Colleague coming in very late almost every day

shoegirl

Wondering what folks think about this.

I work on a fairly autonomous team. There are just 2 of us in our location left and for quite a long time now we've had a huge productivity problem with the other colleague. It starts with his timekeeping. Basically we have a flexible start time which is very generous - an hour or 2 later than what most weekday office workers start at, but for much of the past year or so, this worker is trailing in anything from 15 minutes to 2 & a half hours late. Most days its 30 minutes or so, twice this week its been over an hour. We are supposed to work a 40 hour week, and I have seen his timesheets and they conceal the fact that he still goes home at the same time even if he has only done 7 or 7.5 hours - but puts in for 8 regardless.

Unfortunately our supervisor and team managers are based in other countries and don't know what is going on. I am not one for telling tales, and HR, and the 3 on location managers just completely ignore this problem. Its extremely frustrating because the colleague comes in all happiness and cheeriness as if its the most normal thing in the world to come in an hour late and its all just grand. He does very little work anyway, but thats a secondary issue. We have tried tackling this employee directly amongst ourselves and it improved a bit for a while but the same problem just comes back. Any suggestions?

MoodeRator

Seem sto me that you have gioven this person more than enough chance to amend their ways. I would not hesitate in now raising it to HR.

gandalf

It depends. If his tardiness and non-productivity effects your work load directly or your perception with the management and you have already had words with him then you have no choice but to report the matter to HR.

Diddler82

Any way of arranging calls to come in when he is supposed to be there from HR/Managers on an ongoing basis, or even suggest that they ring him if you go down the route of reporting him.

All they would have to do is maybe check his emails etc see when he has or has not been there...

shoegirl

I did arrange for some work to need doing from just a few minutes after the time he is supposed to be in at, but unfortuantely if he is not there, the team handing over the work just come to me instead!! Although now that I think of it, not sure what is happening when I am not there - I'd say they are just waiting until he comes in, unfortunately. He is slightly more "senior", believe it or not, so most of the team are afraid to say anything to him as he had made numerous accusations of bullying against most people who stood up to him in the past. They didn't go anywhere, but they did put unfair spotlights on the victims, who in reality were really being bullied by him. He's been more or less dumped on me because nobody else wants to put up with his melodrama or laziness.

gandalf

Well from that if the team is coming to you when he isn't there your work load is being increased. If I were you I would contact HR and tease out what your options are without naming him for the moment. Think it over and if after that you feel you need to report him do so.

the_syco

shoegirl wrote: »

the team handing over the work just come to me instead!!

<snip>

He is slightly more "senior"

He's more senior, is he? Are you sure you're qualified? May be best to, erm, send it back to his queue

InReality

Why not take advantage of the situation and come in late yourself ?
Either the fact that less work is being done will be noticed , in which case yer man will have to do more.
Or it won't which means you have more time off yourself.

Its a win - win from your point of view.

doolox

I was once in a situation like that where I worked for a small department where time keeping was bad and nobody really cared waht happening and slacking off was the order of the day. Having worked elsewhere in the company and kn owing this could not last forever without causing trouble I did my best to keep my time keeping and other measureable things in comparatively OK order.
Inevitably tha manager was swapped out and another manager slotted in to "whip" the area back into shape.

Every move we made was questioned, every slight infraction was noted and acted upon and we were under the microscope for a hellish 6 months.

If I had copied the time wasters I would have been in deeper trouble. Some were even nipping off to the pub to watch football during working hours.....!

Get and find out a copy of the rules and follow it exactly. In my opinion, giving this company a minute more than the rules dictate only lets the slacker off the hook and does you or him no favours in the long term.
If possible get your starting and finishing times certified by a neutral outsider possibly by email so that you have a verifiable record of your hours put in and output achieved in the event that all hell breaks out and the accusations start flying............

pickarooney

You say that you have a flexible start time of up to 2 hours after normal office hours but that he comes in 30 minutes late most days... surely the problem is him going home early in that case?

So arrange for work to need to be done after you go home instead of early in the morning. That way if he puts himself down for having worked those house he'll ahve no excuse for not having done the work.

shoegirl

Even easier solution. I've just been made Team Leader of the team.

Answer: delegate every possible thing to him. Whole different ballgame now.

Sadly, it is all about power in the end. He is in some sulk but tough.

ButtercupTheCow

shoegirl wrote: »

Even easier solution. I've just been made Team Leader of the team.

Answer: delegate every possible thing to him. Whole different ballgame now.

Sadly, it is all about power in the end. He is in some sulk but tough.

Another solution- make him email you from his work email, every morning when he comes in, and every evening when he leaves.
In my job, when we do overtime, we have to send our manager an email when we are leaving so she has a record of the times.

This is providing he cannot access his work email on a Blackberry etc.

John_Cultane

shoegirl wrote: »

Even easier solution. I've just been made Team Leader of the team.

Answer: delegate every possible thing to him. Whole different ballgame now.

Sadly, it is all about power in the end. He is in some sulk but tough.

Be very careful that sounds like bullying to me!

As a new team leader you should be treating everybody fairly including people you have previously had issues with while working together. Address the time keeping and the output as the issues arise rather than assume it is the same problem you had before. You could just tell him you want to start with a clean slate and what your frustration was before you became the team leader.

Your choice but you shouldn't be using your new position as revenge but rather a new opportunity for you both. You can now tell him but before it was a little more tricky.

ButtercupTheCow

John_Cultane wrote: »

Be very careful that sounds like bullying to me!

As a new team leader you should be treating everybody fairly including people you have previously had issues with while working together. Address the time keeping and the output as the issues arise rather than assume it is the same problem you had before.

yep, he isn't likely to have changed, so best bet is to stay quiet and then catch him when he comes in late- let him take the rope and hang himself.

Your Airbag

Its like the majority of places, when people are there a long time they feel infalable. As their Senior and have seen it all before they feel like they can take advantage.