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Personnel issues

Lefty Specialist Sep 16 2019 07:23 AM

Just throwing this out there. I have a small department that I manage. 3 people total; 2 are twenty-somethings and the third is a guy in his early 60's. Number 3 is a walking cornucopia of illness; hands, back, knees, lungs, you name it, he's had it. I consider myself a pretty lenient boss, but his absences are starting to get excessive. He'll always work from home, but it's simply not the same as being at your desk. I've had some discussions with him about this in the past. When it reaches a point where I get fed up, we have a talk in my office and things seem to get better for a while. Then inevitably it starts again. He's a good worker (when he's here) and has deep knowledge and industry contacts that I need. But I'm fed up. Firing would probably bring on an age-discrimination suit so I'm not going there. And when someone is truly sick, how can I say no? I've heard every excuse in the book. I let him leave early for doctor appointments. I'm very accommodating. So this morning I get a call that he fell asleep at the wheel and rearended a guy on the Grand Central. It's Monday and I've got things that need doing. I guess I'm just venting because I don't have a good solution.

cal sharpie Sep 16 2019 07:51 AM Re: Personnel issues

i run a large department. One of my people a few years back had many personal issues that made her even showing up for work difficult. Her work itself was good but she was kind of a mess. I worked with our HR department to give her a package that she couldn't refuse - knowing that if she didn't take it she would likely be let go unless she actually showed up more often - which we knew she couldn't really get together. it was frustrating at the time but we ended up a much better department after I put someone else into her role.

Ceetar Sep 17 2019 08:42 AM Re: Personnel issues

I'm low man on the totem pole post places i've been, which is a different personnel issue i guess, so I don't actually run anything, which maybe means I'm overqualified. It's very hard to prove age discrimination, especially when you have documented absences. If you've got any sort of reasonable evidence that he's the least productive of the three, cut him loose. I guess it depends on how desperate you are for the contacts he has or whatever. Work on transferring that knowledge. If you want to be ruthless, say no to work from home, and schedule face to face meetings for those days to make it look like it's needed. ( I don't know what industry we're talking, but for most people that are actually doing stuff, like programming, the 9-5 in front of a desk is stupid and anti-productive) Send him emails when he asks to go home early asking him to come in early or stay late the next day and if he doesn't, there's evidence again.

nymr83 Sep 18 2019 07:28 PM Re: Personnel issues

I've never had an issue with all 8-10 people working for me working from home. I do it too and we are scattered around the country so showing up to offices (all but 1 of us are actually "commutable" and assigned to a real office location that we go in to once a week if that) doesn't really help us interact with each other. That said, ive heard of others in the company getting lazy because of the work from home. They were told in no uncertain terms that they needed to come in every day. Unless you are hired as a remote employee it is a privilege not a right to work at home and should be treated that way.

Fman99 Sep 18 2019 07:34 PM Re: Personnel issues

I use it when I need to and not otherwise. I average maybe 1 full day and a couple of half days of working from home per month, usually around service calls, doctor's appointments and my kids' school activities. I worked from home 3 straight days last week due to automobile troubles. My boss is good with it, as long as I send an email letting the team know where I am. At my last job you had to ask for permission first. It was a bit childish (part of the reason I don't work there any more).

Ceetar Sep 18 2019 08:20 PM Re: Personnel issues

I typically do MORE work at home than at the office. Offices are miserable places to work, and expecting me to be there makes _being there_ the job. presence over substance. But that's literally what 40 hour work weeks are about. Presence.

Lefty Specialist Sep 19 2019 06:43 AM Re: Personnel issues

I work from home perhaps 10 times a year. Do I get as much done as I would in the office? No. I interact with a lot of people on a daily basis and that's simply not possible on a phone line and VPN. And it's true of the people that work for me as well. I don't abuse it, and I let everyone know well in advance when I can. It's the 'I overslept, can I work from home today?' that gets me (yes, that actually happened). In that instance I told him to get his ass in here asap.

Johnny Lunchbucket Sep 19 2019 10:35 AM Re: Personnel issues

My employer is in Chicago and my department coworkers are in Denver, Pittsburgh and Chicago. I can work from home, am now in fact, but also have a wework desk they pay for. MUCH more productive in an office. Ideally we'd all be together but this way we can be on the ground in different places which is helpful

Ceetar Sep 19 2019 12:38 PM Re: Personnel issues

I find the whole office experience so uncomfortable. Feel like people are micro managing and judging things like when i get up to stretch, or how often I pee, or the minutes of my break, etc. The desks are too close. The temperature is often too hot. The coffee is bad. I have to listen to other people's conversations. People can just drop by and interrupt me even if I'm deep into something.

Lefty Specialist Sep 19 2019 01:27 PM Re: Personnel issues

=Ceetar post_id=22333 time=1568918288 user_id=102] I find the whole office experience so uncomfortable. Feel like people are micro managing and judging things like when i get up to stretch, or how often I pee, or the minutes of my break, etc. The desks are too close. The temperature is often too hot. The coffee is bad. I have to listen to other people's conversations. People can just drop by and interrupt me even if I'm deep into something.

Sounds like you're a victim of the 'open-floorplan' office. I'm lucky I still have an office where I can invite people in or close the door if I need to. So I can shut people out (or chew people out without the whole floor listening).

Ceetar Sep 19 2019 01:51 PM Re: Personnel issues

I've been open-floorplan'd here, down from a more sizable cube. That was at least better, as I didn't have to visibly see or be seen as i'm doing my work, makes my skin crawl, but it's still not ideal for all the other reasons. Of course, some of that could be mitigated with better management, more conference rooms, less people having constant phone calls of which multiple people are on the call in the room at their desks..

Edgy MD Sep 19 2019 09:21 PM Re: Personnel issues

Open floorplan is such an enormous scam, but one that corporations are happily willing to fall for, because it allows them to seize half their real estate back from their employees, not appreciating that it makes everybody that much more un-productive while they deal with chronic crawly skin.

nymr83 Sep 19 2019 10:49 PM Re: Personnel issues

i despised my old office with no walls - and i'm sure my coworkers hated how loud i am on the phone, but hey this was the space i was given so whatever!

Lefty Specialist Sep 20 2019 06:34 AM Re: Personnel issues

Edgy MD wrote: Open floorplan is such an enormous scam, but one that corporations are happily willing to fall for, because it allows them to seize half their real estate back from their employees, not appreciating that it makes everybody that much more un-productive while they deal with chronic crawly skin. Everyone I know who works in one hates it. It's supposed to encourage 'collaboration' but what it encourages is distraction. In a situation like that, yeah, working from home is probably better. We're cubes and offices but there's been rumblings about switching to the open floor plan.

41Forever Sep 20 2019 09:01 AM Re: Personnel issues Edited 1 time(s), most recently on Sep 20 2019 12:29 PM

I worked in newsrooms for most of my career, and they are an open floor plan. The atmosphere is a chaotic mix of phones, police scanners, televisions, wisecracking and typing. There was a lot of energy, and there was a lot of collaboration. In fact, when I was working at night and the room was quieter it was a little unsettling. Maybe because it was all I knew and because I loved what I was doing, I never found it distracting or problematic. When we moved to a web-first environment we were handed laptops, a cell phone and a backpack. We didn't have our own desks any more and they mixed the advertising staff with the reporters. (There were some small meeting rooms if we needed a little quieter space for a meeting or interview.) But the idea was that news doesn't happen at our desks and we were allowed to go anywhere. I liked that, too, especially when covering the Legislature. I'd get a lot done sitting in the chambers, and many an afternoon would grab a table at Zoup — well after the lunch rush — and take advantage of the WiFi, each table having an outlet and free Diet Coke refills. Didn't have an office of my own until I worked for the state government, and it was a big adjustment. I have an office now, but my team jokes that I'm not there much. I'm running all over campus with the WiFi and laptop. I like talking with people on campus in person rather than through email or phone calls.

Johnny Lunchbucket Sep 20 2019 10:13 AM Re: Personnel issues

What 41 said about newsrooms. I was no fan of the cubical farm but I left my last office job just before the company was to move to Open Floorville. At wework I'm in a "semi-private" office with 8 workspaces, but due to the transient nature of things your roommates are always changing and desks go unrented-- never had a full house. I'm the second senior member of my space now and only started here in March. WW is kinda too Millennial and has too few "private" options for when I need to make a phone call but its an interesting place to work also, lot of energy and you have no choice but to network with different people. There's a banker, a streaming-audio guy, a SEO guy and a graphic designer in my space now though no one showed up today except me so I can stream Cars videos and Cranepool without irritating the others. My desk is by far the messiest. https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48764774723_34e383a83c_c.jpg> https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48765104971_40718e8aa3_c.jpg>

batmagadanleadoff Sep 20 2019 10:20 AM Re: Personnel issues

This post makes me feel old. I have no idea what you're talking about or how this office works. You share an open office with people that work for other companies?

Ceetar Sep 20 2019 10:26 AM Re: Personnel issues

newsrooms are one of those places that a lot of time that energy and bustle is probably needed. But that's a constant bustle. open office spaces are mostly shifting, coughing, clicking. chairs squeeking. then a phone rings. (and hell, given everyone has at least two..) then someone has a conversation with someone else. about something stupid like the NFL game last night, where someone else is trying to instruct a client over the phone how to reset their password. Meanwhile, you're trying to read an email. I think I could tolerate that wework situation. They're not MY coworkers. I don't have to worry about being judged for having 17 fangraphs pages open because I'm trying to make a salient point about Corey Oswalt's strike% in a web forum before diving back into fighting with CSS Templates. But still, having someone typing in my peripherial visions would distract me, but it's possible I'm easily distractable and find focusing hard. Sometimes I wonder if I'm borderline ADHD. Anyway, fuck that noise right? I'm giving notice on Monday and starting a job that's 98% remote. =batmagadanleadoff post_id=22378 time=1568996457 user_id=68] This post makes me feel old. I have no idea what you're talking about or how this office works. You share an open office with people that work for other companies?

Yeah. It's a way to split all the admin costs of actually running an office (And things like networking and cables and power and..) when you don't really need ALL that space. Efficiency. Sorta like what all the NJ town police and school depts should do.

Johnny Lunchbucket Sep 20 2019 10:32 AM Re: Personnel issues

Yes it's an office building rented out by the desk, or by the office, monthly or by the day. They are all the rage now. It's good for small companies, startups, remote workers like me, etc etc. They provide a kitchen and fridge, free coffee and fruit water, maintain the bathrooms and printers and stuff and provide meeting rooms you can rent by the half-hour (you get credits with your rent that covers the cost of that stuff, printer paper, etc). It's a clever idea. My company thinks it costs too much but that's the deal they made with me. They layer onto this a whole branded experience, where they have parties or events almost every day, using the building as media to market to the (mostly young) people working here. For example, a startup food company will hand out free samples in the common area, or the companies that exist in the building can network with the rest of us, or the other wework sites in the city (there are dozens now). It's also nice because when I'm traveling for work I can set up in the wework of the city I'm in (all using the app or course). That was a huge help vs. working in a starbucks or a hotel room

batmagadanleadoff Sep 20 2019 10:45 AM Re: Personnel issues

What about files? No one in your space has any files!

Johnny Lunchbucket Sep 20 2019 10:55 AM Re: Personnel issues

You get a small 3-door cabinet in my space. You can bring in your own furniture in some rooms but not mine. Well one guy has his own chair. It's about the same amount of personal space you get in a cube

Ceetar Sep 20 2019 10:59 AM Re: Personnel issues

This is my space. Also note that there's a shared footspace. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/Ap0_Ye53wyFltL9pdPB8FkgxXWst4RMeioJcaH4earYEAyV6loRLj_f_GaZDMqaO41KD5OrGrTauoBc9hCvpAzmw-6alGPhpUgm-1u7cMwBBoPlA6Rx1N-yFo6iFAumM8xNp8AE7nx1mRXtM-UK8FLJPonGVQqO927PJdIJNyjp4rYFe2Hj_-sFHIuAjq5VU0DdIxhRb_hcK730tLLY9xw9PtZOEXTPwELmKCREni8VDLuSA1mzYOQUtdSzHYEVC9B9c-gCJeGIjuBfgA0UUcql_C0senJ-d1EZAne-TvXGwuCmMxJtfV_mDSM9i2buhwUyUJa43dvL_NE4OE_egxMh2qB1aRODrQd2xHxSV_OwhftnjMrhNkquJHH1361Ye1yMAy3A2181ZQbYzQiZZDgXG_zqPxNOllyH0v5KIo8qDo1qul-FckI_8lz1Je6en8YsJnC8_aIrH5aGIEMAS7UOZ2rs9EIFsDAcLgTdV8a17D2dpRRzR-dDnSlxtqbJMDGeN3Rejz3y1iY5lbxtGdVw0Z149IwtzzOjILeL5EAuHBZnk0aNqb7eQ9wyWyxn5GmnPM33L3tHA2dYj1c3chh7mVALmbuTTT9OZxC7iIL4C4x_yGUNmq2veG8lJwkwqwVmPiBtfExP4nMkz0rl9e45Jb7j_5Eu1UzilhHtfgBno1gKctV9AGoHx=w1184-h888-no>

batmagadanleadoff Sep 20 2019 11:04 AM Re: Personnel issues

With my luck, I'd get stuck next to someone who rips smelly farts all the time.

Johnny Lunchbucket Sep 20 2019 11:14 AM Re: Personnel issues Edited 1 time(s), most recently on Sep 20 2019 11:24 AM

Same risk as a farty co-worker, no? Everyone has quirks. The graphic designer with his own chair likes to work late and is visibly upset when I don't go home at 6 or something. He likes to be alone. We had a girl who made too many loud phone calls. My desk is a mess, I eat at it, and I bang on the keyboard too loudly and say fuck a lot when getting slack messages from my remote co-workers. Edit: shared footspace is creepy

metsmarathon Sep 20 2019 11:21 AM Re: Personnel issues

ye gods - shared footspace would be a nonstarter. i don't know how the hell i could work from home. aside from the fact that my home is (three boys) chaos central, and the "office" has taken the brunt of it in that it's the least important room in the house, the least used, and therefor the last one to get cleaned and the first one to get dumped in. i mean, we basically offasionally use it once a week to pay bills, and it's where i do my photo-uploading. and that's pretty much it. (side note, this also explains why my photo updates often approach once a month instead of closer to daily). in my experience, working from home can be either perfectly suited to the individual and the work, or it can be a terrible horrible no good very bad fit to the person and the job. i've had job-functions (i guess you could call them positions) where working remotely would have been fine. i've had other situations where, because of the nature of the project and how i fit in, being in separate buildings on the same campus is disruptive and inefficient enough. on my curent project, about half of one team is all in one room, with an open floor plan. and it works like gangbusters. there's so much synergy and rapid flow of information and energy and meaningful collaboration that even the distractions are productive. and it helps that the mix of guys over there is excellent. i'm only in there occasionally. on my half of the team, we've got a bunch of guys in different places, and we generally get together for meetings. and while they're not nearly as structured as some would prefer, it's when we get together in those meetings that real progress gets made. i'd love to have everyone in the same room, or in adjoining spaces. and i've got some real deep introverts, and they would truly benefit from more interaction. though definitely not overlapping footspace or overcrowding. its interesting that the open office plans are generally occurring in places where i'd tend to think that introverts might work. like the IT fields. our safety engineers are all jammed up in tiny overlapping boxes like yours (though not so bad) and they all friggin hate it. it's so ill-suited to them. for creative functions, sure, open spaces are probably really great. for introvert-intensive fields, or even individualized tasking fields, they're the devil's own sweatsocks.

Lefty Specialist Sep 20 2019 11:33 AM Re: Personnel issues

A good friend works in an open floor plan. She says everybody winds up wearing headphones. So much for collaboration. And yeah, playing footsie is a non-starter.

41Forever Sep 20 2019 12:39 PM Re: Personnel issues

Best working from home video EVER: [YOUTUBE]Mh4f9AYRCZY[/YOUTUBE] I know know which is the best part: -- Toddler in the rolling walker following his sister in to the room. A that point, you know things are going to go south very quickly. -- The wife frantically grabbing the kids to get them out while doing her best to avoid being in the shot. -- the rolling walker getting stuck in the door frame as she tried to pull it out. Kudos to the reporter for keeping his composure.

Ceetar Sep 20 2019 12:41 PM Re: Personnel issues

heh. I don't know if I"ll be doing web conferencing in my new job, probably not, but I should think about what fun things to have behind me I guess?

Lefty Specialist Sep 20 2019 01:48 PM Re: Personnel issues

I have a picture of my son at 6 years old giving the thumbs-down and sticking his tongue out under a Yankee Stadium subway sign, on the credenza behind my desk. It's strategically positioned to be in my Skype calls.

Fman99 Sep 20 2019 08:02 PM Re: Personnel issues

I changed jobs last December. The work environment at my previous job was one of the main reasons I left. It was juvenile, and negative, and filled with people who were socially inept - butting into conversations, loudly going on about nothing, interjecting all the time. So many people desperate to show off what they know or think they know. I'm much happier since changing jobs. It's an older set of employees, overall, and just more of a grown up vibe. At age 46, it's what I'm more about. It's still pretty open but the desks are bigger and the coworkers are more courteous. It's nice.