Last week, a close colleague texted me asking if I could cover his shift due to a family emergency. I agreed to help him out. Our company policy includes a clause stating, ‘No employee will work overtime hours without prior authorization from his/her supervisor.’ Knowing id be over 40 hours, I messaged my supervisor asking for permission to cover the shift. In response, I received a thumbs-up emoji. I’m wondering if that emoji be considered sufficient approval, or should I follow up?
Does a thumbs up emoji count towards permission?
r/ask
Comments
📣 Reminder for our users
>1. Check the rules: Please take a moment to review our rules, Reddiquette, and Reddit’s Content Policy.
>2. Clear question in the title: Make sure your question is clear and placed in the title. You can add details in the body of your post, but please keep it under 600 characters.
>3. Closed-Ended Questions Only: Questions should be closed-ended, meaning they can be answered with a clear, factual response. Avoid questions that ask for opinions instead of facts.
>4. Be Polite and Civil: Personal attacks, harassment, or inflammatory behavior will be removed. Repeated offenses may result in a ban. Any homophobic, transphobic, racist, sexist, or bigoted remarks will result in an immediate ban.
🚫 Commonly Asked Prohibited Question Subjects:
>1. Medical or pharmaceutical questions
>2. Legal or legality-related questions
>3. Technical/meta questions (help with Reddit)
This list is not exhaustive, so we recommend reviewing the full rules for more details on content limits.
✓ Mark your answers!
>If your question has been answered, please reply with
Answered!!to the response that best fit your question. This helps the community stay organized and focused on providing useful answers.I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.
What else could it mean? Their fault if they give you affirmation, then claim they meant something else
[removed]
It should be fine surely, but make sure you screenshot it in case they remove the reaction later. I can’t see why they would, but it’s just covering your bases.
I text my supervisors often asking if I can come in early for extra hours and that is always their response. And when I get to work they just tell me where I’m needed and I go. So I would definitely think that is valid response of authorization.
There was a lawsuit recently where the judge decided that the thumbs up emoji counts as confirmation.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/07/business/farmer-contract-thumbs-up-emoji/index.html
Please be clear when answering questions about work.
A thumbs up emoji is not very professional. Get a full verbal/written confirmation
Under these circumstances yes.
If it was me, I would reply “I’m going to interpret that thumbs-up as a yes and work the overtime I asked about. Please let me know before the shift if anything changes.” Then save this conversation.
How young are you? Going to social media to ask what your boss meant with an emoji?🤷🏻♂️🐵🐵
At my place of employment a thumbs up emoji counts.
Yes it is confirmation.
You should follow up to ensure he knows you’ll be going over 40 hours. He gave you a thumbs up on covering your coworkers shift, not overtime.
Yeah you’re def good?
Surely thumbs up counts in the affirmative
Play it safe don’t make assumptions. Request actual confirmation from your supervisor.
Ask them to confirm. It’s not that hard.
I would understand that as approval. If you ask a yes or no question, thumbs up is a yes.
If it’s a more complex question that requires more than just a yes or no, I might read a thumbs up as just acknowledging the information/receipt and expect a more thorough response.
I can’t imagine your supervisor sending the thumbs up and not meaning go ahead in that setting, and frankly I’d just go with it and if they have a problem explain how you understood the thumbs up because that’s on their communication skills if they did not mean to approve
Can you ask the supervisor for explicit clarification?
Extra hours, yes. Overtime, no.
It kinda depends. Most people would take that as a yeah, sure! But if it’s something more serious, like signing off on a contract or agreeing to something, that little emoji might not cut it.
I always follow up and ask.
For me, a thumbs up can go either way as being a confirmation of message is received or being an approval. I use it in both contexts depending on what I’m talking about.