losing the plot!

LegacyUser

Hi all,

Sorry, for the long post. I feel the need to explain everything clearly and my reasons for it cos I might sound like a horrible person, but here goes....

I have a little problem in work, I'm not sure how to broach this subject with my immediate manager, and am looking for a little advice.

I am a senior member of a team of about 10. A new person joined our team, and I happily agreed to train her up and be her mentor. I say happily, as I have done this before and always found it to be a rewarding and enjoyable experience for me. I would be quietly confident in my ability to pass on my knowledge.

So the girl started with us back in June. She had been working in the company in a junior role, and was promoted to our team, so she knew the business and all the processes, my job was to train her on our aspect of the business, which in all fairness, is not a million miles away from what she was doing previously.

All her work needed to be double checked prior to approval, that's fine and standard procedure where I work. We set realistic goals and targets for her, we aimed to have her working on her own after 12 weeks (this is a lot, but we wanted to ensure she was completely comfortable and able to manage before we left her off on her own).

23 weeks later and I am still checking all her work. I have tried everything, changing my training style to suit her, going over everything again with her. I track all her errors, and she has a quality target to reach before we can stop checking her work and she's nowhere near. I've tried incentives, being super nice, being super Not Nice(!) and nothing seems to work. She is also very unresponsive to feedback, talks over me when I'm trying advise with excuses, stares at the wall, the floor anywhere but at me.

I've started to snap at her now, and I feel myself resenting her a bit. I've talked to my manager, she says that the girl is just like that, and we have to keep trying with her. But it seems to me that the company is intent on hand holding her all the way. I know when I started in the job I was told if my quality wasn't up to scratch after 12 weeks, it would be so long to me. However, this girl has worked here a while, and had concessions made for her in her previous role also. I feel they are spoon feeding her.

I want to say to my manager that I can no longer mentor her, as I'm at breaking point, one of these days I'll lose the plot with her. I'm not a patient person by nature, but I've invested so much time and effort with her, what little patience I had is gone.

What's it going to sound like if I say to my manager, 'I can't mentor her anymore, or I'll lose the rag with her.' I'm only her mentor not her manager, I can't discipline her in any way, but I know it will all come to a head with me, and I'll end up insulting her, probably in front of the whole team. This I absolutely do not want to do!!

How can I say this to my manager without seeming like a quitter or a b**ch?

Thanks to all for reading so far, sorry it's such a long post!

abbey2000

you cant say that to your manager. there should be clear targets set for the employee when she starts. if 12 weeks is the timeframe then you should be working with her to get her up to speed during this time. if it takes longer than 12 weeks, then that is ok to, as long as she is making progress and is learning.
The fact is that most times the 12 weeks will be enough for the majority of people, but everyone is different and it may take others a bit longer.

Is she making the same mistakes over and over? is there any improvement in her work from week to week?

LegacyUser

That's the problem, there is a complete lack of effort on her part.

It's the same mistakes over and over. We go through her errors everyday together.
When we ask if there's anything going on, if we can help her in any way that we haven't been, she just says no, everything is fine.

I've asked her repeatedly if there's anything I can do for her, does she want me to spend more time with her and she always says no, while staring anywhere but at me.

She's also not a team player, leaving the office before everything's done, not completing the desired amount of work, but that isn't my issue.

I do really want to get out of this, my own work is suffering as a result. I am so apprehensive about saying anything though...

Mrs OBumble

I think you need to find a reason why someone else in the team should mentor her for a while, and suggest that as a solution to your manager. Sharing the load is what teamwork is all about

TBH, if your manager is any good at all, s/he already knows that there is a problem.

If your new colleague has been in the company for more than 12 months (or her probation period, whichever is shorter), she can't just be fcedked out. So on that basis, what your manager is saying is correct, the company has to keep on trying. (Even if they're trying to performance-manager her out, they have to be seen to be doing everything they can to help her.)

Good luck!

Oh- and you don't sound horrible at all. In fact, you've already given almost 100% than would be expected of you.

LegacyUser

JustMary wrote: »

I think you need to find a reason why someone else in the team should mentor her for a while, and suggest that as a solution to your manager. Sharing the load is what teamwork is all about

TBH, if your manager is any good at all, s/he already knows that there is a problem.

If your new colleague has been in the company for more than 12 months (or her probation period, whichever is shorter), she can't just be fcedked out. So on that basis, what your manager is saying is correct, the company has to keep on trying. (Even if they're trying to performance-manager her out, they have to be seen to be doing everything they can to help her.)

Good luck!

Oh- and you don't sound horrible at all. In fact, you've already given almost 100% than would be expected of you.

Thanks to both of you for your replies.

That's exactly what I am going to suggest to my manager, that someone else take over. Clearly, she is not responding to me at all, the only problem is, I doubt anyone will want to take her on, I've heard that she had similar problems in her previous role.

It's the lack of effort on her part that's driving me to breaking point. I am currently performance managing her, which I shouldn't be doing, I think that's my managers job. Going over her statistics with her daily and reviewing her errors is getting us nowhere, as she's making the same errors over and over and I can see the effort isn't being made to improve at all. She has a pretty handy number at the moment, no responsibility as all her work is double checked. She doesn't respond to any incentives we've given to get her to improve.

Anyway, I think I'm done. I just hope I can put the words together in the appropriate way so I don't come across as a moaner or shirking my work.

Thanks again for the advice

LegacyUser

Hi, OP here,

Just wanted to give an update.

I did speak to my manager, as JustMary suggested.

It went a lot better than I thought it would. My manager actually said she was surprised I hadn't asked to be relieved of mentor duties sooner. She was aware of my concerns as I had voiced them before...

She's decided to let the girl work on her own from now on, even though the company will have to take the hit on the errors she's been making, she agreed that they've been spoon feeding her, and it's time to let her take responsibility for her own work.

Thanks to you both for your replies, they were most helpful. I'm so relieved, I can go back to being stressed over my own work and not someone elses!

Jagera

Everything sounds very well organised & official in your workplace, so I would go down that route.

Write up a report, with clear bullet points on her issues and advise that some sort of extraordinary action needs to be taken. Don't highlight it as a disaster just yet (even though she sounds like one)

Put some suggestions down like external training, relocating her to a different mentor, or possible re-evaluation of her duties.

Don't lose the rag, you'll definitely end up looking like the bad person.