Education & Work Managing people in the workplace issue

Ok, so I wont waffle on,
people who know me, know me as a very calm guy, confident but very little ego, can get annoyed easily but never emotional or angry or lose my temper, I never scream, yell, lose my temper or get agro
admittedly, I dont think im a great leader, Im just average,
im more a ill let you do what you think is best, if I see you doing it wrong, ill correct you,
im also a bit a joker, and will engage in cheeky banter with staff

so as long as the staff respects my position and me, we get along fine

unfortunately, over the years ive realised I can get a bit too relaxed , and staff can get a bit disrespectful. as I never get angry, or emotional
things that I realise I have done wrong is that when a staff argues back, In the past ive addressed the argument, rather than shut it down
I let staff negotiate with me a bit too much, eg days off, eg I get a bit too nice to them
on quiet days if a staff member is late (they are paid by the hour), and if they let me know, I dont get upset with them as it saves on wages
I joke with my staff
I can be at times a bit not firm enough

I currently work in a non white collar business. its a tiny business with 5 staff, im 40s, most of my staff are 20-30, the boss isnt hands on, but is always around, he is a nice guy, and lets me do whatever I want as my experience in the industry is good

anyway, the latest issue i have with a staff is she is 20 years old, good at her job, 98% of the time she great at her job, the other 2% shes a mess attitude wise, but still does a good job
my boss has told me, TMNT, you have full authority, you say shes gone, find a replacement, I trust you.

she sticks her nose into everything, and overall is arrogant, the 98% of the time, she is a smart ass, and the 2% she is absolutely terrible to deal with, she also has substance abuse issues, (she denies it and says she used to but not anymore), others are aware of her current substance issues


most of the time, its comments like
"why dont you do this way"
"why did you hire him, hes useless, so and so is better"
"I didnt make that mistake, you must have"
"why isnt this fixed "
"why is that done that like, its stupid"
"why does the owner do this, it should be like this"
"shouldnt you be working and not on the computer all day" to other staff and me
"why are blinds up, its too bright in here, thats why we're not as busy as next door"
"some one complained we are too expensive, we have to drop prices"
"you guys need to clean more"
"thats why I told you we should have done it this way"
"the social media here sux, we should hire a professional (I do the social media, and its not bad)
when she makes a mistake "oh why wasnt it written clearer, I cant understand that
"the system here is ****"
when I ask her something "I told you the answer yesterday, nothing has changed since then, were you listening"


the list goes on, on the 2% bad day, its bad, she at times has followed me around (our workplace is small) and says ranging from "oh finally youre actually doing some work eh" , "

she is responsbile for a certain section of the business, and she is good at it, clean, organised, detailed, spot on

shes actually a lovely girl most of the time, eg on her days off, she will call the other staff who are doing her job if things are ok

so her bad day tanrtums, at times she has a go at the owner too, however she apoligises, with me, not one apology, she doesnt say anything to me for a day or two and we go back to normal,

ive sat her down and had a talk to her,
whenever she gives me attitude, ive said ranging from "you let me worry about that, its not your concern" to "Mind your own business" to outright ignoring every word
even the boss has sat her down and had a chat

she also knows employment laws very well, so in her previous job (same owner) caused a lot of issues, unfair dismissal, discrimination etc
you can tell she tries to bait me into saying somethign abusive, offensive or lose it
thankfully, I dont step over that line, nor am I inclined to

all this being said, if I get into an argument every single time, im lowering myself to her level, which I dont want to nor can I be bothered, if I totally ignore her in these situations, im seen as a pushover

sorry for the TLDR post

 

It’s a tough issue to deal with.
People like this are poison and infectious so you need to get rid of them ASAP.
Unfortunately the employment laws are difficult so you need to take the correct procedures to not have further issues.
In my last business we had an employee with Narcissistic personality disorder. I didn’t realise it for years until it all clicked and I wasn’t even aware of the symptoms. I just thought this was his particular personality being young and argumentative like your example. When I googled further information it all made sense.
As mentioned, these people are destructive to business and will poison all the other staff with negativity which is a huge cost and loss.
Start giving written warnings wherever possible and allow no room for excuses until you eliminate them.

 

Fewer than 15 employees - exempt from unfair dismissal.

Get rid of quickly, otherwise come back to bite you later in my experience.

 

This wasn’t the case in our recent experience under guidance of a 3rd party employment law agency we were subscribed to.
Maybe the laws have changed recently, but once passed the probation period, terminating an employee becomes increasingly difficult.

 

Have dealt with this before and managed to turn it around.

I pulled her aside for 'a chat', but documented it. I made sure she knew I was documenting the discussion because I had her sign the 'record of conversation' and set up a follow up meeting for the next month.

She was grumpy for the first few days, but her behaviour improved dramatically.

 

When i was managing 20-30 staff in a big accounting firm, I hire for potential and attitude, not knowledge or ability. The latter can be easily learned with the right attitude and outlook. I took a big school grad and trained him into IT. Whereas people who already had the knowledge can be opinionated and unwilling to keep an open mind.

So yeah., agree, I'd get rid of her asap if i were you.

 

Not true. Small businesses must follow the small business fair dismissal code. Small businesses are only exempt of paying redundancy pay in the case of genuine redundancy.

https://www.fairwork.gov.au/Templatesformschecklists/Small-Business-Fair-Dismissal-Code-2011.pdf

 

I've thought about a written warning
Normally i wouldn't bother with them as because if you need to issue them with one, they're usually on the way out

The good thing is the owner was smart and hired her on a casual basis even though she works full time hours so in the case this exact thing happened to get rid of her.

Thank fully finding a replacement for her isn't too difficult.. Just more work for me as she is 40 hrs per week, does a lot of higher duty type stuff
After yesterday's incident where I sent her home due to poor attitude mid shift.
She stormed off while saying "I quit, hope you can manage without me" she scrubbed her name off the roster

Unfortunately the boss is playing it safe and diplomatic and giving her until a time today to. Reply if she is coming back

Edit: didn't know about the less than 15 ppl rule. But the fact she is casual means she can get phased out very easily

edit2: yes Iagree, a toxic environment is no good, in a previous lifetime when I owned my own business, I had to keep a few staff on with bad attitude because I couldnt find staff, its not as if their job was specialised, but simply, due to location, it was near impossible to find a decent staff,

 

Yep, i hear ya,
She's not flush with cash,, but despite this (what I find quite strange with a lot of young people) is that even though they need the job they are always wiling to quit or move on when things don't go their way

Eg I've worked with staff who say they need the money but the moment things don't go their way or it's difficult or they don't like a colleague . They just quit without another job lined up

 

I googled narcissistic personality disorder.
I'm not sure this person fits that description entirely n
What do you guys think ?

Narcissistic Personality Disorder | Psychology Today Australia
She never gloats about how good she is, or a need for Admiration

Its almost like she has argumentative personality disorder (I made that up!)
But becasue she is responsible for her little section in the busienss, she does think that everything should be suited to her, but she doesn't say it like "this should be setup for me" she says it "why is this setup like this, it stupid, I can't reach it.

 

My bad. Early morning wishful thinking on my behalf......

 

just had a look at that link, I assume none of that applies if you are casual?

 

Get approval from your boss to spend a couple of hours with an employment lawyer about how to manage the issue. It will be a worthwhile investment.

 

How confident are you about the substance abuse? There are companies that can be on-site within less than an hour to perform certified drug and alcohol test. This is completely legal if you have resonable suspicion. If she fails send her packing. If she doesn't fail it still puts her on notice.

 

play it fair - which has the added bonus of either getting her performing well, or she's out the door. Also sounds like if you don't document everything and do it properly, she may cause problems for the company.

So tell her like it is - she is going on to a performance management plan, identify where she does well, but also where she is disruptive. Let her know it is not worth keeping her if she is undermining management and causing problems.

Cheers,
Inertia

 

No one can reliably diagnose some one else (or even themselves) with anything by using google - especially a mental health issue.

 

yeah its a tiny business so we probably dont follow protocol to the dot,
shes passed probabtionary, but I assume probationary periods have to be in writing anyway,

as mentioned, her work is never an issue, just her attitude, and the fact she lets her personal issues come out at work,
however ive let the boss know that the workplace is very toxic because of her and its bad for business, I have had another staff who is older complain about the way she talks to him