09 AM on October 22 [1 favorite]

Sorta HR consultant guy here. This is US/East-Coast-centric advice, but I'm guessing it applies most places. How different do call centers get?

Biggest point: Relax. Almost nobody actually checks references, except for very high level jobs that have months-long screening processes, the kind where they actually interview your old football coach form college. And when they do, they realize they're asking a stranger for an opinion. They won't take your ex-manager's word as gold.

Call centers have huge, huge, huge turnover. As such, other call centers will expect flameouts and personality conflicts. If you claimed you always got along with everyone perfectly and never had any stressful problems while working in your previous call center, that'd be less believable to me.

Nobody will be surprised if your manager and his manager and his manager have all long since left the place of employment. So keep using your senior friend as your reference without explaining much (use "I'm not sure who is still left working there with all the turnover, but I know Bill is there." as your rationale) or just give an HR department contact as a reference. Again... the odds are high that nobody really checks anyway, even if they say they check references. Hell, especially if they tell you that they check. That's to scare you into being honest.

Also, call center jobs are pretty entry-level, so if you are really paranoid or nervous about this, just drop that job from your history completely and apply as someone with less experience. Make up for the missing experience by putting on extra confidence.

Again, even if they say they want experience, they'll probably hire the person who seems competent and "together" first. At a call center, a cool headed newbie is more valuable than a hotheaded guy with experience. So play the part.

Good luck.
posted by rokusan at 5:49 AM on October 22 [3 favorites]

Anyone with experience in call-center work knows that excellence in the job does not always translate into happy managers, as managers are forced to keep company-mandated metrics for minimum call times and the like, whereas actually fixing a customer's problem usually takes a little time. So the new company might understand a managerial conflict over the definition of "doing a good job."
posted by Billegible at 6:41 AM on October 22