"My college bestie has many wonderful qualities, and I won't go into those because this is an advice column letter. I'll get straight to the meat of it. She's an unabashed social climber. Her design firm has a lot of high-net-worth clients, and as she moves up the ranks of her company, she's getting to work on more high-end accounts."
"She's always been obsessed with celebrities and wealth, but now that she's actually meeting some of these rich randos, it's all she talks about. And we're not even talking Taylor Swift here. It's maybe the COO of a tech firm, or someone who did a season of a reality TV franchise. Hardly interesting as a conversational topic. I think it just makes her feel good to give the impression that she runs in the same circles as rich people."
A person is frustrated with a college friend who increasingly brags about wealthy and celebrity clients at her design firm. The friend emphasizes social status and recent encounters with rich or famous people, which alienates and angers the correspondent. The correspondent worries the behavior could harm the friend's professional reputation and wants to communicate that the star-focused talk is off-putting without hurting feelings. Recommended approaches include a private, empathetic conversation using 'I' statements, gentle warnings about professional optics, steering conversations toward shared interests, offering positive reinforcement for other qualities, and setting conversational boundaries when needed.
Read at Slate Magazine
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