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Author Topic: It's hard to fire people, it really is (also: bad parents!)
TL
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Hard to fire

Here's a story without names. Okay -- made up names. I'm the general manager of a movie theater. It's my profession, and I love it.

I currently work at a theater which has been open for 2 years. I replaced the original manager (who still works for the company elsewhere) and I've been in charge for about a year.

All this time, there's been a young man employed by the name of Chexmix. Chexmix is sort of immature, but can be fun to around. When I arrived at this theater, I was impressed by Chexmix. I thought he was good. But over time, Chexmix has become very bad at his job. Chexmix comes to work and hangs on a broom talking to co-workers. He contributes virtually nothing. Chexmix can't get along with anybody anymore -- all he ever does is complain about how he hates his co-workers. Chexmix doesn't respond to direction anymore. I come to him and I say, "Listen, Mix, you can't stick an empty cup sleeve on your arm and wave it around saying 'Look Mr. Lance, my arm is wearing protection!' in front of customers. It's inappropriate. You can't sit at your register pumping your arms doing a dance while customers are waiting to be hepled. Customer service -- it needs to be a priority." And Chexmix says "Okay, if that's the way you feel, maybe I'll just quit." And I say "Go ahead and quit. You know where the door is. Look, nothing personal, but it's my job to provide direction, and you have to be able to take direction from me. If your response is that I can't give you direction or you'll quit, save us both a lot of time and trouble."

Chexmix tells my managers, "We all loved the last manager. But Mr. Lance is ruining everything."

Chexmix tells me, "It seems like you and I just have a problem."

I say, "No. I have absolutely no problem with you. I like you -- but you've got to improve your performance."

He says, "I've fixed every performance issue I've ever had."

I say, "No you haven't. On your last two evaluations we've talked about making customer service a priority -- and it still doesn't seem to be. I sit here and watch customers staring at you in disbelief while you perform a 90 second dance instead of helping them."

Him: "Maybe I need to think about if I want to keep working here, if you're gonna sit there and say I haven't tried to improve my performance."

Me: "I didn't say you haven't tried -- I said you haven't succeeded. I would never say you haven't tried, because I can't read your mind. How would I know? If you say you're trying, okay, you're trying. But I need you make it actually happen now."

And there's a long history of poor performance here on his part -- there have been a number of times where he just barely got to keep his job. I've cut him so many favors -- he doesn't even realize.

Chexmix says, "It's a slap in the face that I've been here the longest and yet there are other people making more than me. I was told that the person with seniority would make the most money."

Me: "Who told you that? I never told you that. How do you know how much your co-workers make anyway."

Him: "I have seniority. And I feel that I should make the most."

Me: "Nothing is based on seniority, it's based on job performance. At _______ there's no such thing as seniority."

He keeps saying, "I've been trained in every area."

Me: "Everyone has been trained in every area."

This goes on and on.

He tells me, "I'll have to think about whether or not I want to keep working here."

Me: "Okay. Let me know. For the record, I'd like you to stay -- but you have to be willing to work on the performance. You can't keep pointing the finger at everyone else."

When it comes time to make the next schedule, I see that he has requested five out of seven days off. I'm pretty convinced he's going to quit, so I don't schedule him at all. This is not personally vindictive on my part. I just don't want to be in the position of him coming to me and saying, "I quit!" and then I have to cover all of his shifts.

Then one of my managers comes to me and says, "We have a cash shortage today. Chexmix was 46 dollars short."

This will be his eighth write-up.

I say, "I guess that about does it."

I plan to have the manager who caught the shortage do the termination. This is for training purposes. I'm training my management team so that each of them can run their own theaters. But two things occur to me: First -- it's really hard to fire someone, and maybe I ought to save my guy the headache. It is ultimately my repsonisbility. Second -- it occurs to me that if I wait until after the weekend so we can tell Chexmix in person, the possibility exists that he might try to pick up some shifts from his co-workers, and that could be awfully awkward for him.

So I decide: quick and clean, better to do it now. So I fax in his paperwork, request his final paycheck, and pick up the phone.

"This is Mr. Lance."

"Yeah?"

"The reason I'm calling is because your till was 46 dollars short yesterday."

"I don't know how that could be."

"Okay. Well -- I'm sorry but I have to tell you that you won't be working here anymore."

"Well, that's bullcrap. Something's gonna happen with that. That's bullcrap."

"Okay, well, I'm sorry. It's just that this is your eighth write-up, and we just can't keep on letting you skate by."

"That's bullcrap."

"I'm sorry. You'll be paid on Monday. Thanks."

This is extremely hard for me. I put on a brave face, but it's always hard to terminate someone -- particularly someone who's been there since the beginning. I think that's why we kept him so many other times when we probably should have let him go.

What happens next is slightly harder....

And bad parents

He shows up with his parents. (He's 18, by the way.)

His parents ask me: "You can't even fire our son face to face? You do it with a phone call?"

Me: "Usually I would do it face to face."

They: "Why didn't you this time? Because you can't face our son. Because you know you're in the wrong."

Me: "I assure you that's not the case."

They: "I hope when you get fired, they do it with a phone call."

Me: "I hope that I'm not going to be fired."

They: "Oh you will be."

Me: "Hm."

They: "There's only six write-ups here. You said there were eight."

Me: "That's right. There was a --" (There was a writeup in his till with multiple copies, so at a glance, I thought it was eight -- but it turned out to be six)

They: "Well which is it? Six or eight?"

Me: "Six."

They: "You better get your story straight."

Me: (smile, pained smile, sigh slightly)

They: "Our son doesn't need this job. He doesn't even want this job."

Me: "I sense that. And I think that's a big part of the problem with his performance."

They: "Performance? How many times has he been late? How many times has he called in sick?"

Me: "I never claimed that he's been late. He's not being terminated for tardiness."

They: "That's right. Because you know he's reliable."

Me: "There are other performance factors than tardiness that might lead to someone losing their job."

They: "You are a piece of work."

Me: "I'm honestly sorry that things have worked out this way. But they have. It wouldn't have --"

They: "No you're not. You planned this."

Me: "Pardon?"

They: "You didn't put him on the schedule this week and then he gets fired? Real convenient."

Me: "It's not, actually."

They: "This is just an excuse. You must have been planning to fire him."

Me: "That is incorrect."

They: "We want your boss's phone number."

Me: "That's fine. It's on the card I gave you."

They: "We'll see what he has to say about this."

Me: "Okay."

They: "If you can't handle a kid making changes to his schedule, you need to find a different line of work."

Me: "I'm not sure what you're referring to there."

They: "We're going to get you fired."

Me: "Hopefully not."

They: "None of this is legitimate." (They wave the 6 write-ups.)

Me: "It is."

They: "You'll be hearing from our lawyer."

Me: "I -- look, I appreciate your point of view on this, but --"

They: "And we appreciate yours!" (And they storm out.)

Me: "Thank you."

Now, you know, talking to his parents actually went a long way towards explaining his general attitude of not accepting any responsibility for the various problems with his work, his tendency to always point the finger at someone else, and his general poor work ethic.

Thank God I had parents who taught me to work hard and accept responsibility for myself, rather than parents who would blindly take my side no matter how in the wrong I happened to be.

In fact I will now use this space to call those parents the 'M' word.

Morons.

They're freaking morons.

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Euripides
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I sympathise completely. I probably wouldn't have been so polite.

You're very patient, TL. [Smile]

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Dan_Frank
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All I have to say is, I'm the general manager of a pair of Subway restaurants, and I can sympathize 100% to this story. Before I had this job I never realized how hard it is to fire people. Or how insane and aggravating a teenager's parents can be.

Good luck! [Smile]

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TL
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Yes! I am. (Patient).
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Sterling
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Sounds that way. Jeez.

My sister-in-law works in day-care at a local supermarket. Hearing some of her stories, one thing became clear- some parents really don't know what's good for their children.

I'm as protective a parent as anyone. But that doesn't mean you turn a blind eye to your child's misbehavior. It isn't doing him or her any favors to enable behavior that will be a millstone around their neck all their lives.

I've seen people fired for far, far less than the behavior you describe. You are completely in the right, and I hope your management is smart enough to see it.

(Although, from the sound of it, if the parents are anything like the kid they'll talk tough about calling your management and then never follow through...)

Be proud of yourself that you had the patience to put up with this as long as you have to give your employee a chance. You've done all that could possibly be expected [by sane people].

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Launchywiggin
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At my restaurant, a drawer off by more than 5 bucks was automatic discharge--no arguments.
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Shanna
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I have all new respect for my old managers (I worked seasonally at a theatre) when I think about the number of "Chexmixes" I know who have been fired.
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dawnmaria
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When I was in fast food and my manager was grooming me for my own store, he had me fire someone as a learning experience. Unfortunately the man in question was psycho and he came after me physically in the office. I have never had an easy time firing since. Not that it's ever EASY, but after that I wouldn't sleep the nigh before and almost vomit that day. I am so glad I get to be a stay at home mommy now!
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MightyCow
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I really don't understand why it's so difficult to fire people. I'm talking about from a legal perspective. If you do a bad job, you get fired. Where's the difficulty there?

It makes me crazy how people who are horrible at their job, clearly don't care or want to even be there, will threaten to sue if they're fired.

People like that need a swift kick in the pants and a lecture on responsibility.

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Farmgirl
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Wow - TL. You have my sympathy. It boggles my mind that the parents acted that way. I mean, at that age, it is time for the parents to step back and let junior sink or swim for himself.

Reminds me of those people on American Idol who shout profanities at the judges after basically being told they aren't good enough. What has happened to personal responsibility?

I'm glad I'm not supervisor any longer. I hope I won't ever be again in the future.

FG

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Lyrhawn
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Jeez, I can't believe you stayed that calm all throughout that ordeal.

[Hail] TL

I've seen people get fired at lot at my job, restaurants just have a high turnover rate, and when the person getting fired was hostile, I've NEVER seen the GM that calm in return.

Way to keep your cool, man. And I'd say you did the kid a favor by firing him, if he's smart enough to realize it.

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Will B
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You probably put up with more abuse than I would have. Maybe it's good, if you can let it go right past you. Anyway, you certainly don't *owe* it to anybody to let them abuse you, imho.
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Rohan
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Gotta love the threat of legal action. "We'll spend hundreds of dollars an hour to make sure our son keeps his $6.50 an hour job!"

Not to mention those teensy, tiny, all-important words: "at-will".

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Dagonee
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Seriously. What's the cause of action here? Failure to indulge an irresponsible brat?
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Itsame
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Whenever my brother gets fired, my parents always blame him for being lazy and having poor work ethic (both of which are completely true). The thing is, they are doing what they should be doing, making him take responsibility. The problem is that it is hard to do that as well. People prefer to take the easy way out by blaming others.
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stihl1
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I think you were more than justified with firing the kid. Frankly, he wouldn't have lasted long enough to get 6 write ups with me.

I agree though that firing someone is hard to do. I had a kid that started out working for me and was great. About a month in his performance radically changed. He wouldn't follow directions and was just killing me. So I canned him, and I did it over the phone. I thought it was better than in person as well.

As far as the bad parents thing goes, don't even get me started. That is a whole seperate topic. But the fact is, too many kids that are growing up today are coddled and protected. They are not prepared for the real world where you don't get constantly praised and rewarded and protected. Your parents certainly shouldn't come to work and complain when you get fired.

The key is to document everything, and have a guidebook that spells out how you can be fired and for what. Michigan happens to be an at will state, so you don't really have to go to great lengths to justify a firing, which is nice.

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Survivor
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I always thought it was good form to simply tender your resignation when the appropriate hints were dropped by your boss.
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Phanto
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dawnmaria: How did that end?

Yes, 40+$ going missing is *astonishing*. That alone is more than reason enough to fire him, and excellent job staying calm.

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ketchupqueen
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I'm sorry you had to go through that. But good job handling it the way you did. The whole time I was reading that, I was going, "Wow, yeah, it's amazing he didn't YELL AND THROW THINGS at these people for their annoying stupidity!"
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KarlEd
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Good Heavens! What a frustrating experience. I have to admit a "Chexmix" of that degree would't have lasted half as long with me. I'm all for being tolerant, flexible, patient, etc, but a business is a business. Jobs don't exist as priviledges for the employees.
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dawnmaria
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Phanto:
Luckily one of the other managers saw what started to go down throught the office glass and ran in and restrained the guy and escorted him out of the store. I then collapsed into a crying blubbering little puddle of goo. I also got to go home early! That part was good at least!

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Storm Saxon
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Reading your post was almost painful, TL. You're, like, some kind of managerial god or something.
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rivka
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quote:
Thank God I had parents who taught me to work hard and accept responsibility for myself, rather than parents who would blindly take my side no matter how in the wrong I happened to be.

quote:
I'm as protective a parent as anyone. But that doesn't mean you turn a blind eye to your child's misbehavior. It isn't doing him or her any favors to enable behavior that will be a millstone around their neck all their lives.
Amen! As a teacher (and now college administrator) I have occasionally had to deal with "my child can do no wrong" parents. [Mad] [Razz] [Mad]

quote:
Way to keep your cool, man. And I'd say you did the kid a favor by firing him, if he's smart enough to realize it.
Agreed. Very nicely handled, TL. [Hat]
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Joldo
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I started my first job last weekend (I'm 17) working in a restaurant. I found out I'm a freak.

I work only Saturdays (so today was my second day), and thus I work 12 to 14 hours a day. I've tried to skip my breaks three times, just because I feel like I've got a lot of training to do and I don't really need them. I'm constantly doing something, whether seeing if something needs cleaning up or handling customers.

The other teenagers working there . . . well, they spend a lot of time getting chatty with each other and, yeah, leaning on their brooms. I'm the newest employee, and yet other than some general knowledge of procedure I'm doing better than those kids already. Mostly because on my first day I watched everyone very carefully.

I really just don't get it. I think there's a massive lack of work ethic. One of the girls has skipped two days without calling because she had "relationship drama". Good Lord! What happened to the idea of a job?

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Rakeesh
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I don't think he would've lasted beyond the cup-sleeve protection incident, to be honest. With his already-established pattern of sloppiness and general laziness and crappy work?

"Perhaps you can use the free time you're about to have to visit a comedy club on open-mic night, Chexmix."

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Tresopax
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So, I'm guessing Chexmix won't be using you as a reference...
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Rohan
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Actually, about the over-the-phone thing. Is there some rule somewhere that says in-person is better than over the phone? Maybe it's my experience bias, because I do a ton of business over the phone, including delivering bad news, but it doesn't seem all that different to me. And over the phone certainly takes less time out of your day. Am I rude and uncouth?
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Tante Shvester
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Firing people is the thing I like least about my job. The last guy I fired was in the middle of a shift when I told him to gather his things and clock out. He told me that he didn't want to leave. I stood my ground and told him that I'd hate to have to call security and have him escorted out.

He left.

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Goody Scrivener
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[Hail] to TL. There's no way I could have kept my cool in that situation.

And ya really gotta wonder about an alleged adult who has his parents come in and whine about this. I'd love to know what he told his parents anyway.

Rohan: I was fired from a job over the phone. At 4:55 pm. On my birthday. On my last day of a week's "vacation" to take care of major house renovation type stuff. And then found out the next day that my brother who also worked there was fired about 5 minutes before me. She called him into her office, fired him, and as the CFO was escorting him out of the office, she called me and canned me as well. I'd had 5 years in with the company, he was still in his probationary period. Looking back, I'm actually a little glad she did it over the phone - I didn't have to deal with a train ride in tears and hauling a box full of my personal effects.

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TL
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I served someone with the last name of Hecht today at the theater. (Credit card.) And I thought: JonHecht! is a fellow jatrawhatevero -- maybe I should ask this woman if she's related and if so, I'll pay for her popcorn!!

And then I thought: What the heck? I ain't paying for anybody's popcorn, related to JonHecht or not.

Hatrack is a great place, you guys. Thanks to all of you for being so great. You guys are great. Etc. But be forewarned: I ain't paying for anybody's popcorn.

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Tante Shvester
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Buy me a Coke?
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ketchupqueen
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quote:
Hatrack is a great place, you guys. Thanks to all of you for being so great. You guys are great. Etc. But be forewarned: I ain't paying for anybody's popcorn.
Not even the Ketchup Princess'? Or Mooselet's? Come on, can you honestly resist the cuteness of Hatrack kids?
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TL
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Which one is which? They all look the same.
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ketchupqueen
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Come on, the caption gives their screennames in order. *thwaps TL*
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TL
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Oh wait. I'll go back and look again.....

*grump mode engaged*

But I ain't buying them any popcorn anyhow. I can resist all kinds of things, including cuteness. [Frown] !

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ketchupqueen
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But Emma will even sign to ask you please. It's adorable.

She blows kisses, too.

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TL
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FINE!
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ketchupqueen
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Hee, hee. You cracked. [Evil]
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