How do you solve a problem like your coworker?
(Note: Nobody is named Maria.)
I am currently down to two days a week being long days, as opposed to the entire week itself. Our madcap two weeks of my working the entire business day are over, thankfully. And at least my Mondays were spared of the *whole* day. But, yeah, after that first Saturday I about wanted to gnaw my legs off. I dressed more comfortably last week and skipped wearing the less-comfortable shoes and that made a huge difference, phew. And of course today I wore the less-comfortable shoes, and I am totally feeling it. I do have more shoe inserts so I know how to make them better, at least.
Band started up again on Monday. You'll hear about that soon enough, but my Mondays are back to being long days. And then Tuesdays continue to be a problem, at least potentially through the end of the month. Once we get into October, it should quiet down a bit and I should be able to back off, but the coworker who pops in at the very end of the day, he has a conflict and can't come until later for a couple weeks. Our one room renter meets with a client technically after the close of business, which we allow, but that person was a no-show last night. I was shutting everything down as my coworker arrived and he was like, wait, you're done? There's no reason for me to stay, then! His conflict is right down the street, at least, so it's not like he's coming from out of his way to stop in, and it's a way for him to catch up with a few things in order to be ready to go in the morning.
Anyway. I'm there on Tuesday nights because we cannot leave our closing person alone. Despite being here for five months, she really hasn't caught on to much. And with it still being our busy season--though thankfully tapering off--it's better to have two people available just in case. However, enough people on staff have talked to the owner that...this may not be a problem for much longer. I mean, it will be a problem of another sort, because then I *definitely* would have to work Tuesdays during the late shift, but we wouldn't have this person who's not really doing much for us. In addition to issues with her performance, plus a few personal issues I and my young coworker have had as well, she's also not shown up for shifts recently, as in no call/no show at times. She works another job, and she's had things that she's had to do for that, and as it's her main job, okay, we can understand. She also has health issues and has called off several times because of that. And then, something has come up with her daughter so that now she is unavailable on Mondays. This has all been within the past 3-4 weeks, mind you. She only works 4 days a week! That's, like, seven call-offs out of 16 shifts. When you're that unreliable, and it's our busiest time of year, that's a big problem.
The thing that bothers my boss is that what her daughter is doing, it's related to what our room renters do with their clients. When she didn't show up this past Monday, for the third straight Monday (not counting Labor Day), he texted her to say, hey, what's going on? She said, oh, I told you, I have *this thing* with my daughter. The owner went, no...you didn't tell me about that. I know it got told to the manager, but he's not the big boss. You need to tell the big boss these things. He hired you. He signs your paychecks. You report to him. (Now, granted, things have been especially chaotic these past few weeks, so it is entirely possible this was verbally relayed to him...but if you've been around him a long-enough time, you know that doesn't work very well. Clearly they've been texting each other; all she had to do was text him about it when it first came up and she could have said now, scroll back to 2-3 weeks ago. But that didn't happen. When she hasn't shown up, other people have been the ones to contact her. She is not proactive about the Monday situation.) When he found out this week about what's been going on, the owner started talking to a couple people who were there, and my young coworker said out loud, why isn't she bringing her daughter here? He replied, that's what I'm wondering! So yeah. Way to not support the business for which you work. Especially given that the daughter's situation is taking her to the far side of a not-close town. She may well have her reasons for this, but...still. She is not earning any points with us...any of us.
Which is why our conversation last night was so weird for me. She is having issues with a coworker at her other job, someone who is creating a hostile-enough work environment that she's sought medical attention over it. Uh...if it's that bad, I'd strongly suggest talking with a supervisor or HR or something like that. Get to the root of the issue, especially since this person apparently isn't treating other coworkers this same way, though others may have witnessed that person's bad behavior. I did my best to be diplomatic about it and suggested writing down concerns so that she had them in front of her when she saw her supervisor, and as it turned out, she was supposed to meet with that person today. I told her, at the very least, this could get a record put into the other person's file, so that if anyone else has similar issues, there will be documentation. I'm also hoping this supervisor is good and can couch things a certain way to find out things subtly, not, like, so I hear you hate so-and-so. It's a delicate situation. But here's the part that reminded me that this person is a drama queen, whether she realizes it or not: As we're talking, and she's writing down my suggestions, she's saying, oh, I hope the bad coworker doesn't turn it around on me and say I'm the bad person. ...Yeah, right there is your issue. Because here's the thing: You might just be the bad person. I think she's oblivious to what she does that is...not appropriate for a workplace environment. As she was describing this other person, she could well have been describing me, because I have been super frustrated by my coworker in recent weeks, to the point of doing my best to avoid her and venting to my back-building coworker (who is also getting it from other people like my young coworker, who's the other main person working directly with her). Like, he can tell that I've been flat-out annoyed by the situation. We've known each other for years, he knows my personality, he can tell when something's off. And considering, during the past couple weeks, I've gone to the other building for my breaks between my long shifts, those breaks became rant sessions for good portions of the time. He's shared stuff with the owner--remember, they're related--who then came to me to ask my concerns, and I shared some of them with him. She's not professional and right now I have neither the time nor the energy to show her how to be professional. The first few months? Of course. I expect to have to train someone when they're that new. But now? She should be trained enough on certain things, and she's still not getting it. Just...many of us are ready to be done with the situation. We tried, it didn't work out, we need to move on to Plan B. ...Or we need to come up with a Plan B. Either way. Move along.
I am currently down to two days a week being long days, as opposed to the entire week itself. Our madcap two weeks of my working the entire business day are over, thankfully. And at least my Mondays were spared of the *whole* day. But, yeah, after that first Saturday I about wanted to gnaw my legs off. I dressed more comfortably last week and skipped wearing the less-comfortable shoes and that made a huge difference, phew. And of course today I wore the less-comfortable shoes, and I am totally feeling it. I do have more shoe inserts so I know how to make them better, at least.
Band started up again on Monday. You'll hear about that soon enough, but my Mondays are back to being long days. And then Tuesdays continue to be a problem, at least potentially through the end of the month. Once we get into October, it should quiet down a bit and I should be able to back off, but the coworker who pops in at the very end of the day, he has a conflict and can't come until later for a couple weeks. Our one room renter meets with a client technically after the close of business, which we allow, but that person was a no-show last night. I was shutting everything down as my coworker arrived and he was like, wait, you're done? There's no reason for me to stay, then! His conflict is right down the street, at least, so it's not like he's coming from out of his way to stop in, and it's a way for him to catch up with a few things in order to be ready to go in the morning.
Anyway. I'm there on Tuesday nights because we cannot leave our closing person alone. Despite being here for five months, she really hasn't caught on to much. And with it still being our busy season--though thankfully tapering off--it's better to have two people available just in case. However, enough people on staff have talked to the owner that...this may not be a problem for much longer. I mean, it will be a problem of another sort, because then I *definitely* would have to work Tuesdays during the late shift, but we wouldn't have this person who's not really doing much for us. In addition to issues with her performance, plus a few personal issues I and my young coworker have had as well, she's also not shown up for shifts recently, as in no call/no show at times. She works another job, and she's had things that she's had to do for that, and as it's her main job, okay, we can understand. She also has health issues and has called off several times because of that. And then, something has come up with her daughter so that now she is unavailable on Mondays. This has all been within the past 3-4 weeks, mind you. She only works 4 days a week! That's, like, seven call-offs out of 16 shifts. When you're that unreliable, and it's our busiest time of year, that's a big problem.
The thing that bothers my boss is that what her daughter is doing, it's related to what our room renters do with their clients. When she didn't show up this past Monday, for the third straight Monday (not counting Labor Day), he texted her to say, hey, what's going on? She said, oh, I told you, I have *this thing* with my daughter. The owner went, no...you didn't tell me about that. I know it got told to the manager, but he's not the big boss. You need to tell the big boss these things. He hired you. He signs your paychecks. You report to him. (Now, granted, things have been especially chaotic these past few weeks, so it is entirely possible this was verbally relayed to him...but if you've been around him a long-enough time, you know that doesn't work very well. Clearly they've been texting each other; all she had to do was text him about it when it first came up and she could have said now, scroll back to 2-3 weeks ago. But that didn't happen. When she hasn't shown up, other people have been the ones to contact her. She is not proactive about the Monday situation.) When he found out this week about what's been going on, the owner started talking to a couple people who were there, and my young coworker said out loud, why isn't she bringing her daughter here? He replied, that's what I'm wondering! So yeah. Way to not support the business for which you work. Especially given that the daughter's situation is taking her to the far side of a not-close town. She may well have her reasons for this, but...still. She is not earning any points with us...any of us.
Which is why our conversation last night was so weird for me. She is having issues with a coworker at her other job, someone who is creating a hostile-enough work environment that she's sought medical attention over it. Uh...if it's that bad, I'd strongly suggest talking with a supervisor or HR or something like that. Get to the root of the issue, especially since this person apparently isn't treating other coworkers this same way, though others may have witnessed that person's bad behavior. I did my best to be diplomatic about it and suggested writing down concerns so that she had them in front of her when she saw her supervisor, and as it turned out, she was supposed to meet with that person today. I told her, at the very least, this could get a record put into the other person's file, so that if anyone else has similar issues, there will be documentation. I'm also hoping this supervisor is good and can couch things a certain way to find out things subtly, not, like, so I hear you hate so-and-so. It's a delicate situation. But here's the part that reminded me that this person is a drama queen, whether she realizes it or not: As we're talking, and she's writing down my suggestions, she's saying, oh, I hope the bad coworker doesn't turn it around on me and say I'm the bad person. ...Yeah, right there is your issue. Because here's the thing: You might just be the bad person. I think she's oblivious to what she does that is...not appropriate for a workplace environment. As she was describing this other person, she could well have been describing me, because I have been super frustrated by my coworker in recent weeks, to the point of doing my best to avoid her and venting to my back-building coworker (who is also getting it from other people like my young coworker, who's the other main person working directly with her). Like, he can tell that I've been flat-out annoyed by the situation. We've known each other for years, he knows my personality, he can tell when something's off. And considering, during the past couple weeks, I've gone to the other building for my breaks between my long shifts, those breaks became rant sessions for good portions of the time. He's shared stuff with the owner--remember, they're related--who then came to me to ask my concerns, and I shared some of them with him. She's not professional and right now I have neither the time nor the energy to show her how to be professional. The first few months? Of course. I expect to have to train someone when they're that new. But now? She should be trained enough on certain things, and she's still not getting it. Just...many of us are ready to be done with the situation. We tried, it didn't work out, we need to move on to Plan B. ...Or we need to come up with a Plan B. Either way. Move along.