Colleague with poor writing skills

[SQLCat]

Hello!
I recently took a chance on someone for my team who on paper had the right experience to fill a role I had.
Now that I am training her up it’s become apparent that her communication and writing skills are pretty rough.
Her work is poorly formatted, her spelling poor (and this is with MS Word), she writes in text speak and her punctuation is dreadful. She seems to have a hatred of full stops.
She told me that she believes the content of her work is what matters most and that grammar and punctuation come afterwards.
She is meant to be producing technical process documentation.
She even spells clients’ names wrong in emails to them.
I am being unreasonable?
Gahhhh

[TheCanterburyWhales]

If her day to day work involves technical document writing, wasn't she asked about her experience in this at interview?
Of course if the role requires a lot (or even a little) writing, then it's going to have to be correct, but it's a bit unfortunate that such a big problem has only now come to light.
What was her spoken English like at interview? Often you can tell what a person's written skills are like from their oral ones.

[Ylvamoon]

Sadly, it does matter if she is dyslexic. We had a similar situation (although this person did pass probation). The job is a purely "written communication" type job and the person in question knew that and was otherwise competent doing the job. As it was mentioned in the pre employment health questionnaire, we had to make "reasonable adjustments" . Which, was me proof reading her work, when I took over as her line manager.

[TheCanterburyWhales]

It will matter very much if she's dyslexic if they try to get rid of her based on poor writing skills! They'll be taken to the cleaners.

[Tippexy]

But that makes no sense. The job is to write perfectly so it’s clearly not the job for her. There are some jobs we are just not qualified to do. It’s like saying a blind person should be able to be a bus driver.

[StealthPolarBear]

Not if it's a major part of the role and she refuses support to improve.

[Evilmorty]

I have met Health visitors unable to read graphs so a degree means nothing really.

[SQLCat]

She’s a native English speaker. Based on the role she was in before decent writing skills were assumed.
I agree @StealthPolarBear, if she was writing SQL or programming she’d pay a lot more attention. She would expect more of developers on the team but doesn’t hold herself to the same standards.
I was concerned I was being nit picky, it looks like I’m not!
If I knew she was dyslexic I would cut her some slack.

[Rainbowshine]

HR would only know if she’s declared it. Even then it’s not something that they would share automatically with you.

[Wakeupalready]

Just as a thought - if it's a learning disability it sounds like dysgraphia not dyslexia.
This is a writing disorder ( when handwriting and typing)that manifests with shit punctuation, presentation, misspelling , repeated words, and sentences that don't read correctly.
My DS 16 has this.
But.
He can surmount it by adaptive technology- voice to text software, and knows to step away from a document and do something else for a while till his brain reboots and he can proofread a documented he has verbalised properly.
Technical writer is the last place he should try and get a job in. It would be a disaster, much like what you describe.

Of course she may well also be totally useless, but it doesn't sound like dyslexia if you were to ask about learning difficulties.

[SQLCat]

That doesn’t leave me in a great place as her manager.
Sigh.

[SQLCat]

Dysgraphia does sound plausible!

Thank you!

[DameFanny]

There's fuck all point having great content if the spelling and grammar stop you reading it - or mean you have to read each sentence twice to clarify what is meant. It's like putting a map behind dirty glass so you don't know if you're looking at fly dirt or a tube stop.

Have you explicitly told her that you need her to be coherent? What did you say when she told you your concerns were irrelevant? I'd have been furious at that point.

[user1497207191]

That doesn’t leave me in a great place as her manager.

You only have to make "reasonable adjustments" whatever the disability. If this person is going to be incapable of the accuracy required with whatever "reasonable adjustments" you can make, then you can let them go. You (and HR) just need to do things properly to avoid an unfair dismissal claim. For a start, did they disclose any disabilities in the application/interview process - if not, that's a black mark against them.

[Starlingsarebullies]

Is assistive technology an option?- Dragon Dictate or ReadWriteText Gold are excellent voice to text packages. Grammarly paid version is a good option for proofreading.

Unfortunately, I assess a lot of adults for dyslexia when they have been put on capability and are at risk of losing their jobs (However, lots of people with dyslexia are more than capable of writing technical manuals, coherent emails etc - so please don’t let this bias you in the future )

[Rainbowshine]

Do you have a probation period in place? If so start bringing the issues up now and get support from HR for managing this. It’s speculation about the dyslexia so don’t worry about that unless she brings it up.