Guildance on managing employee

Southend1

DKLS wrote: »

You can easily combine the two, starting with ensuring the employee understands what is expected of them, and the get your finger out and keep your head down and dont rock the boat speech.

No business can afford to carry dead wood, unless its the Public sector.

TBH at the moment, to put it bluntly, the OP is the dead wood more than the new employee. i.e. lacking the correct skills to manage employees effectively. I'm amazed how many posters here advocate management by hiring and firing. I'm not saying carrying "dead wood" is a good idea but this is not a good long term way to run a business and OP and his company would benefit immensely from some management training. This employee may or may not work out but he at least should be given the chance, otherwise the business may get into an endless cycle of hiring and firing when the real problem is insufficient management skills.

Southend1

Mojisola wrote: »

You've got other staff who are presumably working well so your management skills can't be as bad as some are suggesting!

Some people can look good on paper and at interview. If a new member of staff has managed to cause so many problems in such a short time, I wouldn't keep him/her on. You need a good team who will work together - one person who doesn't fit in can cause a lot of problems.

Several posters mention people "fitting in" - could one of you clarify this? Does it for example extend to not hiring women because they don't fit in with the male team members? Diversity can be a great source of strength and as a business grows it is good to have a variety of people on board - clients may identify better e.g. with a quiet, soft spoken person than someone brash and noisy. Poor managers often fall into the trap of like hiring like and pushing out people who don't fit their idea of a typical employee - this is often because their own skills aren't adequate to manage a range of styles and personality types.

Mojisola

Southend1 wrote: »

Several posters mention people "fitting in" - could one of you clarify this? Does it for example extend to not hiring women because they don't fit in with the male team members? Diversity can be a great source of strength and as a business grows it is good to have a variety of people on board - clients may identify better e.g. with a quiet, soft spoken person than someone brash and noisy. Poor managers often fall into the trap of like hiring like and pushing out people who don't fit their idea of a typical employee - this is often because their own skills aren't adequate to manage a range of styles and personality types.

"Fitting in" does not mean "all the same"!

Part of the skill of setting up a team is to select people who have strengths that complement each other so that the team has a good range of potential - one person may shine in an area where others don't - the team then becomes "greater than the sum of its parts".

It's important for a manager to be able to recognise when he/she has made a mistake. Insisting on keeping a disruptive employee on because you don't want to admit you made the wrong selection at interview is poor management.

I also see a difference between the way a manager in a big company may handle things to how an employer/manager may do so. If it's my money on the line, I'm going to want people who don't need a great deal of managing - I'm paying them money to do the job, if they can't do that without having me at their side sorting out problems all the time, I wouldn't want them to stay.

It would be a different issue if the problems were life-related rather than personality. I've let people coast at work while they sorted out relationship issues and health problems because I knew that they were good people who would work well once they were back on track.

Very often problems like cobbingstones describes is a case of a round peg in a square hole - given another position in another company, they might fit in and do well which would be better for them.

Southend1

Mojisola wrote: »

"Fitting in" does not mean "all the same"!

Part of the skill of setting up a team is to select people who have strengths that complement each other so that the team has a good range of potential - one person may shine in an area where others don't - the team then becomes "greater than the sum of its parts".

It's important for a manager to be able to recognise when he/she has made a mistake. Insisting on keeping a disruptive employee on because you don't want to admit you made the wrong selection at interview is poor management.

I also see a difference between the way a manager in a big company may handle things to how an employer/manager may do so. If it's my money on the line, I'm going to want people who don't need a great deal of managing - I'm paying them money to do the job, if they can't do that without having me at their side sorting out problems all the time, I wouldn't want them to stay.

It would be a different issue if the problems were life-related rather than personality. I've let people coast at work while they sorted out relationship issues and health problems because I knew that they were good people who would work well once they were back on track.

Very often problems like cobbingstones describes is a case of a round peg in a square hole - given another position in another company, they might fit in and do well which would be better for them.

Point taken, however OP says this person showed potential at interview. I can't imagine this has disappeared overnight. It strikes me as much more likely to be an issue of inadequate induction and training than anything else in this case.

Good managers recognise when they make a mistake, as you say, so OP needs to consider exactly what the mistake is here, and not just dismiss without proper consideration as to what has gone wrong. Otherwise this will happen again. And again.

Lagoon

Southend1 wrote: »

Point taken, however OP says this person showed potential at interview. I can't imagine this has disappeared overnight. It strikes me as much more likely to be an issue of inadequate induction and training than anything else in this case.

Good managers recognise when they make a mistake, as you say, so OP needs to consider exactly what the mistake is here, and not just dismiss without proper consideration as to what has gone wrong. Otherwise this will happen again. And again.

In the example I used earlier, the person 'showed potential'. In fact, I was involved in the interview/testing process and agreed that they'd be perfect for the job.

As soon as they felt 'settled' after about a week, they changed. They quickly picked up on the roles and personalities of others, and worked out how to use those to their advantage. Suddenly, everyone wanted rid (though it was company policy to give people as many chances as possible, so they stuck around for about a year in the end before management could take it no more!)

The fact is that potential doesn't translate to being the 'right fit'. Someone can show an interest, a passion and knowledge that can be built on, and look perfect for the role through the interview process. Only once they're in the role do you see their 'true colours'.

I agree that if the OP doesn't feel confident then they definitely have training, but on this occasion I think it's sensible to remove the person hired by mistake before they do more damage and are harder to get rid of.

DKLS

Southend1 wrote: »

TBH at the moment, to put it bluntly, the OP is the dead wood more than the new employee. i.e. lacking the correct skills to manage employees effectively. I'm amazed how many posters here advocate management by hiring and firing. I'm not saying carrying "dead wood" is a good idea but this is not a good long term way to run a business and OP and his company would benefit immensely from some management training. This employee may or may not work out but he at least should be given the chance, otherwise the business may get into an endless cycle of hiring and firing when the real problem is insufficient management skills.

I disagree about who is the deadwood, this employee is lying, incurring customer complaints and is upsetting the status quo of the existing team.

If this is only 5 weeks into a new role my instinct would be saying get shot asap, but personally I would give him a chance to change things round.

ILW

OP says they are self employed, so I would assume they own the company.

Funky_Bold_Ribena

Southend1 wrote: »

Point taken, however OP says this person showed potential at interview. I can't imagine this has disappeared overnight. It strikes me as much more likely to be an issue of inadequate induction and training than anything else in this case.

Good managers recognise when they make a mistake, as you say, so OP needs to consider exactly what the mistake is here, and not just dismiss without proper consideration as to what has gone wrong. Otherwise this will happen again. And again.

Inadequate instruction and training? What training do you need to:
Not lie?
Not upset your customers?
Not upset your colleagues?

If they really need that much instruction and training then the business probably can't support them anyway...if you have to keep them under observation to work out whether they are telling the truth, and not let them near customers or colleagues then what's the point in them being there in the first place?

Completely ridiculous to pu.ssyfoot around this issue; they are clearly not working out for varying reasons. As you say - the OP made a mistake in hiring them so it's time to step up to the plate and rectify this mistake asap.

ILW

I would suspect that Southend1 is public sector or similar. Different priorities.

Funky_Bold_Ribena

ILW wrote: »

I would suspect that Southend1 is public sector or similar. Different priorities.

Yeah 'similar'. It's a good way of putting it