How many of you are guilty of this? I have a lot of flaws as a manager, but some events this week make me realize that this is probably my biggest.
There’s been several times that I kept an employee (or worse, manager) much longer than I should have. I think I’ve done this mainly out of fear: fear of having to find a replacement, of having to train somebody else, of unemployment claims, of having to put in extra hours, of hurting feelings… the list goes on.
I just had a manager resign. This person has never been a great asset to our company, but I’ve kept him around because I could really trust him when I wasn’t there. Never mind that he didn’t do things how I wanted them done, or that it often took weeks to get results from simple tasks. I could take a two week vacation and not have to worry! But the other 50 weeks were all frustration on my part. What’s worse, he was by far the highest earner in the store. He didn’t do much more than an employee making half of what he did. But because he was so trusted and allowed me to get away worry-free, I kept giving him raises to make sure he stayed. Talk about not seeing the forest through the trees!
Him resigning was a big wake up call, because it’s not the end of the world. I have a replacement lined up that wants to slide into his schedule. I’ll save a bunch of money, and I can get somebody in there that does things the right way. I’ll have to put in a lot of extra hours for probably 3 or 4 weeks. So what?
Even my wife said “I can’t believe you kept him around this long; he didn’t do the business any favors.” Thanks hun! You could’ve shared those feelings with me a year ago!
I am holding on to them for the same reasons you listed.
I have people that can’t even fold a pizza box correctly, load the soda case the way i want, can’t take an order of the phone, sweep, mop… the list goes on. You show them once how to do it, and they’ll never get it.
I have never taken more then 2 days off a week in the 8 years im in business. I could never go away worrying what kind of damage they can do to the business if i’m gone.
Well that doesnt give me any hope.LOL Last night I has 2 people come in and bitch out me and my driver because of his driving. Both people were from the same run and both within 1 mile from eachother and the store. He is a good worker but can they not even drive right?? I have 2 that I am keeping around for those reasons, although now that I leave the store and get called back in or a customers calls me at home Im thinking about adding a cot to my backroom. Now if only I could figure a way to sneak my dog in here, I guess I’ll never have to go home. Would never have to sweep the floor or buy dog food either…It seems to me that the younger generation is going to have a very hard time in the world today.
I had bigger probem this week, first my trust worthy assi mgr inform me his parents are moving too far he is going with them and left yesterday, than yesterday my other assi mgr who is pregnent tells me she is leaving next saturday and get this same day my mgr tells me she is also pregnent and want to go next saturday too. They are not pregnent by same guy…
so now I have to start all over again… lesson learn is keep taking new application and keep hiringnew part timers all the time.
I was guilty of this with only one person, my prep person. Because we did just about everything fresh at the shop, it was critical for him to be there daily.
He never touched the pizza or pasta sauce, chicken salad, egg salad, steak tips or any marinades. However, the veggies, salads (about 75-150 a day) the prep on all the measured out frozens, the prep on all the measured out steak for philly subs and pizzas, slicing coldcuts daily, the prep on all the four ounce salad dressings…and on and on, I kept him way too long because he knew how much I needed him.
The kicker was when he was prepping the shaved steak - nine and seven ounce portions, two cases a day - he let it get almost to room temp and I flipped.
After that it was hard (sold shortly thereafter) but wow, what a difference in what I wanted and what I got.
The lesson I learned with that was you can take an untrained person and train them to do things your way as opposed to a seasoned person in this industry. All it takes is a person with work ethic and pride. NO EXPERIENCE NEEDED.