What can we do about this colleague?

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As briefly as possible;

Work in a fairly large team of people (20ish on our shift), in the public sector.

New guy (early 20's if it's relevant) joined about 6 months ago on a fixed term contract.

This person turns up to work at least 5 minutes late each morning, regularly appears to be under the influence of drugs, has fallen asleep at his desk on numerous occasions (4 times in one morning once!), and aside from this is a lazy worker.

Most of our tram have voiced concerns to our supervisor and our line managers. Although it would appear this person has been warned about his behaviour, we keep being told that 'there's nothing else we can do' about the situation! We're being told that this is the line from HR.

Has anyone else had a similar experience and has any advice please? Our colleague is a liability, the rest of us are having to carry him and our voices aren't being listened to. What can we do?

I work in the civil service rather than public service, but I think it will be similar.

I have managed poor performance and poor attendance through the formal procedures to either an improvement or dismissal.

In all cases, the rest of the team were justifiably frustrated, annoyed and had little faith I was doing anything. In all cases I had to respect the confidential nature of the process and could only ask them to trust me to manage the situation.

For information, managing poor performance /attendance to dismissal takes me about 12 months. Managing poor performance to improvement has taken 6-12 months. It is not a fast process if done according to civil service processes, and I doubt the public sector is much different. The official line is that it can be done in 3 months, but there is a period of evidence gathering / occ health consultations / peer improvement plans etc that comes before the main process starts.

It can take a REALLY long time to manage someone out of a role. You have to gain the evidence over a LONG period and then make sure it's water tight.

Thanks for the information. We've been told by supervisor and line manager that GR have advised that nothing else can be done - in your experience might this mean something is going on behind the scenes?

How much longer does the fixed-term contract have left to run? Is he actually completing his work and keeping up with his workload? Do you know if the post had a probationary period as well?

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His original contract was a year but he is one of several on fixed term contracts who has just had it extended for another six months! (Apologies, just realised this is a bit of a drip feed). This has added massively to the frustration of myself and other colleagues, we really don't feel like we're being heard or that anything is being done about him. Unfortunately there is no probation period no.

Why don't you try asking him if he has any problems going on in his life rather than chastising him for being 5 minutes late for work. Maybe he has issues and is using substance abuse to cope.

He sounds like he needs to at least be given the opportunity to explain what is happening.

I wouldn't march the poor guy down the disciplinary route before finding out more. If he's been engaged on a contract he must have done something at interview to convince the recruiter he was worth employing, right?

I've done no chastising, I'm not in a position to. I work in the same job as this colleague. I would assume during his warning meetings he has been given opportunity to explain his behaviour.

To be clear, he is at least 5 minutes late each day - today for example it was 25 minutes. His lateness however is probably the least concerning of his behaviours.

Do you have a staff handbook that indicates what the policy is about use of drugs and/or alcohol in the workplace?
At a previous employers of mine it was considered gross misconduct. Some of our staff were driving company liveried vehicles so it was a criminal offence to drive in that state, but the policy was applied company wide..and that's how one of my colleagues was sacked.
Have you tried escalation of the complaint up the managerial chain?

Isnt his manager already plugged into the HR process for this situation? I'm not clear what your role is.

Lots of people make daft choices in their early 20s, what happens next could affect his chances of getting another job, if he's put through disciplinary. Hopefully people will bear that in mind at some stage soon and see if he needs support or counselling. He sounds like a vulnerable young adult.

If you are not managing him, you have no right to be told what's going on - frustrating as it is!

However, you could always just try offering him a listening ear, colleague-to-colleague, without judgment. So, "Sam, I'm aware you've been coming in late some mornings, you having trouble with the trains/bus/your car or something?" or "You seem very tired at work recently, is everything OK at home?" He might be glad of a sympathetic approach.

I has someone under performance management once. When it escalated to my manager, and was out of my hands, I was in the dark on the details. I had a hard job keeping a colleague in check, who actually complained to HR that I was keeping things from her! My line was that we had to trust management to get the right outcome. (which we did in the end.).

Ah, yes - extending his contract would certainly not improve morale amongst the workers!

To be blunt, it's down to the manager. They need to tackle it but it doesn't look like they will. I used to work in HR and it is more common than you think for a manager to ask HR to deal with it because they don't want to be the bad news bear themselves.

So - concrete examples of poor performance. Sleeping on the job is an obvious one. Do you have any kind of workflow that would show he is producing less work (if this is the case, or does he work productively when he is awake?).

If you have a Union, this could also be a source of advice. I would recommend that you complain every.single.time to your managers/line managers so that it would be less trouble to deal with the employee than with the team.

I really do think that your manager is not telling the truth by putting the blame on HR. I doubt HR would have extended his contract without getting the OK from the line managers.

Public Sector employers can have really good support for employees with issues so if he does need support in that area he's probably missing out. But honestly, I think it's down to your manager not wanting to tackle it consistently. I realise that's not much help to you though.

I agree with the PP who suggested that this is already being dealt with. Please trust your manager. You've stated your case. Just because nothing is happening that you see doesn't mean nothing is happening.

This must be frustrating but do you have any evidence he is taking drugs, maybe he is late and falls asleep for other reasons, this is something he could have discussed with his manager that you are all unaware of.

If he is under the influence of drugs they're possibly perfectly legal and he is struggling with the side effects of a new regime perhaps. I was prescribed some that I took at night that left me feeling so zombie - like and exhausted and foggy the next morning it was unreal. I was never late or unprofessional but just being "normal" took an enormous effort whilst taking them (I no longer do - the side effects being the primary reason).

I'd trust your manager on this one; although most certainly frustrating for the rest of the team your colleague may well be going through a tough time.

I can't think of an actual proper reason why 'nothing can be done'. He's only been there 5 minutes, had a fixed term contract which didn't need to be renewed but has been anyway.

I agree with Sassitude HR wouldn't renew a fixed term contract, that decision would be with the line manager/other operational person. HR also wouldn't deal with this sort of thing, that's for a line manager to do. Processes for dealing with conduct/attendance issues in the public sector are notorious for being slow, but they are certainly there.

As you're not his manager it's not for you to deal with, but it is absolutely valid for you to raise concerns about how the behaviour/performance of a colleague is affecting you. Many line managers avoid dealing with difficult situations, but it's a lot harder to do that if you have other team members voicing how they are being affected.

I agree - he shouldn’t need to be carefully managed out of the company at this point as he has worked there for less than 2 years. Prior to two years of service, he can be dismissed for any reason (provided it isn’t in relation to a protected characteristic.) So it seems that unfortunately your management don’t want to dismiss him at this point, not that ‘nothing can be done’.

He would be sacked if he worked at my place.

How do you know he is under the influence? He might be suffering from a condition that means he appears drunk and his medication affects his sleep. Maybe he is protected under the disability act.

Maybe his manager has agreed flexible work to support him and he doesn't want any of this to be shared.

I'm the end if they extended his contract, he must be doing something right. Be careful before you judge and make accusations as you possibly could be very wrong.