help! staff driving me mad

Savvy_Sue

paulwf wrote: »

Get contracts in place

I agree with this: maybe at the same time as disciplinary and grievance procedures, and explain to staff that you're formalising all your procedures.

paulwf wrote: »

and give the problem member of staff as little hours as possible. Never give them overtime. Give them all the worst jobs, perhaps stick them on washing up and cleaning duty all day every day. Basically do everything you can to make them want to leave without risking being guilty of constructive dismissal.

I think you have a contradiction here. I'd treat all staff with scrupulous fairness. And that means that everyone spends as much time washing up as everyone else. And that every mistake is treated in the same way, regardless of who makes it.

Otherwise, if you have treated one person less fairly than the others, by making their life more unpleasant, you risk constructive dismissal claims.

paulwf wrote: »

You owe it to all the other staff as much as anything. If the business is profitable they can get extra hours and you can afford to give them a pay rise, they will thank you for being tough.

And I agree with this too.

dharm999

ohreally wrote: »

In your opinion.

It only becomes an industry norm when downtrodden employees are denied a voice and are discouraged from becoming organised with a view to improving their working environment thus finding zero hours contracts imposed upon them.

Perhaps as a point of interest others could throw their opinion into the ring - i suspect only parties with a vested interest in denying stability and continuity for their employees will support such an offensive employment practice.

I work in security and zero hours contracts are the norm. Its not ideal but in a low margin, customer dictated industry, where the secuirty hours required can change from one week to the next with no notice, we have to do everything we can to stay in business. And its not a matter of saying to customers we wont work to your terms, because there are lots of security companies that will, and its a case of either having the work, or not having it. Its as simple as that. Anything that could reduce our low margins, less than 1%, just arent affordable, so zero hours contracts are the only way we can maintain flexibility, and stay in business.