Colleague who won’t retire but also won’t train

[Putthepanback]

WWYD?

She’s got markedly slower over the last few years (think taking 3 seconds to press each button on the phone when dialling a number kind of thing). We spoken in very casual conversation about retirement and she is very much of the “oooo I’d have nothing to do with my time” school of thought.

We are having a big problem now though as our software is all being changed and we are retraining on the new stuff over the next few weeks.

She got very flustered in the training this morning and left after an hour as she said the trainer was going too fast. We’ve made arrangements for her to have 1 on 1 training instead. She is completely adverse to any kind of change at all. Very negative and “oh it won’t work it works fine now”.

I have to admit I snapped at her today because she’d spent all morning complaining how busy she was but wouldn’t accept any help. I really needed some figures by 3pm which I asked her for this morning. It was easily a 10 minute job for any other member of staff. At 2.30 I walked past and she had only just started. At 2.50 I realised she was counting them up (the columns) with her finger on the spreadsheet and then doing the sums on paper. I very gently said “oh x did you know if you just grab that little cross and drag it across you can add them like this”

She snapped back at me that she knows what she’s doing and she still had 10 minutes.

I had to leave the room before I snapped back at her. She’s been on excel training at least 3 times but just doesn’t retain the info.

What the hell do you do in this situation?! I’m not her manager, just one step above her and they are loathe to do anything and just whisper that she’ll have to retire soon surely! But from what she says she has no intention of going anywhere

[Nikhedonia]

The paper could have been scanned and emailed to your colleagues. Did you think of that?

WTAF.

Sometimes there are posts on MN where you just know the person is disagreeing with the OP to be difficult...

[OooErMissus]

The paper could have been scanned and emailed to your colleagues. Did you think of that?

Cop onto yourself.

All that would have resulted in, would've been someone else having to enter the data into the s/s. Someone else doing her job for her.

Otherwise why isn't everyone scribbling crap on paper and scanning it?

🙄 x a million.

[northernknickers]

@Grumpyperson 😂😂 I can just see their faces, as they open up their email with a scanned picture of this quarter's figures 😂😂 Probably one of THE funniest things I've read on here!!

Brilliant!

[StealthPolarBear]

My job is analysis and preparation of statistics. Maybe I could scrawl "76%" and take a photo for my line manager :o

[Soontobe60]

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g

'Very ageist and sexist of you to imply that woman of our age can't cope with technology.'
🤣🤣🤣I'm a week off 60 and female. I use technology all the time and train others to use it.
In the mid 80s I was a civil servant and worked in several locations. Not one office had a computer. Everything was paper based. I only started to use a computer a couple of years after I started teaching, when I was 32 in the early 90s. My eldest DD didn't have ICT lessons at school at all, she had to go to night school whilst doing her A levels to learn.
My point was that my generation were not brought up with computers unlike today's generation. That is a fact! The older you are when you have to learn new things the harder it can be.

[MaybeitsMaybelline]

I work with someone like this, I’m no spring chicken at 53 but my colleague is incompetent. She can’t do the most basic of jobs and when she is given them she spends hours repeatedly going through them with me until completed, thus meaning I’ve lost two hours of my working day.

I am interested in the response, it’s hard as I like this person but she has 41 years service and pension in, about 25 of those at final salary, no mortgage, says she suffers from anxiety because of change in the workplace but won’t go.

Meanwhile she’s dragging me down.

[SnuggyBuggy]

I'm in NHS admin and there is always that person "who has worked in _ology for 20 years and doesn't want to change" holding everyone back. I think you need to keep to facts like that she is refusing to train, refusing to use excel etc and leave this to management.

[BillywilliamV]

I expect your Managers are managing her out, if she can't use the new software then that is ammunition. It will take some time though and they certainly won't tell co- workers what they are up to.

[magicstar1]

We had an identical issue OP. We sent her on an Excel course and she forgot her glasses so just sat there for the day learning nothing. The manager sort of guided her towards retirement...like your person, she’d write everything in a ledger, then add it up manually. It was horrible, and she had a few months with absolutely nothing to do, as the manager had to keep removing work from her.

[Cruddles]

The paper could have been scanned and emailed to your colleagues. Did you think of that?

No one thought of that because it's a fucking daft idea

[Loopytiles]

You’re not her manager, so nothing you can do except report your concerns about her performance, and the impact on your and colleagues’ workload, to your manager.

[Butterymuffin]

Who made the decision about getting the trainer back in to do a one to one with her?

@Fuma saying it's well documented throughout medical literature doesn't answer the question, and particularly not the bit about how women are worse affected. Can you actually substantiate this?

[Sleepingboy]

So email her and say you don't want handwritten figures and cc her manager in. Everytime.

[SandraOhshair]

I think it will come to a head once the new software comes in. She wont be able to use it, wont use excel, wont email. No one will be able to use her.
You do need to outwardly hide your inner frustration, and gently raising with bosses reasons for delays etc or avoid using her where you can.

[wowfudge]

I work with someone like this. Past state retirement age and no interest in elements of her job she doesn't enjoy. I pass everything which is wrong back to her to be re-done. She's also surly and argumentative when errors are picked up and a gossip. I've given up telling her manager as nothing is ever done about it. She should have been managed out several years ago.

[CoraPirbright]

I would try to keep hold of your (understandable) frustration and just let nature take its course. When the new software comes in, she is not going to be able to do any of her job. This will quickly become even more obvious than it already is and management will start to phase her out. Try to avoid giving her any work that you really need doing in the meantime as it will just irritate you (it would me).

[ControversialFerret]

This isn't about 'getting rid' of people just because they are old. It's about both parties working together to try and accommodate changes, so that they get want they need from the arrangement. There is a woman at a shop local to me, who is in her late 80s and works as a greeter. She's absolutely lovely and knows where everything is, welcomes people in, directs them to what they might need to find etc. The shop manager doesn't have her stacking shelves or working on the till - they've found a role for her that she's good at, where she can make a valid contribution and which works for them both.

In this case the OP's colleague is actively refusing to take on board training and not delivering on essential requirements of the job. If you want to look at it from an ethical perspective; is it fair to keep someone in a role where they are refusing to even try and deliver, when there could be someone out there scraping along on a zero hours contract who could really benefit from being given this opportunity? I'm not suggesting that older workers should all be managed off - simply pointing out that you can argue the ethics in other ways as well.

OP's colleague should have been spoken to by now, and put through a performance management process so that she was aware of the issues (refusing to address it is unfair, most of all to her). Had she known about this, then she may well have felt differently about going for an internal role that was actually a better fit for her skillset. Corporate support and reasonable adjustments don't just mean ignoring capability issues - from someone of any age.

[CanISpeakToYourManager]

OP, I wonder if you agree that you need to speak to your manager about this.

I think people are making a fair point that everyone should be treated with respect. I think this means talking in a neutral and unemotional way with your manager, as an issue you are raising rather than a person you have a problem with. If you had issues with performance, you would want it dealt with professionally, which is your manager's job.

[CanISpeakToYourManager]

Also, I am interested because my mum refuses to retire and I don't know what her performance is like but I can totally imagine her being like this woman. If her team had a problem with her I would hope they would raise it professionally rather than letting it fester.

[user1480880826]

I see this problem all the time. And it’s only going to get worse as the population ages, the retirement age is pushed back and offices become increasingly digitized. I have members on my team who are only in their 50s but they can’t do the most basic things on a computer like cutting and pasting or underlining text.

It’s a real probably which is much bigger than any of us.

Write to your MP.

[user1480880826]

*problem, not probably

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

It's not age that's the problem here, it's attitude. Some people love learning, are open to new ideas, always want to find a way to do something more efficiently/better. Others don't. I expect this was an issue right back when the abacus was invented.

[AlexaAmbidextra]

I have members on my team who are only in their 50s but they can’t do the most basic things on a computer like cutting and pasting or underlining text.

This is sheer laziness. Nothing whatsoever to do with age.

[BarbaraofSeville]

I agree Alexa.

I'm 46 and when I started work in 1992 computers had just been installed in the office, and that was in quite a backwards place so more forward thinking employers would have had them a few years by then, which makes them common place for the last 20-25 years and those people in their 50s that apparently struggle with cutting and pasting (don't they have any primary age DC or other relatives that could show them?) would have been in their 20s at the time and well able to pick up such a skill, in no time at all.

[wowfudge]

Alexa I have young, bright, educated colleagues whose word skills are rubbish but they are expert at excel, i.e. it also depends what people use all the time for their specific jobs.

I agree it's attitude rather than age which is the major factor.