[Brian_K_White]

I don't even explain why I'm taking a day off or a half day or whatever.

It's no one else's business to decide if they agree the reason is valid. Don't volunteer stuff like that especially when it would be something they'd likely agree with. Don't validate their right to decide or even be aware of anything like that. Next time maybe your need might not be so convinvcing to anyone else, but you've already established they have a right to know and a right to veto, so then trying to be private stands out as different from other times.

It doesn't mean being inflexible or uncooperative either. If there is actually some problem, they can negotiate and try to make the case and convince you that they really need you just that much just that day, and you can voluntarily decide to change your plans, but without ever volunteering what those were. And make it cost. Keep score. Claim a return favor.

[president_zippy]

This is great advice in general: establish personal boundaries early and stick to them. I never had a problem with vacation time or sick time, but I've had problems with this one asshole at my current job. I managed to fix that problem coworker eventually, but it would have been easier to just stand my ground the first time he was disrespectful.

For some reason, PhDs think they can treat every coworker without a PhD like a grad student, and that they can treat grad students like crap. I took a significant reduction in pay to work for academia thinking I was going to work in a great environment working on finding cancer cures alongside good people. At the end of this year, I'm leaving to finish some post-bacc classes and never working for a nonprofit again. Not just because of the culture, but also because I'm sick of working in a low-accountability environment where incompetence is tolerated and people optimize their work around visibility rather than things that really make the world better.

I know from experience that the private sector has just as many perverse incentives and just as much dysfunction, but at least I'll get paid 2-5x as much and retire sooner.