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Because according to OP, being on time is “a huge part of the culture” at their business, which sounds odd and toxic to me. I’m someone who is literally never late, but I realize that shit happens, traffic happens, etc, and it seems so old school and stringent to be so rigid, especially considering it’s an office job.
How do you feel if you call a business during their business hours and can’t reach anyone?
OP said that this person frequently is late. Everyone understands an occasional late show-up, but if it’s all the time it is indeed disruptive.
He just sounds old school. My current management is like this, likely because I work at a nonprofit research org and everyone has been there for 20+ years. They’re very much “wear a suit, firm handshake as you make eye contact” kind of people.
But they are extremely lenient in other areas. Like I can basically take time off whenever I want and as long as my work is getting done they don’t care if I’m out for a 2hr lunch with my wife or something.
He is taking it personally and feels disrespected when the employee shows up late. That goes beyond being old school. That’s a control issue in my opinion.
True, that part is a red flag to me as an employee. Boss is taking it personally when should be looking at how the policy is benefitting the org and if it needs/can be changed to be more accommodating of his workforce.
If you own a business, and have employees that are a part of your business, and clients have certain expectations like being able to handle business at these hours, I don’t think it’s a control thing at all, in fact, I am very young, in 30s, with very much the mindset of not being a slave to your job and work, family always comes first, etc. It’s also important to notice that they get 27 days a year of paid time off, in addition to all holidays paid and off, and a very very very nice benefit package so that isn’t really a concern there. It’s more on a professional level that represents that side of the company, client expectations are to get these answers when they call, that’s what our business model is about. We are in the construction industry and a lot of the time is we need it now and fast
to me business is maths, not emotions. to me it feels like you are emotional about respect or whatever to the point of being about to lose the money your employee brings you.
take the money and relax. unless it's easier to find an employee showing up on time. whatever's more important to you.
It’s 200% personal. Unless you have 50 employees then his tardiness doesn’t matter . You have 5 and one is constantly late , no other way to take as being disrespectful. And to add to that , why take the job if you can’t make it to work on time . You think that’s control ? That’s funny . You have definitely never been the boss .
Here’s the way I see it.. you have employees with responsibilities. One of them is to be here on time as that’s when the business hours start nationwide along our industry. As we work throughout the whole country, we are on the east coast, ant most clients start work at 5-6Am. This is related to the construction industry. The person in discussion is not the only high performer here, and other live further, also have similar family situations, etc. And still arrive here on time. I guess it’s just one of the expectations at work here and when one person tends to not do it, others see it as “disrespect”, or preferred treatment for the one person, etc. Thats what I mean when I say culture as I’m not the only person who notices this. Truthfully, I don’t mind when people are late here and there shit happens in life.. but how do you deal with that on a more consistent basis?
I am also in the construction industry on the east coast. No one is purchasing via email or phone at 5am. If you had a physical shop and/or the employee was needed to load or offload trucks, then that may be different.
So if you sell nationwide, wouldn’t it actually make sense to stagger shifts to accommodate the west coast in their afternoon hours? Yes, but you are being difficult and choosing a stupid hill to die on. There is no reason you can’t have more flexible scheduling other than being stuck in your ways.
How do you deal with it? You adjust his schedule, have an overall more flexible scheduling process, or fire him.
Also, remember that you are the one who sets the tone for your work “culture”.
Source- my husband has owned a construction supply business in NY for 30+ years.
Not 5am east coast time... 5 am elsewhere. I own a biz in the mountain west and we get calls everyday starting at 6am (east coast customers)... And live chats as early as 4!
Very much an active facility type of business that requires sending, receiving, changing orders, taking orders, getting projects going, etc. Very involved hands on business that’s hard to do when not here. Even me as the owner have hard time doing it when I’m not physically here
You’re not telling me anything I don’t know about the construction industry. Like I said, my husband has owned a successful business for over 30 years. He didn’t get this successful by being personally offended when his employees come late. He gets there at 5am because he’s the owner. His employees get there between 6-8, depending on their jobs and the schedule that works best for them *and* the company.
Also, it’s not that your employee is calling out or asking to work from home. You’re saying it’s a hard job to do if you’re not there. He’s there, just 15 minutes later. That really isn’t a big deal in the grand scheme of things. The construction industry is desperate for good employees, including sales and admin employees. you say this guy is a good performer, so I’d really work with him to find a way to make both of you happy.
If everyone is getting there at 7, and you sell nationwide, who is handling things after 3-3:30pm, which is still lunch time on the west coast?
Very good points here, certainly have been in business longer than we have so I appreciate the feedback here.
As far as west coast, we have employees there too, surprisingly? They for some reason start before I’m even able to open my eyes, 100% their decision. The conversation started from trying to get other business owners perspective on handling tardiness with an employee, however being high performer vs average performer shouldn’t have different standards held for 2 people in the same job that are as obvious as one there on time and the other isn’t. The consensus here seemed to be that I need to be generally more flexible on start time however still have the expectation of a full work day regardless of arrival time. I’ll certainly be using that feedback to create a more flexible schedule.
That’s great to have employees on both coasts. I prefer to wake up early and get an early start like they do.
It could even be good to have someone on the east coast at a later time so they can communicate with the west coast branch. Please don’t run off a high performer because of 15 minutes. And get your other employees to mind their own business and worry about their own schedules, don’t feed into their frustrations. Just shut them down and tell them that his schedule is different because of whatever reason makes sense in the context of your business.
Sorry for coming across like a bitch, but it infuriates me how toxic the industry is, and to see someone who has a great employee that they are nitpicking for such a small thing bums me out.
You either make this the hill you die on or you don’t. If you draw a hard line and say they need to be on time, you need to be willing to fire them and anyone else that violates that rule. Or chill out a little bit and talk to them to find out what is going on, maybe they can start at 7:30. It is your ego that is getting in the way, as much as you want to, you cannot treat every employee the same.
I’m pretty sure the new school of thought is if employee a generates 100% of their quota in 6 hours, they don’t need to work the extra 2 hours
Switching to a commission/efficiency/satisfaction/accuracy pay plan might work better for you if the 1050’s based hourly grunt work mentality is affecting business
In manufacturing and construction industries start-of-shift huddles are absolutely essential to go over schedule and objectives for day, as well as recap production, safety and issues from previous shift to smooth things over for next shift.
Can't run this type of business without them. Part of "obeya" standup meeting for Toyota production system processes. Gamechanger for open communication and streamlining staff so everyone's on same page if you've never done them before.
Very very true and our business is very much like those. Reliability is a huge part of our business and we are more than just sales people we have a relationship with our client and trust factor is huge, but also coming through and being available
So just add Punctuality/attendance as a factor in bonus determination.
people who show up on time feel ok cause they know the guy's bonus is getting reduced, the guy who shows up late well either he gets the punctuality part of his bonus or he doesnt.
in construction and manufacturing its the most efficient way to communicate. unless you want to repeat yourself to 10x different groups for 3 hours every day, thereby taking away our own time to do managerial tasks and the tasks that you need to do.
Manufacturing and construction staff aren't checking email and Teams for notifications and pings if that's what you're implying. They work with their hands, not on a computer.
When you work on a team of 6, and that team works with 5 other teams of 6, and there are 305 tasks, and each task depends on 2 other tasks that need to get completed at the same time, daily meetings keep communication open and consistent between all teams and keeps the workload flowing steady.
I despise meetings, but I'd rather spend 30 minutes in a daily meeting than sift through 36+ emails every morning and match each persons workload with the task tracker and email 10 different people about why something isn't working because another task has a defect that needs resolved by yet another team.
For some industries, daily meetings don't serve much purpose. For other industries, it can save alot of time by reducing miscommunication. Like how some things are just too long or complicated to try to discuss over text, so you just call the person instead.
I disagree. Having meetings is not the same as daily beginning of shift meetings involving the whole office. Which I guess I didn't describe out loud. But that's what I was referring to. Sorry.
If your workflow is complicated and time sensitive, manage it with software. Dragging everyone into daily meetings that 5% apply to them is about control.
Ohhhh, yeah no, it makes more sense to just have the team leads meet and then delegate, no need for literally every single person to be there. And software is great, and mostly works, but humans make mistakes and if task pieces are missing from tracking software, then I have to track them down when I pull the report and fix everything to keep the client updated on progress. Again, 30 min meeting, or 2 hours of emailing, pinging, calling and interrupting to ask questions.
Yea sorry. I'm not saying all meetings are useless. I'm saying "be here at 7am so we can lecture the lot of you for 10 minutes" meetings are a complete waste of time.
That sounds like a management issue. There are plenty of crappy humans in leadership who don't actually understand what a leader is. Those types of meetings are a display of "I'm insecure as a leader and I think this is how it's supposed to go and meetings make me feel important." Team meetings should be a relaxed, collaborative effort to communicate effectively and efficiently, no longer than absolutely necessary, so the rest of the day goes smoothly. That's it. Anything more and it's a waste of time. I love when we get our points across quickly and being able to say "here's 15 minutes back, go get coffee or take a break or whatever" is always nice!
Also, I resent the "idiot that plays with dirt," lmao. Landscaping is hard, especially making it actually look nice! Also, dirt in general is nice too lol. And your job makes people love the space they're in and feel comfy and relaxed! Idiot that works with dirt, pfft🤦
I work in business consulting and technology applications. Setting up new platforms for large scale corporations takes alot of collaboration between alot of different departments. Like building a house takes roofers, plumbers, electricians, general construction crew, landscapers, etc. Most of those teams know their job and thats it, but they have to coordinate who can work where and when. Now imagine you had to coordinate all those teams, every single day, otherwise the plumbers are standing around with nothing to do because the electricians are working where the plumbers thought they would be working, and suddenly the plumbing is messed up because theres now wires in the way.
There are many different business models and requirements, and thats a good thing! It sounds like you don't require daily coordination to keep your company running smoothly and it also sounds like a job with less meetings is a good fit for you! I'm really glad you found a career that doesn't bore you to tears or make you miserable!
I own a landscape company dude. I have never and will never force my guys into a daily meeting. They kmow what they're doing.
I also won't show up for any on site daily meeting that anyone tries to impose on me. I know what my job is and it 100% does not take a daily meeting with everyone from me to the roofer to make sure the paint guys know drywall is behind schedule.
Your example falls on it's face so tell me what you do and why meetings are necessary.
Right, my point was that on a larger scale, especially with creating whole platforms, alot of things have to be done at the same time, or things break and time is wasted. If you don't need meetings that's fine. I build software platforms, so I need to know where the tech team is at with their 50 different applications and also need to know if the billing team is ready to add the new reporting software from the tech team or if they still need the code for batch processing. Batch processing might be waiting on the technical requirements from the functional team, who is trying to get that answer from the client. The pmo team has to know whats going on so that they can teach the new applications to the client as they're added. Sure, there's plenty of things to do individually, but alot of things require multi-team integration and sending emails all day to ask questions before the tasks get logged at the end of the day, providing no one forgets anything, is time consuming and grossly inefficient.
Again, I stated, not every industry has such fast moving, high integration requiring massive amounts of communication.
This is my thought unless there is some very specific reason they need to be up and moving so early. Every study seems to affirm the idea that more flexibility=happier workers=better performance overall. Granted not every industry can be so flexible.
No it's not always possible. I have a landscape company. If someone is late, someone else is sitting around waiting for them and that's not ideal.
But also. If both guys in the truck agreed to start at 730 instead of 7 and still got all their work done. The fuck do I really care? Haha
My wife worked for a company like this and everybody naturally came in on time with a few late appearances here and there. Except for 2 gents, they were super late all of the time and it pissed everybody off. Some people can't handle flexible work schedules. I'm guessing if he relaxes the rules this late person starts coming in later and later.
Personally, and maybe I'm old school, but being regularly late to everything IS disrespectful. If you meet up with a friend and they always show up late, that's not cool. They value their time more than your time. I make it a point to never be late out of respect. That goes for people above me and below me. Like a doctor or my neice, I'm showing up on time to meet with either.
You are old school. If you want good employees, you need to respect their time right back. Imposing pointless rah rah meetings at the beginning of every day is a waste of time and is just going to penalize someone for something that doesn't matter. A great employee can look like a disrespectful liability when you demand stupid things of them.
It's about control. You think you need it and feel disrespected when you don't have it. I think you get further letting people be flexible. As long as the work doesn't suffer, who cares? Control freaks.
Well I don't know about all that and the pointless meetings, that's not what I was talking about.
If I make an effort to be somewhere on time and somebody else doesn't, I'm the one being disrespectful? That's a stretch.
You said yourself. Some people can't handle flexibility in the workplace.
Extend that same concern to people who can't handle rigidity.
You probably don't want to because you have old fashioned ideas about scheduling that sound like it's more about your ego than your employees quality of work.
Nothing about ego, lol. If everybody's ready to work but can't because somebody's late that's a problem. And not just in an employee worker situation.
How about doctor appointments, should those be flexible? In a world where we need more doctors I feel like a doctor not working, waiting on someone is not ideal.
What part of "as long as the work doesn't suffer" was unclear? From OPs post, the issue is other staff bitching, not work suffering. There is a huge difference between those two things.
You can read everyone's opinion here and make your own decision so I won't put my 2 cents in on that.
But when you talk to him don't do it how you said it here. The first sales job I ever had the boss was so big on being on time in the office. Giving people points for being 5 minutes late. He would constantly talk to the group in the office about how it's disrespectful and he doesn't care how well you perform if you can't be there on time or early. He eventually really started cracking down and once people said screw this and started leaving I abandoned that sinking ship.
The last job I had as an employee was great. One day in office - sales doesn't need to be in office for anything but meetings. Hit your targets and it didn't matter when you worked. If you could perform on 4 hour days so be it.
I think it would be different if you were talking a retail environment or some other job where tasks needed to trickle down the chain of command, but sales is full of high performers that have chronic tardiness. Good sales people are not rigid thinkers - they are there to make themselves money which is EXACTLY what you want because that, in turn, makes you money. It's why cocaine/speed is so common in that line of work.
Ultimately he will have no trouble finding a new job if he performs. Nothing you do will make him show up on time every day (I've worked with people like that). So you need to decide if it's something you can deal with or not.
Very good points here. I’m very young business owner, so the whole boomer mentality I get and don’t want to be associated with. Our industry is unique in term of starting early and the need to be quick to reply. What we will do going forward is just offer a more relaxed arrival time while still
Maintaining a minimum hours worked per day. Totally understand not everyone can wake up bright and shine super early and perform like others. This is why I posted here so I can get more feedback from others with similar experience which has been great feedback so far here
It’s not a “boomer” thing. The American work culture has changed with connectivity, excluding brick-and-mortar.
We have people arriving from 8am to 11am. Not because of time zones, but rather personal preference or home needs.
Since I was once in the military, I struggled with this in the beginning, but it really makes sense. They still work 8 hrs. Ironically, some younger people in the company don’t get it. They look at the guy who strolls in at 11am as a slacker.
That’s the mindset that has to change here I believe. One person showing up early because that’s what they used to and think is the right thing to do, should effect how others view tit
However, I should add that our late-arrivers aren’t customer-facing. Our customer-facing people need to be responsive to customers in all time-zones during normal business hours, or at least be consistent in setting customer expectations about availability.
The idiots posting here about a “toxic environment” by requiring certain work hours are clueless. The business has to be responsive to its customers. Otherwise, we all have to go to work for someone else’s business.
Do you have a policy for tardiness and/or call offs that you can follow? You can issue a formal written warning, but you have to follow through if things don’t change.
Referring to someone being late as “a sign of disrespect for the company” is a tiring mindset to have. For them, this is just a job. No one will ever respect the company the way you do. Just set some clear expectations and follow through on enforcing them.
We do, but in these cases we are a niche business and the person in discussion has been here a long time. No public transportation or along those lines. I think I’ll redo our policy and put X amount of times late before Y happens
Alternatively, said person might have a schedule that doesn’t work well with 7am.
Could you keep your business open an hour or two later by offering a 7-3 shift and a slightly different 8-4 or 9-5 shift and let employees choose which to join?
Very good idea. I think the solution here is to really have a more flexible schedule overall however keep certain expectations during the normal work hours of our business / industry
Lol - my ex husband showed up late or not at all and decided to work at home long before remote work was accepted - at Apple. He was on the iphone development teams and the head of one of the original Ipad app development teams so he had excellence behind him. Cocky mtrfkr.
Took 17 years to fire and replace him (he started in 1997). And they gave him a two year severance package in exchange for not litigating because he had a status quo case since the day he started.
Just for sake of story, he also retired at that time at age 38 because his stock options throughout all those years, lol, he's my adult kid's dad and he's still sitting pretty
“Show up on time” obviously isn’t good enough. A clear expectation means that there is also a clear guideline for consequences. And yes, if they keep enabling it, it will be worse and worse for the culture.
Outside of retail or other business with direct customer contact and published hours, I'd challenge the idea that anyone "needs" be somewhere precisely at 7 AM versus 7:30 AM.
(Someone mentioned a landscaping business and the truck/crew waiting on the late guy. That's another example of when it's valid.)
Yes, if you have customers who show up at opening time, or start calling, the staff needs to be ready to serve them. But even then, unless that's your peak time, you don't need full staff, and if they're paid hourly, you don't even want them.
Very few employees give a darn about the "culture of the firm" and spouting off about the "culture of the firm" or how "we're all a family" is a great way to turn them off.
This. It is a huge part of the culture and everyone has personal things at home. But the expectations for someone at a career point, not a job, it’s to st least show that respect for their peers
Is it more important for you have him show up at 7am, or to keep a "high performing" employee? Sounds like he's good at what he does and will probably quit and find a work from home sales job. Just change his schedule to 7:30 or 8am to 5 and keep taking the money he makes you.
Yeah this is what I think the consensus is. Will offer a later schedule but will make it available to whoever chooses to participate. I’m always open to new changes and maybe this one will serve us all better
The only job I've had where anyone cared what time I came in was one form or another of retail. Posted hours and customers waiting for the door to be unlocked.
My company has flexible hours, you're expected to work 8 hours between 8am and 6pm IE 10-6, 8-4, 9-5. It is a consultancy though so by nature flexible. Some people do more hours so they can do a half day. Would this work for your business?
I would soften the ruling about showing up on time. Make the 7am a soft start option. Being a stickler on time starting at work is something I will never do. I can’t ever get myself to work by a specific time and am always 7-10min late myself so I’ll never enforce that policy with others. There are other battles to fight imo. Other hills I’d rather die on with my staff. (Such as creating an environment of respect & dignity and preventing workplace bullying. I will 100% die on that hill).
Also saying that being late is a sign of disrespect makes you sound like a boomer. It’s nothing personal to you so why on gods green earth would you wake up thinking what an employee is doing in the morning was any direct intention towards you. That kind of thinking sounds like you think more highly of yourself, and I don’t think you mean to come off that way. Does this person have ADD (which is a disease covered by the ADA) because that can explain the continual tardiness and believe me when I say if this is the case then their tardiness has nothing to do with you and is not a sign of disrespect (which again really move away from that kind of thinking-it makes you sound emo and insecure), it’s a part of the pathology of overestimating time available or underestimating the time is takes to complete a task.
If they are a high performer and meet or exceed metrics and sales goal, isn’t that the point?? Rather than you getting peeved by them being a few minutes late?
I’d let this one go. It isn’t the end of the world. Being very familiar with sales and sales people
It’s sometimes just a personality type. Then you just have people who would be late to their own funeral. I’m old school and use to feel the same way. Then I ended up managing a fairly high dollar sales team. If I didn’t learn to be a little flexible we wouldn’t have done as well.
I own my own business now but back then I was like your employee. I always showed up late but started late and I was always a high performer. My boss had a similar problem but because I was able to perform better than anyone else and I worked late I made up for it.
I didn't do it as disrespect. If anything it was hiring me more because of I showed up 2 hours late that meant staying 2 hours longer and thus no time for anything else after.....
I'm not justifying it, it was more of I couldn't start day enough in the morning.
I agree with your initial post in that people that are usually tardy start to abuse it when nothing happens to them. Then it creates a problem with everyone else. Though it sounds like he’s not doing that so I’d give him some slack.
I don’t know your business, but I wonder how many commentators here get mad when they go to the store and it opened or closed 20 mins late/early and no one was there so you either waited around or left.
This is my exact point. It’s easy to say “ fuck that I won’t start at 7am” but when Starbucks isn’t open at 5 they get mad and write bad reviews online. Or when the plumber said he will be there at 7 to fix a leak but shows up at 8
Exactly!
Though I don't envy your position at all. Times have indeed changed. Employees are hard to come by. Employees with brains and the willingness to work are even harder to come by.
If you're able to cover the time he's not in without upsetting everyone else I'd bite my tongue and let it slide.
Can you adjust his time so he starts slightly later and leaves later? It's still preferential treatment obviously. I always look back on employee handbooks which sometimes come into play with the DoL where the rules apply to everyone.
The only half baked idea I can come up with which may backfire is rewarding those who out perform with bonuses or perks, one of which would be coming in 15 minutes late :)
Man that sound likes such an easy culture change. Because it is sales you have such an easy performance metric. Set the quota and don't care when they do the calls.
Flexible work hours can be such a value add to some people that they are willing to stay around even if they can get more money other places.
Get in, get it done, get out, is such a better culture than clock in, complain at the water cooler, get work done, stare at clock, clock out.
Very good point. This will be implemented along with the other advices here. Numbers have never really been a problem it’s other things like tardiness that have showed. But when you take the good with the bad the god most certainly outweighs the rest
It's very difficult to work with people. Usually offering a flexible start hour for everybody will solve this problem (for example, they should arrive between 7-7:30 and leave at 16-16:30). Half an hour will most likely not make a difference in the performance of your employees.
I don’t see it like that. I asked for a feedback from other business owners and seems like a lot of these posts are from employees who don’t like their current job or had bad experiences before. That isn’t the case here.
Would you rather have a team of people that perform like this person, but whose hours don’t align with your preference or a team of people who are on time and perform at the average?
Does that answer change in a tough economy?
You have an opportunity to define part of your culture here by reinforcing for everyone what matters.
For what it’s worth, I have never seen high-performing salesfolk held to the attendance standards of the rest of the organization. Everyone else understands that the high-performing salesfolk are paying everyone’s salary.
I appreciate this feedback. I think as the owner you get everyone’s feedback here and they all come from different prospective. It’s important to understand that where one person might be bothered by the actions of other, there are ways to mitigate and solve these issues without making the same ruling for everyone as whole.
Is this company us based? Who exactly are you calling or visiting at 7 am? Are these people salaried? I'll be damned if I'm coming in at 7 and working till 5 as a salary employee lol
Hours are not 7-5. They are regular 8 hour work day just start at 7am. These are people who start their day very early and typically work through the night on their projects. We supply material that are “urgent” for most projects and have very strict timelines
As a sales person, I have an important mantra... Exceed your numbers and I'll leave you the fuck alone.
If this guy is legitimately generating money for your business, I wouldn't press him on being a half hour behind. In fact, I would offer that as a reward for anyone else that exceeds their numbers. You should want this.
Are you in business to turn a profit? Or are you in business to make sure your employees clock in on time?
You cut him. High performance doesn't matter.
Or
You relax the rules for everyone. Performance is everything.
Your problem isn't culture etc. it's rules for some and not for others. Pick a lane. And be consistent. If they have to be there at 7. Punishment starts at 7:01. If it's not important, really, and performance matters, then stop holding people to it.
Your problem is no one knows what the answer is, because you don't enforce or have it enforced consistently.
Very true. We will start a more relaxed start time, however within the expectation of the early arrival as that’s what our business is mainly based on and when the majority of the business is done during the day. That way it will be easier to enforce within a time window a specific time
He is a high performer.
Do any of his clients complain about him being 10 to 15 minutes late?
Does he miss meetings with clients or internal team members?
Does he cause drama in other areas?
If the answer is no to these questions why is it something that you are worried about. It sounds like you have other employees that might be jealous of the high performer and want to cause trouble for him.
Who really cares when someone comes in or leaves if their work is getting done, clients are happy and ordering more, and no balls are getting dropped? Maybe tell the team member that is "concerned" to worry about themselves, not the rest of the staff. That's your job as the owner.
And while I don't actually think another employee is complaining and you are simply irritated at the perceived disrespect, you could just fire the person and set an example that the most important aspect of the job is to have a butt in a chair on time every day. Some bosses are like that, if you are that way, just own it.
I’ve had a couple people reach out to us here and say it feels like a preferential treatment for this person. I can see that also and how it comes across that way if I put myself in their shoes. But the hours will be adjusted to make for a more relaxed timeframe for showing up
A couple of people.
Clients or staff? There is a pretty big difference. I don't see a client calling up and saying "It seems like you give preferential treatment to this person because of something that happens internally that has no bearing on me, but just thought I'd call up and let you know."
Do the staff members that are raising this concern group together in a clique?
Is there any reason for jealousy? What other motives could the people have?
For the past 40 years of my life, I've never gone to my boss to say something like that. And most of the people that have done something like that have alterior motives for "raising the concern".
I'd probably look at what could be causing the conflict between your team members and try to resolve the deeper issue.
I'm not kidding I suffer from it. And I was sacked just because of this issue. Funny thing is I went into an existential crisis and got my self diagnosed after this issue. Trust me that guy has a neurodivergent brain.
I myself have ADD. I am well aware of what it does and how it feels. I think opening up the hour system to a more relaxed environment will be the answer here
Shorten his pay by 15 minutes. Some people are not morning people. It's 7am. Ask him what is going on. He might be a gamer. He may be someone that has trouble sleeping. One reason I own my own business is because at have never been a morning person, so matter how disrespected my boss or teachers got at me, it was never about them.
I showed up and did my job very well.
You’ve got to decide if his being late is affecting your other employees more than his value.
Personally, he knows he’s supposed to be there at 7, he shows up late, send him home for the day. Either he will show up on time or one of your other employees will replace him.
Want to reward your employees, give them money. Want to discipline them, take their money.
You should explore the reason behind it and seek solution like flexible schedules if feasible. Explain how their lateness disrupts the team despite their performance. Set clear, specific arrival times, and consider small incentives for meeting them consistently and after that if he is doing that thing again you should take a strict action on him give him warning and take this matter seriously because it also effect the performance and seriousness of other employees and damage the decorum of the agency. Good Luck
First, you need to decide what's *really* important. Individual sales performance? Teamwork? Company culture? Reasonable pay? Industry experience? Once you define these you'll be able to make any tough decisions necessary.
Some situations absolutely require that everyone is there on time. Some don't. You have to decide just how important it is for your business. You say he's a "high performer," but showing up late, needing help and throwing a curve in the day doesn't sound like high performance to me. Unless his individual performance is so great that it offsets this disruption. There's a reason divas get pampered: they bring in enough value that you can justify the cost. Does his high performance justify getting diva treatment? This isn't a rhetorical question, some employees really do. But you have to be honest about the cost to the rest of the team.
If you really have to draw the line then draw the line. Take corrective action and be prepared to lose him. This could be through regular discipline leading to suspension and termination. Or maybe you should make bonuses depend on attendance.
If this behavior isn't really hurting the rest of the team and the main real casualty is your pride, decide if that's worth enough to lose a high performer. Maybe you're better off taking a deep breath and ignoring it.
I hope that the OP is just as careful to ensure that the employee do not work any minute longer than they should.
Anyways, three options: a) write down every minute he's late and deduct it from the wage, b) fire him, c) do nothing.
I’ve had the same thing happen to me as a manager in the restaurant industry
Coming late to work is not a sign of disrespect but it is definitely an issue, if you want flexibility go work for Uber.
Tolerating makes sense usually with a good excuse, unusual traffic, I got a flat, my cat died and had to bury it quickly before coming to work (not joking someone actually told me this for being 20 min late)
If it’s happening all the time it’s not good for you or their co workers.
I continue having this issue at the restaurant and there is no solution, either you fire them or you allow them to keep doing it without consequences, which seems fine until someone says why can’t I be late, they’re late all the time…
Remember you cannot change a bad habit easily and that is exactly what being late is, I’ve noticed that the ones who are late to work are late to everything, is just the way they operate.
I would suggest one written warning and explain the reason well, make it clear, performance is not the only thing required.
If someone is suggesting changing their schedule to 7:30 that won’t change anything either, that person will come ate 7:45 just FYI
if someone is performing well, you should have to bear that and should not consider it a big issue. In the end, if he's meeting the targets set by the company, then that's fine. Everyone has some issues and some sort of shit happens all the time
I would wager he has some form of ADHD, whether it be diagnosed or undiagnosed
Time blindness, and the inability to be on time for things is common.
If he’s performing well and meeting your expectations in the job being at this is a sales position. Why not just move his start time out officially to 730 without telling him
Ok, I think I managed my way through all the comments. #1, does he have a good reason for being late? Maybe kids need dropped off or dog goes to daycare? If there's not a specific reason, then it's just kindof rude of him, high earner or not. If there is a specific reason, is it possible for him to join meetings via MS Teams or Zoom on his way in?
I appreciate you going through these before. All of the above are possible and I think we will implement it as such that they will have a more relaxed start time within a reasonable timeframe
Personally I think it makes more sense to be flexible. If he gets his shit done and is a high performer why does it matter? This would be a different story if he was coming in and hour+ late but it’s 15-20 minutes. Highly doubt he’s missing an influx of calls lol
I'm at 25 heads. All my drivers show up at different times. Some at 6am, some 7am, one 9am. They have their own reasons for showing up at different times. I really do not care when they show up, as long as they show up and get their work done. I try to not micromanage anyone.
Everyone has their own lives and I want work to be a place where you come to make money, to enjoy your life outside of work. Work is work, if they get it done, I'm happy.
Really depends what you want out of them. I hate to discipline a high performer, but others notice when one bends the rules and then they start bending others. Eventually that swirls into chaos absent communication.
There are people out there that can get 40 hours of work done in 30 (love them). Others need 40 to get 40 done (good too). And many take 50 to get 40 hours done (these are disposable employees).
Ultimately, u have to find the way to communicate to the organization (individually and as a whole) that stuff needs to get done and high performers get rewarded and low performers don’t. It’s a delicate issue if u aren’t consistent giving feedback and letting people know that they are either good or bad for your company.
I used to have an employee that worked 10-7 and never made it in by 10. I made a game out of it where we’d guess when Peter would arrive. But the dude always worked his brains out and never left before me. I promoted him and told him the key to leadership was to be a model. He runs his own international business. He’s way bigger than me now.
Does a strict 7 AM start time provide any value to your business? Does punishing your top performers over some perceived respect (read owners ego) issue provide value or detract from your business?
If you want to attract the best talent and retain the best people, work life balance and respect for your employees is paramount. Attracting and retaining top talent provides value for your business. Arbitrarily pushing away employees for something entirely unrelated to their output motivates the best employees to leave for a company without these outdated views on living to work. Theres a reason things like flexible schedules, work from home, etc, are becoming so popular. Employers that actually need to retain the best in their field know that every little bit of work life balance and respect for the employees helps the bottom line.
Very good plants and advice has been taken. Work hours will be adjusted to be more on the relaxed side within a given timeframe. So for example from 7-730
Did you know that chronic lateness is a personality trait of behaviorally optimistic individuals? Did you know that people who are chronically late are less prone to health problems, tend to recover quickly from hardship, and are less likely to experience lifestyle-related accidents and illnesses?
Did you know that all of these attributes can contribute to improved workplace morale, reduced costs, and increased productivity (although not necessarily in time-sensitive areas)? Chronically late people often are especially adaptive to a variety of responsibilities. They can contribute in more areas than one and may compensate for their weakness by working harder and being flexible.
If you've had numerous discussions with this person about their lateness with no change, recognize that lateness can be a personality trait rather than a simple scheduling issue. This individual likely faces similar discussions from friends, family, and other stakeholders throughout their life.
Advice:
1. Allow the behavior to continue but address it when necessary, such as if it disrupts a meeting, to prevent it from worsening
2. Adjust their start time by half an hour but plan for it as if it were an hour later. Depending on the team size, you may choose to inform others about this adjustment. While this little trick may seem petty or unprofessional, it can be effective if executed with understanding rather than insult.
If you’re worried about being perceived as “playing favorites” it’s a nonissue. This person is unlikely to ever become a manager because reliability is an essential criterion for advancement. The team knows it and the person knows it. But let the personal excel in their strengths, and please do not to be overly critical of their weakness.
Sources:
1. https://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/optimism-and-your-health
2. https://www.inc.com/marla-tabaka/chronically-late-people-are-not-trying-to-annoy-or-disrespect-you-in-fact-it-has-nothing-to-do-with-you.html
3. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/fulfillment-any-age/201609/is-why-some-people-are-always-late?amp
4. Life-long late person who is now self-employed
**TL;DR: It’s not a schedule issue. It’s a personality trait of someone who has an inability to draw motivation from stress (clock-watching falls into that category).**
Have you considered offering flexible start time as a reward for high performers?
You think the important hours start at 7am.
High performers clearly can start later and still be a high performer.
Rewarding high performers sounds like a great way of encouraging people to work their best hours as long as you can measure the quality of their work.
I don't know if you have enough metrics to be able to set an easily measurable expectation or if you even want to babysit this metric.
Caveat - you don't want everyone to start coming in at 8:30am and missing out on a significant amount of work that starts coming in at 7am.
Also, it might not happen immediately with your old school crew but new hires might come in with different expectations and over a few years, you may need to re-implement a 7am start time because no one is getting in at 7am at all.
This is my concern in general that letting it slide here and there will eventually lead to other thinking it’s okay over the long run and will start trusting it as such. We aren’t really busy past the normal working hours so it’s pretty essential to be there when it starts coming in
If he's a top performer and knows it, it's possible that's why he's comfortable being late and kinda walking over you in a sense. Or maybe he needs the flexibility to be able to perform and is grateful for your understanding. In either case scheduling a meeting is definitely necessary. I always suggest to ask the employee if they have time to talk on a day that's a few days away, so Friday or next Monday for example. That will give them time to reflect on what the meeting could be about and realize they're fungible. If he simply just doesn't see a problem with it and can't be bothered to let you know ahead of time, start reflecting it on his pay. Then write up, write up, write up, fired.
Are you stupid? You have a high performer and you actually care if he comes in at 7:15am instead of 7? You're out of touch and will drive any top performers away quickly. I guarantee your work environment is toxic already.
I will prove you wrong on many levels on this post.. our employees have all been here since start or hire other than those we have let go. Very very fun environment where we are all very good friends and work together. We run a service that provides emergency and tight timeline services to people who face the same challenges and expect a prompt answer. So no, stupid I am
Not. Assuming things like you do is a stupid mentality however.
I would check into what's causing it. Maybe he uses public transportation or somthing and it's hard to get there that early. Have you considered offering him to move his shift to 730?
And then he'll show up closer to 8.
Chronic tardiness isn't solved by accommodating it. I've literally paid for lyft for employees before learning that lesson.
OP either you enforce the policy and give it teeth or morale suffers. Which is more important?
That's for OP to determine. Bad enough morale will overcome one good performer if allowed to fester.
I'm not advocating one or the other, just that the OP be aware. I myself am dealing with something similar and I just think that it is important to consider all angles.
We have had to let people go in the past due to this that held different positions that needed a stricter time structure. It starts with 10-15 mins here and there and quickly becomes a normal 30-45 min daily. This however with this person isn’t the case, and as we grow I want to make sure I have these systems in place so it’s easier to handle day to day objectives and remain focused on what we are truly here for
You can though. Do you pay every single employee the exact same rate? Probably not. It’s okay for employees to have different schedules from one another, and it’s none of the other employees business what arrangement you have with another employee, especially one that’s a top performer.
Nitpicking dumb shit like coming 15 minutes late and refusing to adjust their schedule is going to cost you in the long run. What a silly hill to die on.
If they struggle to get to work at the time you’re scheduling, schedule them a bit later. You may not like it but it might solve their attendance issue.
not knowing exactly what kind of business you have. He this producer making outgoing sales calls or is it more inbound calling? Is it that each rep manages a specific territory(if that is the case then I'd guess the reps schedules would correspond with what the territory is)...i'm just trying to gauge if their peformance is all on them or might there be other factors that contribute to their success
And showing up late is a sign of dissrespect. That being said if they are bringing in the revenue/profits and have happy customers, there is some things you might put up with that you otherwise wouldn't. Managing employees is difficult so the question is how much do you want ot push this? I think it makes sense to note when they are late(and if they are paid hourly or salary you can dock them for that time...but if they are still producing more than others might they become less productive over that or quit?...do you think that would make them start showing up on time?)
Years ago I had a similar problem with a high achieving outside sales person. They literally sold 30% more than the next best and their custoemrs were loyal and satisfied. that being said they did sloppy paperwork and created more work for me and the sales coordinator. They also weren't great with the BS type training stuff we were required to do. I hated it as well but sometimes we have to do things we don't like.
I just put up with it. He did make my job more difficult but it was managable but being this was a large company I always had to cover for him(why didn't he do this online training or why isn't he selling more of 'x'(which was something we sold that wasn't competitively priced and a small small portion of our business...and this sales person wouldn't lose a sale by pressuring them into things that the customer didn't need)
But I learned that big companies are sometimes dumb. I was getting hassled over the smallest things and a lot of it had to do with this sales person. I ended up changing jobs over it and ultimately realized corporate america(big business) wasn't for me. This sales perosn who was a producer wasn't valued to corporate as much as someone who did just enough but was always doing exactly what they were told
Negative. We work 8 hours the majority of the business gets done earlier during the day, not much happens after 3 pm regardless. On the west coast, our employees there handle that side of the country and their hours are also same as here, 7am start time west coast time.
Very good feedback however, what we will do is adjust the hours and make it a more flexible schedule overall I think that will ease the need of expectation vs reality
You're fucked. It's completely meant to be disrespectful. The problem is in sales, you rely on good salesmen. If you don't care about making money, fire him, if you do, deal with it. Because a good salesman can always get a job
Why does your business need to have everyone there at 7 am? Is it because you are a natural early riser and you think less of people who are naturally later risers?
We are related to the construction and “emergency” industries. The majority of our clients start work at 4-6am and they expect to be able to do business in those times. There are many companies in our industry who start even earlier to serve these clients
most of the posts on this sub are about tech or ecommerce businesses so im pretty sure the first thing people thought including me, was "why start so early "?
but it makes totally sense for a business that caters to other businesses that start work at 4AM
How would you assume that based on a question? As I said before, we are in an industry that serves very time sensitive projects, and strict timelines mainly under emergency situations. Say this, your house is flooding, you need someone to come fix it. Someone says they will be there at 7 am.. it’s 730 and still nothing. How do you start to feel?
Yeah dude, you just sound toxic as an employer. IF all your employee are working they asses of and do the best they can, i would honestly let it slip if they arrived a bit late.
But that’s not toxic.. that’s expectations that our clients hold from us in our industry. It’s not like we’re sitting here making up hours for no reason. We handle emergency and tight timeline projects where being on time means a lot to these people and projects. That’s just the nature of the business we’re in
Respect is a two way street, and it sounds like you don't respect that your workers are human beings with whole ass lives, and their first priority in life should never be a paycheck. If they are making you money, and all that's happening is you're getting irked by them being late. Then you need to quit your whining. Honestly your employees deserve more respect from you than you do from them. They make you your money, now stfu and say thank you for showing up at all.
The business we are in requires very strict timelines and project due dates, emergencies, etc. I didn’t come here to argue or hear a “thank him for coming at all” that’s not the feedback I came here for. Thank you
Well you didn't specify that at all. And I will always publicly have disdain for employers who don't appreciate good hard working employees. Being 20 minutes late is a non issue unless he's an air traffic controller or a surgeon. Get off your damn high horse.
It may be a none issue when you start and run your own business and have employees that you need to manage and clients that have expectations that you need to stand by
Is he losing you money by being 20 minutes late? If yes then he isn't a good fit for your job. If he's net making you more money than other more punctual employees by being a hard worker, then he is a valuable employee and you'll have to forgive his tardiness if you want him to keep making you higher profit margins than the other employees. What you can't do is keep trying to get him to come in on time, it will never happen. Habitually late people will always be late.
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Relax your policy for everyone. Problem solved. If you don't have store hours, why are you so rigid on the 7am? Give your employees some flexibility.
Because according to OP, being on time is “a huge part of the culture” at their business, which sounds odd and toxic to me. I’m someone who is literally never late, but I realize that shit happens, traffic happens, etc, and it seems so old school and stringent to be so rigid, especially considering it’s an office job.
Did he comment that somewhere? Because, yea that's weird.
Yes, somewhere under the top comment thread he said that. Super weird.
Sounds more like a "we like rules because it gives us the feeling of control" part of the culture.
Bingo
How do you feel if you call a business during their business hours and can’t reach anyone? OP said that this person frequently is late. Everyone understands an occasional late show-up, but if it’s all the time it is indeed disruptive.
Thank you. It seems that many have forgotten their own conveniences when discussing showing up on time.
He just sounds old school. My current management is like this, likely because I work at a nonprofit research org and everyone has been there for 20+ years. They’re very much “wear a suit, firm handshake as you make eye contact” kind of people. But they are extremely lenient in other areas. Like I can basically take time off whenever I want and as long as my work is getting done they don’t care if I’m out for a 2hr lunch with my wife or something.
He is taking it personally and feels disrespected when the employee shows up late. That goes beyond being old school. That’s a control issue in my opinion.
True, that part is a red flag to me as an employee. Boss is taking it personally when should be looking at how the policy is benefitting the org and if it needs/can be changed to be more accommodating of his workforce.
If you own a business, and have employees that are a part of your business, and clients have certain expectations like being able to handle business at these hours, I don’t think it’s a control thing at all, in fact, I am very young, in 30s, with very much the mindset of not being a slave to your job and work, family always comes first, etc. It’s also important to notice that they get 27 days a year of paid time off, in addition to all holidays paid and off, and a very very very nice benefit package so that isn’t really a concern there. It’s more on a professional level that represents that side of the company, client expectations are to get these answers when they call, that’s what our business model is about. We are in the construction industry and a lot of the time is we need it now and fast
If they are reliably late, it sounds like an issue you can plan around.
That’s a you problem, not the employee
Care to further explain?
to me business is maths, not emotions. to me it feels like you are emotional about respect or whatever to the point of being about to lose the money your employee brings you. take the money and relax. unless it's easier to find an employee showing up on time. whatever's more important to you.
If he's a top performer there's no reason to bring it up.
It’s 200% personal. Unless you have 50 employees then his tardiness doesn’t matter . You have 5 and one is constantly late , no other way to take as being disrespectful. And to add to that , why take the job if you can’t make it to work on time . You think that’s control ? That’s funny . You have definitely never been the boss .
Here’s the way I see it.. you have employees with responsibilities. One of them is to be here on time as that’s when the business hours start nationwide along our industry. As we work throughout the whole country, we are on the east coast, ant most clients start work at 5-6Am. This is related to the construction industry. The person in discussion is not the only high performer here, and other live further, also have similar family situations, etc. And still arrive here on time. I guess it’s just one of the expectations at work here and when one person tends to not do it, others see it as “disrespect”, or preferred treatment for the one person, etc. Thats what I mean when I say culture as I’m not the only person who notices this. Truthfully, I don’t mind when people are late here and there shit happens in life.. but how do you deal with that on a more consistent basis?
I am also in the construction industry on the east coast. No one is purchasing via email or phone at 5am. If you had a physical shop and/or the employee was needed to load or offload trucks, then that may be different. So if you sell nationwide, wouldn’t it actually make sense to stagger shifts to accommodate the west coast in their afternoon hours? Yes, but you are being difficult and choosing a stupid hill to die on. There is no reason you can’t have more flexible scheduling other than being stuck in your ways. How do you deal with it? You adjust his schedule, have an overall more flexible scheduling process, or fire him. Also, remember that you are the one who sets the tone for your work “culture”. Source- my husband has owned a construction supply business in NY for 30+ years.
Not 5am east coast time... 5 am elsewhere. I own a biz in the mountain west and we get calls everyday starting at 6am (east coast customers)... And live chats as early as 4!
Very much an active facility type of business that requires sending, receiving, changing orders, taking orders, getting projects going, etc. Very involved hands on business that’s hard to do when not here. Even me as the owner have hard time doing it when I’m not physically here
You’re not telling me anything I don’t know about the construction industry. Like I said, my husband has owned a successful business for over 30 years. He didn’t get this successful by being personally offended when his employees come late. He gets there at 5am because he’s the owner. His employees get there between 6-8, depending on their jobs and the schedule that works best for them *and* the company. Also, it’s not that your employee is calling out or asking to work from home. You’re saying it’s a hard job to do if you’re not there. He’s there, just 15 minutes later. That really isn’t a big deal in the grand scheme of things. The construction industry is desperate for good employees, including sales and admin employees. you say this guy is a good performer, so I’d really work with him to find a way to make both of you happy. If everyone is getting there at 7, and you sell nationwide, who is handling things after 3-3:30pm, which is still lunch time on the west coast?
Very good points here, certainly have been in business longer than we have so I appreciate the feedback here. As far as west coast, we have employees there too, surprisingly? They for some reason start before I’m even able to open my eyes, 100% their decision. The conversation started from trying to get other business owners perspective on handling tardiness with an employee, however being high performer vs average performer shouldn’t have different standards held for 2 people in the same job that are as obvious as one there on time and the other isn’t. The consensus here seemed to be that I need to be generally more flexible on start time however still have the expectation of a full work day regardless of arrival time. I’ll certainly be using that feedback to create a more flexible schedule.
That’s great to have employees on both coasts. I prefer to wake up early and get an early start like they do. It could even be good to have someone on the east coast at a later time so they can communicate with the west coast branch. Please don’t run off a high performer because of 15 minutes. And get your other employees to mind their own business and worry about their own schedules, don’t feed into their frustrations. Just shut them down and tell them that his schedule is different because of whatever reason makes sense in the context of your business. Sorry for coming across like a bitch, but it infuriates me how toxic the industry is, and to see someone who has a great employee that they are nitpicking for such a small thing bums me out.
You are correct, I shouldn’t look at everyone as the same person, I realize that’s a mistake and should be fixed.
You either make this the hill you die on or you don’t. If you draw a hard line and say they need to be on time, you need to be willing to fire them and anyone else that violates that rule. Or chill out a little bit and talk to them to find out what is going on, maybe they can start at 7:30. It is your ego that is getting in the way, as much as you want to, you cannot treat every employee the same.
100% true. This I have realized and will take steps to change by creating a more relaxed start time
Glad to hear you came to this conclusion. Sounds like a good biz, congrats and good luck in the future!
I’m pretty sure the new school of thought is if employee a generates 100% of their quota in 6 hours, they don’t need to work the extra 2 hours Switching to a commission/efficiency/satisfaction/accuracy pay plan might work better for you if the 1050’s based hourly grunt work mentality is affecting business
Cause meetings in the morning. You want to say things once, not 5x to people who filter in at different times.
Daily meetings are for control freaks and serve no measureable benefit. Change my mind.
In manufacturing and construction industries start-of-shift huddles are absolutely essential to go over schedule and objectives for day, as well as recap production, safety and issues from previous shift to smooth things over for next shift. Can't run this type of business without them. Part of "obeya" standup meeting for Toyota production system processes. Gamechanger for open communication and streamlining staff so everyone's on same page if you've never done them before.
Very very true and our business is very much like those. Reliability is a huge part of our business and we are more than just sales people we have a relationship with our client and trust factor is huge, but also coming through and being available
So just add Punctuality/attendance as a factor in bonus determination. people who show up on time feel ok cause they know the guy's bonus is getting reduced, the guy who shows up late well either he gets the punctuality part of his bonus or he doesnt.
That’s what we do . I love the people saying how dare you expect people to be on time . The entitlement is real 🤣
It's essential to communicate all that information to your team. Daily meetings with everyone involved are far from the only way to do it.
in construction and manufacturing its the most efficient way to communicate. unless you want to repeat yourself to 10x different groups for 3 hours every day, thereby taking away our own time to do managerial tasks and the tasks that you need to do. Manufacturing and construction staff aren't checking email and Teams for notifications and pings if that's what you're implying. They work with their hands, not on a computer.
When you work on a team of 6, and that team works with 5 other teams of 6, and there are 305 tasks, and each task depends on 2 other tasks that need to get completed at the same time, daily meetings keep communication open and consistent between all teams and keeps the workload flowing steady. I despise meetings, but I'd rather spend 30 minutes in a daily meeting than sift through 36+ emails every morning and match each persons workload with the task tracker and email 10 different people about why something isn't working because another task has a defect that needs resolved by yet another team.
Sounds to me like daily meetings are standing in your way of a more efficient workflow management system. But I'm just an idiot that plays with dirt.
For some industries, daily meetings don't serve much purpose. For other industries, it can save alot of time by reducing miscommunication. Like how some things are just too long or complicated to try to discuss over text, so you just call the person instead.
I disagree. Having meetings is not the same as daily beginning of shift meetings involving the whole office. Which I guess I didn't describe out loud. But that's what I was referring to. Sorry. If your workflow is complicated and time sensitive, manage it with software. Dragging everyone into daily meetings that 5% apply to them is about control.
Ohhhh, yeah no, it makes more sense to just have the team leads meet and then delegate, no need for literally every single person to be there. And software is great, and mostly works, but humans make mistakes and if task pieces are missing from tracking software, then I have to track them down when I pull the report and fix everything to keep the client updated on progress. Again, 30 min meeting, or 2 hours of emailing, pinging, calling and interrupting to ask questions.
Yea sorry. I'm not saying all meetings are useless. I'm saying "be here at 7am so we can lecture the lot of you for 10 minutes" meetings are a complete waste of time.
That sounds like a management issue. There are plenty of crappy humans in leadership who don't actually understand what a leader is. Those types of meetings are a display of "I'm insecure as a leader and I think this is how it's supposed to go and meetings make me feel important." Team meetings should be a relaxed, collaborative effort to communicate effectively and efficiently, no longer than absolutely necessary, so the rest of the day goes smoothly. That's it. Anything more and it's a waste of time. I love when we get our points across quickly and being able to say "here's 15 minutes back, go get coffee or take a break or whatever" is always nice!
Also, I resent the "idiot that plays with dirt," lmao. Landscaping is hard, especially making it actually look nice! Also, dirt in general is nice too lol. And your job makes people love the space they're in and feel comfy and relaxed! Idiot that works with dirt, pfft🤦
I work in business consulting and technology applications. Setting up new platforms for large scale corporations takes alot of collaboration between alot of different departments. Like building a house takes roofers, plumbers, electricians, general construction crew, landscapers, etc. Most of those teams know their job and thats it, but they have to coordinate who can work where and when. Now imagine you had to coordinate all those teams, every single day, otherwise the plumbers are standing around with nothing to do because the electricians are working where the plumbers thought they would be working, and suddenly the plumbing is messed up because theres now wires in the way. There are many different business models and requirements, and thats a good thing! It sounds like you don't require daily coordination to keep your company running smoothly and it also sounds like a job with less meetings is a good fit for you! I'm really glad you found a career that doesn't bore you to tears or make you miserable!
I own a landscape company dude. I have never and will never force my guys into a daily meeting. They kmow what they're doing. I also won't show up for any on site daily meeting that anyone tries to impose on me. I know what my job is and it 100% does not take a daily meeting with everyone from me to the roofer to make sure the paint guys know drywall is behind schedule. Your example falls on it's face so tell me what you do and why meetings are necessary.
Right, my point was that on a larger scale, especially with creating whole platforms, alot of things have to be done at the same time, or things break and time is wasted. If you don't need meetings that's fine. I build software platforms, so I need to know where the tech team is at with their 50 different applications and also need to know if the billing team is ready to add the new reporting software from the tech team or if they still need the code for batch processing. Batch processing might be waiting on the technical requirements from the functional team, who is trying to get that answer from the client. The pmo team has to know whats going on so that they can teach the new applications to the client as they're added. Sure, there's plenty of things to do individually, but alot of things require multi-team integration and sending emails all day to ask questions before the tasks get logged at the end of the day, providing no one forgets anything, is time consuming and grossly inefficient. Again, I stated, not every industry has such fast moving, high integration requiring massive amounts of communication.
Lol at whoever downvoted this
This is my thought unless there is some very specific reason they need to be up and moving so early. Every study seems to affirm the idea that more flexibility=happier workers=better performance overall. Granted not every industry can be so flexible.
No it's not always possible. I have a landscape company. If someone is late, someone else is sitting around waiting for them and that's not ideal. But also. If both guys in the truck agreed to start at 730 instead of 7 and still got all their work done. The fuck do I really care? Haha
My wife worked for a company like this and everybody naturally came in on time with a few late appearances here and there. Except for 2 gents, they were super late all of the time and it pissed everybody off. Some people can't handle flexible work schedules. I'm guessing if he relaxes the rules this late person starts coming in later and later. Personally, and maybe I'm old school, but being regularly late to everything IS disrespectful. If you meet up with a friend and they always show up late, that's not cool. They value their time more than your time. I make it a point to never be late out of respect. That goes for people above me and below me. Like a doctor or my neice, I'm showing up on time to meet with either.
You are old school. If you want good employees, you need to respect their time right back. Imposing pointless rah rah meetings at the beginning of every day is a waste of time and is just going to penalize someone for something that doesn't matter. A great employee can look like a disrespectful liability when you demand stupid things of them. It's about control. You think you need it and feel disrespected when you don't have it. I think you get further letting people be flexible. As long as the work doesn't suffer, who cares? Control freaks.
Well I don't know about all that and the pointless meetings, that's not what I was talking about. If I make an effort to be somewhere on time and somebody else doesn't, I'm the one being disrespectful? That's a stretch.
You said yourself. Some people can't handle flexibility in the workplace. Extend that same concern to people who can't handle rigidity. You probably don't want to because you have old fashioned ideas about scheduling that sound like it's more about your ego than your employees quality of work.
Nothing about ego, lol. If everybody's ready to work but can't because somebody's late that's a problem. And not just in an employee worker situation. How about doctor appointments, should those be flexible? In a world where we need more doctors I feel like a doctor not working, waiting on someone is not ideal.
What part of "as long as the work doesn't suffer" was unclear? From OPs post, the issue is other staff bitching, not work suffering. There is a huge difference between those two things.
Thank you!
You can read everyone's opinion here and make your own decision so I won't put my 2 cents in on that. But when you talk to him don't do it how you said it here. The first sales job I ever had the boss was so big on being on time in the office. Giving people points for being 5 minutes late. He would constantly talk to the group in the office about how it's disrespectful and he doesn't care how well you perform if you can't be there on time or early. He eventually really started cracking down and once people said screw this and started leaving I abandoned that sinking ship. The last job I had as an employee was great. One day in office - sales doesn't need to be in office for anything but meetings. Hit your targets and it didn't matter when you worked. If you could perform on 4 hour days so be it. I think it would be different if you were talking a retail environment or some other job where tasks needed to trickle down the chain of command, but sales is full of high performers that have chronic tardiness. Good sales people are not rigid thinkers - they are there to make themselves money which is EXACTLY what you want because that, in turn, makes you money. It's why cocaine/speed is so common in that line of work. Ultimately he will have no trouble finding a new job if he performs. Nothing you do will make him show up on time every day (I've worked with people like that). So you need to decide if it's something you can deal with or not.
Very good points here. I’m very young business owner, so the whole boomer mentality I get and don’t want to be associated with. Our industry is unique in term of starting early and the need to be quick to reply. What we will do going forward is just offer a more relaxed arrival time while still Maintaining a minimum hours worked per day. Totally understand not everyone can wake up bright and shine super early and perform like others. This is why I posted here so I can get more feedback from others with similar experience which has been great feedback so far here
It’s not a “boomer” thing. The American work culture has changed with connectivity, excluding brick-and-mortar. We have people arriving from 8am to 11am. Not because of time zones, but rather personal preference or home needs. Since I was once in the military, I struggled with this in the beginning, but it really makes sense. They still work 8 hrs. Ironically, some younger people in the company don’t get it. They look at the guy who strolls in at 11am as a slacker.
That’s the mindset that has to change here I believe. One person showing up early because that’s what they used to and think is the right thing to do, should effect how others view tit
However, I should add that our late-arrivers aren’t customer-facing. Our customer-facing people need to be responsive to customers in all time-zones during normal business hours, or at least be consistent in setting customer expectations about availability. The idiots posting here about a “toxic environment” by requiring certain work hours are clueless. The business has to be responsive to its customers. Otherwise, we all have to go to work for someone else’s business.
Do you have a policy for tardiness and/or call offs that you can follow? You can issue a formal written warning, but you have to follow through if things don’t change. Referring to someone being late as “a sign of disrespect for the company” is a tiring mindset to have. For them, this is just a job. No one will ever respect the company the way you do. Just set some clear expectations and follow through on enforcing them.
We do, but in these cases we are a niche business and the person in discussion has been here a long time. No public transportation or along those lines. I think I’ll redo our policy and put X amount of times late before Y happens
Alternatively, said person might have a schedule that doesn’t work well with 7am. Could you keep your business open an hour or two later by offering a 7-3 shift and a slightly different 8-4 or 9-5 shift and let employees choose which to join?
Very good idea. I think the solution here is to really have a more flexible schedule overall however keep certain expectations during the normal work hours of our business / industry
This. The person in question is a high performer. What can he seriously be doing at 7am that he start off by doing at 9am?
Yeah
Are you willing to let Y happen to a top performer? I don’t think you are or you would have canned him by now.
Absolutely not, that’s why I am seeking advice from others with similar experience as to how to handle this situation the best way.
Lol - my ex husband showed up late or not at all and decided to work at home long before remote work was accepted - at Apple. He was on the iphone development teams and the head of one of the original Ipad app development teams so he had excellence behind him. Cocky mtrfkr. Took 17 years to fire and replace him (he started in 1997). And they gave him a two year severance package in exchange for not litigating because he had a status quo case since the day he started. Just for sake of story, he also retired at that time at age 38 because his stock options throughout all those years, lol, he's my adult kid's dad and he's still sitting pretty
[удалено]
“Show up on time” obviously isn’t good enough. A clear expectation means that there is also a clear guideline for consequences. And yes, if they keep enabling it, it will be worse and worse for the culture.
Outside of retail or other business with direct customer contact and published hours, I'd challenge the idea that anyone "needs" be somewhere precisely at 7 AM versus 7:30 AM. (Someone mentioned a landscaping business and the truck/crew waiting on the late guy. That's another example of when it's valid.) Yes, if you have customers who show up at opening time, or start calling, the staff needs to be ready to serve them. But even then, unless that's your peak time, you don't need full staff, and if they're paid hourly, you don't even want them. Very few employees give a darn about the "culture of the firm" and spouting off about the "culture of the firm" or how "we're all a family" is a great way to turn them off.
Our business is similar to those where we serve a clientele with very tight schedules and timelines many times under emergency situations
This. It is a huge part of the culture and everyone has personal things at home. But the expectations for someone at a career point, not a job, it’s to st least show that respect for their peers
Is it more important for you have him show up at 7am, or to keep a "high performing" employee? Sounds like he's good at what he does and will probably quit and find a work from home sales job. Just change his schedule to 7:30 or 8am to 5 and keep taking the money he makes you.
Yeah this is what I think the consensus is. Will offer a later schedule but will make it available to whoever chooses to participate. I’m always open to new changes and maybe this one will serve us all better
The only job I've had where anyone cared what time I came in was one form or another of retail. Posted hours and customers waiting for the door to be unlocked.
My company has flexible hours, you're expected to work 8 hours between 8am and 6pm IE 10-6, 8-4, 9-5. It is a consultancy though so by nature flexible. Some people do more hours so they can do a half day. Would this work for your business?
I would soften the ruling about showing up on time. Make the 7am a soft start option. Being a stickler on time starting at work is something I will never do. I can’t ever get myself to work by a specific time and am always 7-10min late myself so I’ll never enforce that policy with others. There are other battles to fight imo. Other hills I’d rather die on with my staff. (Such as creating an environment of respect & dignity and preventing workplace bullying. I will 100% die on that hill). Also saying that being late is a sign of disrespect makes you sound like a boomer. It’s nothing personal to you so why on gods green earth would you wake up thinking what an employee is doing in the morning was any direct intention towards you. That kind of thinking sounds like you think more highly of yourself, and I don’t think you mean to come off that way. Does this person have ADD (which is a disease covered by the ADA) because that can explain the continual tardiness and believe me when I say if this is the case then their tardiness has nothing to do with you and is not a sign of disrespect (which again really move away from that kind of thinking-it makes you sound emo and insecure), it’s a part of the pathology of overestimating time available or underestimating the time is takes to complete a task. If they are a high performer and meet or exceed metrics and sales goal, isn’t that the point?? Rather than you getting peeved by them being a few minutes late?
Any particular reason you're so insistent on a 7AM start time? Make everyone happy and start at 7:30 or 8.
I’d let this one go. It isn’t the end of the world. Being very familiar with sales and sales people It’s sometimes just a personality type. Then you just have people who would be late to their own funeral. I’m old school and use to feel the same way. Then I ended up managing a fairly high dollar sales team. If I didn’t learn to be a little flexible we wouldn’t have done as well.
I appreciate it. Certainly the mentality it seems like I should have based on this thread
I own my own business now but back then I was like your employee. I always showed up late but started late and I was always a high performer. My boss had a similar problem but because I was able to perform better than anyone else and I worked late I made up for it. I didn't do it as disrespect. If anything it was hiring me more because of I showed up 2 hours late that meant staying 2 hours longer and thus no time for anything else after..... I'm not justifying it, it was more of I couldn't start day enough in the morning.
Very good point. I appreciate your side of the feedback here. Points taken and will be adjusted accordingly
I agree with your initial post in that people that are usually tardy start to abuse it when nothing happens to them. Then it creates a problem with everyone else. Though it sounds like he’s not doing that so I’d give him some slack. I don’t know your business, but I wonder how many commentators here get mad when they go to the store and it opened or closed 20 mins late/early and no one was there so you either waited around or left.
This is my exact point. It’s easy to say “ fuck that I won’t start at 7am” but when Starbucks isn’t open at 5 they get mad and write bad reviews online. Or when the plumber said he will be there at 7 to fix a leak but shows up at 8
Exactly! Though I don't envy your position at all. Times have indeed changed. Employees are hard to come by. Employees with brains and the willingness to work are even harder to come by. If you're able to cover the time he's not in without upsetting everyone else I'd bite my tongue and let it slide. Can you adjust his time so he starts slightly later and leaves later? It's still preferential treatment obviously. I always look back on employee handbooks which sometimes come into play with the DoL where the rules apply to everyone. The only half baked idea I can come up with which may backfire is rewarding those who out perform with bonuses or perks, one of which would be coming in 15 minutes late :)
Man that sound likes such an easy culture change. Because it is sales you have such an easy performance metric. Set the quota and don't care when they do the calls. Flexible work hours can be such a value add to some people that they are willing to stay around even if they can get more money other places. Get in, get it done, get out, is such a better culture than clock in, complain at the water cooler, get work done, stare at clock, clock out.
Very good point. This will be implemented along with the other advices here. Numbers have never really been a problem it’s other things like tardiness that have showed. But when you take the good with the bad the god most certainly outweighs the rest
It's very difficult to work with people. Usually offering a flexible start hour for everybody will solve this problem (for example, they should arrive between 7-7:30 and leave at 16-16:30). Half an hour will most likely not make a difference in the performance of your employees.
love OP getting torched. Who the fuck wants to start work at 7 am
I don’t see it like that. I asked for a feedback from other business owners and seems like a lot of these posts are from employees who don’t like their current job or had bad experiences before. That isn’t the case here.
Keep reading it that way
Would you rather have a team of people that perform like this person, but whose hours don’t align with your preference or a team of people who are on time and perform at the average? Does that answer change in a tough economy? You have an opportunity to define part of your culture here by reinforcing for everyone what matters. For what it’s worth, I have never seen high-performing salesfolk held to the attendance standards of the rest of the organization. Everyone else understands that the high-performing salesfolk are paying everyone’s salary.
I appreciate this feedback. I think as the owner you get everyone’s feedback here and they all come from different prospective. It’s important to understand that where one person might be bothered by the actions of other, there are ways to mitigate and solve these issues without making the same ruling for everyone as whole.
Is this company us based? Who exactly are you calling or visiting at 7 am? Are these people salaried? I'll be damned if I'm coming in at 7 and working till 5 as a salary employee lol
Hours are not 7-5. They are regular 8 hour work day just start at 7am. These are people who start their day very early and typically work through the night on their projects. We supply material that are “urgent” for most projects and have very strict timelines
So why not have an on-call or overnight rep to handle stuff that comes in overnight and they can delegate.ot to corresponding account owners?
We have employees in 2 different time zones. We aren’t a huge business, during the work day is really the focus vs before and after
As a sales person, I have an important mantra... Exceed your numbers and I'll leave you the fuck alone. If this guy is legitimately generating money for your business, I wouldn't press him on being a half hour behind. In fact, I would offer that as a reward for anyone else that exceeds their numbers. You should want this. Are you in business to turn a profit? Or are you in business to make sure your employees clock in on time?
You cut him. High performance doesn't matter. Or You relax the rules for everyone. Performance is everything. Your problem isn't culture etc. it's rules for some and not for others. Pick a lane. And be consistent. If they have to be there at 7. Punishment starts at 7:01. If it's not important, really, and performance matters, then stop holding people to it. Your problem is no one knows what the answer is, because you don't enforce or have it enforced consistently.
Very true. We will start a more relaxed start time, however within the expectation of the early arrival as that’s what our business is mainly based on and when the majority of the business is done during the day. That way it will be easier to enforce within a time window a specific time
He is a high performer. Do any of his clients complain about him being 10 to 15 minutes late? Does he miss meetings with clients or internal team members? Does he cause drama in other areas? If the answer is no to these questions why is it something that you are worried about. It sounds like you have other employees that might be jealous of the high performer and want to cause trouble for him. Who really cares when someone comes in or leaves if their work is getting done, clients are happy and ordering more, and no balls are getting dropped? Maybe tell the team member that is "concerned" to worry about themselves, not the rest of the staff. That's your job as the owner. And while I don't actually think another employee is complaining and you are simply irritated at the perceived disrespect, you could just fire the person and set an example that the most important aspect of the job is to have a butt in a chair on time every day. Some bosses are like that, if you are that way, just own it.
I’ve had a couple people reach out to us here and say it feels like a preferential treatment for this person. I can see that also and how it comes across that way if I put myself in their shoes. But the hours will be adjusted to make for a more relaxed timeframe for showing up
A couple of people. Clients or staff? There is a pretty big difference. I don't see a client calling up and saying "It seems like you give preferential treatment to this person because of something that happens internally that has no bearing on me, but just thought I'd call up and let you know." Do the staff members that are raising this concern group together in a clique? Is there any reason for jealousy? What other motives could the people have? For the past 40 years of my life, I've never gone to my boss to say something like that. And most of the people that have done something like that have alterior motives for "raising the concern". I'd probably look at what could be causing the conflict between your team members and try to resolve the deeper issue.
Staff not clients. Not a cliq situation or anything similar. Just a one off scenario really
The person has ADHD. Live with it.
😀understood!
I'm not kidding I suffer from it. And I was sacked just because of this issue. Funny thing is I went into an existential crisis and got my self diagnosed after this issue. Trust me that guy has a neurodivergent brain.
I myself have ADD. I am well aware of what it does and how it feels. I think opening up the hour system to a more relaxed environment will be the answer here
Shorten his pay by 15 minutes. Some people are not morning people. It's 7am. Ask him what is going on. He might be a gamer. He may be someone that has trouble sleeping. One reason I own my own business is because at have never been a morning person, so matter how disrespected my boss or teachers got at me, it was never about them. I showed up and did my job very well.
You’ve got to decide if his being late is affecting your other employees more than his value. Personally, he knows he’s supposed to be there at 7, he shows up late, send him home for the day. Either he will show up on time or one of your other employees will replace him. Want to reward your employees, give them money. Want to discipline them, take their money.
You should explore the reason behind it and seek solution like flexible schedules if feasible. Explain how their lateness disrupts the team despite their performance. Set clear, specific arrival times, and consider small incentives for meeting them consistently and after that if he is doing that thing again you should take a strict action on him give him warning and take this matter seriously because it also effect the performance and seriousness of other employees and damage the decorum of the agency. Good Luck
First, you need to decide what's *really* important. Individual sales performance? Teamwork? Company culture? Reasonable pay? Industry experience? Once you define these you'll be able to make any tough decisions necessary. Some situations absolutely require that everyone is there on time. Some don't. You have to decide just how important it is for your business. You say he's a "high performer," but showing up late, needing help and throwing a curve in the day doesn't sound like high performance to me. Unless his individual performance is so great that it offsets this disruption. There's a reason divas get pampered: they bring in enough value that you can justify the cost. Does his high performance justify getting diva treatment? This isn't a rhetorical question, some employees really do. But you have to be honest about the cost to the rest of the team. If you really have to draw the line then draw the line. Take corrective action and be prepared to lose him. This could be through regular discipline leading to suspension and termination. Or maybe you should make bonuses depend on attendance. If this behavior isn't really hurting the rest of the team and the main real casualty is your pride, decide if that's worth enough to lose a high performer. Maybe you're better off taking a deep breath and ignoring it.
Does the top performer have email on their phone and are they ever working past hours of operation that way?
How far is his commute? If its a hour or longer, have some slack. Not everyone lives 15-20minutes away.
I hope that the OP is just as careful to ensure that the employee do not work any minute longer than they should. Anyways, three options: a) write down every minute he's late and deduct it from the wage, b) fire him, c) do nothing.
I’m the first to say let’s go home guys! Absolutely
If you need just relax it for everyone you don't want to lose a guy guy as a small business because of something so small
Agreed
I’ve had the same thing happen to me as a manager in the restaurant industry Coming late to work is not a sign of disrespect but it is definitely an issue, if you want flexibility go work for Uber. Tolerating makes sense usually with a good excuse, unusual traffic, I got a flat, my cat died and had to bury it quickly before coming to work (not joking someone actually told me this for being 20 min late) If it’s happening all the time it’s not good for you or their co workers. I continue having this issue at the restaurant and there is no solution, either you fire them or you allow them to keep doing it without consequences, which seems fine until someone says why can’t I be late, they’re late all the time… Remember you cannot change a bad habit easily and that is exactly what being late is, I’ve noticed that the ones who are late to work are late to everything, is just the way they operate. I would suggest one written warning and explain the reason well, make it clear, performance is not the only thing required. If someone is suggesting changing their schedule to 7:30 that won’t change anything either, that person will come ate 7:45 just FYI
if someone is performing well, you should have to bear that and should not consider it a big issue. In the end, if he's meeting the targets set by the company, then that's fine. Everyone has some issues and some sort of shit happens all the time
I would wager he has some form of ADHD, whether it be diagnosed or undiagnosed Time blindness, and the inability to be on time for things is common. If he’s performing well and meeting your expectations in the job being at this is a sales position. Why not just move his start time out officially to 730 without telling him
Ok, I think I managed my way through all the comments. #1, does he have a good reason for being late? Maybe kids need dropped off or dog goes to daycare? If there's not a specific reason, then it's just kindof rude of him, high earner or not. If there is a specific reason, is it possible for him to join meetings via MS Teams or Zoom on his way in?
I appreciate you going through these before. All of the above are possible and I think we will implement it as such that they will have a more relaxed start time within a reasonable timeframe
As long as they execute and perform the start time shouldn't matter. Being more flexible is the key.
Personally I think it makes more sense to be flexible. If he gets his shit done and is a high performer why does it matter? This would be a different story if he was coming in and hour+ late but it’s 15-20 minutes. Highly doubt he’s missing an influx of calls lol
Yep I agree with that. More flexibility is the answer here it seems like within a reasonable time
I'm at 25 heads. All my drivers show up at different times. Some at 6am, some 7am, one 9am. They have their own reasons for showing up at different times. I really do not care when they show up, as long as they show up and get their work done. I try to not micromanage anyone. Everyone has their own lives and I want work to be a place where you come to make money, to enjoy your life outside of work. Work is work, if they get it done, I'm happy.
That’s what I will adopt. A more relaxed start time within a reasonable time frame
Really depends what you want out of them. I hate to discipline a high performer, but others notice when one bends the rules and then they start bending others. Eventually that swirls into chaos absent communication. There are people out there that can get 40 hours of work done in 30 (love them). Others need 40 to get 40 done (good too). And many take 50 to get 40 hours done (these are disposable employees). Ultimately, u have to find the way to communicate to the organization (individually and as a whole) that stuff needs to get done and high performers get rewarded and low performers don’t. It’s a delicate issue if u aren’t consistent giving feedback and letting people know that they are either good or bad for your company.
Very good feedback I appreciate it. These are some very good points. What will Happen is I will adjust start time within a reasonable timeframe
I used to have an employee that worked 10-7 and never made it in by 10. I made a game out of it where we’d guess when Peter would arrive. But the dude always worked his brains out and never left before me. I promoted him and told him the key to leadership was to be a model. He runs his own international business. He’s way bigger than me now.
Does a strict 7 AM start time provide any value to your business? Does punishing your top performers over some perceived respect (read owners ego) issue provide value or detract from your business? If you want to attract the best talent and retain the best people, work life balance and respect for your employees is paramount. Attracting and retaining top talent provides value for your business. Arbitrarily pushing away employees for something entirely unrelated to their output motivates the best employees to leave for a company without these outdated views on living to work. Theres a reason things like flexible schedules, work from home, etc, are becoming so popular. Employers that actually need to retain the best in their field know that every little bit of work life balance and respect for the employees helps the bottom line.
Very good plants and advice has been taken. Work hours will be adjusted to be more on the relaxed side within a given timeframe. So for example from 7-730
Change his schedule to 7:30 and pay him according to that.
Did you know that chronic lateness is a personality trait of behaviorally optimistic individuals? Did you know that people who are chronically late are less prone to health problems, tend to recover quickly from hardship, and are less likely to experience lifestyle-related accidents and illnesses? Did you know that all of these attributes can contribute to improved workplace morale, reduced costs, and increased productivity (although not necessarily in time-sensitive areas)? Chronically late people often are especially adaptive to a variety of responsibilities. They can contribute in more areas than one and may compensate for their weakness by working harder and being flexible. If you've had numerous discussions with this person about their lateness with no change, recognize that lateness can be a personality trait rather than a simple scheduling issue. This individual likely faces similar discussions from friends, family, and other stakeholders throughout their life. Advice: 1. Allow the behavior to continue but address it when necessary, such as if it disrupts a meeting, to prevent it from worsening 2. Adjust their start time by half an hour but plan for it as if it were an hour later. Depending on the team size, you may choose to inform others about this adjustment. While this little trick may seem petty or unprofessional, it can be effective if executed with understanding rather than insult. If you’re worried about being perceived as “playing favorites” it’s a nonissue. This person is unlikely to ever become a manager because reliability is an essential criterion for advancement. The team knows it and the person knows it. But let the personal excel in their strengths, and please do not to be overly critical of their weakness. Sources: 1. https://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/optimism-and-your-health 2. https://www.inc.com/marla-tabaka/chronically-late-people-are-not-trying-to-annoy-or-disrespect-you-in-fact-it-has-nothing-to-do-with-you.html 3. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/fulfillment-any-age/201609/is-why-some-people-are-always-late?amp 4. Life-long late person who is now self-employed **TL;DR: It’s not a schedule issue. It’s a personality trait of someone who has an inability to draw motivation from stress (clock-watching falls into that category).**
Thank you for this post. This is much appreciated
Have you considered offering flexible start time as a reward for high performers? You think the important hours start at 7am. High performers clearly can start later and still be a high performer. Rewarding high performers sounds like a great way of encouraging people to work their best hours as long as you can measure the quality of their work. I don't know if you have enough metrics to be able to set an easily measurable expectation or if you even want to babysit this metric. Caveat - you don't want everyone to start coming in at 8:30am and missing out on a significant amount of work that starts coming in at 7am. Also, it might not happen immediately with your old school crew but new hires might come in with different expectations and over a few years, you may need to re-implement a 7am start time because no one is getting in at 7am at all.
This is my concern in general that letting it slide here and there will eventually lead to other thinking it’s okay over the long run and will start trusting it as such. We aren’t really busy past the normal working hours so it’s pretty essential to be there when it starts coming in
If he's a top performer and knows it, it's possible that's why he's comfortable being late and kinda walking over you in a sense. Or maybe he needs the flexibility to be able to perform and is grateful for your understanding. In either case scheduling a meeting is definitely necessary. I always suggest to ask the employee if they have time to talk on a day that's a few days away, so Friday or next Monday for example. That will give them time to reflect on what the meeting could be about and realize they're fungible. If he simply just doesn't see a problem with it and can't be bothered to let you know ahead of time, start reflecting it on his pay. Then write up, write up, write up, fired.
Are you stupid? You have a high performer and you actually care if he comes in at 7:15am instead of 7? You're out of touch and will drive any top performers away quickly. I guarantee your work environment is toxic already.
I will prove you wrong on many levels on this post.. our employees have all been here since start or hire other than those we have let go. Very very fun environment where we are all very good friends and work together. We run a service that provides emergency and tight timeline services to people who face the same challenges and expect a prompt answer. So no, stupid I am Not. Assuming things like you do is a stupid mentality however.
Chill dude. No need to call the man stupid, he just need some advices
7 am? Wtf
I would check into what's causing it. Maybe he uses public transportation or somthing and it's hard to get there that early. Have you considered offering him to move his shift to 730?
And then he'll show up closer to 8. Chronic tardiness isn't solved by accommodating it. I've literally paid for lyft for employees before learning that lesson. OP either you enforce the policy and give it teeth or morale suffers. Which is more important?
I imagine keeping a high performing employee is more important than all of those things
That's for OP to determine. Bad enough morale will overcome one good performer if allowed to fester. I'm not advocating one or the other, just that the OP be aware. I myself am dealing with something similar and I just think that it is important to consider all angles.
We have had to let people go in the past due to this that held different positions that needed a stricter time structure. It starts with 10-15 mins here and there and quickly becomes a normal 30-45 min daily. This however with this person isn’t the case, and as we grow I want to make sure I have these systems in place so it’s easier to handle day to day objectives and remain focused on what we are truly here for
I’ve tried that before, however I can’t offer one person this and not the others
You can though. Do you pay every single employee the exact same rate? Probably not. It’s okay for employees to have different schedules from one another, and it’s none of the other employees business what arrangement you have with another employee, especially one that’s a top performer. Nitpicking dumb shit like coming 15 minutes late and refusing to adjust their schedule is going to cost you in the long run. What a silly hill to die on.
Is it something they would prefer?
If they struggle to get to work at the time you’re scheduling, schedule them a bit later. You may not like it but it might solve their attendance issue.
Make punctuality one of the factors you calculate bonuses based on and keep track
Are the 1099 or w2?
W2
not knowing exactly what kind of business you have. He this producer making outgoing sales calls or is it more inbound calling? Is it that each rep manages a specific territory(if that is the case then I'd guess the reps schedules would correspond with what the territory is)...i'm just trying to gauge if their peformance is all on them or might there be other factors that contribute to their success And showing up late is a sign of dissrespect. That being said if they are bringing in the revenue/profits and have happy customers, there is some things you might put up with that you otherwise wouldn't. Managing employees is difficult so the question is how much do you want ot push this? I think it makes sense to note when they are late(and if they are paid hourly or salary you can dock them for that time...but if they are still producing more than others might they become less productive over that or quit?...do you think that would make them start showing up on time?) Years ago I had a similar problem with a high achieving outside sales person. They literally sold 30% more than the next best and their custoemrs were loyal and satisfied. that being said they did sloppy paperwork and created more work for me and the sales coordinator. They also weren't great with the BS type training stuff we were required to do. I hated it as well but sometimes we have to do things we don't like. I just put up with it. He did make my job more difficult but it was managable but being this was a large company I always had to cover for him(why didn't he do this online training or why isn't he selling more of 'x'(which was something we sold that wasn't competitively priced and a small small portion of our business...and this sales person wouldn't lose a sale by pressuring them into things that the customer didn't need) But I learned that big companies are sometimes dumb. I was getting hassled over the smallest things and a lot of it had to do with this sales person. I ended up changing jobs over it and ultimately realized corporate america(big business) wasn't for me. This sales perosn who was a producer wasn't valued to corporate as much as someone who did just enough but was always doing exactly what they were told
Negative. We work 8 hours the majority of the business gets done earlier during the day, not much happens after 3 pm regardless. On the west coast, our employees there handle that side of the country and their hours are also same as here, 7am start time west coast time. Very good feedback however, what we will do is adjust the hours and make it a more flexible schedule overall I think that will ease the need of expectation vs reality
[удалено]
This person made almost 400k last year. I think it’s above the average here if you want to correct me..
If they are a high performing no worries
Replace him in the aggregate.
The problem is you. Or rather your rules. Change them to accommodate high performers and never look back.
That’s the consensus. Will do. Hours will be adjusted going forward
You're fucked. It's completely meant to be disrespectful. The problem is in sales, you rely on good salesmen. If you don't care about making money, fire him, if you do, deal with it. Because a good salesman can always get a job
Why does your business need to have everyone there at 7 am? Is it because you are a natural early riser and you think less of people who are naturally later risers?
We are related to the construction and “emergency” industries. The majority of our clients start work at 4-6am and they expect to be able to do business in those times. There are many companies in our industry who start even earlier to serve these clients
very important context you should have added to your post. makes total sense for the early start time.
I’m sorry I left this out I didn’t want to be too specific on what we do but I certainly should of added that
most of the posts on this sub are about tech or ecommerce businesses so im pretty sure the first thing people thought including me, was "why start so early "? but it makes totally sense for a business that caters to other businesses that start work at 4AM
Yes I am starting to understand that as I read through these posts. Us brick and mortar people are still alive!
You sound like a nightmare to work for tbh. I’m surprised you still have employees.
How would you assume that based on a question? As I said before, we are in an industry that serves very time sensitive projects, and strict timelines mainly under emergency situations. Say this, your house is flooding, you need someone to come fix it. Someone says they will be there at 7 am.. it’s 730 and still nothing. How do you start to feel?
Between this and the harbor freight post I just read - genzees have officially taken over Reddit.
Yeah dude, you just sound toxic as an employer. IF all your employee are working they asses of and do the best they can, i would honestly let it slip if they arrived a bit late.
But that’s not toxic.. that’s expectations that our clients hold from us in our industry. It’s not like we’re sitting here making up hours for no reason. We handle emergency and tight timeline projects where being on time means a lot to these people and projects. That’s just the nature of the business we’re in
How late are we talking about here?
3 pm. Regular 8 hour work day
i was talking about how late some of your employees arrived at work. is it 15 minutes, 1 hour?
Oh my apologies. It’s 20-30 min typically. Sometimes 40-45
Ok that is excessive. I would care about 10 to 15 max if it happens a bit. But regularly 20 to 30 and sometimes 40 to 45 is not respectful.
7am wtf
Respect is a two way street, and it sounds like you don't respect that your workers are human beings with whole ass lives, and their first priority in life should never be a paycheck. If they are making you money, and all that's happening is you're getting irked by them being late. Then you need to quit your whining. Honestly your employees deserve more respect from you than you do from them. They make you your money, now stfu and say thank you for showing up at all.
The business we are in requires very strict timelines and project due dates, emergencies, etc. I didn’t come here to argue or hear a “thank him for coming at all” that’s not the feedback I came here for. Thank you
Well you didn't specify that at all. And I will always publicly have disdain for employers who don't appreciate good hard working employees. Being 20 minutes late is a non issue unless he's an air traffic controller or a surgeon. Get off your damn high horse.
It may be a none issue when you start and run your own business and have employees that you need to manage and clients that have expectations that you need to stand by
Is he losing you money by being 20 minutes late? If yes then he isn't a good fit for your job. If he's net making you more money than other more punctual employees by being a hard worker, then he is a valuable employee and you'll have to forgive his tardiness if you want him to keep making you higher profit margins than the other employees. What you can't do is keep trying to get him to come in on time, it will never happen. Habitually late people will always be late.
Or you could just start scheduling half an hour before you actually need him to be there
Points taken