Insights / Participation
Say the unwritten rule out loud
The information gap at work is rarely about skill. It is about who was told how things actually work.
By McKinley Malbrough III, J.D., MS-HRM. Published September 4, 2026.
Short answer
The gap at work is rarely about skill. It is about who was told how things actually work: how decisions really get made, which meetings are real, what asking for a raise is supposed to look like here. People arriving with professional networks inherit those rules through family and hallway conversation. Everyone else learns them by making a mistake in public. Ask the room to name one rule nobody wrote down, anonymously, and read three of them aloud.
What counts as an unwritten rule?
How decisions really get made and where. Which meetings are performative and which are real. Whether "send me a note" means email or Slack. What asking for a raise is supposed to look like here. Whether after-hours messages expect an answer.
None of it appears in the handbook. All of it determines who advances.
Why does this land harder on some people?
Because people arriving with professional networks inherit these rules through family, friends and hallway conversation. A first-generation professional gets them by making a mistake in public.
In ZIP 94603, where I am from, roughly 3 in 1,000 adults hold a professional degree (ACS 2020 to 2024, table B15003). The rules are not being handed down at home there, because almost nobody in the room has them yet.
How do I put this in a session?
Ask the room to name one rule that nobody wrote down, in writing, anonymously. Read three aloud and confirm which are true.
It takes eight minutes and is the part people quote back to you a year later.
Is this a facilitator's job?
If you are running onboarding, manager training or anything about how work gets done, yes. The alternative is a workplace where the same information keeps reaching the same people first.
That is the whole reason I built this: nobody was ever going to tell you how it works, so I did. Now pass it on.
McKinley Malbrough provides education and is not an attorney. Contacting him creates no attorney-client relationship. If you have a legal question or need legal advice, contact an employment attorney.
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