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Reader question: Please explain “cut you any slack” in this passage: Don’t expect anyone to cut you any slack – you have to earn it. And whatever you do, don’t call in sick. Bosses don’t equate having a cold with being sick. My comments: This sounds like a father figure giving counsel to a youngster fresh, say, at a job. Anyways, if people tell you not to expect anyone to cut you any slack, they are telling you not to expect anyone to make special allowances for you. Don’t expect them to hand anything to you on a plate, as your ma and pa might have done. You have to earn it. Hence, if you do anything wrong, expect yourself to be scolded, criticized and punished accordingly. Do not expect anyone to be lenient on you. Above all, do not call in sick all the time. First of all, “bosses don’t equate having a cold with being sick”. To bosses, being sick is something much more serious. To bosses, being sick is, for example, you being bedridden and too weak to lift your cell phone to even make the sick phone call. In other words, to bosses, having a cold means if you’re perfectly all right to come in to work. Different perspectives, you see. But the advice given in the example from the top is, by and large, plausible. If you expect anyone to cut you any slack, you’ve got to give them a good reason to. To call in every now and then sick, for example, is simply not going to cut it, so to speak. | 
