Comments on: What to Do When You and Your Employee Disagree about Their Performance

By: Sew Fong

Sew Fong — Thu, 26 Oct 2023 06:46:30 +0000

Thanks for reminding me that I am normal. I always retain the judgement/conclusion and forget the facts. My brain is on power savings mode. If this conversation is important enough for me, I need to take the effort to recall the facts. If I cannot remember the facts, I need to be truthful about that as that creates trust.

By: john yates

john yates — Wed, 25 Oct 2023 20:17:14 +0000

In reply to georgewilhelmsen.

Respectfully, yes I know that whenever someone starts a conversation with “Respectfully” it is sometimes through a bias filter. As in, “I see your point but you have a conditioned response.”

So respectively, many organizations structure from the top down. What is in the job description places a person at a disadvantage from the start as each person has dynamic skills and interests. But top down is sometimes a rock wall. They may be underutilized or unqualified to any one description, pigeon holed to fail due to being held back, held to a bar that isn’t within their skill set.

Job descriptions that promote dynamic workflow may contribute to increased job performance and corporate health.

My question is why was the engineer on the phone longer than others?

By: georgewilhelmsen

georgewilhelmsen — Wed, 25 Oct 2023 13:46:15 +0000

First off, congrats on not falling into the trap of I’m perfect and you’re not.

Second, I had the same issue with an employee. I tried being subtle, just posting the time each employee spent on the phone in a month (in this case, it was in excess of 60 hours for this employee. The bar chart was posted without names. It was an engineering organization, so while some communication was warranted, 60 hours was around 3 times warranted in a month.

No effect.

So I documented. And Documented, and DOCUMENTED. This employee went on an improvement plan. And he eventually left our organization.

During this time, I had the opportunity to attend an industry supervisor training session. Part of the session was to get help from your peers on an equipment issue and a personnel issue. I brought this employee’s behavior as my issue.

I got some good suggestions.

At the end of the presentation (and note, I hadn’t use the employee’s name, I made one up), one of the supervisors in the group came up to me and said “Is that “the employees name?” I said no, and asked why he thought it was.

Turns out, this was that same employee’s previous manager, who had left his company when the manager held him accountable. It was the same pattern.

In this case, it was the employee who had the problem, rather than the supervisor. I’m not saying I never had to have a conversation like you – in fact I did several times in my career. Check and adjust. Move on, get better.