when did honesty stop being the 'best policy'

opalsphere

When did people stop telling others that they have failed in the workplace? No one ever seems to express disappointment any more, instead smiling and saying all is fine but not contacting the person again.

I have just taken on a new assistant for the summer. I felt that she needed a chance as she is finding it hard to get work after being away and is over 50. However, she is nowhere near as good as her cv says she is. (I didn't check references) It turns out that she isn't familiar with a basic microsoft office package (2007 hardly hi tech any more) she does one thing at a time and takes ages sending an email. Taking 'time to think things through to herself' (her words) before doing any task no matter how small. I have told her that she is going to have to react a lot quicker and multi task if she wants to secure a 'real' job anywhere, which she didn't take kindly to.

I was horrified at how little she has actually achieved when I asked her for feedback before she left. I didn't say anything, just said that she could finish the work next week. Is it no longer the 'done thing' to actually tell someone that they are not pulling their weight or doing things incorrectly? I know for example, if I gave a presentation and it wasn't what the organisation had wanted, I would hope that they would tell me so that I would change it next time.

My question is, when did people stop telling others if they were not performing at work the way it is expected? Would you say anything to her?

sambuka41

opalsphere wrote: »

she is nowhere near as good as her cv says she is. (I didn't check references)

You should have checked her references, there, that was me telling you about how you're not preforming!! :p:D Seriously though, the refs may have been able to tell you about her level of proficiency with computers.

opalsphere wrote: »

I have told her that she is going to have to react a lot quicker and multi task if she wants to secure a 'real' job anywhere, which she didn't take kindly to.

I was horrified at how little she has actually achieved when I asked her for feedback before she left. I didn't say anything, just said that she could finish the work next week.
My question is, when did people stop telling others if they were not performing at work the way it is expected? Would you say anything to her?

But given the opportunity to comment on her productivity you didn't, you said she could finish it next week, how is she supposed to know any different if you don't say it? It would be perfectly acceptable to say to her that you needed it before next week (obviously that would have needed to be said at the start of said project), give her a time limit to work to, not vague jibes about being quicker.

You kind of insulted her by making comments about her ability to secure permanent work. I wouldn't have liked that either, your only concern is the work she is doing for you.

needadvi

Where's the whip? Faster.....damn it.....FASTER. :L

Irish_Elect_Eng

As with all things in life there is an infinite variety in peoples capability and their perception of their own capability.

• You can have one person producing 10% of the work that you expect and being 100% happy that they are performing well.
  
• You can have another person producing 200% of the work that you expect and being 100% sure that they are about to be fired.

Folk are strange.

The hardest part of being a manager is "actually" managing people, and probably the hardest part of that is motivating people to perform to their strengths.

A good policy is: (Taken from the Classic "The One Minute Manager")

(1) Set Clear Goals.
(You cant expect anyone to work well if they don't know where the goal is, how can they produce good work if they do not know what good work looks like in your eyes. What would a game of soccer look like without a goal:-))

(2) Quickly. Praise the Work Completed.
(Try to find people doing things right, praise that which is done well, early or done without asking)

(3) Quickly. Reprimand Mistakes.
(Let people know what was wrong with their actions, Never criticize the persons character, its pointless they cannot change their character only their actions)

Stheno

Agree with Irish completely.

I'd add in another, be aware of challenges people may be facing. In my last job I used office 2003, I spent more than a month learning office 2010 which is similiar to 2007 with the ribbons etc when I started my current role. They are loads of hints and tips for office 2007 online microsoft have pages about it.

Ask her if she is not familiar with it, and point her to the tutorials.

Give deadlines for work.
Manage against those deadlines.
Encourage her to speak up if she is having GENUINE difficulty achieving those deadlines and work with her if you can.

Mrs OBumble

Stheno wrote: »

In my last job I used office 2003, I spent more than a month learning office 2010 which is similiar to 2007 with the ribbons etc when I started my current role. They are loads of hints and tips for office 2007 online microsoft have pages about it.

I've been temping - gotta make employers think I know how to use whatever software they're running, even if I've never seen it before.

In the gig-before-last, I was confronted with 2007 ribbons for the first time, and then 2010 a few weeks later when they upgraded the PC. Had to do some pretty quick reading of help files for certain features .. it certainly didn't take me a month to come up to full productivity, 'cos I only learned the bits I needed, as I needed them. The current job is high level and a bit more relaxed - I've had the time to watch the video courses and learn new features. This was nice, but not essential to productivity.

OP, you should've checked refs. Verbally (written refs are worthless), including "would you hire X again" and "is there anything else you think I should know".

Also, if you're giving someone a chance, always do it on a limited term basis, IMHO. But if she's lied on her CV ... don't just let her finish, actually fire her.

You're right, feedback should be given. I don't know if it's a particularly Irish thing not to do so though... eg would you give it if she was your friend's mammy? ... lots of that sort of hiring happens here.

amen

In my last job I used office 2003, I spent more than a month learning office 2010 which is similiar to 2007 with the ribbons etc when I started my current role

A month to learn office 2010 ? I assume then that you now know what every menu item does, you can create temples, windows macros etc?

Stheno

amen wrote: »

A month to learn office 2010 ? I assume then that you now know what every menu item does, you can create temples, windows macros etc?

Just to clarify I don't use office 9-5, so as I came across differences I had to deal with them.

Some of the stuff I was doing was conditional formatting, animation in powerpoint, calendar function in excel etc.

The regular word/excel functions I was fine with the less used functions I'd to look up Over the course of a month I covered pretty much everything I'd deal with.

However I know plenty of companies who had to put an entire training plan in place for their staff after they migrated from 2003.

watna

amen wrote: »

A month to learn office 2010 ? I assume then that you now know what every menu item does, you can create temples, windows macros etc?

I think a month isn't unrealistic for learning what you need in that particular job. I used Word a lot (2007) and would consider myself at quite a high level. If you use it for certain things there's no bother learning it. I used to be an executive assistant and when I started my last EA job I was on 2007 having never used it before, it didn't take me long to pick up what i needed to do my job (Outlook/word processing/fairly simple budgeting spreadsheet pivot tables etc).

OP, having been an EA my advice is to be honest. In one of my jobs my manager wasn't happy with some of my work (she was actually being completely unreasonable, but that's another story). I came across emails she had sent bitching about me that she had deleted but not from her deleted items (she asked me to look for something in there for her and I found them). Once I found that my confidence was rock bottom and our relationship never recovered. I could always sense she was annoyed but she never said anything, some of the things I thought she was annoyed about were actually out of my control and had she discussed them with me she would have understood. It was a horrible atmosphere and situation and my confidence took a good knocking after that. i left not long after and it took until my first performance review in my new job (my old boss never gave them to me, the bosses EA always has lowest priority!) to feel better again.

If you have an assistant, communication is key. The relationship between you is the most important thing. Yeah, maybe she is not up to the job but how is she to know that she needs to improve or how to do it. That's especially true if she is over 50 and doesn't have much experience as an EA.

PCPhoto

opalsphere wrote: »

When did people stop telling others that they have failed in the workplace? No one ever seems to express disappointment any more, instead smiling and saying all is fine but not contacting the person again.

ok - did she fail in the workplace or did she fail your expectations ?

opalsphere wrote: »

I have just taken on a new assistant for the summer. I felt that she needed a chance as she is finding it hard to get work after being away and is over 50. However, she is nowhere near as good as her cv says she is. (I didn't check references) It turns out that she isn't familiar with a basic microsoft office package (2007 hardly hi tech any more) she does one thing at a time and takes ages sending an email. Taking 'time to think things through to herself' (her words) before doing any task no matter how small. I have told her that she is going to have to react a lot quicker and multi task if she wants to secure a 'real' job anywhere, which she didn't take kindly to.

Firstly - she's over 50, has she been working all her life, or out of the workplace for 15,20,30years, maybe she has never worked with office 2007 - I have done and passed courses which say I'm proficient in microsoft office but I haven't really used "office" in 10-15years, I occasionally use word but generally I copy and paste from the previous invoice that I sent and adjust the dates etc....I'm 32years old !!

as for telling her she needs to buck up and work better if she wants a REAL job ....no-one likes to be insulted

opalsphere wrote: »

I was horrified at how little she has actually achieved when I asked her for feedback before she left. I didn't say anything, just said that she could finish the work next week. Is it no longer the 'done thing' to actually tell someone that they are not pulling their weight or doing things incorrectly? I know for example, if I gave a presentation and it wasn't what the organisation had wanted, I would hope that they would tell me so that I would change it next time.

My question is, when did people stop telling others if they were not performing at work the way it is expected? Would you say anything to her?

ok - you were horrified ....compared to a 20something temp coming in its probable that she was slow in understanding the inner workings of "your office".

so you didn't explain to her that she didn't meet your expectations, as for your presentation .... what would you do if the organisation didnt tell you they didnt like your presentation ...how would you know? How do you know they are happy with your own work levels?

As regards your actual question.... people stopped telling people they were not performing at work when it became a common occurrance for a person who lost their job to goto the union or goto a solicitor and fight for their job/sue for compo because the boss said a "2yr old would do it" or they were personally insulted by comments made by "superiors/managers"

In the current climate it seems like management are unwilling to let someone go - for fear of a backlash - recently a girl in my girlfriends office was recognised as being slack...so she was moved to a different dept, and moved again until they found a menial job which meant any mess ups are unlikely to cause trouble for the rest of the dept.....long story short ... after all this moving around, she announces she is pregnant (before she was even 8weeks ) over the coming months during lunch breaks and discussions with colleagues the subject of people loosing their jobs was aired and she stood up declaring she cant get fired ..... pointing at her belly and wriggling around ...saying "discrimination baby!! cant fire me because I'm pregnant"

long and short of my story is that people nowadays know the law and unless you have undeniable proof that someone is incompetent or doing illegal stuff at work then you cant really do much*

*=assuming they get past the first 12months.

Mrs OBumble

PCPhoto wrote: »

ok - you were horrified ....compared to a 20something temp coming in its probable that she was slow in understanding the inner workings of "your office".

As a 40-something temp, I'll bet my bottom dollar that I had a better understanding of the offices I went into than a 20-something with only a few years of work experience. :cool:

Stheno

JustMary wrote: »

As a 40-something temp, I'll bet my bottom dollar that I had a better understanding of the offices I went into than a 20-something with only a few years of work experience. :cool:

I'd agree with that tbh