#@$%!!!!!!!!!!

[mascot]

Can I say dammit here?

My "problem child" at work (I'm her supervisor) has got to be the most difficult person to deal with...ever!  There's a process we need to follow, I've sent out an email to all involved with a template to follow.  After 4 months and a dozen or so requests, she has followed the template ONCE and every other time I have to fill in what she left out, or make corrections.  ONE TIME!

Today, she sent another request, but she left out one tiny step in the process.  So I told her, "FYI - don't forget to click the [GO] button before you send the link" because it didn't complete the process when she sent it.  One simple little FYI...

FIFTEEN minutes and FOURTEEN email messages later she is STILL arguing with me that she did it correctly, even though she sees the wrong results.  If she clicked the [GO] button before her request it would have been done correctly. 

Really, can I say dammit here??

[Kittyzee]

IMO you can....and if you are her supervisor, I think I would have a face to face chat with the problem child.  14 email messages is a far shot from being appropriate, and a waste of time to boot, especially in a work setting.  She needs to suck it up, straighten up and fly right--admit she made a mistake and learn from it, or I'm sure there are plenty of people who know perfectly well how to follow directions who are looking for a job.   

[mascot]

A little history about this woman....she worked her before and got let go for the same thing: failure to follow directions, non-compliance.  They hired her back for some reason and she and I used to be friends, but she has fought me on just about everything.  I've finally gotten my bosses to see how difficult she is, and it's getting to the point where my boss is getting tired of her.  We have bi-weekly meetings and for the last three months every meeting topic was instigated to put into writing the rules that she has not followed.

Now you're asking, why do they keep this woman aboard, especially since she has a reputation for not respecting authority and doing things her way despite what she gets told to do?  I dunno.  Really.  The only thing I can come up with is that the job takes a bit of training, and since we are almost always on crunch time throughout the year they don't know if they can find a qualified applicant, let alone want to have a new employee who will take months to get up to speed.  Then again, you're absolutely right, 15 minutes of my time wasted because she couldn't simply say "okay" is not condusive to a productive environment.

Everything with her is at least 6 emails back and forth, once the boss's boss even got involved and flat out told her, "Michael told you to do it this way, he is your senior editor and I expect you to follow his direction".  Finally...she followed my direction.  Would you believe that time she was listing a panel as being "Red" when it was clearly gray on the 2 dozen product images I presented her with?!?  She got it in her head that the component was red because she does not know how to properly read the manufacturer's catalog. 

When she gets her stubborn mind made up you cannot convince her the sky is blue, she will fight you tooth and nail until you finally get so tired of it that you say, "fine, it's green" and walk away.

Last review I was fair but honest, she went to the boss and said, "I don't feel like I'm appreciated".   I told my boss, "how can I appreciate someone who fights me all the time?".

[Brian]

Michael,
I agree with KittyZee 100%.  One way to look at this is that if you are spending "X" number of your hours correcting her mistakes, giving her the same direction over and over, attending meetings to spell out how to do her job...take all that time and compare it with how long it would take to train someone else and get them up to speed.  You may find that you'll be severely overworked for the next few months while you're doing your job, her job and then interviewing/hiring/training, but it may very well be worth it in the long run.

Then there is always the Performance Improvement Plan.  Sit her down, tell her that this is the procedure to be followed by the letter, and it is done this way for a reason and if she fails to meet the expectations of her position, she will receive a written warning, then the next violation she will be terminated.  Remember to document, document and document, but it sounds like you're doing that already!

[mascot]

Unfortunately I don't have any authority to take action, just complain to my boss.  But she is on a PIP now, funny you mention that, it's been a long time coming.  There was a point in time where my boss didn't want to hear it from me, and so I went to her boss and told her.  Finally my boss apologized and decided to take my complaints more seriously.  My problem child did get a little demotion last review period and was put on the PIP.

I think the real problem here is that she apparently got a pretty big inheritance and made a comment one day that she "didn't have to work".  I told her a few months ago, "I'm happy for you that yo don't need to work, but I need you to start acting like you do".  She was better for about a week, then back to her old ways.

We'll see, but it just doesn't seem to end with her.

[Kittyzee]

Seriously Michael, I know you don't have the authority to get rid of her, but if she worked for me--she'd be history.  I know that sounds harsh, but her record speaks for itself. 

AND I totally agree with Brian 100% also...documentation is imperative, but you've probably already been doing that. 

Another thing, this may be a specialized job that takes some training--you'd be surprised how quickly some people can take to a job.  When you get rid of someone like her and teach someone else the right way to do things from the start, you're not going to believe how easy your job could be from now on.  Hopefully you have some pull with the boss, get her out of there since she doesn't really need the job, and let someone else "shine"!   

[Jerry]

You got fine advice from LuAnn and Brian.  You can say %$*%$@#$ all you want.

[mascot]

Oh believe me, you guys are preaching to the choir on this one.  This woman made me so angry one week that I actually called HR and asked them if I request to be removed from my current position would there be repurcussions.  I think when I finally repeated that to our director (whom I've known for almost 20 years) I think they started to listen. 

If it were up to me she'd have been gone 3 years ago, but the decisions belong to those above me.  Hopefully they will get her to start complying or ask her say goodbye.  Let someone who WANTS to work have her job!

[Esther]

You do know that nothing motivates a person to do a good job like needing a job. Also I'd ask her if she'd rather be right or keep her job. But darn it all, you can't fire her anyway. Hang in there. Sometimes the people in authority don't see their nose in front of their face. When they finally get it, maybe they'll let her go.

By the way, you can't say dammit on this forum. 

[mascot]

LOL @ Esther!

[Johns]

Blind,

During my career I supervised many employees, and had just about every employee problem imaginable crop up*.  I had the advantage of hiring all my own employees and as long as I documented every problem, I had the authority to terminate them, a last resort that I always hated to invoke, but as the years went by, I found that problem employees never change.  I had to terminate people whom I really liked, but could not depend upon to have goals congruent with the company. 

I really sympathize with your problem because I cannot imagine being responsible for an employee without hire/fire authority, and therein lies the crux of your problem. I have no idea what your relationship with your superiors is, but given the situation you describe, if I were faced with the problem you describe, I would have a face to face with my boss and tell he or she that I can no longer deal with an employee that fights me at every turn and that I want them to tell me what they propose to do to solve the problem and be adamant that the problem be solved.

I'm pulling for you in this and I strongly suspect that you will be successful.


*One example: As treasurer of a savings and loan, I ran the finance/accounting function.  All of my employees were college graduate accountants and while there was specific separation of duties, there were still areas where each had to work closely with others as a team.  One day I noticed that two of my female employees were not talking to each other.  Neither would volunteer any information as to the nature of the problem between them.  Gleaning information from other female employees I discovered the reason for the silent treatment: Each was jealous of the other over a gift of a "beanie baby" (from a fast food restaurant) from a male programmer in the IT department.  Now the programmer was married.  So were both of the employees in my department. You should now begin to appreciate the pure idiocy of the situation.  Armed with the crux of the dispute, I was able to resolve it by suggesting we bring the spouses into the discussion.  Problem solved.

[Jerry]

Great idea Johns.  They sure quit fast over that threat!

Esther, yes we can say Dammit, but you can't!

[mascot]

Believe me, everything that has been suggested has been done.

I think things started to turn around when, a couple months ago, I told my boss and my director that I was so frustrated with problem child that I didn't want to be a supervisor anymore.  They want me to be the supervisor of the product, so it was a shock to them to hear it but I think it woke them up.  Unfortunately, this problem child is one of those who whines and cries foul, and the company always cowers down to people like that out of fear of a lawsuit.

We had a woman years ago that coughed and hacked horribly and very disgustingly so (imagine the worst sounding cough: phlegm, mucous, solids, liquids, gases, things that you didn't know existed)  Everyone complained and she kept getting her desk moved.  She went to HR and WE were told that we could get terminated if we say something about it!

No, sometimes you just have to get stuff off your chest and that's kinda what I needed to do.  I wish I could follow the advice given here and be met with positive results, but this has been going on for a long time, and I have tried everything I can think of to the point where they almost saw me as a problem because I complained too much.  But then I reminded my boss that she is the one who told me to keep her informed, I think as a new boss she just wasn't ready to have to deal with it.  She seems to respect me tons more now, and even takes my suggestions to heart, so we'll see...

thanks....

[Mikey]

Then there is always the Performance Improvement Plan.

Thank GOD I'm retired!  The PIP sure brings back memories.....bad memories....  Thank GOD I no longer have to deal with troublesome employees and their union reps.  If you think you have it bad Michael, you also should thank God that you don't work in the government sector where the troublesome employee not only has union reps supporting their bad behavior but the employee has civil service protection which makes terminating a substandard employee a major pain.....  It can be done, but most supervisors cave.....

[mascot]

Oh, I believe you, Mikey.  I was in the USAF, and believe me...I saw and heard stuff that would make you cringe.  Well, maybe not you, but still....

It's funny, we had a guy who was doing something that was very immature, and I was the target of his actions.  Yet I was told that if I complained to HR I would be labelled as an instigator!  True story! 

Office politics...following real politics to the letter of the law!

[Jonna]

Oh my, I agree with Mikey.  There is nothing quite like a bad employee who has permanent civil service rank and doesn't give a sh*t what any supervisor says because he/she knows there is little you can do.  Many years I spent as a Lt. with more than enough of these folks to ever want to be a boss again.  Well, I don't want to be an employee either.  Heh!   We used to have these management meetings and the real problem children would be traded around like bad luck cards.  Anyone newly promoted would get the worst of them. 

When I first made Sergeant I got put on midnights with this guy who was famous.  He became my civil service poster boy.  I think about him whenever the bureaucracy of anywhere starts getting to me, the man was the perfect civil servant.  I was a new sgt. so I was all spit and polish and thought I could conquer anyone.  Serge brought me right down to reality.  I would explain the policy to him, he would agree with me completely and then he would go out and continue to do everything exactly the way he had always done it for 20 years.  I'd call him in again and tell him we had these policies, new and improved and mandatory by the way.  He would listen and nod his head and say 'of course Sarge, that's how I'll do it' and then go out and continue with his usual.  When I called him on the fact that I'd already told him to change how he did things he'd say "Oh! Is that what you meant? I didn't understand you. Of course, I'll do it that way now".  But... he NEVER changed anything about how he worked.  It was hopeless, the man never argued, he never refused, he never said anything but 'of course' and 'oh, I didn't understand'.   It was incredibly frustrating and yet I learned a lot about management trying to work with him.  I finally realized that because he would never argue or disagree he was almost impossible to write up for anything.   I finally just told him that I was going to write him up for his infractions and send the write up downtown but that I had no real expectations of him or of results from the writeups.  He gave me a big smile, he'd conquered another one.  I learned a lot from old Serge, he was still working at the same station on the same shift when I retired.  No one was ever able to change one iota about how he did things.  He was the real brick wall.  Mr. Civil Service.

[MikeW]

So sorry Mike -
I have the exact problem, but in reverse.

We, like most companies, have this huge book of rules - and I have this employee that knows all the rules and follows them to a T.  Now we work in the global HQ of the third largest engineering firm on the planet, so the 'rules', never enforced at the best of times, are more of a hint then a mandate. The Executive Chairman of the Board is treated a little differently than the supervisor of janitorial services - but this woman just wont get it. Everytime I point out what went wrong, she can quote chapter and verse of the rule book that she followed - and she is always correct - and the client is always unhappy. Yeeesh!
I HATE rules and scripts. Anyone who has ever had a computer issue and had their phone call answered in India will have to agree,

Cheers,

Mike

[Jerry]

dirty Harry lives!

[mascot]

Jonna - That is EXACTLY like this woman is, when you talk to her she will always say she understands, she will say she doesn't have a problem following directions, then she goes out and does whatever she feels like doing.  When I was given the additional role of supervising this product (I already had three others) this woman tried to undermine me at every opportunity.  After a couple long, stressful years, we are actually going the direction I have been suggesting since the beginning.  This woman, she has been part of the reason it's taken so long, she was given carte blanc a couple or so years ago because it was a new product for us and she swindled everyone into thinking she had lots of product knowledge and experience.  I saw right through her BS because she would contradict me on things that I knew.  Now people are seeing that she's not as knowledgable as they thought.

Sidestepping this issues, but along the same lines, I was supposed to supervise this project about 5 years ago, but the manager at that time had zero experience and even less knowledge, but he wasn't open to suggestion.  He got so tired of my ideas and suggestions that he eventually pulled me off the project.  Kinda funny, seeing as how I was a long time employee with very high productivity and much more product knowledge than he had.  He put the slowest guy in the department on the new project and put me on another project that has been a money pit from the get go and was slowly being phased out.  He did this all because he wanted full ownership of the new project.  So here we are, five years later and basically a majority of my recommendations from back then have been implemented, and to this day they are still slowly going the direction I have suggested for years.  When I told my current boss about one issue in particular and told her that I had made that suggestion years ago and was pulled off the project, she was surprised and said she didn't know that.  I told her a few more things that have occured and you could almost see the expression on her face through the phone line, it was a real eye opener for her.  I think that's when she started to realize that maybe I did have some pretty damn (sorry Esther) good ideas.

But, back to the problem child, this is why she's such a problem today, nobody wanted to deal with her and her boss back then gave her all this luxury to do as she wanted because he was useless and always pawned responsibilities on whomever would take them.  I provided him with a multipage report and he passed it on to his boss as if he compiled the data, and took all the kudos for it without ever mentioning that I put it all together.  So the problems we have today are step children to the poor management of the past.  We've gotten rid of the bad elements, but the road has been long and hard to turn this around.  I hope we get there before I start losing my hair! (either from stress or simply pulling it all out!  )

[mascot]

Yep, Mike, I have to agree.  I constantly remind everyone at our meetings: "There is only one rule that applies 100% of the time - and that is that there is no rule that applies 100% of the time".  The people who have been there the longest don't debate me on this because we've seen it all and know that to be virtually true.  That, of course, is tongue-in-cheek, but still it gets the point across that you have to weigh the situation against the results and determine the best route to take.  You can't always rely on the rules.  I've presented things to the guy who did our programming for our authoring system that even he didn't know were possible ... and he's very good at what he does.  It's just that sometimes rules were written for a desired result and you can often find that to get a different, sometimes better result, you change one little thing and viola! There you have it. 

Our problem child is almost like you say as well.  We mentioned in the meeting not to list parts that were under a buck, standard hardware - nuts, bolts, washers, etc.  So she listed everything that was $1.01 or more.  When we told her that we said don't list standard hardware, she comes back with, "but you said under a dollar, these are a dollar thirty-five".  I wonder if she felt my hands tighten around her neck through the phone line?  I guess it's a good thing I work from home and not in the office ... I can cuss without anyone hearing me except Rocky! 

[Desertponder]

I feel your pain.
We had a gal working in our dept. a couple of years ago that was like that. She drove the rest of us nuts.
She did things her way and that was that. My boss was so frustrated because he also could not terminate her. The only one that can terminate is our GM. I was frustrated because I would often have to carry most of her workload because she wouldn't do it correctly. Then when my boss would tell her she had to do something over because it was incorrect she would hit the roof and yell at him. He got to the point that he refused to deal with her. It took months to get her terminated because HR had to have documentation and other "good reasons" before they would approve it.

[lorraine1960]

GET RID OF HER AND FIND SOMEONE ELSE...LIFE IS TOO SHORT ......

[Bartman]

I'm curious as to how old this problem child is?

I find the 18 to 29 year range seems to have this idea that they are entitled to something from the moment they step through the door their first day.  I call them the "entitled generation".  None of them really want to work to being entitled, just have it it.

I sound like a stuck record most of the time.  I repeat procedures daily to my entitled guys.  Usually falls on deaf ears although after 3 years I have managed to change a couple small behaviour patterns in then.  By the time I retire I might have them ready to take over...

Bart

[mascot]

Believe it or not, she's older than me: about 52!! 

Our latest debate was yesterday.  It's stupid crap, and I finally told her "L-O-O-K with your eyes, I don't care what the web sites say".  She's so damn ignorant sometimes, she'll fight for the sake of arguing and when it comes to brass tacks it's not even worthy of the argument, but we all have learned that she tries to win these little battles of wit so that she can build up to something bigger.

I once caught her telling me that so-and-so wanted something done a certain way, and I was shocked because it didn't seem like a good idea.  So I told her okay, then tried to call so-and-so.  He didn't answer but called me back a few minutes later and basically told me that problem child was just there trying to sell HIM on the idea, claiming that I was the one who wanted it that way!

She spent the first few days after she got hired ripping her boss a new one while he was out on vacation (not that he didn't deserve it) but then when he returned her nose got really brown and she told him she was really looking forward to being a part of his team and that she knew he was a good team leader.  She was so full of it her eyes became brown.

So ask me why she still works there.  g'head.

I dunno.  I really don't. 

[Mikey]

So ask me why she still works there.  g'head.

There are many possibilities as to why she still works there..... 

Back in the late 70's my partner and I had days off of Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.  We had only 3 or 4 years on the job which was not enough time to get weekends off.  We talked to our sergeant and asked if we could get part of a weekend off or at least Friday and we were denied because we didn't have enough seniority.

A few nights later we were on patrol at about 1AM and we were driving along and saw a black and white patrol car parked off in the distance next to a warehouse.  We thought it was probably our sister unit parked there and figured they were probably sleeping.  We turned off our headlights and drove around behind the warehouse and quietly pulled up alongside the parked police unit.  To our surprise it was our sergeant sitting in the driver's seat with his window rolled down and smoking a cigar.  He had a very surprised look on his face.  As we greeted him the head of a woman suddenly popped up from the area of his lap.  We recognized her as being someone we had seen before going on ride-a-longs with the sergeant. 

Without batting an eye the sergeant immediately told us he had been thinking about our days off request and he was going to give us Sunday, Monday, Tuesday as days off.  We thanked him and drove off.  We were laughing hysterically and I commented that I wondered what we had to catch the sergeant doing in order to get the full weekend off.......

Those skeletons in the closet can come in handy.......

[mascot]

Well, Mikey, I really don't think she knows your old Seargent, so that's probably not why! 

Funny how things work out like that.  I held something over a bosses head once and got what I wanted.  Actually, I just quit the job, but it was when I was working at a mens shoe store where they wear referee uniforms (not sure if I can say the store because of what I'm about to share).

I caught a couple employees smoking pot and told them if I caught them again they'd be fired.  My boss (who was a manager trainer - that's right, I was in training to become a store manager) told me that he told them it was okay to smoke pot if the gate was down.  I didn't care, I had my rules and we argued.  He told me to take the night off, I took my life off and handed him the keys.

A couple weeks later I told him what I wanted for a "severance package", missed vacation, etc., and it came out to about $900.  He told me to call the district manager and I did.  I told the district manager, "I don't think you know what's going on in your trainer's store, do you?".  He said, "I know that Joe abides by 98% of the store and company policies.  You don't knwo what you're talking about , you're just breathing hot air".  I told him, "I'm not talking about store or company policies, I'm talking about state and federal laws.  Now, do you want to call Joe back and see if he thinks I know what I'm talking about??".

Twenty minutes later, Joe called and told me that my check for $900 was going Fed Ex and I'd receive it on Monday or Tuesday.  He also told me that he learned a lot from me and that he was going to make some changes, and thanked me.  They only owed me about a couple hundred bucks, but I figured what I knew could have cost them a lot more so they were going to pay for it.

[Jonna]

Mikey, your story rang many bells for me, I've heard a lot of similar ones       In some of them the head popping up was wearing a uniform too and they had REALLY good days off.