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Ask HN: How will you handle a team member who always comes late and leaves early?

16 pointsby meteoralmost 10 years ago

14 comments

fringedgentianalmost 10 years ago
If I am not not their supervisor and they are not specifically impacting my ability to get my own work done, I would mind my own business. Because it is thankfully not any part of my job description to monitor the time my coworkers spend in office.
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jacquesmalmost 10 years ago
That depends on whether he&#x2F;she delivers or not. I&#x27;ve had people working for me that didn&#x27;t seem to care about the clock but as long as they delivered their share (and sometimes more) I never cared too much.<p>What I do have a problem with is people that are there strictly 9-to-5 <i>without</i> delivering. That&#x27;s a much bigger problem. (Obviously, just being there 9-5 is no problem that should be the norm, that people are only there for the time that you actually pay them.)
imauldalmost 10 years ago
This breaks down in to 2 situations:<p>- They are coming in late and leaving early and completing all their assigned tasks. There is no problem.<p>- They are coming in late and leaving early and not completing their tasks. This requires at the very least a discussion about meeting the goals set for this employee and what it means to complete them. If you have a formal discussion with the employee about their goals and how they are not meeting them and they do not improve then you have a case to remove them.<p>I suppose there are some smaller inconveniences that go along with someone not being around but they can be pretty easily resolved.<p>- They should be easily reachable at the very least from 9-5 regardless of the time they actually spend at the office. No one should be stuck waiting on them for an answer to something.<p>- Other employees may doing an unfair share of tasks that crop up during the day. If an unexpected task comes down from on high or from a client or whatever you usually task someone handy with with it. If this employee is never around they will likely never be tasked with something like this. Just remember to keep them in mind for things like this and shoot them an email&#x2F;text to inform them.
10dpdalmost 10 years ago
Two points:<p>1. I&#x27;m assuming that you mean a team member who comes in late and leaves early, but doesn&#x27;t do any additional work outside of the office environment? I know of many people who leave the office early and work from home.<p>2. The key metric here is delivery - I&#x27;d much rather someone who works fewer hours but delivers results over someone who works long hours, but doesn&#x27;t deliver.
spacemanmattalmost 10 years ago
Seems like this question is from the perspective of a 9-5er who doesn&#x27;t have visibility into this person&#x27;s performance or workflow.<p>I look like the in-late-out-early guy part of the time, especially when I&#x27;m working late at home a lot. If you have to wonder, though, your problem is with management, not me.
raoollalmost 10 years ago
If he does what he&#x27;s supposed to do then let him be. If it&#x27;s affecting his work you better have a talk with him.
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rkangelalmost 10 years ago
Approach the problem not in terms of the hours they are working but in terms of the outcomes (whether that&#x27;s not completing tasks, or lack of availability to clients, or something else).<p>For example, if they aren&#x27;t delivering what they should: Have the conversation with them, explaining that they aren&#x27;t completing the work they should be. They need to do something about this and one solution might be to spend more time it.<p>Note that this is also the early stage of what in the UK would be the normal process of dealing with under-performing employees, that might eventually result in termination.
jasonkesteralmost 10 years ago
You left out the important bit: Is he actually working less than 8 hour days (or whatever is the norm in your country), or is he simply working less hours than the rest of the team.<p>Only in the first case do you need to have that difficult talk with him. In the other case, the best plan would be to use him as an example for the rest of the team to emulate. Get your work finished and get out. If the rest of the team isn&#x27;t doing that, it&#x27;ll come back to bite you in terms of long term productivity and team happiness.
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confiscatealmost 10 years ago
correct me if I&#x27;m wrong, but given the way you stated the question, it sounds to me your real concern isn&#x27;t whether she&#x27;s delivering enough work, but rather, whether her hours will give the impression to the rest of the team that &quot;working less is ok&quot; and potentially demotivate others.<p>is this what you&#x27;re asking? if so, might help to clarify that in the question statement
gbalajialmost 10 years ago
If that member survives in the org without getting fired for this behavior, it shows he&#x2F;she is productive and delivers the result. If at all, you worry it may create negative impact on your organisation&#x27;s culture, you may offer better position and make use of member&#x27;s skills for their own as well as organisation&#x27;s growth leading to win-win situation.
TEMPsmalllabalmost 10 years ago
* Root cause the issue, this might be just result of motivation issues.(salary, recognition, stress, office politics, not challenging work and etc.I mean you name it.) * Try to find this was the case all the time or just started recently. * Use the scrum(in a micro management way?), let him answer three questions everyday.<p>Are you his manager or just team member? If you are a team member which means you might also have a problem which appears this way, this guy working hours beside.
xyz124almost 10 years ago
How long has he been in the company? Is he a new member or is there a track record of delivering&#x2F;not delivering stuff?
zhte415almost 10 years ago
I am more interested in how so many people can complete their tasks and manage their time so perfectly everything is done by 6pm and can be picked up at 9am the next day with no hitches.<p>Amazing time managers, with perfect foresight and judgment abilities.
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techjuicealmost 10 years ago
If the person is not working their full hours commitment that they agreed to to when they accepted the job (e.g. 40 hours for a regular full time job ) it is time for them to go. It is illegal (fraud) to bill for a full days work, but not work the full day for the hours billed.<p>If they are skimping on things like working a full day without using their vacation time and clearing leaving early with the boss. Then the person is probably skimping on other important things that will eventually come back to bite the team, themselves, or even worse the company.<p>People that do this are not trustworthy and should be distanced from those that do their full hours and bill their time accurately. Insure the boss knows of the illegal activity so he can work with H.R. to get the person out of there as soon as possible so you can get a more trustworthy replacement. How much work they complete or the quality of it is no substitute for committing fraud.
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