WTF is Business Casual

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of WTF is Business Casual?! , Jenny and Sarah dive into the viral debate that took over every HR person's Instagram feed. Is it okay to bring an iced coffee to a job interview? The original TikTok said absolutely not. The internet had other ideas. And Jenny and Sarah? They went through every possible emotion before landing somewhere surprisingly nuanced. Wheth...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of WTF is Business Casual?! , Jenny and Sarah are back on one of their favorite topics — Gen Z in the workplace — and they've got new material. From a Michigan university scrapping letter grades for first-semester freshmen to Oprah's jaw literally hitting the floor when a 23-year-old talks about work-life balance, this one covers a lot of ground.  They di...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of WTF is Business Casual?! , Jenny and Sarah are back for part two of their workplace advice reaction series. They're reviewing trending career takes and giving their real perspectives as corporate insiders. From a woman who says everything in corporate is made up (she's not wrong) to Dan Martell's fire-or-hire takes that had them equal parts noddin...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of WTF is Business Casual?! , Jenny and Sarah are doing something a little different. Reacting in real time to the viral workplace advice flooding your social media feeds. From the Dan Martells and Gary Vs of the world to random HR "professionals" who've been fired multiple times and somehow think that's a flex, Jenny and Sarah are calling it al...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of WTF is Business Casual?! , Jenny and Sarah pull back the curtain on what HR really does, and rip apart every myth that makes them want to flip a table. Spoiler: it's not party planning, it's not firing people for fun, and it is absolutely not easy. From a termination that had Sarah fearing for her physical safety in a basement, to a manager who sent Je...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of WTF is Business Casual?! , Jenny and Sarah get real about why "soft skills" is a garbage term for the most critical thing missing from your workforce right now. Armed with a Harvard Business Review study of 70 million job transitions, they make the case that collaboration, communication, and problem-solving aren't the floor. They're the ceili...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of WTF is Business Casual?! , Jenny and Sarah talk about the "peanut butter raise" debate that's been making the rounds in HR circles. A recent industry article predicts companies are about to ditch across-the-board raises in favor of rewarding top performers only, and Jenny and Sarah have some thoughts.  Spoiler: they don't think it's actu...

Send us Fan Mail Most small business owners know they need HR support. The problem is figuring out what level of support they actually need. In this episode, Jenny and Sarah pull back the curtain on RiseHR's HR Collective and explain why they created it, who it's designed for, and how it helps Colorado small business owners get expert HR guidance without paying for a full-time HR profess...

Send us Fan Mail What happens when employees stop asking and start telling? In this episode, Jenny and Sarah unpack a growing workplace trend they have been seeing with small business owners: employees announcing schedule changes, cutting their hours, demanding remote work, and assuming the answer will be yes. The bigger issue is not employee boldness. It is leadership hesitation. They dig into wh...

Send us Fan Mail A team gets invited to a "free" lunch with a consultant, and it ends up costing the company six months of peace. Jenny and Sarah unpack a "WTF" moment where a simple midday meeting turned into a spiral of written statements, HR investigations, and a team that stopped speaking to each other. It’s a look at how a lack of curiosity and a surplus of ego can turn a...

Send us Fan Mail Rebroadcast: It’s graduation season, and we’re dusting off one of our all-time fan favorites! Whether you’re tossing your cap, building a team, or guiding the next generation, this episode is essential listening for navigating the transition from campus to career. ______ Gen Z has officially entered the chat and corporate America isn’t ready. Jenny and Sarah rip into the chaos (an...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Jenny and Sarah break down one of the most misunderstood workplace complaints: “You lack initiative.” But what does that actually mean? Because to employees, it often sounds like: Work more. Stay later. Do extra. Don’t get paid for it. And to leaders, it usually means something completely different. This episode unpacks the gap between those two interpretations—and why...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Jenny and Sarah follow a strange rabbit hole that started with a podcast about the history of meth. Yes, really. The episode explored how stimulants were once used to push soldiers, pilots, and workers to stay awake longer and produce more. And it sparked a bigger question: why has the workplace always been obsessed with squeezing more productivity out of humans? More w...

Send us Fan Mail  This week, Jenny and Sarah lean into the weird. They kick it off with an AI interview note-taker that accidentally sent a candidate the hiring team’s unfiltered commentary about other applicants. Yes, really. Including the not-so-flattering parts. It’s a cautionary tale about AI tools, privacy, and why you should absolutely lock down your settings. They also get into: Employees b...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Jenny and Sarah tackle the HR landmines small businesses step on all the time. They break down three compliance issues that quietly turn into very loud, very expensive problems: employee misclassification, messy PTO policies, and unpaid interns who legally aren’t interns. First: employee misclassification. Paying someone a salary does not make them exempt. Titles don’t...

Send us Fan Mail  This week, Jenny and Sarah tackle a topic that somehow manages to be both extremely relatable and extremely lawsuit-y: swearing at work. It starts with a law update that made both of them do a double take. Turns out, “letting an F-word fly” at work is no longer just a culture question. In some cases, it is a legal one. And in 2024 and 2025, the courts made that line a lot thinner...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Jenny and Sarah start the year by doing what they do best: collecting a pile of workplace nonsense from the internet and asking the uncomfortable question. Why are we still building work like people are machines? They bounce through everything from four-day workweek studies to open offices, from job hunting on dating apps to LinkedIn slowly becoming Facebook with certif...

Send us Fan Mail Rebroadcast: We’re bringing back one of our favorite episodes as hiring ramps up in the new year—and it’s just as relevant now as ever! In this laugh-and-learn episode, Jenny and Sarah take you inside the beautiful mess of modern recruiting. From jaw-dropping candidate missteps to the surprising rise of parental involvement in job applications (yes, it’s happening), they break dow...

Send us Fan Mail Development planning is the most ignored, and most misunderstood, part of performance management. In this episode of WTF is Business Casual , HR consultants Jenny Levy and Sarah Burston break down why development planning deserves its own lane and why bundling it into performance reviews quietly wrecks employee growth, engagement, and retention. This is Part Two of their performan...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Jenny and Sarah drag the workplace ritual everyone hates: performance reviews. They open with a simple truth HR has known forever. Nobody likes them, nobody trusts them, and nobody thinks they actually work. Managers dread writing them. Employees dread reading them. Yet here we are, still clinging to a system that feels older than a fax machine. And yes, they get into t...

Send us Fan Mail Cold and flu season has arrived, and Jenny and Sarah have officially reached their breaking point. This week, they break down the circus of people dragging themselves into the office sick, logging onto Zoom while sweating through a fever, or insisting it’s “just allergies” in the middle of December. From vomiting kids to adults powering through meetings mid-retch, this episode get...

Send us Fan Mail Welcome back to WTF is Business Casual , where HR consultants Jenny Levy and Sarah Bursten roast, rant, and reality-check the weird stuff that somehow passes for “normal” in the workplace. This week we’re calling out all the things people still think are fine at work, but absolutely aren’t. From awkward hugs to speakerphone oversharers, cubicles that look like dorm rooms, and the...

Send us Fan Mail Gen Z has officially entered the chat and corporate America isn’t ready. Jenny and Sarah rip into the chaos (and low-key brilliance) of the newest generation in the workplace. Are they entitled job hoppers with no soft skills… or the only ones brave enough to call BS on burnout culture?  Spoiler: it’s complicated — and very, very human. They unpack everything from Gen Z’s allergy...

Send us Fan Mail Employers love to say they support work-life balance and encourage you to take your PTO. But here’s the workplace reality: when employees actually unplug, they’re often seen as less committed, and less promotable. Welcome to the detachment paradox. In this episode of WTF is Business Casual?! , Jenny and Sarah unpack the HR bias that rewards “always on” employees and punishes those...

Send us Fan Mail Jenny and Sarah rip into the black hole of modern work life: meetings. Endless updates, back-to-back Zooms, and “quick syncs” that somehow eat your entire day. It’s no wonder productivity is tanking. They break down: Why update meetings are the real productivity killers The hidden cost of meetings when you factor in salaries (spoiler: it’s a lot) How stripping recurring meetings o...