WWYD? Underperforming team member

[DivisionBelles]

I've just been promoted at work to the manager of my small team. This is a newly created role and the team hasn't had a manager before me. This is also my first management role. There's 3 of us; me, been there 4.5 years; colleague 1, worked at the company for 9ish years in the same role and colleague 2, who has worked for the company for 30+ years and has seen it start from a very small enterprise and grow into a much larger, more professional organisation.

Colleague 2, let's call her Sarah, has not had a proper defined role for a number of years and instead has been allowed pretty much free reign to do very little. Company owner (and my direct boss) sees value in Sarah because of length of service and because she does know the company well. Unfortunately she's now been given a role in my team.

Sarah has not moved with the times and is struggling with the new technology we've recently started using, as well as routine things like answering the phone and replying to emails. These skills are all a fundamental part of our business and everyone needs to be able to do it competently. Sarah is very slow and unconfident so consequently her productivity is minimal. Colleague 1 (Jane) is getting fed up as currently she is carrying Sarah.

I need to motivate Sarah, but she is prone to tears - I think because she knows she's struggling. I'm very patient with her, explaining things, helping her get used to the new system, but she's just not getting it. The phone will ring, and she'll ignore it, or conveniently pretend to be busy doing something else. In any one day there can be 100+ emails to answer, but if she does 5 it's a miracle. My boss will 100% not get rid of her, but I'm struggling to think of ways to get her to work faster and more pro-actively without my input all the time. Moreover, Jane is getting pissed off as her workload has increased significantly.

Any tips on how I can coach her to work better?

Are there any jobs that are fairly easy, repetitive and a bit dull. Preferably ones that Jane finds boring and are quite laborious?

Can you agree that Sarah is to be the “specialist” at these?

It sounds like she is terrified of most of the work so she needs to be doing the same thing over and over again.

Have you thought about getting her some training?

Sarah is not competent enough to answer the phone or emails? After 30 years? Deary me.

Will you be doing annual appraisals? How about discussing her targets with her and setting out how many emails she has to answer each day, etc?

Is there any training she could have that would help?

Or it might be time for her to leave. No wonder Jane is cross!

Sarah literally has managed to avoid technology in the business. God knows how she's managed get away with it, but she has!

The boring repetitive tasks sound like a good start, but she will soon run out of these on a daily basis.

I'm not sure she'll be up for any training, although I might suggest to my boss that we find her an Office for Dummies type thing. Whether she'll be up for it though is another matter.

Well, then maybe sit Sarah down and chat to her. Ask her what she thinks she can bring to the company. Why has she been allowed not to do any work for years? No good for Sarah or the company. And anyone working with Sarah will always do more and be at a disadvantage.

What tasks were done by Sarah before, OP? What kind of things were they if they were not technology-based.

Similarly, what was Jane doing beforehand if she is only now getting cheesed off with carrying Sarah and her workload has recently increased?

I do wonder if Sarah has always irritated you and you see this as your chance to sort it out, even if the company is not very supportive. While it certainly doesn't sound like Sarah is an effective worker from what you say, why is it only a problem now?

Emails and phones () have been around a long time. Unless you have the most complicated phone system in the world, she should be confident to answer it. Has something happened more recently to make things worse?

Without outing myself too much, it's difficult to explain exactly what Sarah has been doing prior to her new role. Unfortunately she has been allowed to get away with doing very little.

She's escaped technology as previously she hasn't really had to use it on a day to day basis. I don't dislike her and I do kind of feel sorry for her as this role has somewhat been forced on her and I'm not sure she really wants to do it. But as my boss is reluctant to let her go, he has had to find something for her and this really was the only space for her to go. However, this is her job now, and she does need to pull her weight and try and get up to speed. Jane will be away on extended leave later this year and I'm genuinely concerned that she won't cope. Of course I am more than happy to help out, but I have my own responsibilities and deadlines as well. Luckily it is a quiet time in the business but I am dreading it all the same.

I need to sit her down I think and find out if there is any support she needs to help her.

We have a Sarah. Very similar including length of service. She does simple, functional tasks. I sympathise as I temporarily line managed her at one point and it was very frustrating and time consuming.

I did my best with a pdp, objectives etc but she is either sloth-like in tasks she doesn't want to do or gets in a real state so I suspect she will occupy the basic admin slot until retirement despite my efforts.

We have another, even longer serving (and deeply unpleasant) Sarah who I'm performance managing and that's proving challenging as nobody's dared challenge her until now.

All inherited issues from previous line management unfortunately. If your team can see you tackling things, they'll feel reassured.

I'd be looking for a new challenge in a different company if that's feasible.

You've got a part time worker (at best!) in Sarah who management have tolerated doing "very little" (and after several decades you aren't going to suddenly get a mega-productive person from someone who won't even use the basics of technology!) and you have someone going on extended leave (how did that ever get approved!).

Then there's you. Haven't they done a good job of stitching you up. You'll have to do the lion's share of the work, and any failings will be down to you, you'll carry the can for a situation they've forced you to accept.

You've got enough experience and time for that to look good on your CV, and they'll have no reason to mark you down if you get another job.

In this type of situation, always change before you have to.

I If Sarah is meant to be answering emails and only manages 5 a day, if any of those are from customers, they've probably given up and gone elsewhere.

She's not exactly going to get the customer service of the year award is she. And if ineffectual management have turned a blind eye to having passengers in their business because they haven't had the guts to sort it out ages ago, they are letting her down, and the rest of the staff who have to pick up the slack.

Why not get her a dictation system for emails or a phone on which she can dictate emails?

She doesn't use technology though....... that would be like dragging her into the 19th century

She should be able to handle dictating emails. All she had to learn is opening them.

I bet typing emails is an issue for her.

How old is she? I used to be quite bemused by people like Sarah... until the menopause came knocking on my door and started working with a much younger team. Ive suddenly gone from a super efficient confident person to one struggling with the most basic skills (for me), taking twice as long to perform something and confidence at rock bottom. I'm not half as bad as what you describe of Sarah but can relate.

The impact of the menopause on performance is starting to be more recognised and accepted in the workforce as is aging alone. It seems that your boss has accepted her situation probably because he has seen her much more efficient in her younger years.

It is very likely that she knows how you feel about her and that her colleague is getting fed up with her and that will only impact om her confidence more. Sadly, you're going to have to patient with her and accept that everything will take longer with her but patience and understanding will alleviate her anxiety and will help her perform better.

Sadly, you're going to have to patient with her and accept that everything will take longer with her but patience and understanding will alleviate her anxiety and will help her perform better.

Swingofthings, you are much kinder and more tolerant than I would be. Sarah has not suddenly gone from using the phone (!) and emails confidently to being unable to use them. She has NEVER used them. Sounds like she's been happy to pick up a pay cheque for doing fuck all every month and now she's actually having to do some work, she's shocked and can't cope. I would have very little sympathy;. Sarah is happy enough for everyone else around her to work and pick up her slack. Lazy cow.

Would it help if you or Jane spent some time side by side with Sarah, to see what is actually slowing her down when it comes to answering emails? Is it lack of proficiency with your email system, slow typing, or struggling to put together responses? That might show you where she can speed up - training on email system, typing course, some set texts to copy and paste into responses (if this would work in the role)?

What happens when she doesn't answer the phone? Does someone else pick it up instead? Is her phone on her desk? You could set a clear target - the phone must be answered within 5 rings - and instruct Jane not to answer it. If the target isn't met, ask Sarah why this was, and then, whatever reason she gives, talk about how she can overcome this or what her priorities must be in future.

We have a Sarah. She's been pushed around the organisation for years with no-one taking the time to offer her training, or to manage her performance and she must be bored shitless of all the mundane crap she's now given to do.
She's 2 years from retirement and it's been decided to just let her carry on until she leaves.

She earns £34k a year and has a very handsome pension though so I'm not feeling overly sorry for her.

That is exactly it tenlittlecygnets. I'm beginning to see that management higher up are mainly to blame here. She's been allowed to coast for years, and now she's actually got to 'earn' her pay, she can't. The trouble is, she's had the opportunity to keep up with change in the business but chose, and was allowed not to, and now it's almost too late. My manager seems to have some kind of blind faith that she'll get there, but I fear that ship has sailed. She's around 15 years older than me - I'm mid 40s.

I don't want to leave, yet. This is a good opportunity for me to gain some experience in a management role, and generally I like the work and the people I work with. However, I'm not prepared to be trodden on nor nanny an underperforming colleague forever.

I would organise a rota.
Sarah on phone duty for X amount of hours, then the other team members for similar hours.

She's not a good typist - two fingers only from what I can see. I've set her up with lots of email templates but she appears not to be using them. I'm going to try the phone ring target today and see how we get on.

Give her a rota and a daily target, and review it at the end of each week?

So Sarah needs to man the phones 9 - 11, Jane does 11 - 1, Sarah does 1 - 3.... and Sarah needs to average 15 emails an hour. Track it all and use the data to assess her performance. If she won't improve, she'll miss her targets for a few weeks and you can start a PDP - but if she needs to earn her keep, like you say, she should try.

You can offer her help and support too, but there's nothing like actually doing it.

I agree with time slots for Sarah to answer the phone. Then perhaps colour emails Sarah has to respond to whilst Jane answers the phone. You’ll need to check her every hour to see if there’s any support she needs from you. But hopefully after a week things may improve. Good luck

Start with training then make sure all staff have clear job descriptions. Follow this up with setting some easy objectives for everybody and some specific to each role. Make sure you can measure the objectives ie it's no good saying she never answers the phone if you can't back it up with proof. If you're not happy with performances you can then give her support to meet her objectives, if she doesn't you can look at performance management in line with your company policy.

It's a long term project to get someone to improve their performance if you aren't careful you leave your company open to legal action. Perhaps you need to start with some line management and employment law training. Good luck.

I would focus on one task and have her do that all day until she gets it, probably answering the phone. She must have one at home.