How to tackle time management with long serving staff as a new manager

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Help! I’ve just taken over managing a team of 16

For context it’s public sector and most have 30 years service in post and all are partially retired.

In fairness they’ve not really had a manager for 3 years and so I can see complacency has set in but for a majority their time keeping is shocking, they come and go as they want and don’t mark up flexi sheets accurately.

The other difficulty is they are spread across 5 sites.

I have been doing one on ones to get to know the team and the issue has come up a few times from staff who are following procedure and feel that they’re picking up the majority of the work.

I have looked and this is correct they are all doing the same function but some are getting allocated and completing more work than others l.

How do I set the correct tone without appearing heavy handed and micro managing but being fair to all??

That's a tough one. Could you talk about a team ethos? Being respectful of and supportive to the wider team. Look to slightly formalize hours, asking if possible colleagues work a set pattern even if it's not 9-5 mon-fri. It's ok to come in a bit stricter than they're used to. Hopefully they'll grumble but comply.

You do have a fine balancing act to achieve here.

Any team that has lacked good management for three years is going to be in poor shape. Issues won’t have been listened to, appraisals will have been overlooked, apathy will have set in.

You can make it clear that YOU have been set some targets to get the productivity of the team up to where it’s supposed to be. Make it known you will hear complaints, welcome ideas, and want to ensure everyone can contribute fully to the team effort. There is nothing wrong with telling individual members of staff they are not keeping up with the expected rate of work which other members of the team are accomplishing.

however remember it isn’t always as clear-cut as it seems. The “lifers” apparently coasting to retirement may be struggling with health issues, caring responsibilities and exhaustion that people tend to struggle more with as they age. They may be struggling with changes in process or technology that haven’t been properly implemented , it could be as simple as not being very good at managing their inbox - so are they modelling best practice in all processes and tasks?

I would definitely be setting a tone from the top that you want this team to stand out for its productivity and professionalism and every single one of your 16 staff has a role to play and you are depending on them to raise or maintain their game so that the workload is shared fairly.

Spending time with each team is essential, I’d be very visible rotating between sites.

And then in a month I’d be starting to firm up the conversations “I’ve noticed you don’t make it to work on time, what’s the reason for that?” And then “That flex is okay if you are making the same output each week as expected, but you’re below par so either you need to find a way to make up that time, or you need to be in work for your full hours so I can observe and work with you to improve your productivity.”

You have a nice conversation about fairness, and ensuring that public money (their taxes) are spent wisely. Accurate paperwork you can say you’ve promised your boss a full audit - and nobody can be reasonably offended by the need for an accurate paper trail.

It’s an opportunity for everyone to state what they would like their working hours to be - do some of the partially retired folks want to drop hours a bit? And then you give everyone (the piss-takers, mostly) choices, like you would a four year old. Would you like to work these hours or these? Would you like to be paid this, or this?

You may lose some staff. But that’s what you need?

I have been there. Inherited a department where two staff were unaccountably being paid for 37.5 hours but rostered to do 35. They were given a few options, and fell into line quite quickly.

Start off with saying in a meeting / Teams call the order has come from above / the company requires that sheets need to be filled in correctly, etc. Then send an email reminder saying most people are following these rules but some are not.

Then another email saying the same thing and that you will need to discuss individually if it continues. And the discuss and manage individually.

I would possibly ignore the timekeeping and focus on the productivity.

Wow, that's a tough team to manage.

I think you have to go in very gently. Are they getting the work done? With so much experience, they can probably get loads done compared to less experienced staff, so does it really matter if they're not in the office as much as they should be?

If there are performance issues, manage those by the book, and you'll find people leave.
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Do your team have a team charter and Ways of Working document setting out expectations. My team are dispersed and all work Flexi so we are expected to put in our calendars a block for start of work, end of work day and lunch we can change them as we see fit but it means everyone knows when everyone else is available. If we are away from our desks / phones for 15 mins or more we block the time out.

When you say they aren't filling out time cards accurately enough is it flexible enough to do so with new modern working or are they too lazy/ a bit laissez-faire? Originally my organisation Flexi time recording spreadsheet was split into am and pm but I needed an evening block too as I often take an hour for school run and to spend time with DD and catch up on her day before leaving her to her own devices but I then had to fudge the actual time worked but the number of hours were accurate. My work then added a 'deducted' time slot so you could factor in any longer break which was useful for parents/elderly carers, those who had to take a longer break for health reasons, run the car to the garage for an MOT, traveling from site to home to finish off for the day etc allowing people to work flexibly around their fixed work commitments.

Being new is the ideal time to start a clean slate with everyone as you can hide it among a "getting to know the team and learn your jobs" review.

Thanks all

to answer and clarify

There is no close management to me

without being exact it would be like we are civilians in uniformed service - my line manager would be a high ranking officer who expects me to just get on and not take them away from their other role.

our standard flexi is 8-10 start finish between 4-6. Main issue is leaving at 230 claiming to work until 4 - filling in 30 minutes for lunch but taking 90.
nipping out for a quick errand for 20 minutes - claiming it as tea break but then taking 60 minute lunch saying it’s their lunch and 2x 15 minutes tea breaks combined….

Unfortunately they are not getting the work done.

I have had a chance conversation this morning and may have found accommodation where I can have the majority on same site as I am based most of the week.

Gosh that is definitely taking advantage!

you’ve had some good advice above and I recommend you take it.

People leaving at 2 is shocking I’d be tackling that one first and other people will start getting the message

Whole team meeting. Explaining that its rèally important that everyone works as a team. That includes accurate recording on time sheets and punctuality as that affects moral of the remaining team that dont record accurately and are punctual
Layer it with lots of positive things that you want to build on. Notice something good that everyone in your team has achieved and mention by name how we all benefit from janes marvellous turnaround of xyz et.

My employer is fine with Flexi working around fixed work commitments, but you do your hours. What they are doing is simply theft. I think you are in a much stronger position going in new to assert processes rather than clawing it back if it had been you that let it slide.

That kind of taking the piss on flexi is classed as corporate fraud, I've known people dismissed for it if they're actually stealing hours rather than making the time up elsewhere. If they take an extra hour every day that's almost a whole working day - maybe more if they are part time. If they are putting the times down and covering up they're not there then they know they shouldn't do it don't they.

The reason people do this is a) dishonesty for a few followed by b) seeing others get away with it and joining in.

What I'd do is issue a reminder - at a meeting and then in writing - to all of the ground rules and what is/isn't acceptable and then monitoring and pulling up the first offender you can prove. There must be a policy they'll be violating. That's usually enough to knock the behaviour on the head ie showing them you are serious about taking action.

Thank you all!
you have all offered excellent advice

You’ve had great advice here already.

Mine is to document every single thing in case they accuse you of bullying.

This. The focus should be on everyone pulling their weight. Not necessarily time keeping which may be a symptom of the issue but isn't the actual problem.

How many out of the 16 are doing this?

Out of the sixteen - 7 definitely are but possibly 2 more.

Of the 7 - 2 work full time hours and 5 work 2.5 days per week - the 2 full time have just requested to reduce their hours to 2.5 as well.

all are less productive than would be expected

What about also looking at it from an individual pov. Who exactly are the x number of employees that aren't meeting their goals/objectives.

I wouldn't be starting at the time sheets. I'd be looking at the whole team and getting them to work as a team, and identifying who needs to go (there will be some). If there's a set amount of hours that need covered or work needs doing identify it. Concentrate on the work not the hours.

Set them all individual objectives and for the ones not doing as they should make following these correct procedures and working their hours part of them.

Can you split/allocate the tasks/responsibilities so it's clear they're all pulling their weight equally and none of them have any grounds to argue because they all have the same amount of work to (proportionate for PT hours obviously).

Obviously it would depend on their job, but it might work better than if there is one big pile of jobs where they all take one to work on and some get through more than others in a week.

So instead of having one pile of 160 jobs, give them all 10 to complete per day or whatever? Or split into areas/postcodes/letters of the alphabet?

If their job involves answering the phone/staffing a counter, set up a rota so they all have to provide cover in turn and they're forced to stay there all day at least some of the time.

So over half the team are under performing and committing fraud?

I'd be sitting with HR and your manager on the lengths that they will support you because 9 staff members putting grievances in for you trying to tackle this will basically kill your career.

This is not going to be solved by just cracking down on timesheets.

Unfortunately they are not getting the work done.

^

So this is where the problem lies.

They can't be trusted with their flexi

This is challenging. But in a way, the issues the team are displaying fall into quite objective, easy to demonstrate evidence issues that you can present to them and ask them to joint problem solve with you. You just have to go in armed with all the evidence, that is the key.

If you Google 'Having Difficult Conversation ACAS' the top link is a really helpful PDF guide that takes you step by step how to approach something like this. I appreciate it's more difficult to tackle in real life, and with so many team members it's going to be quite the undertaking.

Also, remember that if you keep it non-emotional and fact-based, it doesn't matter if people get a bit annoyed, or even leave. It's not your job to be liked, people just need to respect you as the boss. They won't get far with making a complaint against you if you follow the steps set out in the ACAS guide.

In the process of upsetting a few piss takers you will win the hearts and minds of the harder workers, and hopefully end up retaining them for longer if you manage to deal with the few who are letting the team down. There's nothing more disheartening that working on a team with a coaster and management not being gutsy enough to do anything about it. A win would be the coasters leave, and you are left with a happier team of hard workers, and can hire well going forward to fill the new gaps.