71–80 of 89 posts
Why do employers deny their employees toilet breaks? Do they actually believe it makes the employees more productive, or are they just cruel people?
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He didn't ruin it for everybody. Management decided to punish the collective rather than deal with an employee who is acting in bad faith.
He did ruin it for everyone. Management called him up on the sick days. he responds by saying that there's no policy for sick days, and to show him in the handbook where it says he has a limited number of sick days, or that he needs to notify someone. They can't, because we don't have one. When he's told this isn't acceptable, he pushes back saying that he's being singled out.
The "just wing it and hope no-one takes the piss" approach is fine if you've only got a handful of employees, but is increasingly risky beyond that - it was probably only a matter of time before that organisation got into a difficult HR situation one way or another.
It's not even going to have been much of a time-saving, since all the legally-mandated bits (eg. equal opportunities, grievance procedures, anti-harassment, modern slavery, and consultation process) will still have been needed at that size, just without a central place to track and manage it all.
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He didn't ruin it for everybody. Management decided to punish the collective rather than deal with an employee who is acting in bad faith.
He did ruin it for everyone. Management called him up on the sick days. he responds by saying that there's no policy for sick days, and to show him in the handbook where it says he has a limited number of sick days, or that he needs to notify someone. They can't, because we don't have one. When he's told this isn't acceptable, he pushes back saying that he's being singled out.
So instead of punishing everyone for some lying asshole's poor judgment, I propose management puts that lazy jerk on their own SDIP (sick day improvement plan).
EDIT: As an alternative, sure, update the handbook's sick policy while that liar is working for you. Since there's now precedent for handbook updating, should be an easy thing to revert it back to the normal, "no sick day policy" after they leave (by whatever means).
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No, it's bizarre that this isn't normal. The law is an expression of our desire that our industry doesn't exploit forced labour. The fact that this mostly only counts when the forced labour takes place in our own country is a weird historical detail, long outdated by globalisation. Either you think that forced labour in Malaysia is OK in which case this seems bizarre, or you think it's not OK in which case we need a…
"Either you think that forced labour in Malaysia is OK in which case this seems bizarre" It would be an interesting poll to see what the populace actually things about this statement...
"Do you think forced labour in Malaysia is OK" - nobody answers yes to this.
"Are you willing to make sacrifices, such as imposing liability on local business, in order to discourage forced labour in Malaysia?" - this is the question.
This pattern applies to a lot of stuff. All politicians claim to have a solution to the housing crisis. But most "solutions" are suspiciously absent of downsides. If nothing you propose involves sacrificing anything or creating any losers I conclude you don't actually care about the housing crisis.
You can use this on your managers too. "What are we gonna do about the tech debt?" If the answer doesn't involve delaying features then you should interpret it as "nothing".
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Few years back (before covid) I splashed out on a fancy Dyson. Worst vacuum cleaner ever. I'm sporting a Vax now, quite good, even runs VMS.
Miele vacuums are better performers than Dyson, and cheaper too.
If you pick up a Dyson vacuum you'll notice that it just feels flimsy in the hand. I think they're aggressively cost-engineered- the material you save by designing molded parts to be minimally thick has got to be like tens of cents to a couple dollars over the whole machine...
James Dyson advocated for Brexit on the basis of supporting British industry, and shortly afterwards migrated the company HQ to Singapore.
I'm nearly certain he believed/believes in the Britannia Unchained folks type nonsense. Brexit, then ECHR exit, deregulate like crazy and exploit everyone and their mum. So long as GDP goes up.
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Miele vacuums are better performers than Dyson, and cheaper too.
Never understood the hype with Dyson. I suspect that like many successful hardware businesses, their story is mainly of brand strength, not of actual product quality. If you pick up a Dyson vacuum you'll notice that it just feels flimsy in the hand. I think they're aggressively cost-engineered- the material you save by designing molded parts to be minimally thick has got to be like tens of cents to a couple dollars o…
In the UK at least his actions (offshoring, Brexit and tax) have probably significantly devalued the brand with a key part of his core demographic.
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He did ruin it for everyone. Management called him up on the sick days. he responds by saying that there's no policy for sick days, and to show him in the handbook where it says he has a limited number of sick days, or that he needs to notify someone. They can't, because we don't have one. When he's told this isn't acceptable, he pushes back saying that he's being singled out.
You're in America, right? At–will employment? The manager could have simply terminated that employee, citing no reason?
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He did ruin it for everyone. Management called him up on the sick days. he responds by saying that there's no policy for sick days, and to show him in the handbook where it says he has a limited number of sick days, or that he needs to notify someone. They can't, because we don't have one. When he's told this isn't acceptable, he pushes back saying that he's being singled out.
That sounds like the real problem was the lack of an employee handbook. They're not strictly required by law, but 30 employees is well above the level where you should really expect to have one in place. The "just wing it and hope no-one takes the piss" approach is fine if you've only got a handful of employees, but is increasingly risky beyond that - it was probably only a matter of time before that organisation got…
That's my point - we didn't have one because we didn't need one. 30 people is still small enough that you can be on first name terms with every single person in the company and know what everyone is doing day-to-day. Anecdotally, I'd say one in every 30 people I've worked with in my career are like this - so that's probably the point you do need one.
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He did ruin it for everyone. Management called him up on the sick days. he responds by saying that there's no policy for sick days, and to show him in the handbook where it says he has a limited number of sick days, or that he needs to notify someone. They can't, because we don't have one. When he's told this isn't acceptable, he pushes back saying that he's being singled out.
Poor performers get put on PIPs, right? Did that person's poor performance "ruin it for everyone" and put the rest of the working plebs (the entire company or department or whatever) on PIPs? No, of course not. The poor performer gets singled out, which is just fine. So instead of punishing everyone for some lying asshole's poor judgment, I propose management puts that lazy jerk on their own SDIP (sick day improvemen…
he's not a poor performer, he's just an asshole. And you can't fire someone for being an asshole
> So instead of punishing everyone for some lying asshole's poor judgment, I propose management puts that lazy jerk on their own SDIP (sick day improvement plan).
You're missing the point. You can't single the person out for violating a policy that you didn't have written down. The only reason that policy is now written down is because that person violated the policy. Singling out someone for being (genuinely) ill is likely to end up with you on the wrong end of an employment tribunal who will ask you "what is your sickness policy"