Letting someone fail at work - aibu to let it happen?

[MrsBede]

In brief, I have a deputy who has failed to perform since appointment. I have followed all procedures to deal with this but my organisation is poorly led and I have limited support from those above - eg I should have a line manager but the post is vacant. We're public sector.

A senior manager has now told me my deputy needs to be given a project to lead on and when it flops it will be the point at which the lack of performance is finally dealt with. It's horrible, but the team and our clients are being detrimentally affected by this person's lack of competence so it has to happen - I've tried so much to bring them on but they just haven't responded.

So the project has been explained to them and they have got started. There are already issues becoming apparent but they have now sent me details of their next steps and it's really poor. Do I intervene or just let it play out? It will be a fuck up (not dangerous or anything) and should bring things to a head, but what if they come back and say they ran it past me first and I didn't voice concerns?

My problem is lack of support from above but there is none, so MN - please help!

Sounds like terrible management from above you tbh. Staff being treated like shit and public money being wilfully wasted

IME that's pretty well par for the course in the public sector, so the total lack of getting a grip on things is no surprise at all. As a PP said, it's also why decent people leave and what passes for a "service" can end up stuck with the otherwise unemployable

You've had some excellent advice here, OP, but really the only long term answer is to look elsewhere

If the senior manager won't put it in writing, it tells you all you need to know about the ethics of what you're doing.

ALWAYS be wary of any policy that someone's not prepared to document.

If you’ve supported before could you bat it back with “I don’t think you’ve applied the learnings from [similar scenario when you told them what to do]. Please review the feedback/discussion/steps/process we did then and have another go.”

@PuppyMonkey

I agree with those saying you need to flag it up to the senior person who allocated the shit employee this task.

Forward the senior the work you’ve been sent to look through and explain how worried you are at the standard and how many times you’ve had to support this person to the detriment of your other work. Let the senior manager decide what to do next with SE (shit employee).

The capability process will always require that someone provides the employee with support / oversight while the employee's performance is being managed. The OP is their manager and appointed them, so it is going to fall to her.

HR can be helpful in providing the guidance / policies etc. that the OP will have to work through, but it usually falls to the manager to take the capability process forwards.

It sucks for the poor woman having to juggle it on top of her own heavy workload, but that's how it is.

Right, so if the senior manager ignores your worries, you have covered yourself when it goes tits up and the project is a disaster. Because you’ll have an email trail that shows you reported the poor work

Are you NHS, OP? This is very much par for the course in my experience (depressingly so).

There are already issues becoming apparent but they have now sent me details of their next steps and it's really poor. Do I intervene or just let it play out? It will be a fuck up (not dangerous or anything) and should bring things to a head, but what if they come back and say they ran it past me first and I didn't voice concerns?

I would intervene with a couple of bullets on what they need to do. I would want written proof that I tried to help (albeit in a very limited capacity, as that's all they should need as they've been doing this for years now).

The other potential way of managing up/covering yourself is asking your senior manager what is priority in the next [timeframe] because you do not have capacity to support x through this project and do y and z. You might be able to get them to say in writing to drop x.

(I think it’s not right to set them up to fail - the better course is just to keep pushing it back to them saying please revise and consider abc and try not to get dragged into it yourself.)

@PuppyMonkey

Right, so if the senior manager ignores your worries, you have covered yourself when it goes tits up and the project is a disaster. Because you’ll have an email trail that shows you reported the poor work

It's not going to work like that. The OP is the manager of this individual. Simply batting issues up the chain is not going to look good, when they have specifically asked for input/feedback.

It's crap, but batting it upwards isn't going to cover the OP at all. Reporting poor work isn't sufficient when you actually manage the person doing the work.

@Orf1abc

As their manager you should be offering feedback and support to improve. Why are you not doing this?

I imagine the op has been doing just that. Now it has come to a head. There is a limit to what we can do for colleagues, however willing.

Unless there is a sudden improvement, the person is obviously in the wrong job; could be guided towards applying for a slightly different role that would suit them better.

Op separately document the problems that you are having - overwork/poor MH. Report to manager and/or HR.

This is about you saying that you are not getting enough support. You do not need to explain details just how it is affecting you. A good employer would then be looking at your workload, training that you need etc.

Today 18:01 ChazsBrilliantAttitude

Send back a list of questions that would point them in the right direction if they were competent. If they fail to act on them you can say guidance was offered in a form that encouraged reflection and reassessment of the proposed approach without stepping in and taking over as this was a development opportunity for x.
Document everything and keep Senior Manager updated so they don’t have plausible deniability.

do this it will look bad on you if you don’t respond to them asking for feedback on the next steps

OP, if you have genuinely followed all relevant procedures and they're not getting you anywhere, then I'd be inclined to set this out in writing with some proposals for improving those procedures. Your current situation isn't tenable, but you can't just bully someone out of a job, no matter how crap they are.

I think you also need to push for a proper probation process while you're at it.

no you definitely cant just ignore it. You'll have to give them feedback that there is things they need to fix etc.

Sounds like you need a new job, OP.

@MrsBede not sure what line of work you and the person in question are in. If that person is following procedure and failing then the issue is the procedure and not the person in the first instance. If that is not the case, have they received all the required training to be able to do the job competently? If it can be demonstrated that they have all the training required, has there been immediate and constructive feedback given when issues have appeared to allow the individual to seek to make changes along with offers of further training, shadowing or mentoring? I think if any of the above is flaky then it seems harsh, if it can be demonstrated that everything has been done to set this person up to succeed from day one and they are still in this situation, then maybe looking for them to leave is the correct decision, it just sounds like it is being dealt with in a poor way from your senior managers. Do they not have Personal Improvement Plans that can be put in place to manage a person from the business if they do not improve?

aaaaaarr Wed 14-Jul-21 18:08:29
So this person has been set up to fail? This is so unprofessional on so many levels. Why hasn't a performance improvement plan been put in place? This is a very odd approach to a performance issue and I'd want no part of it from a professional standpoint. It's actually quite dark.

This ^
I worked in the Civil Service for years, and this is not acceptable. Don’t be part of this victimisation plan. If the person isn’t up to the job there is a set ( and fair) disciplinary process to follow.

I am so confused.

You were involved with recruitment, this has been going on years....how did this employee make it past the first 6 months.

Can you not use a pip? That you manage and maintain?

if you have genuinely followed all relevant procedures and they're not getting you anywhere, then I'd be inclined to set this out in writing with some proposals for improving those procedures

In any other sphere that might help, but in the public one where initiative's often unwelcome it's more likely that OP's boss will resent it (and probably think she's after his job)

That he'll commit nothing in writing is no surprise either, since if he too has no real accountability he probably doesn't have a clue what to do. Unfortunately the rot's endemic, and as others have said the only real course is to get out

Then you need to go over the head of the person who is "telling" you to do this.

Can you send a reply stating that their planning is wrong, can they please resubmit it, as after x amount of time in employment you feel they should not still be needing you to sort this issue.
Only say it in a nice way, while not actually helping them.

I know that's not how we deal with it where I work.

I'd recommend your first step should be going to HR or whoever deals with HR and ask if there is a process.

Hopefully there is a framework you can follow. Broadly speaking it should be a conversation with the person about their lack of performance with questions to work out if there is anything underlying that has caused the performance issues. Then depending on the outcome of that you work out the next steps.

If you don't have a HR person / department then I would recommend doing some independent research into how to manage under performers. The idea of giving someone a project so that they will fail and can then be fired off the back of it sounds pretty horrible to me for everyone concerned.

Start looking for another job.

I wonder what the response would be if you were to ask the senior manager to put what has been said to you in writing. Even just the request for the person to do the particular project.

@Puzzledandpissedoff

if you have genuinely followed all relevant procedures and they're not getting you anywhere, then I'd be inclined to set this out in writing with some proposals for improving those procedures

In any other sphere that might help, but in the public one where initiative's often unwelcome it's more likely that OP's boss will resent it (and probably think she's after his job)

That he'll commit nothing in writing is no surprise either, since if he too has no real accountability he probably doesn't have a clue what to do. Unfortunately the rot's endemic, and as others have said the only real course is to get out

I'm not sure I agree that initiative is often unwelcome in the public sector, but in relation to HR policies it definitely is!

Any changes to HR policies & procedures in the public sector will require pretty extensive union negotiation. The OP might be able to provide feedback to her HR business partner, but drafting up proposals for change could be detrimental to the organisation's relationship with the union - all it would take is for one employee to see the draft and share it with them.

I worked in the Civil Service for years, and this is not acceptable. Don’t be part of this victimisation plan. If the person isn’t up to the job there is a set ( and fair) disciplinary process to follow.

100% agree - if there is one thing the public sector has coming out of its ear, it's comprehensive and fair HR policies and procedures.

Follow the process to the letter, and go through the cycle as many times as it takes. Get your HR rep to sit in on meetings where appropriate, so you have an observer present. Document everything and store it all together as an audit trail.

Separately, raise the issue of the lack of support you're getting from senior management.

There isn't a short cut for this, and it can take years. So I'd also do some job hunting in (what's left of) your spare time.