You can be replaced, you know

(Woohoo! The hatchet is here! – promoted by buhdydharma )

Did you ever have an employee who just wouldn’t do what he was asked to do? Who just – in spite of clear and concise instructions – never managed to accomplish what it was you hired him to do? The guy who came off great in his interviews, who tossed around an impressive-looking résumé, but once he was hired, all of a sudden became the living embodiment of the Peter Principle?

You think to yourself, cheeeez, exactly how many times do I have to tell this person what to do? I mean, what does he want – a fax, for God’s sake? A written invitation? A full-page ad in the friggin’ New York Times??

But you’re patient. You work with him, holding his hand, making suggestions, gently at first, then perhaps a bit more sternly. All the while remembering Gen. George Patton’s advice on being a good boss and inspiring those who work for you:

Don’t tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.

Only thing is, the “results” you end up getting from this employee continue to be disappointing. The guy almost never fails to let you down. I mean, he continues to demonstrate – time and time again – that he couldn’t organize a dog fight.

Or, how about the guy who, in spite of having been given all the tools he needed to get the job done, still managed to weasel out of getting it done, complaining the whole time that it was impossible, that in fact he didn’t have what he needed to do it? Or – get this – that, if he were to actually do the job he was hired to do, he wouldn’t get hired again? Or – better yet – after utterly failing to – or failing even to attempt to – do the job that you hired him to do, this guy somehow believes you’re going to hire him again???

Or – how about the guy who manages to look busy all day, peering intently into his computer screen, talking loudly on the phone (with whom, you’re not quite certain), assiduously shuffling stacks of paper, making a great show of moving them from one side of his desk to the other – all the while somehow never managing to put any of the “agenda” he’s so mightily working on into action? An “agenda,” by the way, invented by him, not the one you hired him to carry out?

Have you ever had an employee who had no gumption, no resourcefulness, no fire in the belly, no initiative, no stick-to-itiveness? Someone who, when faced with an obstacle, simply rolled over and gave up? Someone who made excuses for not doing the hard work? Someone who gave up after – at most – one try?

What do you do with an employee like that?

Of course, it might not simply be that such an employee is incompetent or lazy. It could be that he’s got another agenda, one that he didn’t bother to share with you when you were hiring him. He could be one of those guys who somehow gets it in his head that once he starts punching the clock and using the employee restroom, somehow he’s entitled to a paycheck. You know: the guy who thinks he knows better than you. Someone who has the balls to get snippy with you, his boss?

Sometimes, once someone like that is hired, they start to play politics. They forget the real reason they were hired – the job they were brought on board to accomplish – and they instead get all wrapped up in office intrigue. Sometimes, they get so deep into it that they become deluded into thinking their real boss is someone different from the person who hired them, and that that “New Boss” somehow carries more weight than the boss whose decision it was to bring them on board in the first place.

So – just what DO you do with an employee like that?

Simple: You FIRE him.

It’s harsh, but it’s necessary. There’s work to be done around here, after all. And you feel bad having to do it, of course. I mean, it’s not like you hired the guy thinking that you were gonna hafta fire him, f’cryin’ out loud. You’re not on some big power trip – you don’t get your jollies from firing people. It’s just that, well, you hired the guy to Do. A. Job, and if he’s not gonna do it, no matter how many chances you give him, and no matter how much you hold his hand, and no matter how right and obvious the need for the work is – well, then, you’ve got no real choice. The work still has to get done – it’s just that he won’t be the one doing it for you, that’s all. I mean, it’s not like there’s any shortage of people willing to fill the position.

So, ya goofed. Made a mistake. Erred in your assessment of someone’s capabilities, their motivations, their character, their work ethic, their commitment. Don’t beat yourself up – it happens all the time. Hey, you hired the guy ’cause you thought he would help you get the work done. And you were wrong. No crime in that.

Just – let’s fix it, okay?

Now appearing in Orange, too.

37 comments

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  1. Meantime, people are dying. Shoot, if the Democrats in Congress continue to produce the kind of work they’ve shown so far, all of the violence in Iraq will END. Forget al-Anbar – the whole dang country will be perfectly quiet!

    And then – finally! – they will be able to claim “success,” and bring our troops home, even if it’s in a box.

    For those misguided employees who, now that they’ve gotten the job, might have confused their real bosses with their supposed “new” bosses, a few words to the wise:

    Conrad Burns

    George Allen

    Rick Santorum

    Richard Pombo

    ‘Nuff said.

    Gary Larson did a classic “The Far Side” cartoon back in the 1980s that I wish I could lay my hands on. I couldn’t find it online, and I’m not about to go up in my attic and rummage around for it, but it was so succinct and hilarious, I know I kept a copy of it somewhere. I’ll try to describe it: It shows a guy just about to go into a men’s room marked, “Employees Only,” when, from behind him, his boss intones, “Not so fast, Reynolds.”

    “Not so fast.” Heh.

    So! My first diary here on Docudharma! Woo-HOO! Thanks, buhdy (and all)!

    When do we eat?

  2. after utterly failing to – or failing even to attempt to – do the job that you hired him to do, this guy somehow believes you’re going to hire him again???

    ….and has the nerve to ask you for a handout so he CAN get hired again…

    sigh…but youre soo soo right.

    • nocatz on September 28, 2007 at 03:23

    and put it in my bio?

    • Armando on September 28, 2007 at 03:48
  3. How?

    Primary their asses?

    Stay home?

    Third party?

    I have no idea, but I’m getting mighty tired of defending a party that is proving itself worthless again and again and again.

    Fuck ’em.

    First the moveon bullshit and now they actually lend support to the Bush administration as it seeks more chaos and bloodshed?

    Do they want the base demoralized?

    The fuckers will give us Hillary, which will mobilize the Thugs before the general election, and in the mean time the Dem base will be dropping out, one by one.

    Idiots.

    • xenic on September 28, 2007 at 03:59
  4. has been quoted as saying the people of the United States would be made to ask for entrance into the new “benevolent” world government.

    Six full years is far too long a time to attribute to failure.  Deals have been made,courses charted and plans finalized.  After all global interests simply can’t cater to a mere 300 million vs the growing world population of 6 billion.  The secret government/Illuminati/CFR/Bilderburgers whomever have already made their decrees.

    “We” are but ants to them.

  5. more and more of my favorite authors are showing up  🙂

  6. all over.

    I can relate, believe me.  Good to see you here, oc.

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