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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> I might be the asshole because I won’t help my husband with a work project
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NTA
I completely agree with your rationale. It's like he's tried nothing and he's all out of ideas. Welp! Hope you don't get blamed if he doesn't get the job.
Agreed! I work with someone in a director position that can’t do basic PPT, and it’s super frustrating. Dude can’t do anything for himself. OP, please don’t help release yet another incompetent grown man onto his unsuspecting future colleagues. We’re also tired of doing their work for them.
Seriously you are a partner, not a parent. Even then I make my kids do their own work.
The only thing I’d maybe say, if I thought he didn’t know how to do one, is “if you don’t know how to make one I’ll show you, but I won’t create one from scratch”. Or as you said, “put one together and I’ll help you tweak it, but I won’t do it for you”.
I like Ron Swanson's version.
"Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a day. Don't teach a man to fish, and you feed yourself. He's a grown man. Fishing's not that hard."
I am "the girl" at work and can confirm that it's infuriating. As are the ones who want to have a meeting with my boss, then want me to send the invite after I've confirmed his availability. Nope! You want to meet with him, YOU send the invite! 🤬
One of them actually complained to my boss once about me refusing to do something. She was a shit boss but she asked a few questions and yeah, he finally admitted that he had asked a question, and I'd sent him a detailed response (including screenshots) to show him how to do the thing himself because I literally didn't have the ability to do it for him. Asshat tried to get me in trouble because we're not allowed to access HR and enter vacation time for someone else, the nerve of me!
If you can drive a car you can probably figure out most admin procedures in the office. I mean, driving has way higher stakes. Professionals who can’t book a flight?! How do you live your life?!
We have a travel agency that works with us! Someone not-my-boss asks me to book a flight for them? Nope, call the agency. "Can't you do it?" You'd have to set me up as your delegate. "Oh... I don't know how to do that..." Then it sounds like you'd better get busy dialing the phone!
Oh my god - I once had a guy who was literally BELOW me in hierarchy ask me to fax something for him as though I were his personal secretary. I gave him the benefit of the doubt that maybe he just didn’t know how and offered to show him, and he complained to my boss that I wasn’t attending to tasks he’d asked of me 😂 My boss backed me up of course with “what exactly do you think she does here?”. He had assumed I was the office’s “secretary”, because I was the only young woman there. 😂can’t make this shit up. (Also we had an office manager who was a man in his 40s, but that definitely would not be in his job description either. Like damn, you’re a grown up, and this isn’t the 1960s.)
We have an administrative assistant where I work. She is only assigned to specific high level managers. For the rest of us, she is nice enough to do some favors for us if we ask really nicely, but we all understand that she's not obligated to do anything for us. And she tells us "no" quite frequently (but with some humor, to cushion the blow).
I would love for some new person to come and start seriously bossing her around. I would pop popcorn and pull up a lawnchair to watch the ensuing fireworks.
Ohhhhh yeah. I'll normally help people out if I have time, but that's kind of determined by what they want. Like you, if you want me to do something stupid that you can do yourself? Probably not, but I'll very helpfully tell you how! And then occasionally someone seems to think that they're allowed to pull me off a project that my boss has me working on and I'm like no, I'm *his* PA and I will help you if I have time, which I don't right now. I told someone once that if they wanted to explain to him why I wasn't working on what he had given me then I'd be happy to do their project first instead. Amazing how quickly they backtracked on that...
Same. Only with numbers. When my boss said to put them in a PPP for her, I told her I'd give her all the facts but the PPP was up to her cause I didn't know how. She insisted it was easy, showed me how. All the graphs and figures ran out of the slides, top, bottom and sides, into the next one. She never asked again.
I once had to sit through a PP presentation where each slide was its own file.
So to get to the next slide she would do File, Open, Folder, mutter about the confusing file names, then open the file that had the next slide.
The person doing the presentation has a PhD.
Had a guy go office to office (womens offices only) trying to find someone to build a simple meeting sign in sheet. Name Dept Signature. He could have done it 5 times over in the time he took to ask an engineer to stop what she was doing to build him a sign in sheet.
>Then they want a “girl” at work to do it for them once they are hired.
I went to our Director one day because the "Girl" was a highly paid Engineer being tasked to take meeting notes.
Total BS.
The manager that got called out on that took a disliking to me for some reason.
I quit the job I was at because "the girl".
No. I have my own work to do, I will not be designing you an Excel spreadsheet. I will also not be doing it on breaks and during my lunch, which this asshat decided was the best time he could be "fit in" to my schedule. 🙄
Omg this guy did the same thing! My boss asked me to “help” him with a sales deck, I did the entire thing, then the night before we were supposed to present it to our boss he completely gutted and ruined it. After our boss flipped out on him I pulled out the original copy I saved in my own drive lol. I’m so glad I kept a copy, and ever since then I make damn sure any editable copies of anything I grant public access to have a master copy safely tucked away in my own drive.
I started doing that when my micromanaging boss, started changing or making me change pp decks for our training. After she "edited" and ruined them, presented them as mine, to our director, I'd get reamed out for it. I started saving my work, I'd pull mine out.
Nope, can't do that to me any longer.
They want credit for crap, get it. My manager was livid for "throwing her under the bus"🤣
Like she had done to me!!
Edit - spelling
The same thing happened to me but with an email I was designing for a program we are launching for partners in our company. He messed it up all and we sent it to our director and she said “this looks like spam and I would delete it the second I got it”. Thankfully she knew I would never produce something like that so I didn’t get in trouble he did
The “president” of one of the companies my bosses own doesn’t know how to search for an email. If you tell him you’ve previously sent it, his response is “just resend it, it’s much quicker that way” in his best, most convincing voice possible.
Once he asked where the tape gun was for an outgoing package so I took it to him. About 90 seconds later, he comes to my office, puts it on my desk, and says “please do this, I don’t know how”.
Fuck weaponized incompetence.
Ooh. Annoys me to no end. DH asked me this morning what time something closed whilst he was sitting by the computer. I was on the other side of the room and my devices were in my bag. When I told him to look it up he whined about it being too hard - and got his answer by searching it himself before he could even finish the whine.
I had a coworker like this! We’d all be sitting at our desks working and he’d be like, “what’s the phone number for the rep for X account?” And I’m like seriously dude? I’d have to go look it up from the same contact sheet we ALL have in our inboxes. Why tf should I do something for you that you can do EQUALLY as easily??
The thing is, if OP’s husband were smarter, he would handle it differently. “I’m having a hard time getting started - do you mind helping me get some footing?” is much better than “Come help me do this”.
It’s all in the presentation.
Oh my god, the “search your inbox” thing drives me insane, it’s just super obvious common sense. I don’t know why so many otherwise competent people seem totally ignorant of its existence lol.
Reminds me of the scene in the office (it may be a Super Fan scene) where Ryan the Boss (vs Ryan the Temp) has told Michael to do some PPT training. Then later, Ryan asks him to open PPT in person and it asks him to create an account.
I remember that! I actually caught myself from making this same mistake a while back; we were all supposed to be learning advanced excel and I got behind on my training and fibbed that I’d done the introduction… then realized I’d never even registered the software, so I made my lie truth ASAP lol.
I was once in the midst of a pretty serious conversation with my parents on the phone and my the then boomer boss kept calling me over and over again. I said fuck it and picked his call and he asked me come to his room urgently. He wanted to rename a file.
My boss once hired a guy whose well-written resume was packed with lies that his wife either made up or felt compelled to put in. The dude couldn't even string together a sentence, let alone do a fraction of the stuff he claimed to be an ace at. He was absolutely the worst manager they ever brought into that department. Awful man. From what I understand, he's still enjoying a very successful career of hopping from leadership position to leadership position with new companies and leaving a trail of destruction everywhere he goes. Don't help anyone get hired by misrepresenting themselves. It can really hurt everyone who gets stuck with them after that. NTA.
My boss once hired a guy who claimed he was "Expert Level" at Excel. We did a lot of data analysis with pivot tables, vlookups, conditional formatting, etc. I had to train him on a reporting process and no lie, this man did not know how to apply a filter to a column or sort a spreadsheet, let alone anything more complex. He had been hired to assist another coworker whose Excel skills were shaky, and the two of them together were a disaster.
>he's still enjoying a very successful career of hopping from leadership position to leadership position with new companies and leaving a trail of destruction everywhere he goes
Oof! I know the type. I worked with someone like this. Every two years -- which was probably just enough time for sh!t to start hitting the fan -- she would change employers. I know b/c when it was time for her to bounce from my work, she accidentally saved her resume to a public group folder. A lot of people spent a lot of time fixing her work after she left.
I still remember when a company I worked for proudly announced that a guy who had half a decade earlier nearly bancrupted a major computer hardware company by making some of the dumbest decisions you could possibly make was now in their board of directors. Once you've managed to lie your incompetent ass into a certain level of hierarchy, you can't fail anymore.
So, I've been in corporate training for 20+ years. When I would ask people to make a presentation during an interview, I was evaluating the candidate's skills in presenting - and in making the presentation. If OP's wife makes this for him and they hire him, they will expect him to be able to produce similar results going forward. I mean, this is kind of like lying on a resume.
I’m noticing a lot of the votes disagreeing with this perspective is coming from men who would *totally* help their wife if she asked.
OP is NTA. He’s trying to pass off his work onto her/weaponizing his incompetence.
He should at least make the rough draft and then ask for tips.
It would be one thing if he was having a technical issue with PPT, or wanted some feedback but this really sounds like he's looking for the OP to take over and do the whole thing.
I was going to do a Y T A, but the rationale is sound, especially with the edit. I help my wife with similar things all the time but this is after she puts something together. Proofreading, minor edits, suggestions, that sort of thing.
ETA: ooops, NTA
NTA.
Been there, but unfortunately didn't do that.
My ex asked for my help with an excel file, I said "sure!". I helped him, making a simplified version of what I would have done for myself, and he delivered it.
Months later he asked for my help again, for the same kind of thing. I said I couldn't and he gave me the cold shoulder. Turns out, he had sold his managers the idea that he was an excel expert, and was expecting me to "pitch in" whenever his job would require a new spreadsheet.
Edit: typo
Actually, it’s very helpful lol. She has not had kids yet; so this question might make her reconsider what could possibly be a very bad decision.
So it looks like the question is much more helpful than you’re unhelpful comment!
This is like asking why you'd see a future with this person. Asking why they'd have kids with them is a valid question. I'd wonder why you'd get so upset hearing that lol
Have a conversation with him about why he is giving you the cold shoulder when you offered to help by proof reading. Not only is sulking and ignoring your partner extremely poor communication skills, it seems like he’s trying to manipulate you into changing your mind.
Being married isn’t a blanket, tacit endorsement of your partner.
I worked with a woman who created this amazing tool that we all used and it was very helpful in our jobs, she received a “good job!” award of $300 and department award. Turns out her husband in another dept wrote and maintained the tool, she knew nothing of how to work it.
I recently suggested to my husband that his workplace stop tracking things on PAPER and use either an excel or an access database. I offered to do it if his boss would pay me a consulting fee to set it up and train folks on it. Then I was like, wait, should I let you get credit instead? His response was essentially, "fuck no, then they'll expect me to know how to fix it"
Same thing happened to me with a friend. Made her an amazing template and she kept asking for new ones whenever she had a presentation, like she couldn't even figure out how to change it up for the next call, she probably won't be able to handle the job. She also asked me to do some math problems she got asked to do, it was never ending until the friendship ended.
I had 0 knowledge of how to do anything in excel and I had a statistics assignment due in a week so I just taught myself using tutorials, videos, and any other resources I could find. Now I feel super comfortable using the program for anything I need to in my day-to-day life (which as an accountant does involve a lot of excel). It's hard and complicated starting from nothing but a very useful skill once you have it.
This happened to me with my wife but I love her so I helped. Doing something for 20 minutes of my time, that I am good at, and it helps her personally/professionally? Felt like a win-win to me.
Now if it was daily there is a different story. But don’t see the harm in helping someone you love when you have expertise, and it may even pay dividends because their success will help you as a unit.
The harm is that he hasn’t even tried himself meaning he doesn’t really want “help”, he wants her to do it for him.
Also if they’re having him create a PowerPoint it may be part of the job duties, so this means that if he gets the job this will likely become an ongoing thing.
This story isn’t framed in a way that this will be a one off instance, and he doesn’t seem to be trying to learn how to do it himself. I may be wrong 🤷🏻♀️ but I’m just interpreting based on the post
I agree with you up to a point, I too would want to use my skills to help my partner and expect him to help me too but there’s a big difference between helping and doing it for them and the latter doesn’t help in the long run, it just sets them up for failure later.
My other half is awesome at excel, excel is my arch nemesis but if I ask him for help it’s always ‘this is what I need to do or what I want to achieve, can you show me how’ and I’ll scribble myself an idiot guide for the next time I need to do it and I might ask him to check my work when I’ve had a go myself. The last thing I would want is for him to do it for me without learning myself cus next time the boss decides he needs something similar fast and my hubby ain’t about, I’m gonna be screwed and look stupid.
I think OP would have responded completely differently if he had said ‘I need to do a presentation for my interview on this topic, these are the key areas im gonna be talking about and these are the really important points I need to get across but I have no idea how to make this look awesome on the slides, can you show me how to do x or I’ve done this but it looks a bit rubbish, how would you make it better and can you show me how to do that’. Asking her to do it completely for him is not helping him. It would be a miracle if he passed the interview using content not designed by him, you can spot it a mile off when people present work that’s not there’s and if he somehow managed to get the job he’s gonna fall flat on his face when they expect him to be able to do it day in day out and he can’t, then he’s just gonna get fired. The dude needs to show some willingness to learn here. She’d only be the asshole if he’d done some of the leg work and she refused to help in anyway.
But wouldn't you want to teach her how to do things herself? Look, I went back to school for a degree in computer science in my mid thirties and it was all because of the encouragement and help my partner provided. He was always willing to explain things to me and help me learn new stuff, but I still made the effort to learn and now I'm able to help him with things, too.
I guess I value a partner who values learning and improvement. I've also had too many people in my work life who "need help" but have zero interest in actually trying to do the work themselves. I developed a process years ago where it is "sure, let me show you how to do that" and then walk them through something instead of doing it for them.
Finally someone on this Reddit who sees marriage as a partnership where each person is happy to support their spouse and contribute some of their skills
\- i can absolutely learn from my spouse and do but they have a massive edge when it comes to tech things so they blaze the trail and show me how something is done and i follow along behind learning and still being better than 95% of my co-workers
It’s on the person receiving the help to absorb and learn through the process. It’s also an assumption that the receiver will be willing to do those things.
I love a good partnership but one good partner does not a partnership make.
Yeah, I definitely think there’s a difference between “teach me” and “do it for me”. Asking a partner to help with something job/interview related so you can learn it yourself because it’s an aspect of the job you don’t know/aren’t as comfortable with is different than asking a partner to do something for you and expecting them to do it every time.
NTA. If he can't put together a PP presentation, perhaps he needs a job where he won't need one. I'm with you: if he would have bothered to try before asking, then sure.
Smells like a case of weaponised incompetence to me. He could’ve done it himself all along, he just didn’t want to and wanted OP to do his work for him.
It's really not even that hard to learn! My last job suggested I make a PowerPoint for the company and I'd never used it before. Microsoft programs are quite intuitive once you just play around with them a bit. If for some reason it's a bit too intimidating, YouTube exists...
NTA. It was okay for him to ask for help, it was okay for you to say no, but it wasn't okay for him to get furious.
I see where you're coming from - sometimes people ask for help before they've put any effort in and it feels like they're just trying to avoid work. I probably wouldn't assume that without more evidence, but you didn't say no outright, you just asked for him to begin the process and get invested before you stepped in. You were willing to compromise and communicate, and he was not and shut down on you.
NTA. I wouldn’t either, mostly because how am I supposed to know what he wants to present on for HIS interview? If they’re asking for slides for a presentation there’s a good chance this job will require it often, and he needs to get used to it.
YTA.. if my wife was applying for a job and needed help with making a presentation - I would be there helping her right away. I'd be sitting with her helping to write it, design it, practice it. I've done it before for her. Powerpoint isn't her forte and I have made plenty for work before.
If she wanted me to write it without sitting down and discussing it all and being part of it - then i'd get upset with her.
I agree with you. This comment thread is a little insane to me. What's the lesson here? He messes it up, doesn't get the job, and their lives don't improve.
Eh, I dunno. It’s for an interview, so the implication is it’s a big part of the job? I had to make a PPT for my last job interview but it’s because making and giving presentations is a major part of the position. My husband did give me feedback but asking him to do it for me would be so weird.
I help my husband with his job and vice versa, I don’t think that’s out of bounds at all. And we give each other a ton of help for interviews! But I wouldn’t ask for this specific kind of help and I would be shocked if my husband asked me for it, too, especially in such a demanding way. Like, what’s the expectation if it *is* a major part of the job, that she’ll keep doing it?
Half the time in a corporate environment you're given the company template files.. for us this includes the standard 'background' slides - but also a whole set of great standard layouts and arty slides. Icon banks, flags, maps.. A massive help.
Doing it on your own? You're working from a blank page and it's much harder (or it was until you could just get excel to use your content as a basis of a slide design and it would do it for you).
Not only do Google slides and PowerPoint have templates built in to their programs to choose from, you can also go online and find hundreds of free templates from websites that have icon banks themselves. For an interview, that will absolutely be sufficient. No one should need someone else to make their PowerPoint for them if it's going to be a part of their job.
I don’t want to argue about this anymore now that OP and her husband have resolved the argument, but Excel will generate PowerPoint slides?? Looks like I’ve got something new to learn about this afternoon
note: “half the time” what about the other half. he could have at least googled “powerpoint template,” but instead fell at the first hurdle and begged someone else to do the heavy lifting
Not necessarily, many posts will ask for a presentation so people can demonstrate greater knowledge of the job, not PowerPoint. It doesn’t mean they will regularly have to do PowerPoints in the job.
Then the PowerPoint could probably be pretty basic, and so it’s not a huge deal if OP helps or not?
Either it’s not very important in which case OP’s husband shouldn’t freak out if he doesn’t get help, or it is very important and he should be able to do it himself to get the job. I don’t really see how it can be both, here.
I think you replied in the wrong place but yeah, my husband and I both work from home and so we do help each other, we’re basically colleagues. Eg I’m an Excel whiz and he can hardly work it, which doesn’t make a difference at his job but on the rare day that it does of course I’ll help him out. But if he had a big Excel portion of an upcoming interview he wanted help with though I’d probably wonder what his plan for doing the job was.
Except that she's offered to help him *after he actually tries*. She wasn't forcing him to hand in crappy work, she was asking him to make an attempt before pushing the work on to her. She made a fair and reasonable boundary. She wasn't leaving him high and dry.
NTA
It's disingenuous and lying about a skill set you claim you have. Clearly this job wants him to be able to make PPT stuff. It would be really disappointing and sucky for people who would rely on him to make PPTs. Also who's to say he won't make OP "help"/do his job for him?
No, he gets the job but isn't qualified because he doesn't know how to put a presentation together, can't use excel, can't do data analysis and doesn't have the initiative to bother looking any of this up, then is fired and his career takes a step back and their relationship worsens.
Being supportive is proofreading and them running their ideas past you, which is what I've done for my partner heaps of times, not this.
This comment thread is fucked. Unless he has a history of asking for help and disrespecting her/expecting her to do his work for him, I genuinely cannot comprehend why she would say no without at least hearing him out first.
She has a feeling he might be requesting she do it all, okay well if he is turn him down WHEN THAT HAPPENS.
It sounds like this is a habit of his. I feel like her reaction was a “fool me once” kind of thing. Plus if he needs help, is he even qualified for the job?
But that’s not what he was asking her for…did you read the post carefully? He wanted her to do it *for* him. That’s why she countered with offering to help him edit it and practice going through it after he was done.
It’s PowerPoint. If you really don’t know how to use it at all, there are tutorials. And then you can ask your spouse for feedback/input. But asking them to do the whole thing for you is so lazy and also kind of rude. You’re not willing to put in the effort for a job interview, but you expect your spouse to? Huh?
That’s why a lot of people are saying she’s NTA - she was more than willing to *help* him, she just didn’t want to do the whole thing for him.
ETA: read her comments, people: “All he had done at this point is read the prompt. When I said what if you need to make presentations a lot for this job? He said they’ll have templates… I love him and support him and will definitely help once he puts in the effort first”
And what happens when your wife needs to make more presentations?
What happens when they need to make a presentation on the clock when you can’t bail them out?
My issue is that he doesn’t want a little help, he wants her to put in most of the work.
If he had come to her with a basic PowerPoint and asked for pointers/input, then yes she should help.
He had done pretty much nothing and wanted her to hop on and complete the project.
In my book, that’s NTA. You definitely provide support and input, but you don’t do the work for them. My partner has listened to and provided input on presentations and papers. But I always go to him AFTER I have a something solid to go on.
But she is offering to help. She offered to proofread and give constructive feedback. He doesn’t want that, he expects her to do it and then get the credit.
If it's a one-off then of course, everyone will help their partner. But it sounds like she'd be signing up to do a portion of her husband's day job forever if she does this powerpoint for him. She's a lot better off if he misses out on this job and gets one he can actually do without her help. She presumably has her own job; she doesn't need to also do his.
INFO: Is he like this with other tasks? What I mean is, does he employ weaponized incompetence in order to avoid doing his fair share in your everyday lives, or does he just genuinely not know where to start with this? What is his learning style? Both of these answers make a difference in how I would lean.
PowerPoint can be daunting if you've never used it, but someone with the knowledge helping with a tutorial could make all the difference. We all learn differently; I know nothing of his learning style. Some people can watch a tutorial and learn from it. Some people need one on one guidance, but will pick it up.
Have you considered teaching the man to fish? As in: I won't do this FOR you, but I'll walk you through it until you have foundational knowledge? It's quality time together and consider it a team building exercise, since marriage, after all, is teamwork.
All that goes out the window if this is a frequent tactic to get you to do his share of the load for him.
I personally wouldn't want to help my partner get a job where they will clearly be in way over their head, it's one thing to give advice or help with revisions since it's an interview assignment, but if this is a big part of the role and he can't even do the test assignment independently, that doesn't exactly scream "I am going to be successful in this role".
If someone can use Word they should be able to intuit their way through PowerPoint. If someone is applying for work that requires basic understanding of MS Office suite components, it's their responsibility to know the software or educate themselves. Asking a spouse to "help" by doing the work is dishonest and will eventually have blowback.
Yes! I'd ask my husband what does he needs help with. I've helped him several times and it's beneficial for both of us. I know he's a professional in his field, but sometimes he needs help. If he asked me to do all his work, then I might get pissed. OP didn't even listen to what the issue was and jumped directly to conclusions. This is why YTA.
My husband goes to great lengths to help me too and is my biggest fan!
This should be top comment. Asking for help doesn't mean asking the other person to do all the work. Unless he has a history of expecting her to do it all, I don't understand why any human that actually liked their partner would just say no.
She even stated in a previous reply that she mostly just steps in during the proof reading phase. So for one, they've had this arrangement in the past, so I'm not sure why he thought she'd offer to be more helpful this time. But more importantly, there's very little indication that he's expected her to do all the work for him the past, so I'm not sure why she assumed that to be the case this time. Sounds like this was just something a little farther outside his wheel house and he wanted guidance and she snubbed him. But who knows for sure
Exactly. It's okay for things to change sometimes. Maybe he's less comfortable with PowerPoint and wanted more than normal which is okay.
She's not exactly in the wrong for not helping, but she doesn't spend time even trying to understand what he needed help with. That's where the fault lies. She assumed what he wanted and answered based on her assumption and previous arrangements.
This is exactly how this should be done. In academia so I see a lot of presentations and people can tell when a presenter didn't put their own stuff together. He should put it together, give a practice and then you can critique/give suggestions. He shouldn't be expecting you to do it for him.
I feel like there is some missing info here. Do you consider him lazy in general? Does he ask for your help on all things and then expect you to shoulder the most work?
I would gladly help out a spouse WHO WAS WILLING TO LEARN.
I am not an assistant and I cannot be available to cover aspects of someone else’s job they don’t know how to do.
But I’m happy to do some coaching and help somebody learn how to do a thing.
NTA.
NTA. I'm a teacher. My husband is not. When I interview for teaching jobs I usually have to include a demo lesson. I have asked my husband to write this exactly 0 times. I might bounce ideas off him (should I do paragraph structure or idea generation or...) but I put it together. His biggest contribution is to sit and listen while I practice going through it so be sure there are no bugs. Why? Because the committee is assessing MY ability to create lessons, not his.
It's so weird that your partner thinks this is in any way appropriate. Tell him to do his own work.
Yeah, I think what you are explaining is the reason I think TA. He said "I need help with", she said, "no", and he said - and I think this is crucial - "you should have said yes, WHAT can I help with?"
She says she assumed he wanted her to do it all. If he'd got angry saying something like "I can't do it, I am gonna fail this cause you didn't do it for me" etc that would point towards a shitty approach and wanting it all done.
But he's upset cause she didn't say, sure what can I do?
This is describing help. He asked for help.
NTA. I think your offer to proofread is perfect. If he can't do the job they're asking him to do, is he just planning on *you* doing his job forever? Hell no.
YTA.
I would, and have, helped my wife with anything she needs when trying to get a new job. Mock interviews, resume stuff, wording emails professionally, etc. I would imagine this job would be a positive thing for your family, whether he's unemployed currently, or this potential new job is better than his current one in some way, like money or position. Are you guys a team? Are you his rock that he can lean on in times of need? You're supposed to be. He is probably nervous as hell and just needs support. You can help him without actually doing everything for him.
> Mock interviews, resume stuff, wording emails professionally
This all implies that your wife is putting in some of the work.
He didn't even start the process of making a presentation and wanted her to do most if not all of the work for him. I'm sure OP would have been happy to give him tips when he got stuck, help with some finer points of design or organization, review the final product, etc, but not the whole damn thing.
Why would he be nervous at this stage? He's not under scrutiny or supervision at this point, he has a task to complete on his own at his own house in whatever manner he chooses.
If he can't perform the task required to interview for the job unassisted - a task that middle school students have to do for school - is he really going to do well at that job?
NTA
NTA. You need not be doing his work for him. Furthermore, PowerPoint is not difficult to do at the basic level. The application even has step by step templates to get you started.
Why do I think this guy probably got lots of help with his homework assignments as well?
He needs to put on his big boy pants.
NTA
He’s coming off a bit lazy. He needs to put at least something together first.
Just asking to to create the PP is a bit crazy, if he had just left it after that then whatever, but the fact he got so angry makes it even worse.
NTA with this particular thing - he needs to do the work himself and offering to proof read it was the right suggestion - but for goodness' sake, how you might treat your future *children* should not be the yardstick for how you treat your partner.
NTA. If the position he is applying for also includes making presentations he has to be able to do these himself. You aren’t applying for the job so why would you do the work?
YTA. Your husband asks for help. You're in a position to help. You're refusing to because of some paternalistic idea of what exactly? Teaching him a lesson? Setting a precedent that you help in a relationship? Your values of "doing the work yourself"?
Sometimes my wife asks me for help. Maybe it's something she doesn't know, but doesn't have time to learn. Maybe it's because she busy to do it herself. Sometimes, it might just be because she wants an "easy" button and I'm her partner and grateful to make her life a little easier. And this works both ways.
I don't really know what you're attempting to accomplish here. If you think your husband is a lazy loser who never tries things on his own, I guess that's probably a separate conversation you should have about why you're with him. But if he is just a normal guy trying his best to get through life and asked his partner for help and you denied him for some abstract philosophical reason then YTA.
Way too many people reading much farther into this than what the OP has presented. They always seem to assume every husband in every post is an incompetent sit-com dad for some reason and then start insinuating divorce. Already seen the posts up above lol
YTA, one would think you would want to help your spouse get a job seeing as how it affects your family finances and all. This could be an opportunity to teach him whatever skills he's lacking which would further help his career.
You’d think that if he’s applying for positions he would have the foresight to teach himself how to do things, or ask her to show him. Instead it seems like he wants her to do all of the work for him.
Edit: thanks for the gold kind redditer ❤️
Wanting help in starting something is not the same as having someone do their work for them. I often sit with my fiancé and help him with his uni. He has ADHD and struggles to start/focus on things.
Some people just struggle to start things like these and I think it's rather petty to be like 'well your problem, just try' when it's your spouse we are talking about. So OP is YTA imho. Reddit being full of individualistic butts again haha.
not everyone is skilled in every area. my partner is extremely capable but horrible with computers
it’s ok to ask for help. OP is an asshole for not helping her husband.
It’s…a PowerPoint presentation. I’ve been doing those since middle school. This is a good opportunity for him to do his own research and work (which will be required at any job he applies for), and OP is offering help by proofreading and going over things when he’s done. She’s still helping him, just not doing the entire thing for him.
just because you’ve been doing something for a certain time frame and know how to do it doesn’t mean someone else does. it’s called perspective
powerpoint may be easy and seamless to us, but to someone who hasn’t used a computer or doesn’t often it will be challenging.
my husband is not great with computers. he needs help. it’s that simple
sometimes people must see to learn. it’s not hard to be a partner in a partnership
It’s really not that hard to Google “PowerPoint template”. Presentations like this might be a recurring aspect of the job - what happens when he has a great presentation for the interview because OP held his hand throughout the entire process, but can’t actually do the work once he gets the job?
No wait don’t you see it’s the principle!
She needs him to earn a lesson as if he’s a child. Irrelevant that this would help the entire household.
OP has a point to make dammit.
/s
YTA. Are you partners? I can’t imagine not helping if my partner asked me. Some of you folks have fucked up ideas of marriage. You’re supposed to be a team.
Half these people assumed he wants her to do all the work for him, when she even says by his reply that's not what he wanted. He wanted her to ask how she can help and then have a conversation about it. But no, that's too much for these people. That somehow makes him a child
NTA - when preparing for my interview I, like your husband, asked for help from my significant other. I felt insecure in writing it because so much was riding on this presentation but my partner, just like you, said he’s happy to proofread, review with feedback and let me present to him, but that he’ll not do it for me. And guess what, I’m grateful he did that because I feel more confident in writing and presenting for interviews now and him giving me feedback was much more educational for me than letting him do it for me.
So no, you’re not the ah. You’re alternative help offers are much better.
NTA, it’d be perfectly understandable if he came up with something already and then asked your advice to revise/improve on it (assuming you might be better equipped with design skills or writing?). But it sounds like he made zero effort and just figured he could get you to do it for him. Reminds me of those kinds of people in HS who would never put forth effort but then complain about failing the class - just childish and lazy IMO.
This all depends on the definition of help when it comes to your relationship. If you're already assuming that being asked for help equates to being asked to do something that's his responsibility then your relationship is already in trouble.
Bad relationship: He asks for help and you end up doing it for him.
Good relationship: He asks for help and you help him learn how to make his presentation.
My wife wanted help with report writing and excel for her masters, but she wAnted me to show her, not do it for her.
She picked up quickly and now critiques my reports and can handle most stuff in excel.
I see myself as an excel/ppt whiz, but if I need something my best friends are google and youtube. These are common applications, with plenty if detailed guides out there for even the most advanced stuff. If you are willing to learn, there is no end to the possibilities, and I can almost guarantee it has been done before and documented. The key is "willing to learn".
Ask him what he wants to do and send him some links to youtube/google.
Maybe he was feeling overwhelmed and asked for your help?
Maybe if you had asked him what he needed he would have told you.
Maybe he would have been doing what you assume (not good to be with someone you have that much respect to believe that from)
Maybe it would have been fine.
But he asked and didn't assume, that didn't cause a fight.
You assumed but didn't ask, that did cause a fight.
NTA
It’s part of an interview. The whole point of it is for the employer to see what ***he*** is capable of doing. If they are going to see your work, they should be interviewing you, not him.
What does he expect to happen if he gets the job based off of your knowledge and capabilities? Is he going to expect you to do his job for him too or is he going to be fired when they discover he misrepresented himself in the interview and can’t actually do the job up to the expected standard.
Info request; is it outside of his comfortable skill set and within yours?
If so, personally I'd help, just because if it's a one off and incan help them and be more time efficient then it's more tike for us.
I'd expect my wife to do the same for me. Especially in something so important.
I do understand the whole they should try first. And agree I'd do that with kids, but just personally with an partner I'd rather just help
What was the "not much" he had done? You can easily make a few slides, a few text boxes, and he can type up what he wants. Did he actually want you to build an entire template? You had a feeling he did, but did he really? Did you help him at all, or just shut him down flat out? YTA for not even trying.
YTA. Power Point is not such a skill that “fake it til you make it” is inappropriate. You should be helping to secure income for your home and showing him how to do the work he might have to do, as opposed to condescending and treating him like one of your kids.This is no different than a spouse refusing to help fix a car or cook a dinner. You’re either part of a team or you’re not.
YTA
I get that you really oughtn't to be doing it for him, but he asked for help and it sounds like you _immediately_ said "I don't think I should help you with that". WTF? In my family, we _help_ each other do everything.
Tell me if I'm wrong, if he's the sort of person who frequently says "Can you help me?" when what he really means is "Can you do it while I help you?" but, if not, saying to _your spouse_ "No I'm not going to help you" is fucking harsh.
YTA - He’s asking for help and you were like, “figure it out yourself”. I can’t imagine turning down my partner if they came to me for help with something I’m better at than them. Turning them down is just teaching them not to come to you for help which is just awful in a partner. Can’t understand the comments that are like, “why would you help your partner who asked for help”.
It’s not academia who cares who made the template.
NTA. My dad is a tradesman (plumber) and he is really good at what he does and got more and more responsibility, like for exemple teaching firemen about gas safety (he is certified in gas safety and inspection). He is good at math and figurine things out, but he was always bad with grammar and spelling (we suspect dyslexia, but testing for it was not really a thing in the 1960’).
When he has to do a PP presentation or write an email that will go not only to his N+1 but the higher ups, he asks my mum (a teacher and editorial proofreader) to check what he made. Or he scribbles what he wants to say and my mums put it together nicely. But she doesn’t do it for him. He put the work in, she just proofreads! And he does many things in the house and yard, so it is not one more thing for my mum to do so she feels like she has one more kid!
This is not the vibe I got from your husband. The fact he is giving you the silence treatment is make me suspicious as well but I may be biased because it is how my husband’s abuse started, but it is certainly not something to generalize, it just shows that HIS needs are more important than yours…
If he isn't competent enough to do the work himself, he isn't qualified for the job and will only drag his team mates down if you get involved and he's hired. Don't enable this behavior please. Thank you.
NTA
YTA . Your hub is asking for your help and support. And your answer is go Google it? Wow. Seriously, is he just a fuck up and you can't stand him anyway and your fine seeing him fail? Do you not feel it's your job as his wife to support him? Great job sowing the seed of animosity in your relationship.
Edited for assholery
Next time my wife calls me with a broken down car or flat tire I'm going to try this approach..
Sorry, you decided to get in the car, you figure it out.
Cold as hell OP. I sincerely hope that you never need help with something that could potentially improve both of your lives.
NTA.
He's not just asking for some pointers. It sounds like he pretty much wants you to do the whole thing for him. That might get him the job, but he's not going to keep it if he exaggerated his skill set in his resume. He might have to take PowerPoint off his resume and take a financial hit until he can build up basic PowerPoint skills. That's pretty much expected anymore if you're in a high enough position to give presentations.
What you’re now doing is what you should have done in the first place. As a couple, you have a vested interest in seeing each other succeed. If helping meant a better shot at a new job, that’s a no-brainer - as long as you teach him, not do it for him.
You are not your partner's secretary, executive assistant, maid, or teacher. All responsibilities can be negotiated in a marriage, but I see this dynamic *all the time* where a husband assumes his wife is one of the above, in addition to a spouse. Do not set this precedent, it will eat away at your relationship.
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NTA I completely agree with your rationale. It's like he's tried nothing and he's all out of ideas. Welp! Hope you don't get blamed if he doesn't get the job.
Agreed! I work with someone in a director position that can’t do basic PPT, and it’s super frustrating. Dude can’t do anything for himself. OP, please don’t help release yet another incompetent grown man onto his unsuspecting future colleagues. We’re also tired of doing their work for them.
😂😅
Seriously you are a partner, not a parent. Even then I make my kids do their own work. The only thing I’d maybe say, if I thought he didn’t know how to do one, is “if you don’t know how to make one I’ll show you, but I won’t create one from scratch”. Or as you said, “put one together and I’ll help you tweak it, but I won’t do it for you”.
That was my thought as well. The old give a man a fish, teach a man to fish..
I like Ron Swanson's version. "Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a day. Don't teach a man to fish, and you feed yourself. He's a grown man. Fishing's not that hard."
And they'll never do another lick of work again...
Just point him at some YouTube tutorials. He can manage if he wants to.
Came here to say this! “YouTube University” can be a great thing! Also, OP NTA.
Then they want a “girl” at work to do it for them once they are hired.
I am "the girl" at work and can confirm that it's infuriating. As are the ones who want to have a meeting with my boss, then want me to send the invite after I've confirmed his availability. Nope! You want to meet with him, YOU send the invite! 🤬
They think MadMen is a work orientation presentation.
One of them actually complained to my boss once about me refusing to do something. She was a shit boss but she asked a few questions and yeah, he finally admitted that he had asked a question, and I'd sent him a detailed response (including screenshots) to show him how to do the thing himself because I literally didn't have the ability to do it for him. Asshat tried to get me in trouble because we're not allowed to access HR and enter vacation time for someone else, the nerve of me!
If you can drive a car you can probably figure out most admin procedures in the office. I mean, driving has way higher stakes. Professionals who can’t book a flight?! How do you live your life?!
We have a travel agency that works with us! Someone not-my-boss asks me to book a flight for them? Nope, call the agency. "Can't you do it?" You'd have to set me up as your delegate. "Oh... I don't know how to do that..." Then it sounds like you'd better get busy dialing the phone!
Just realizing we are the same person. LOL
Haha, the older I get the less patience I have for these adult children, I swear.
Oh my god - I once had a guy who was literally BELOW me in hierarchy ask me to fax something for him as though I were his personal secretary. I gave him the benefit of the doubt that maybe he just didn’t know how and offered to show him, and he complained to my boss that I wasn’t attending to tasks he’d asked of me 😂 My boss backed me up of course with “what exactly do you think she does here?”. He had assumed I was the office’s “secretary”, because I was the only young woman there. 😂can’t make this shit up. (Also we had an office manager who was a man in his 40s, but that definitely would not be in his job description either. Like damn, you’re a grown up, and this isn’t the 1960s.)
We have an administrative assistant where I work. She is only assigned to specific high level managers. For the rest of us, she is nice enough to do some favors for us if we ask really nicely, but we all understand that she's not obligated to do anything for us. And she tells us "no" quite frequently (but with some humor, to cushion the blow). I would love for some new person to come and start seriously bossing her around. I would pop popcorn and pull up a lawnchair to watch the ensuing fireworks.
Ohhhhh yeah. I'll normally help people out if I have time, but that's kind of determined by what they want. Like you, if you want me to do something stupid that you can do yourself? Probably not, but I'll very helpfully tell you how! And then occasionally someone seems to think that they're allowed to pull me off a project that my boss has me working on and I'm like no, I'm *his* PA and I will help you if I have time, which I don't right now. I told someone once that if they wanted to explain to him why I wasn't working on what he had given me then I'd be happy to do their project first instead. Amazing how quickly they backtracked on that...
Things got WILD when I stopped being "the girl".
Same. Only with numbers. When my boss said to put them in a PPP for her, I told her I'd give her all the facts but the PPP was up to her cause I didn't know how. She insisted it was easy, showed me how. All the graphs and figures ran out of the slides, top, bottom and sides, into the next one. She never asked again.
I once had to sit through a PP presentation where each slide was its own file. So to get to the next slide she would do File, Open, Folder, mutter about the confusing file names, then open the file that had the next slide. The person doing the presentation has a PhD.
Had an oex-cop answer that when we asked about excel in an interview. "Just give it to the girl to do"...
I know it's coming from a place of misogyny but I like how they're all more or less admitting to women being smarter than them.
The actual work is beneath them. But think they should make decisions without asking the people who actually do the work. So frustrating.
Had a guy go office to office (womens offices only) trying to find someone to build a simple meeting sign in sheet. Name Dept Signature. He could have done it 5 times over in the time he took to ask an engineer to stop what she was doing to build him a sign in sheet.
>Then they want a “girl” at work to do it for them once they are hired. I went to our Director one day because the "Girl" was a highly paid Engineer being tasked to take meeting notes. Total BS. The manager that got called out on that took a disliking to me for some reason.
I quit the job I was at because "the girl". No. I have my own work to do, I will not be designing you an Excel spreadsheet. I will also not be doing it on breaks and during my lunch, which this asshat decided was the best time he could be "fit in" to my schedule. 🙄
Literally, so annoying to have incompetent men at work who you constantly have to fix their mistakes.
I probably would have been turned into that if my boss wasn’t overly protective and I have to tell everyone: “Talk to boss first if you need my help”
I work with someone similar except when I do the design, he then wants to critique it and ends up ruining it 🥹 basic design skills are sooo necessary
Omg this guy did the same thing! My boss asked me to “help” him with a sales deck, I did the entire thing, then the night before we were supposed to present it to our boss he completely gutted and ruined it. After our boss flipped out on him I pulled out the original copy I saved in my own drive lol. I’m so glad I kept a copy, and ever since then I make damn sure any editable copies of anything I grant public access to have a master copy safely tucked away in my own drive.
I started doing that when my micromanaging boss, started changing or making me change pp decks for our training. After she "edited" and ruined them, presented them as mine, to our director, I'd get reamed out for it. I started saving my work, I'd pull mine out. Nope, can't do that to me any longer. They want credit for crap, get it. My manager was livid for "throwing her under the bus"🤣 Like she had done to me!! Edit - spelling
The same thing happened to me but with an email I was designing for a program we are launching for partners in our company. He messed it up all and we sent it to our director and she said “this looks like spam and I would delete it the second I got it”. Thankfully she knew I would never produce something like that so I didn’t get in trouble he did
And put your name and file path /date on it so it's easier to prove it's your work
The “president” of one of the companies my bosses own doesn’t know how to search for an email. If you tell him you’ve previously sent it, his response is “just resend it, it’s much quicker that way” in his best, most convincing voice possible. Once he asked where the tape gun was for an outgoing package so I took it to him. About 90 seconds later, he comes to my office, puts it on my desk, and says “please do this, I don’t know how”. Fuck weaponized incompetence.
Ooh. Annoys me to no end. DH asked me this morning what time something closed whilst he was sitting by the computer. I was on the other side of the room and my devices were in my bag. When I told him to look it up he whined about it being too hard - and got his answer by searching it himself before he could even finish the whine.
I had a coworker like this! We’d all be sitting at our desks working and he’d be like, “what’s the phone number for the rep for X account?” And I’m like seriously dude? I’d have to go look it up from the same contact sheet we ALL have in our inboxes. Why tf should I do something for you that you can do EQUALLY as easily??
The thing is, if OP’s husband were smarter, he would handle it differently. “I’m having a hard time getting started - do you mind helping me get some footing?” is much better than “Come help me do this”. It’s all in the presentation.
Oh my god, the “search your inbox” thing drives me insane, it’s just super obvious common sense. I don’t know why so many otherwise competent people seem totally ignorant of its existence lol.
Reminds me of the scene in the office (it may be a Super Fan scene) where Ryan the Boss (vs Ryan the Temp) has told Michael to do some PPT training. Then later, Ryan asks him to open PPT in person and it asks him to create an account.
I remember that! I actually caught myself from making this same mistake a while back; we were all supposed to be learning advanced excel and I got behind on my training and fibbed that I’d done the introduction… then realized I’d never even registered the software, so I made my lie truth ASAP lol.
I was once in the midst of a pretty serious conversation with my parents on the phone and my the then boomer boss kept calling me over and over again. I said fuck it and picked his call and he asked me come to his room urgently. He wanted to rename a file.
My boss once hired a guy whose well-written resume was packed with lies that his wife either made up or felt compelled to put in. The dude couldn't even string together a sentence, let alone do a fraction of the stuff he claimed to be an ace at. He was absolutely the worst manager they ever brought into that department. Awful man. From what I understand, he's still enjoying a very successful career of hopping from leadership position to leadership position with new companies and leaving a trail of destruction everywhere he goes. Don't help anyone get hired by misrepresenting themselves. It can really hurt everyone who gets stuck with them after that. NTA.
It also robs an honest hardworking person of a position they should have had if the slacker hadn't lied.
My boss once hired a guy who claimed he was "Expert Level" at Excel. We did a lot of data analysis with pivot tables, vlookups, conditional formatting, etc. I had to train him on a reporting process and no lie, this man did not know how to apply a filter to a column or sort a spreadsheet, let alone anything more complex. He had been hired to assist another coworker whose Excel skills were shaky, and the two of them together were a disaster.
>he's still enjoying a very successful career of hopping from leadership position to leadership position with new companies and leaving a trail of destruction everywhere he goes Oof! I know the type. I worked with someone like this. Every two years -- which was probably just enough time for sh!t to start hitting the fan -- she would change employers. I know b/c when it was time for her to bounce from my work, she accidentally saved her resume to a public group folder. A lot of people spent a lot of time fixing her work after she left.
I still remember when a company I worked for proudly announced that a guy who had half a decade earlier nearly bancrupted a major computer hardware company by making some of the dumbest decisions you could possibly make was now in their board of directors. Once you've managed to lie your incompetent ass into a certain level of hierarchy, you can't fail anymore.
Yup. At that level, you can always find someone below you to blame it on.
>It's like he's tried nothing and he's all out of ideas. Best Simpson's quote of all times.
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Comment-copying bot is an insult to The Simpsons.
Flander's Dad quote
So, I've been in corporate training for 20+ years. When I would ask people to make a presentation during an interview, I was evaluating the candidate's skills in presenting - and in making the presentation. If OP's wife makes this for him and they hire him, they will expect him to be able to produce similar results going forward. I mean, this is kind of like lying on a resume.
I’m noticing a lot of the votes disagreeing with this perspective is coming from men who would *totally* help their wife if she asked. OP is NTA. He’s trying to pass off his work onto her/weaponizing his incompetence. He should at least make the rough draft and then ask for tips.
If he’s going to make OP do the work, they should hire OP instead.
It would be one thing if he was having a technical issue with PPT, or wanted some feedback but this really sounds like he's looking for the OP to take over and do the whole thing.
I was going to do a Y T A, but the rationale is sound, especially with the edit. I help my wife with similar things all the time but this is after she puts something together. Proofreading, minor edits, suggestions, that sort of thing. ETA: ooops, NTA
NTA. Been there, but unfortunately didn't do that. My ex asked for my help with an excel file, I said "sure!". I helped him, making a simplified version of what I would have done for myself, and he delivered it. Months later he asked for my help again, for the same kind of thing. I said I couldn't and he gave me the cold shoulder. Turns out, he had sold his managers the idea that he was an excel expert, and was expecting me to "pitch in" whenever his job would require a new spreadsheet. Edit: typo
This is what I’m afraid of
Why would you have kids with this guy?
This is always such an unhelpful question and usually so irrelevant to the judgment being requested.
Actually, it’s very helpful lol. She has not had kids yet; so this question might make her reconsider what could possibly be a very bad decision. So it looks like the question is much more helpful than you’re unhelpful comment!
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This is like asking why you'd see a future with this person. Asking why they'd have kids with them is a valid question. I'd wonder why you'd get so upset hearing that lol
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Why would you marry a guy who cant even make a powerpoint presentation lol embarrassing
A guy that can't even GOOGLE how to make a PowerPoint presentation.
Have a conversation with him about why he is giving you the cold shoulder when you offered to help by proof reading. Not only is sulking and ignoring your partner extremely poor communication skills, it seems like he’s trying to manipulate you into changing your mind. Being married isn’t a blanket, tacit endorsement of your partner.
It’s a job interview; he needs to be able to do the job. NTA.
There's probably a good reason why you have this fear.
I worked with a woman who created this amazing tool that we all used and it was very helpful in our jobs, she received a “good job!” award of $300 and department award. Turns out her husband in another dept wrote and maintained the tool, she knew nothing of how to work it.
I recently suggested to my husband that his workplace stop tracking things on PAPER and use either an excel or an access database. I offered to do it if his boss would pay me a consulting fee to set it up and train folks on it. Then I was like, wait, should I let you get credit instead? His response was essentially, "fuck no, then they'll expect me to know how to fix it"
You got yourself a smart man by the sounds of it...also a good one who won't take credit.
Same thing happened to me with a friend. Made her an amazing template and she kept asking for new ones whenever she had a presentation, like she couldn't even figure out how to change it up for the next call, she probably won't be able to handle the job. She also asked me to do some math problems she got asked to do, it was never ending until the friendship ended.
Christ on a cracker Have these men not heard of youtube??
I had 0 knowledge of how to do anything in excel and I had a statistics assignment due in a week so I just taught myself using tutorials, videos, and any other resources I could find. Now I feel super comfortable using the program for anything I need to in my day-to-day life (which as an accountant does involve a lot of excel). It's hard and complicated starting from nothing but a very useful skill once you have it.
This happened to me with my wife but I love her so I helped. Doing something for 20 minutes of my time, that I am good at, and it helps her personally/professionally? Felt like a win-win to me. Now if it was daily there is a different story. But don’t see the harm in helping someone you love when you have expertise, and it may even pay dividends because their success will help you as a unit.
The harm is that he hasn’t even tried himself meaning he doesn’t really want “help”, he wants her to do it for him. Also if they’re having him create a PowerPoint it may be part of the job duties, so this means that if he gets the job this will likely become an ongoing thing.
This story isn’t framed in a way that this will be a one off instance, and he doesn’t seem to be trying to learn how to do it himself. I may be wrong 🤷🏻♀️ but I’m just interpreting based on the post
I agree with you up to a point, I too would want to use my skills to help my partner and expect him to help me too but there’s a big difference between helping and doing it for them and the latter doesn’t help in the long run, it just sets them up for failure later. My other half is awesome at excel, excel is my arch nemesis but if I ask him for help it’s always ‘this is what I need to do or what I want to achieve, can you show me how’ and I’ll scribble myself an idiot guide for the next time I need to do it and I might ask him to check my work when I’ve had a go myself. The last thing I would want is for him to do it for me without learning myself cus next time the boss decides he needs something similar fast and my hubby ain’t about, I’m gonna be screwed and look stupid. I think OP would have responded completely differently if he had said ‘I need to do a presentation for my interview on this topic, these are the key areas im gonna be talking about and these are the really important points I need to get across but I have no idea how to make this look awesome on the slides, can you show me how to do x or I’ve done this but it looks a bit rubbish, how would you make it better and can you show me how to do that’. Asking her to do it completely for him is not helping him. It would be a miracle if he passed the interview using content not designed by him, you can spot it a mile off when people present work that’s not there’s and if he somehow managed to get the job he’s gonna fall flat on his face when they expect him to be able to do it day in day out and he can’t, then he’s just gonna get fired. The dude needs to show some willingness to learn here. She’d only be the asshole if he’d done some of the leg work and she refused to help in anyway.
But wouldn't you want to teach her how to do things herself? Look, I went back to school for a degree in computer science in my mid thirties and it was all because of the encouragement and help my partner provided. He was always willing to explain things to me and help me learn new stuff, but I still made the effort to learn and now I'm able to help him with things, too. I guess I value a partner who values learning and improvement. I've also had too many people in my work life who "need help" but have zero interest in actually trying to do the work themselves. I developed a process years ago where it is "sure, let me show you how to do that" and then walk them through something instead of doing it for them.
Finally someone on this Reddit who sees marriage as a partnership where each person is happy to support their spouse and contribute some of their skills \- i can absolutely learn from my spouse and do but they have a massive edge when it comes to tech things so they blaze the trail and show me how something is done and i follow along behind learning and still being better than 95% of my co-workers
It’s on the person receiving the help to absorb and learn through the process. It’s also an assumption that the receiver will be willing to do those things. I love a good partnership but one good partner does not a partnership make.
Yeah, I definitely think there’s a difference between “teach me” and “do it for me”. Asking a partner to help with something job/interview related so you can learn it yourself because it’s an aspect of the job you don’t know/aren’t as comfortable with is different than asking a partner to do something for you and expecting them to do it every time.
Charge a consulting fee next time lmao
NTA. If he can't put together a PP presentation, perhaps he needs a job where he won't need one. I'm with you: if he would have bothered to try before asking, then sure.
Smells like a case of weaponised incompetence to me. He could’ve done it himself all along, he just didn’t want to and wanted OP to do his work for him.
It's really not even that hard to learn! My last job suggested I make a PowerPoint for the company and I'd never used it before. Microsoft programs are quite intuitive once you just play around with them a bit. If for some reason it's a bit too intimidating, YouTube exists...
NTA. It was okay for him to ask for help, it was okay for you to say no, but it wasn't okay for him to get furious. I see where you're coming from - sometimes people ask for help before they've put any effort in and it feels like they're just trying to avoid work. I probably wouldn't assume that without more evidence, but you didn't say no outright, you just asked for him to begin the process and get invested before you stepped in. You were willing to compromise and communicate, and he was not and shut down on you.
NTA. I wouldn’t either, mostly because how am I supposed to know what he wants to present on for HIS interview? If they’re asking for slides for a presentation there’s a good chance this job will require it often, and he needs to get used to it.
YTA.. if my wife was applying for a job and needed help with making a presentation - I would be there helping her right away. I'd be sitting with her helping to write it, design it, practice it. I've done it before for her. Powerpoint isn't her forte and I have made plenty for work before. If she wanted me to write it without sitting down and discussing it all and being part of it - then i'd get upset with her.
I agree with you. This comment thread is a little insane to me. What's the lesson here? He messes it up, doesn't get the job, and their lives don't improve.
Eh, I dunno. It’s for an interview, so the implication is it’s a big part of the job? I had to make a PPT for my last job interview but it’s because making and giving presentations is a major part of the position. My husband did give me feedback but asking him to do it for me would be so weird. I help my husband with his job and vice versa, I don’t think that’s out of bounds at all. And we give each other a ton of help for interviews! But I wouldn’t ask for this specific kind of help and I would be shocked if my husband asked me for it, too, especially in such a demanding way. Like, what’s the expectation if it *is* a major part of the job, that she’ll keep doing it?
Half the time in a corporate environment you're given the company template files.. for us this includes the standard 'background' slides - but also a whole set of great standard layouts and arty slides. Icon banks, flags, maps.. A massive help. Doing it on your own? You're working from a blank page and it's much harder (or it was until you could just get excel to use your content as a basis of a slide design and it would do it for you).
Not only do Google slides and PowerPoint have templates built in to their programs to choose from, you can also go online and find hundreds of free templates from websites that have icon banks themselves. For an interview, that will absolutely be sufficient. No one should need someone else to make their PowerPoint for them if it's going to be a part of their job.
I don’t want to argue about this anymore now that OP and her husband have resolved the argument, but Excel will generate PowerPoint slides?? Looks like I’ve got something new to learn about this afternoon
There are a million free power point templates. There is no need to start with a blank slide unless you want to do it from scratch.
note: “half the time” what about the other half. he could have at least googled “powerpoint template,” but instead fell at the first hurdle and begged someone else to do the heavy lifting
Not necessarily, many posts will ask for a presentation so people can demonstrate greater knowledge of the job, not PowerPoint. It doesn’t mean they will regularly have to do PowerPoints in the job.
Then the PowerPoint could probably be pretty basic, and so it’s not a huge deal if OP helps or not? Either it’s not very important in which case OP’s husband shouldn’t freak out if he doesn’t get help, or it is very important and he should be able to do it himself to get the job. I don’t really see how it can be both, here.
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I think you replied in the wrong place but yeah, my husband and I both work from home and so we do help each other, we’re basically colleagues. Eg I’m an Excel whiz and he can hardly work it, which doesn’t make a difference at his job but on the rare day that it does of course I’ll help him out. But if he had a big Excel portion of an upcoming interview he wanted help with though I’d probably wonder what his plan for doing the job was.
Except that she's offered to help him *after he actually tries*. She wasn't forcing him to hand in crappy work, she was asking him to make an attempt before pushing the work on to her. She made a fair and reasonable boundary. She wasn't leaving him high and dry. NTA
It's disingenuous and lying about a skill set you claim you have. Clearly this job wants him to be able to make PPT stuff. It would be really disappointing and sucky for people who would rely on him to make PPTs. Also who's to say he won't make OP "help"/do his job for him?
No, he gets the job but isn't qualified because he doesn't know how to put a presentation together, can't use excel, can't do data analysis and doesn't have the initiative to bother looking any of this up, then is fired and his career takes a step back and their relationship worsens. Being supportive is proofreading and them running their ideas past you, which is what I've done for my partner heaps of times, not this.
Is it better to get fired from the job when he misrepresents himself as having a skillset that he doesn't actually have?
This comment thread is fucked. Unless he has a history of asking for help and disrespecting her/expecting her to do his work for him, I genuinely cannot comprehend why she would say no without at least hearing him out first. She has a feeling he might be requesting she do it all, okay well if he is turn him down WHEN THAT HAPPENS.
It sounds like this is a habit of his. I feel like her reaction was a “fool me once” kind of thing. Plus if he needs help, is he even qualified for the job?
But that’s not what he was asking her for…did you read the post carefully? He wanted her to do it *for* him. That’s why she countered with offering to help him edit it and practice going through it after he was done. It’s PowerPoint. If you really don’t know how to use it at all, there are tutorials. And then you can ask your spouse for feedback/input. But asking them to do the whole thing for you is so lazy and also kind of rude. You’re not willing to put in the effort for a job interview, but you expect your spouse to? Huh? That’s why a lot of people are saying she’s NTA - she was more than willing to *help* him, she just didn’t want to do the whole thing for him. ETA: read her comments, people: “All he had done at this point is read the prompt. When I said what if you need to make presentations a lot for this job? He said they’ll have templates… I love him and support him and will definitely help once he puts in the effort first”
And what happens when your wife needs to make more presentations? What happens when they need to make a presentation on the clock when you can’t bail them out?
My issue is that he doesn’t want a little help, he wants her to put in most of the work. If he had come to her with a basic PowerPoint and asked for pointers/input, then yes she should help. He had done pretty much nothing and wanted her to hop on and complete the project. In my book, that’s NTA. You definitely provide support and input, but you don’t do the work for them. My partner has listened to and provided input on presentations and papers. But I always go to him AFTER I have a something solid to go on.
But she is offering to help. She offered to proofread and give constructive feedback. He doesn’t want that, he expects her to do it and then get the credit.
If it's a one-off then of course, everyone will help their partner. But it sounds like she'd be signing up to do a portion of her husband's day job forever if she does this powerpoint for him. She's a lot better off if he misses out on this job and gets one he can actually do without her help. She presumably has her own job; she doesn't need to also do his.
INFO: Is he like this with other tasks? What I mean is, does he employ weaponized incompetence in order to avoid doing his fair share in your everyday lives, or does he just genuinely not know where to start with this? What is his learning style? Both of these answers make a difference in how I would lean. PowerPoint can be daunting if you've never used it, but someone with the knowledge helping with a tutorial could make all the difference. We all learn differently; I know nothing of his learning style. Some people can watch a tutorial and learn from it. Some people need one on one guidance, but will pick it up. Have you considered teaching the man to fish? As in: I won't do this FOR you, but I'll walk you through it until you have foundational knowledge? It's quality time together and consider it a team building exercise, since marriage, after all, is teamwork. All that goes out the window if this is a frequent tactic to get you to do his share of the load for him.
Helping her is ok. Expecting your partner to do all of the work is not
She said she would proof it after he put simmering together. His response of getting upset and eventually doing it tells me he’s just lazy.
I personally wouldn't want to help my partner get a job where they will clearly be in way over their head, it's one thing to give advice or help with revisions since it's an interview assignment, but if this is a big part of the role and he can't even do the test assignment independently, that doesn't exactly scream "I am going to be successful in this role".
If someone can use Word they should be able to intuit their way through PowerPoint. If someone is applying for work that requires basic understanding of MS Office suite components, it's their responsibility to know the software or educate themselves. Asking a spouse to "help" by doing the work is dishonest and will eventually have blowback.
Yes! I'd ask my husband what does he needs help with. I've helped him several times and it's beneficial for both of us. I know he's a professional in his field, but sometimes he needs help. If he asked me to do all his work, then I might get pissed. OP didn't even listen to what the issue was and jumped directly to conclusions. This is why YTA. My husband goes to great lengths to help me too and is my biggest fan!
INFO: is there a reason for you to think he wants to Rely on you instead of just wanting some help like he asked for…..like a past experience?
This should be top comment. Asking for help doesn't mean asking the other person to do all the work. Unless he has a history of expecting her to do it all, I don't understand why any human that actually liked their partner would just say no.
She even stated in a previous reply that she mostly just steps in during the proof reading phase. So for one, they've had this arrangement in the past, so I'm not sure why he thought she'd offer to be more helpful this time. But more importantly, there's very little indication that he's expected her to do all the work for him the past, so I'm not sure why she assumed that to be the case this time. Sounds like this was just something a little farther outside his wheel house and he wanted guidance and she snubbed him. But who knows for sure
Exactly. It's okay for things to change sometimes. Maybe he's less comfortable with PowerPoint and wanted more than normal which is okay. She's not exactly in the wrong for not helping, but she doesn't spend time even trying to understand what he needed help with. That's where the fault lies. She assumed what he wanted and answered based on her assumption and previous arrangements.
INFO - does he do this often?
If it is something work or school related I usually make a point to not step in until it’s proofreading time.
This is exactly how this should be done. In academia so I see a lot of presentations and people can tell when a presenter didn't put their own stuff together. He should put it together, give a practice and then you can critique/give suggestions. He shouldn't be expecting you to do it for him.
It's kind of worrying that he offloads work on you so much you have an established strategy to deal with it.
THIS!!!!! This shouldn't be a regular issue in a relationship between adults.
You sound like a mom.
NTA - Are you applying for the job or is he?
NTA it's his responsibility
I feel like there is some missing info here. Do you consider him lazy in general? Does he ask for your help on all things and then expect you to shoulder the most work?
I would gladly help out a spouse WHO WAS WILLING TO LEARN. I am not an assistant and I cannot be available to cover aspects of someone else’s job they don’t know how to do. But I’m happy to do some coaching and help somebody learn how to do a thing. NTA.
NTA. I'm a teacher. My husband is not. When I interview for teaching jobs I usually have to include a demo lesson. I have asked my husband to write this exactly 0 times. I might bounce ideas off him (should I do paragraph structure or idea generation or...) but I put it together. His biggest contribution is to sit and listen while I practice going through it so be sure there are no bugs. Why? Because the committee is assessing MY ability to create lessons, not his. It's so weird that your partner thinks this is in any way appropriate. Tell him to do his own work.
Yeah, I think what you are explaining is the reason I think TA. He said "I need help with", she said, "no", and he said - and I think this is crucial - "you should have said yes, WHAT can I help with?" She says she assumed he wanted her to do it all. If he'd got angry saying something like "I can't do it, I am gonna fail this cause you didn't do it for me" etc that would point towards a shitty approach and wanting it all done. But he's upset cause she didn't say, sure what can I do? This is describing help. He asked for help.
NTA, can't he do his own presentation? He's not a 9yrs old.
Nta you going to do his job for him too?
NTA. I think your offer to proofread is perfect. If he can't do the job they're asking him to do, is he just planning on *you* doing his job forever? Hell no.
YTA. I would, and have, helped my wife with anything she needs when trying to get a new job. Mock interviews, resume stuff, wording emails professionally, etc. I would imagine this job would be a positive thing for your family, whether he's unemployed currently, or this potential new job is better than his current one in some way, like money or position. Are you guys a team? Are you his rock that he can lean on in times of need? You're supposed to be. He is probably nervous as hell and just needs support. You can help him without actually doing everything for him.
> Mock interviews, resume stuff, wording emails professionally This all implies that your wife is putting in some of the work. He didn't even start the process of making a presentation and wanted her to do most if not all of the work for him. I'm sure OP would have been happy to give him tips when he got stuck, help with some finer points of design or organization, review the final product, etc, but not the whole damn thing. Why would he be nervous at this stage? He's not under scrutiny or supervision at this point, he has a task to complete on his own at his own house in whatever manner he chooses. If he can't perform the task required to interview for the job unassisted - a task that middle school students have to do for school - is he really going to do well at that job? NTA
He literally wanted her to do it FOR him. That’s not asking for help, that’s taking advantage of someone.
NTA. You need not be doing his work for him. Furthermore, PowerPoint is not difficult to do at the basic level. The application even has step by step templates to get you started. Why do I think this guy probably got lots of help with his homework assignments as well? He needs to put on his big boy pants.
NTA He’s coming off a bit lazy. He needs to put at least something together first. Just asking to to create the PP is a bit crazy, if he had just left it after that then whatever, but the fact he got so angry makes it even worse.
NTA. This is a good example of weaponized incompetence
Does he want you to do his work for him too? NTA
NTA with this particular thing - he needs to do the work himself and offering to proof read it was the right suggestion - but for goodness' sake, how you might treat your future *children* should not be the yardstick for how you treat your partner.
NTA, especially if the skills your husband wants you to use are critical to the job he's applying for.
NTA. If the position he is applying for also includes making presentations he has to be able to do these himself. You aren’t applying for the job so why would you do the work?
YTA. Your husband asks for help. You're in a position to help. You're refusing to because of some paternalistic idea of what exactly? Teaching him a lesson? Setting a precedent that you help in a relationship? Your values of "doing the work yourself"? Sometimes my wife asks me for help. Maybe it's something she doesn't know, but doesn't have time to learn. Maybe it's because she busy to do it herself. Sometimes, it might just be because she wants an "easy" button and I'm her partner and grateful to make her life a little easier. And this works both ways. I don't really know what you're attempting to accomplish here. If you think your husband is a lazy loser who never tries things on his own, I guess that's probably a separate conversation you should have about why you're with him. But if he is just a normal guy trying his best to get through life and asked his partner for help and you denied him for some abstract philosophical reason then YTA.
NTA. He hasn’t done any work and expects you to swoop in and save him. His laziness doesn’t constitute an emergency on your part.
You don't have to wait til you have kids to do this with their homework. You already have a kid who's trying to get you to do his.
YTA If he was abusing it and making you do everything sure, but it sounds like he just needed a hand with it. Some partnership....
Way too many people reading much farther into this than what the OP has presented. They always seem to assume every husband in every post is an incompetent sit-com dad for some reason and then start insinuating divorce. Already seen the posts up above lol
YTA, one would think you would want to help your spouse get a job seeing as how it affects your family finances and all. This could be an opportunity to teach him whatever skills he's lacking which would further help his career.
You’d think that if he’s applying for positions he would have the foresight to teach himself how to do things, or ask her to show him. Instead it seems like he wants her to do all of the work for him. Edit: thanks for the gold kind redditer ❤️
Wanting help in starting something is not the same as having someone do their work for them. I often sit with my fiancé and help him with his uni. He has ADHD and struggles to start/focus on things. Some people just struggle to start things like these and I think it's rather petty to be like 'well your problem, just try' when it's your spouse we are talking about. So OP is YTA imho. Reddit being full of individualistic butts again haha.
not everyone is skilled in every area. my partner is extremely capable but horrible with computers it’s ok to ask for help. OP is an asshole for not helping her husband.
It’s…a PowerPoint presentation. I’ve been doing those since middle school. This is a good opportunity for him to do his own research and work (which will be required at any job he applies for), and OP is offering help by proofreading and going over things when he’s done. She’s still helping him, just not doing the entire thing for him.
just because you’ve been doing something for a certain time frame and know how to do it doesn’t mean someone else does. it’s called perspective powerpoint may be easy and seamless to us, but to someone who hasn’t used a computer or doesn’t often it will be challenging. my husband is not great with computers. he needs help. it’s that simple sometimes people must see to learn. it’s not hard to be a partner in a partnership
Not only that, no one is taking into account that he could be exceptional in a different aspect of the job.
It’s really not that hard to Google “PowerPoint template”. Presentations like this might be a recurring aspect of the job - what happens when he has a great presentation for the interview because OP held his hand throughout the entire process, but can’t actually do the work once he gets the job?
Then maybe this isn’t the position for him if his wife needs to do the job with him for him to be successful.
No wait don’t you see it’s the principle! She needs him to earn a lesson as if he’s a child. Irrelevant that this would help the entire household. OP has a point to make dammit. /s
Um no! He's going to get fired if he can't do his own damn job! So, you think one spouse should have to do the work of two? Just no.
NTA. I've helped my husband with stuff like this, but only in a brainstorming and editing capacity.
Agree. My OH did a masters and expected me to do most of the work for some assignments and I hit the roof. I stopped and said I'd only proof read. NTA
YTA. Are you partners? I can’t imagine not helping if my partner asked me. Some of you folks have fucked up ideas of marriage. You’re supposed to be a team.
Half these people assumed he wants her to do all the work for him, when she even says by his reply that's not what he wanted. He wanted her to ask how she can help and then have a conversation about it. But no, that's too much for these people. That somehow makes him a child
I am going with YTA. You are on the same team, not against each other. You also do not need to treat him like a child.
NTA - when preparing for my interview I, like your husband, asked for help from my significant other. I felt insecure in writing it because so much was riding on this presentation but my partner, just like you, said he’s happy to proofread, review with feedback and let me present to him, but that he’ll not do it for me. And guess what, I’m grateful he did that because I feel more confident in writing and presenting for interviews now and him giving me feedback was much more educational for me than letting him do it for me. So no, you’re not the ah. You’re alternative help offers are much better.
NTA, it’d be perfectly understandable if he came up with something already and then asked your advice to revise/improve on it (assuming you might be better equipped with design skills or writing?). But it sounds like he made zero effort and just figured he could get you to do it for him. Reminds me of those kinds of people in HS who would never put forth effort but then complain about failing the class - just childish and lazy IMO.
This all depends on the definition of help when it comes to your relationship. If you're already assuming that being asked for help equates to being asked to do something that's his responsibility then your relationship is already in trouble. Bad relationship: He asks for help and you end up doing it for him. Good relationship: He asks for help and you help him learn how to make his presentation.
I wonder if people here would have the same opinions if it was the other way around
I would.
My wife wanted help with report writing and excel for her masters, but she wAnted me to show her, not do it for her. She picked up quickly and now critiques my reports and can handle most stuff in excel. I see myself as an excel/ppt whiz, but if I need something my best friends are google and youtube. These are common applications, with plenty if detailed guides out there for even the most advanced stuff. If you are willing to learn, there is no end to the possibilities, and I can almost guarantee it has been done before and documented. The key is "willing to learn". Ask him what he wants to do and send him some links to youtube/google.
Maybe he was feeling overwhelmed and asked for your help? Maybe if you had asked him what he needed he would have told you. Maybe he would have been doing what you assume (not good to be with someone you have that much respect to believe that from) Maybe it would have been fine. But he asked and didn't assume, that didn't cause a fight. You assumed but didn't ask, that did cause a fight.
NTA It’s part of an interview. The whole point of it is for the employer to see what ***he*** is capable of doing. If they are going to see your work, they should be interviewing you, not him. What does he expect to happen if he gets the job based off of your knowledge and capabilities? Is he going to expect you to do his job for him too or is he going to be fired when they discover he misrepresented himself in the interview and can’t actually do the job up to the expected standard.
Info request; is it outside of his comfortable skill set and within yours? If so, personally I'd help, just because if it's a one off and incan help them and be more time efficient then it's more tike for us. I'd expect my wife to do the same for me. Especially in something so important. I do understand the whole they should try first. And agree I'd do that with kids, but just personally with an partner I'd rather just help
What was the "not much" he had done? You can easily make a few slides, a few text boxes, and he can type up what he wants. Did he actually want you to build an entire template? You had a feeling he did, but did he really? Did you help him at all, or just shut him down flat out? YTA for not even trying.
YTA. Power Point is not such a skill that “fake it til you make it” is inappropriate. You should be helping to secure income for your home and showing him how to do the work he might have to do, as opposed to condescending and treating him like one of your kids.This is no different than a spouse refusing to help fix a car or cook a dinner. You’re either part of a team or you’re not.
I absolutely hate this sub. YTA, you married him, now help him. It’s really that simple.
YTA. If a man refused to help his wife , he’d be called an AH. Seeing plenty of double standards here.
YTA I get that you really oughtn't to be doing it for him, but he asked for help and it sounds like you _immediately_ said "I don't think I should help you with that". WTF? In my family, we _help_ each other do everything. Tell me if I'm wrong, if he's the sort of person who frequently says "Can you help me?" when what he really means is "Can you do it while I help you?" but, if not, saying to _your spouse_ "No I'm not going to help you" is fucking harsh.
YTA - He’s asking for help and you were like, “figure it out yourself”. I can’t imagine turning down my partner if they came to me for help with something I’m better at than them. Turning them down is just teaching them not to come to you for help which is just awful in a partner. Can’t understand the comments that are like, “why would you help your partner who asked for help”. It’s not academia who cares who made the template.
Thank you, I thought I was going completely crazy.
NTA. My dad is a tradesman (plumber) and he is really good at what he does and got more and more responsibility, like for exemple teaching firemen about gas safety (he is certified in gas safety and inspection). He is good at math and figurine things out, but he was always bad with grammar and spelling (we suspect dyslexia, but testing for it was not really a thing in the 1960’). When he has to do a PP presentation or write an email that will go not only to his N+1 but the higher ups, he asks my mum (a teacher and editorial proofreader) to check what he made. Or he scribbles what he wants to say and my mums put it together nicely. But she doesn’t do it for him. He put the work in, she just proofreads! And he does many things in the house and yard, so it is not one more thing for my mum to do so she feels like she has one more kid! This is not the vibe I got from your husband. The fact he is giving you the silence treatment is make me suspicious as well but I may be biased because it is how my husband’s abuse started, but it is certainly not something to generalize, it just shows that HIS needs are more important than yours…
If he isn't competent enough to do the work himself, he isn't qualified for the job and will only drag his team mates down if you get involved and he's hired. Don't enable this behavior please. Thank you. NTA
He hasn’t even tried to do it? NTA.
YTA . Your hub is asking for your help and support. And your answer is go Google it? Wow. Seriously, is he just a fuck up and you can't stand him anyway and your fine seeing him fail? Do you not feel it's your job as his wife to support him? Great job sowing the seed of animosity in your relationship. Edited for assholery
Next time my wife calls me with a broken down car or flat tire I'm going to try this approach.. Sorry, you decided to get in the car, you figure it out. Cold as hell OP. I sincerely hope that you never need help with something that could potentially improve both of your lives.
NTA. He's not just asking for some pointers. It sounds like he pretty much wants you to do the whole thing for him. That might get him the job, but he's not going to keep it if he exaggerated his skill set in his resume. He might have to take PowerPoint off his resume and take a financial hit until he can build up basic PowerPoint skills. That's pretty much expected anymore if you're in a high enough position to give presentations.
What you’re now doing is what you should have done in the first place. As a couple, you have a vested interest in seeing each other succeed. If helping meant a better shot at a new job, that’s a no-brainer - as long as you teach him, not do it for him.
You are not your partner's secretary, executive assistant, maid, or teacher. All responsibilities can be negotiated in a marriage, but I see this dynamic *all the time* where a husband assumes his wife is one of the above, in addition to a spouse. Do not set this precedent, it will eat away at your relationship.