Am I going to fail probation

[Greenraintoday]

I'm getting worried, half way through probation, have had 3 unavoidable bouts of sickness ( all different cases and not disability related) been late in to work 4 times and have been reminded to answer emails that I forgot several times

In my defense I have had alot going.on in personal life and this has impacted me

AIBU to think I should be given another chance ?

You would not pass probation at my places of work, any of them.

I had someone who was a temp member of staff. She was frequently off sick and was terrible at managing her work. She would have failed her probation if it was a permanent post.

Probation should be the best behaviour period. You are showing them your “best behaviour” and it’s not great!

Not answering emails is weird, why are you choosing to do a bad job? Perhaps reflect on that and see if you can turn things around?

I’d be very surprised if you did pass probation. Everybody has stuff going on in their personal life, being on time to work and doing your job without being prompted is basic though, and also essential to the job.

You would not pass in my firm. It’s very competitive. We don’t need to keep people who can’t even present well in probation.

Everyone has issues in personal lives.

The sickness isnt a problem on its own.

The being late was totally avoidable and annoying but for a great employee not a dealbreaker.

The emails... 😯😯😯😯 its a sign. Needed to be prompted "several" times.

Question: if you were an employer and hired someone who behaved like you have - would YOU pass their probation?
Because I wouldn't

You are an unreliable, poor performer. That's a bad combo....
assuming 3 month probation you'd be failed at every company I've worked at

What have they said at 'touchpoints' along the way? You dont go from start to job to end of probation, there must be some interim feedback?

It would depend on why you were off sick, why you were late and what was going on in your personal life that made you late and effected your performance at work.

So for example, if you were leaving a domestic violence situation or were dealing with a terminally ill family member and were late because you struggled to get your kids settled in their new school while hobbling around on a broken leg then I would extent your probationary period and give you time to improve your performance.

I you were failing to juggle every day life responsibilities, late frequently on a Monday morning and had 'flu' 3 times in a month and always on a Friday then I would consider you unreliable and let you go.

I wouldn’t keep you on. You sound unreliable and flaky.

Doesn’t sound likely tbh. Now with workers being protected from 6 months onwards they are likely to have to be more decisive. I wouldn’t want someone so flaky.

Start arriving earlier, 10 -15 mins and getting straight on with your work, as a habit. It will be noticed. A colleague of mine did this and management noticed and she was also never being late again as she had 10-15 minutes in hand. Sickness, mention that you've started taking Vitamin D and you're going to get the flu vaccine if it was a bad cold. Take steps to be a better employee. Forgotten emails, you need to find a system or find someone who is super organised and ask their advice. Make sure you are really prompt in replying to those people who fed back that you had not replied.
If you get into work early use that time to review your emails and work out a plan of work for the day.
Use your remaining probation time to bring your work up to standard or above. Ask for feedback after a few weeks of this new approach. This will probably mean prioritising work wherever possible. Give yourself the best chance and ask if they would consider extending the probation.

I work in a different field (teacher -have additional responsibilities so line manage people).

Certainly at my place, you wouldn't pass with that record but we may extend initially with clear parameters for improvement.

I managed someone who has had 4 episodes of random sickness since Sept and we are extending their probation.

It may sound harsh but people being repeatedly off sick/late/underperforming is draining and has massive impact on others in the team/managers who have to fill the gaps.

Not being funny love, we've all got things going on in our personal lives....

Late, sick and even when you're there. You're not doing the job you're paid for!

Would you keep yourself on??!!

I’d say the only chance you’ve got is to request a meeting with your line manager, acknowledge what you’ve been doing wrong & say why, then tell her / him that you’re going to use@ApplesAreAmazing’s plan to make sure it doesn’t happen again. And DON’T let it happen again.

If it was just the sickness, I would extend your probation for another three months. Its that time of year and there are so many awful bugs are around.

But the lateness and failing to complete a simple task of answering emails repeatedly without being prompted? It would be a goodbye from me. Being late for work is not only disrespectful of your colleagues time, but points to you not being able to manage your time effectively.

You should probably start looking for another job.

Nothing much further to add tbh.
As a people manager, in my line of work, you would have already failed.

Im not one for “never be sick” cause life happens. But my bar IS high for what I would take sick leave for. Three occasions in 3 months indicates yours isn’t, coupled with lateness (how?!) shows you’re not serious about work. And “forgetting” to reply to emails…shows even when you do bother to go to work, you’re not present.

personal life issues are not mitigating factors either. They are if you’re a well respected consistent employee “time served” but even then, good will has a limit.

not once in your post have you asked for ways you could potentially turn this around, it’s very navel gazing.

When you say 3 bouts of sickness, how many days has you had off?

If it was just sickness and I beleived you, as in I didn’t think you were just claiming sick so you didn’t need to come to work, I’d extend probation to be sure, but being late and having to be reminded to actually do parts of your job, yeah sorry I’d fail you.

Make sure you gravel. Show that you accept that your performance has been acceptable to your standards to. Show how you intend to improve significantly. Ask to extend your probation. Put all your efforts in giving them no reason to complain going forward.

YABU. There are two separate issues. The sickness is one thing, as it’s unavoidable, and actually it isn’t unusual for people to get sick when they start a new job and they’re suddenly exposed to a whole lot of new people and a new environment.

But lateness is avoidable - especially four times! Once should be enough for you to learn that you need to leave home earlier or take a different route to work or whatever. And not answering emails is unforgivable.

It’s not really an excuse that you’ve got a lot going on in your personal life. It’s impacting both your attendance and performance at work. So your employer wouldn’t be unreasonable to let you go.

No one here can say what is going through your managers mind. Maybe they think you are doing great, maybe they are already advertising for a replacement.

Go and speak with them and ask how to improve.

Your track record to me sounds poor - being late and missing duties is not acceptable. Whether you manage to pass probation or not you must start to take work seriously or you will be cut at some point.

Really constructive advice there I think.

You have failed your probation period.

Not sure you can rescue that kind of poor performance now either.

There will be 100 more people queuing up for the opportunity who will not do any of what you have failed to do quite frankly.

You do not make any business sense so look for something else I would say, accept that this is not how you behave when trying to impress and show that you are a reliable, good fit.

Sorry to be blunt but there’s no point in making it fluffy, you need to look elsewhere and do better.

It’s not looking great tbh.

This is what this probationary period is for - to see if you’re capable of doing the job - and it sounds like you’re not.

Surely you don’t want to continue with this job anyway as it sounds like you’re finding it too difficult?

When does your probationary period end?
You have until then to completely turn it around.

You can then explain that you just had a run of bad luck, the days off resulted in the emails and you were just chasing your tail - but that in the past X amount of months, you’ve not had any sick days and have been on top of your work etc.

It all depends on how long the period was and how long you’ve got left of it.

Mine was a year and the first 3 months I was not that competent (but had no sick days tbf) but after that I found my feet and my feedback from my meeting was outstanding in all areas.
So it maybe that you have time to turn it around still.

Not a good look in the first 3 months TBF. But then again how can you blame the employee for being sick.