Coworkers that suck..

[DitchPanda]

18 hours ago, bigbassin' said:

I joke around all the time that for some guys every day is there first day.

 

 I had a guy that did the exact same thing every single day for 8 months straight on a jobsite. We finish the job and move to a new project, exact same work as the previous project.

 

Work is identical, everyone’s task remained the same, same layout was provided to the crew. All of this is discussed at the start of shift.
 

I see him get out of the truck about 100’ away and stare at his drill like he’s never seen one before.

My phone starts to ring.

 

”Hey boss, what am I doing today.”

 

Same exact thing you’ve done for 8 straight months…

Hey boss what am I doing today? Looking for a new job because your fired

[txchaser]

On 10/24/2022 at 1:45 AM, throttleplate said:

The next morning when i punched in he walked up to me and asked me if i would like to have his old but new house vacuum telling me his wife just bought a new one.

He had it with him at the timeclock and i didnt have a vacuum and was going to buy one but i accepted his and after that exchange, with no verbal apology for the label he called me by, he nor anyone else ever called me that label again.

I was expecting a few different endings to that story, but... "he apologized with a vacuum cleaner" was not one of them.

[throttleplate]

14 hours ago, txchaser said:

I was expecting a few different endings to that story, but... "he apologized with a vacuum cleaner" was not one of them.

LOL, yeah i knew he was doing the im sorry thing and the shop guys knew i was looking to buy a vacuum as i asked a few days earlier where i can get a vacuum for cheap.

I bet his wife chewed is rear end off when he told her what took place with my phone call in the break room to H.R. We never had a problem after that.

[cheezyridr]

On 10/24/2022 at 11:05 AM, Bluebasser86 said:

When I did construction we had a guy that used to hide in the portajohn forever to avoid work. There was always big piles of gravel on those jobsites and I'm a good aim so anytime I'd see him sneaking away, I'd give him about 5 minutes to get settled in before I'd launch an assault with the biggest rocks I could throw, just a few fast ones to really get his attention so he knew that we all knew that he was ducking work. Got him a couple times dropping them down the vent pipe also. 

 

we had some guys like that on a site i worked, about 3 years ago.  by luck, i had a couple chopsticks in the car.  i put them in the hasp while they were inside, and went back to work. 

 

On 10/24/2022 at 4:18 PM, gimruis said:

 

 

  Sort of a screening process, if you will. 

 

one of the places i worked asked me to come up with a way to screen out people who don't follow directions well. i added a single page to the front of the application, and it solved the problem pretty well.  on the top half of the page was a set of instructions. below it, a large blank space.  the instructions were as follows:

 

CAUTION!

READ THE ENTIRE APPLICATION, AND ALL INSTRUCTIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE FILLING OUT APPLICATION.

1) draw a square in the blank space below, approximately 2"x2"

2)put your initials inside the square

3) put today's date  above the square

4) put the date you can start work below the square

5) fill out the application on the pages following this one

 

the 2nd to the last item on the application were instructions to ignore steps 1-4. 

if we saw ANY marks on the bottom of the cover page, your application went into the circular file the minute you walked out.   if your cover sheet was clean with no eraser marks, you probably got hired that day.

 

 

[slonezp]

Maybe we are the bad co-workers.

 

Worked alone my entire life. Career ending injury took me out of the trades and into the office. It's extremely difficult to transition worlds. My first job after getting hurt was trade related, in an office, working with children. By children I mean new college grads. Also worked with a bunch of two faced scum corporate folks. By scum, I mean charging companies for work that was never done and/or double charging those same companies.

The HR girls hated me and, being legally disabled, I was untouchable.  When I had my "Exit" interview LOL what's that? Never heard of it. The question was "What made you decide to leave***? My answer was "If your dog takes a crap in your kitchen, do you pick it up and throw it out or, pick it up and move it to your living room? You people move the crap from department to department rather than throwing it in the trash. 

The guy I gave my exit interview to quit shortly after I did. 

I'm still in contact with 3 people from the company. 1 fisherman I met working there who, is my sons age, and 2 guys I knew and I got the jobs for them. Nothing against any of them. I just hold higher values.

[the reel ess]

On 10/23/2022 at 9:59 PM, DitchPanda said:

 Im sure we've all had them and they suck for various reasons. The latest one I'm dealing with is driving me insane. He's annoying because he takes forever to make a point when he's speaking if he even makes one. Also he's been in the Ethanol industry for 5 or 6 years but he can't do a single d**n thing on his own.

 On top of all of this he's super socially awkward...stands around all creepily while other people are talking and when he wants to butt in he holds his finger up as if he was raising his hand to speak in class. Dude we did that in like 4th grade, your 35 years old stop being a moron.

 So how many of you have had a coworker that gets under your skin?

I worked with a guy who sounds similar. He was incredibly socially awkward. He wanted to leave work early every day. He was obsessed with talking about metallurgy. You couldn't turn his mind from a wrong direction. And he made the same drafting mistakes every time, which I had to correct. I told my wife who's a teacher and she said it sounds like kids she has taught with Asperger's Syndrome.

[Bankbeater]

I've been working the same job for the past 36 years.  I've seen my share of butt kissers, back stabbers, and people that are just not that bright.  All I can say is that I'm glad I will be retiring in a few years.

[Woody B]

Bad co workers are.....bad, but bad managers are even worse.   

[slonezp]

35 minutes ago, Woody B said:

Bad co workers are.....bad, but bad managers are even worse.   

and this is the reason one needs to have a marketable skill. And by marketable, I am not implying one must be skilled labor. Even if you are part of the unskilled labor pool, strive to be the best at what you do. Someone will notice. If they don't, take your experience elsewhere. 

 

I don't have patience for a bad boss and/or micro managing. Rub me the wrong way more than once and I'm history. Hire me to do a job and let me do it. If I need to be told how to do my job daily, either I accepted the wrong job or you hired the wrong employee. 

 

[DitchPanda]

2 hours ago, Woody B said:

Bad co workers are.....bad, but bad managers are even worse.   

Amen to this. Got a few of those floating around at my job as well.

[slonezp]

6 minutes ago, DitchPanda said:

Amen to this. Got a few of those floating around at my job as well.

A good manager needs to know the jobs he/she manages and how to delegate such jobs based on the employees skill level. He/she also needs to delegate jobs properly when shorthanded. He/she also needs to be willing and able to step in at any and every position they supervise at any point in time. Many managers are unable to do this. 

 

The movie Office Space comes to mind when talking about employee and management. 

 

[DitchPanda]

23 hours ago, slonezp said:

A good manager needs to know the jobs he/she manages and how to delegate such jobs based on the employees skill level. He/she also needs to delegate jobs properly when shorthanded. He/she also needs to be willing and able to step in at any and every position they supervise at any point in time. Many managers are unable to do this. 

 

The movie Office Space comes to mind when talking about employee and management. 

 

My supervisor is exactly as you describe...great guy. My general manager seems to be a sociopath...doesn't give a d**n how his actions affect anybody but himself. He sucks.

[slonezp]

5 minutes ago, DitchPanda said:

My supervisor is exactly as you describe...great guy. My general manager seems to be a sociopath...doesn't give a d**n how his actions affect anybody but himself. He sucks.

I could call my GM or the owner of the company at 2am and they would answer the phone. Probably give me crap the next day but they would still answer. I could call my GM or the owner of the company with a question and if they don't have the answer, they will point me in the right direction to get the answer I need. 

 

Bottom line is making money and keeping the customers happy. I'll preface this by saying, 99% of my customers are not the general public. I deal with mechanical contractors for the most part. I sell to the general public at my discretion. I threw a guy out of my store last week. Not the first time and not the last. He didn't, but had he called my corporate office, they would have stood behind me no questions asked.

I work for a family owned company. The owner could close the doors today and probably support the next 3 or 4 or 5 generations of his family with the money he has. He's younger than me by a few years Guy works 10-12 hours a day. He'll pick up the phone no matter what. His office is the sales floor at our corporate office. Someone walks into the store and says "I want to talk to the owner!" He's there.

 

I'm fortunate

[Eric 26]

I too am very fortunate to work for a great owner and have a great supervisor to boot. The company owner has his office door  open and is easily accessible as well as being the person I hand my paperwork into daily. Although I’ve had a few co workers over the years who got under my skin as well as one boss I really wanted to throttle, I’ve been very fortunate so far.

[Darth-Baiter]

On 11/7/2022 at 6:31 PM, slonezp said:

A good manager needs to know the jobs he/she manages and how to delegate such jobs based on the employees skill level. He/she also needs to delegate jobs properly when shorthanded. He/she also needs to be willing and able to step in at any and every position they supervise at any point in time. Many managers are unable to do this. 

 

 

This is the kind of supervisor I am hoping to be.  I took a promotion and left my office for a new one. one with a commute.  I am fostering a new environment.  I dont assign work that has little value.  I hated it myself and won't do it to others.  what they do needs to matter and make a difference and I never steal the credit.  ever.  .  it is working.  my old office wants me back as supervisor and some of them have even transferred to me.  my old office is 7 mins from my home, so eventually I will be back.  but it will be tough to leave my group and go to the one that has been dismantled.  

 

I hope to retire soon and leave all this behind me.  my work is like Blockbuster Video.  they refuse to change and IMHO it will leave us in a really bad spot.  

[DitchPanda]

7 minutes ago, Darth-Baiter said:

This is the kind of supervisor I am hoping to be.  I took a promotion and left my office for a new one. one with a commute.  I am fostering a new environment.  I dont assign work that has little value.  I hated it myself and won't do it to others.  what they do needs to matter and make a difference and I never steal the credit.  ever.  .  it is working.  my old office wants me back as supervisor and some of them have even transferred to me.  my old office is 7 mins from my home, so eventually I will be back.  but it will be tough to leave my group and go to the one that has been dismantled.  

 

I hope to retire soon and leave all this behind me.  my work is like Blockbuster Video.  they refuse to change and IMHO it will leave us in a really bad spot.  

Alot of my management team is like this...unfortunately the top guy at my plant is not. He always preaches work to live and how important keeping  our senior employees but his actions clearly show profit over people. Its sad that its come to this because we are a very high performing plant in our fleet. Think we have 33 facilities and we are very often in the top 5-8 on most metrics. If he keeps pushing like this the out come will not be good...I've seen it firsthand in our sister plant. He will run good people out, push the remaining ones harder and start losing them. Then our RVP will get involved because our performance will slip, find out that his "business strategy" is pushing good people out and they will kick his a#$ to the curb to stop it.

[TnRiver46]

[galyonj]

5 hours ago, Darth-Baiter said:

This is the kind of supervisor I am hoping to be.  I took a promotion and left my office for a new one. one with a commute.  I am fostering a new environment.  I dont assign work that has little value.  I hated it myself and won't do it to others.  what they do needs to matter and make a difference and I never steal the credit.  ever.  .  it is working.  my old office wants me back as supervisor and some of them have even transferred to me.  my old office is 7 mins from my home, so eventually I will be back.  but it will be tough to leave my group and go to the one that has been dismantled.  

 

My man.

 

I started a new gig about a year ago. It's a young shop, so nobody (except sales, because they can't be trusted) has just one job. I'm sure everybody reading this knows what I'm talking about.

 

I'd be perfectly content to remain a senior software engineer for the rest of my career. Come in, get my marching orders, write my code, and check out at the end of the day.

 

Unfortunately, fate has different plans.

 

Now I run a team in addition to getting to write code.

 

And I feel some kind of way about this. I don't much like it, but I do my best, and I run my team with the same mindset that you do: Hire people you trust to do the job, get them the resources and work with them to fill knowledge gaps they might have to do the job I hired them for, then run interference for them as necessary so that they've got the bandwidth to do it. Otherwise, I stay out of their way and let them run the ball.

 

All the credit goes to them, all the blame goes to me.

 

I think a lot about what I wish I'd had in a leader/mentor when I was a baby engineer, and I try as hard as I can to be that person for my people.

 

And I think that's really all you can do.

[J Francho]

Servant leadership is where it's at. 

[flyfisher]

Leadership is so different than managing.  Over my years in the corporate world as a process engineer and now in education I have learned that just because you are great at your job it doesn't mean you are great at leading others to do the same job well.  You see it a ton in athletes trying to be coaches.  It isn't always the case but I have seen it enough to know that it is more common than it isn't.  I am trying to get into leadership in the school system and it is difficult for a bunch of reasons but at the same time I know it will happen eventually.  Leading people is about empowering them to do their job to the best of their ability and then letting them do it....

[slonezp]

3 hours ago, flyfisher said:

Leadership is so different than managing.  Over my years in the corporate world as a process engineer and now in education I have learned that just because you are great at your job it doesn't mean you are great at leading others to do the same job well.  You see it a ton in athletes trying to be coaches.  It isn't always the case but I have seen it enough to know that it is more common than it isn't.  I am trying to get into leadership in the school system and it is difficult for a bunch of reasons but at the same time I know it will happen eventually.  Leading people is about empowering them to do their job to the best of their ability and then letting them do it....

Some personalities can't deal with being empowered. Some folks need to be told what to do. The guy I have working for me has full reign to do his job. I want him to succeed. Guy has been in the industry in some capacity or another, longer than I have. He just has little practical knowledge and cannot think outside the box.

A couple issues I'm dealing with is when he doesn't know what to do, he's a deer in headlights and he won't ask for help and, he spends either too much or too little time coming up with answers and, I believe, customers sense the frustration in his voice. (there's a run-on sentence for you Mr. Teacher ) When he is corrected, and I don't mean that the way it comes across the keyboard, he doesn't take it well. If we're not busy, I listen to all his conversations at the counter or on the phone and jump in when necessary. If we are busy, I only hope for the best that he sold the correct part or gave the correct information.

I sell commercial and industrial hvac parts. It's not always rocket science but sometimes it is. I have a ton of resources, some better than others, to get the correct parts and or correct information. I have forwarded him all of my contact info. 

He is an hourly employee. My hourly wage is similar to his. I get commission on store sales, he does not. Every sale he doesn't get comes out of my paycheck not his. That is my incentive to get him to succeed. Unfortunately, his personality and inability to think outside of the box, has me struggling. He's great with the customers but average with his knowledge. Again, I don't have issue with that. All I ask of him is when he doesn't know something, ask me. It never happens. 

Yesterday I listened to his side of a conversation he had on the phone. I figured out what part the customer was looking for without ever hearing the customer. He did not. The customer told him they would just call my main office "Because they would know what he was looking for" and hung up on him. Again, his lack of knowledge is one thing I can deal with. His reluctance to ask for help...

 

     

[DitchPanda]

22 minutes ago, slonezp said:

Some personalities can't deal with being empowered. Some folks need to be told what to do. The guy I have working for me has full reign to do his job. I want him to succeed. Guy has been in the industry in some capacity or another, longer than I have. He just has little practical knowledge and cannot think outside the box.

A couple issues I'm dealing with is when he doesn't know what to do, he's a deer in headlights and he won't ask for help and, he spends either too much or too little time coming up with answers and, I believe, customers sense the frustration in his voice. (there's a run-on sentence for you Mr. Teacher ) When he is corrected, and I don't mean that the way it comes across the keyboard, he doesn't take it well. If we're not busy, I listen to all his conversations at the counter or on the phone and jump in when necessary. If we are busy, I only hope for the best that he sold the correct part or gave the correct information.

I sell commercial and industrial hvac parts. It's not always rocket science but sometimes it is. I have a ton of resources, some better than others, to get the correct parts and or correct information. I have forwarded him all of my contact info. 

He is an hourly employee. My hourly wage is similar to his. I get commission on store sales, he does not. Every sale he doesn't get comes out of my paycheck not his. That is my incentive to get him to succeed. Unfortunately, his personality and inability to think outside of the box, has me struggling. He's great with the customers but average with his knowledge. Again, I don't have issue with that. All I ask of him is when he doesn't know something, ask me. It never happens. 

Yesterday I listened to his side of a conversation he had on the phone. I figured out what part the customer was looking for without ever hearing the customer. He did not. The customer told him they would just call my main office "Because they would know what he was looking for" and hung up on him. Again, his lack of knowledge is one thing I can deal with. His reluctance to ask for help...

 

     

 Sounds like your more understanding than I am. I to have a problem with people that won't ask for help but I also have an issue with a lack of knowledge, especially when your job title requires it. Just had a guy Monday admit he didn't understand how to lock out an Evaporator. The guy is a plant technician 3 just like me and knowledge on how to operate and isolate the process equipment is a requirement for the job. So he says I don't really understand how to safely do this and our GM...the dumba$%...says hey thanks for admitting it we will take care of it. So you admit to your boss you can't do the job your getting paid for and he gives you an atta boy. Whatever happened to actually living up to the expectations set for your position?

 So I have a really close friend whose a school teacher. If he went to the principal and said I know I'm supposed to teach math but I don't know how to add and subtract, I wonder if the principal would say oh don't worry about it just sit there and we will keep paying you for no reason?

[slonezp]

4 minutes ago, DitchPanda said:

 Sounds like your more understanding than I am. I to have a problem with people that won't ask for help but I also have an issue with a lack of knowledge, especially when your job title requires it. Just had a guy Monday admit he didn't understand how to lock out an Evaporator. The guy is a plant technician 3 just like me and knowledge on how to operate and isolate the process equipment is a requirement for the job. So he says I don't really understand how to safely do this and our GM...the dumba$%...says hey thanks for admitting it we will take care of it. So you admit to your boss you can't do the job your getting paid for and he gives you an atta boy. Whatever happened to actually living up to the expectations set for your position?

 So I have a really close friend whose a school teacher. If he went to the principal and said I know I'm supposed to teach math but I don't know how to add and subtract, I wonder if the principal would say oh don't worry about it just sit there and we will keep paying you for no reason?

I'm not a salesman. I'm a lowly commercial refrigeration mechanic that had a career ending injury 10 years ago, that just happened to get lucky working, where I'm working. My customers all know this and they see me as an equal. 

I don't know everything and I don't expect him to know everything. I do expect him to know where to get the answers. That is where I have issue. I push people to our engineering dept all the time for answers I don't have. I might lose credit for the sale but I gained the confidence of my customer for the next time around.

 

Mind you, I took 5 years of stagnant sales from this store from $850K annually to over $2M in 2 years. I never dealt with hydronics or commercial controls or pneumatics when I was still in the field. Just refrigeration. Refrigeration sales are maybe 15% of my sales at best. I'm selling crap I never worked on in my life. I read technical manuals day in and day out. If my customers trust me to give them the correct parts/answers, I'm golden. What happens is, I'll get a call or text when I'm on vacation or out of town and tell them to call the store. "That's ok I'll call....(fill in the blank). 

 

Got a call today from a customer who offered me a job a few months ago running his service department for more money than I am making now. "You quoted me this and gave me that" conversation. Well, my employee gave him that. Whatever. I told him I would take care of it.

 

These are my frustrations. I've worked my entire life alone. Working with others can sometimes be difficult.

 

[TOXIC]

As has been said, one of the biggest mistakes companies make is to take someone who does their job exceptionally well and promote them to be a manager/supervisor.  Sometimes it works but for the most part it doesn’t.  Having been a manager for most of my governmental career (yes, I realize government is a different beast) I was hired and trained to be a manager.  I was taught the skills I needed to manage multiple positions and multiple people doing multiple jobs.  Did I need to know how those jobs functioned….yes I did….but did I need to know how to perform those positions at a high level, absolutely not.  My job was to manage not produce.  I once was put in charge of a contracting division when I had -0- contracting experience.  In my first all-hands meeting with supervisors and staff, I told them I didn’t know squat about contracting.  My job was to manage them, do the things that enabled them to do their job more efficiently and not to do their job or contract.  Sure, I picked up contracting knowledge along the way but my job as a leader was to do what it took to make my employees maximize production.  I did performance appraisals, incentive programs, processed leave, worked implementing corporate directives, team building and most importantly I motivated my employees, which is probably the most important aspect of what I did and the hardest.  Everyone is motivated by different things, some money, some recognition and many other factors. My job was not to design or build the corporate machine but it was to put drops of oil in the individual cogs to keep it running at maximum production without coming apart.  Natural managers are a rare breed I was taught tips tricks and styles of management my entire career.  I was trained to be a manager. 

[gim]

4 minutes ago, TOXIC said:

take someone who does their job exceptionally well and promote them to be a manager/supervisor.  Sometimes it works but for the most part it doesn’t.

I work for the federal government in a non-hazardous line of law enforcement and some of of our managers/supervisors have taken this route.  They were really good at field work and wanted a promotion.  Well, then their line of work completely changes, for not much more pay either.  They become a desk jockey, sit in meetings half the day, listen to their employees complain, and read emails endlessly.  I've had the opportunity to apply for a promotion like this a couple times and I kept coming back to the same question: why would I want to do something like this all the time for only a minimal more amount of money?  And so I stay put instead and just keep working as a field agent.  Just isn't worth another few thousands bucks/year.