New employee (Gen Z} doesn’t want to meet in person

[outofofficeon]

I took on a graduate for a new position, she’d been job hunting for a few years, I felt good about giving her a hand up into a great career.
She lives about an hour away so works remotely. She bright and polite and reliable and a good member of the team.

The problem I have is that she doesn’t want to visit the office in person or meet her colleagues in person, I offered to put her up in a nice hotel and pay travel costs so that she could spend a few days with us in person. She declined. My latest issue is that she doesn’t put her camera on when we are communicating at work as part of daily work or chats. I understand she might not be very confident but I think that you have to get out of the house / your comfort zone if you want a career.

im not sure what to do- any advice oh wise ladies.

The company I work for (major UK city) has a hybrid working policy. Most people's commute is about an hour each way, or more.

Am absolutely stunned that you felt it was necessary to dangle the carrot of travel costs and overnight accommodation to try to persuade her into the office. An hour's travel each way is really not unusual or unreasonable.

Appreciate you were offering it to make it as seamless as possible for her but, christ alive, she's a young adult – this feels like an incredible level of babying. And now that you've made that offer, you've set a precedent for her or any other employee – you've made a rod for your own back.

If her work is fine (many people, even if they're office based and extroverted and older often have cameras off) where is the issue?

By "team bonding" are there specific people who are pushing for her to turn up in person?

If she's signed the remote working contract, is there some resentment there? Are these people pushing for her to be forcibly "presented" to them?

Would they be making the same demands if she was an older man?

There's definitely a type of unpleasant person who dislikes the new WFH culture.

They're used to physically lording it over younger women, PoC, people who are introverted...Or collecting gossip and having small amounts of social power.

It's not a case of being chatty and iiking and missing people (which is sweet) its just there's very little gossip and control you can do to a few lines on a screen!

As an older Millenial I have demonstrably good social skills and I definitely "did my time" in workplaces.

But I'd often automatically get treated like absolute crap as a petite younger woman..."she's reliable but not respected"...

Same office who would ignore anything I said (or see me as a workhorse), tall bloke walks in (not even a permanent employee) and everyone is competing to be his best mate.

I absolutely respect the younger generation for distancing themselves a bit...Good for them and their hot yoga and matcha lattes!

The "difficult" people at my work are consistently complaining that they don't have access to all the people to patronise and put into a hierarchy the way they used to....

This ^

I don't understand why the OP seems to have been so reluctant (or scared) to get to the bottom of this employee absolutely refusing to come into the office and won't turn her camera on.

The OP needs to have an initial informal chat about the issue to explain it's causing problems for the employer and to try to determine if the employee has a legitmate reason for doing this. (eg physical disability, mental health problems, anxiety, agrophobia, facial deformity etc etc). There could be whole host of valid reasons for her refusal.

But if there is no good reason then the OP needs to point out the probationary period, no unfair dismissal within 2 years, and see if that makes a difference.

I suspect the OP must work for some really small firm as their contracts of employment seem pants and they can't possibly have a decent HR dept. They need to get their employment contracts reviewed.

I hope @outofofficeon comes back with an update as I'd like to know how it turns out

I mean, you're going to have to get rid of her, unfortunately. It is what it is.

Hire an enthusiastic 40-50 year old who will turn up every day and not go sick and not act like a total prima donna?

Well if she’s an ‘employee’ what she wants doesn’t come in to it. Does her contract state exclusively home based? My contracts for my employees all state our office as the main place of work with other locations as required with sufficient notice and travel costs. Not entirely sure why you are letting her take the piss and if you don’t get on top
of it you’ll find the rest of your team don’t appreciate you letting the tail wag the dog. As long as you give her reasonable notice and it’s within the contract stipulations she doesn’t get to say ‘No’. Although be warned, I bought a business and inherited an employee like this and every time she was supposed to come to our main office for training she rang in sick. If you don’t get her on the same page she will become a problem.

i dont agree

That was 5 years ago

no one was locked indoors. You could go for walk/use your garden.

Offering a different perspective. I work in a field where a lot of ND individuals also work. I find a preference for camera off is often related to that, not a generational thing. Could she have ND? In our policy we do not mandate cameras on and allow people to leave them off. We do regular MH check ins too and allow a lot of flexibility. Some of the most amazing and innovative work gets done in this way. Is she under performing? If not then I don’t see the issue. You cannot enforce your need for social contact on someone with say autism, and you might lose a valuable employee if you do.
But if she’s underperforming I’d focus on that.

I'm intrigued with the implied 'mystery' of this person!! Do you even know what they look like, did you meet them in person or at least with the camera on before you hired them?! 🤔
I agree with another poster who mentions how easy and common it is for the 'neurodivergent' card to be slapped out on the desk at the mere suggestion of being asked to do something they would really prefer not to!! 😠
With this in mind I would personally ask her politely to switch the camera on during meetings and if she continues to decline then you are well within your rights to enquire why she is doing so and her future within your company simply has to be dependent on her response and actions...🙄

This camera off thing and all the excuses as to why cameras need to be off are ridiculous. It’s probably that she’s still sat in bed in her pyjamas and can’t be arsed to sort a desk out. You need to start managing this employee otherwise all your employees will start taking the piss too.

You don’t ask her. You tell her what your expectations are - and what the business needs.

Maybe that’s why she was looking for work for so long…

It wuite clearly says online that not only have studies said that it halts productivity, having your cameras on has to be in the policy to be policy.

I learnt a very important life lesson this week. When it comes to a contract you have to detach yourself completely. Forget what YOU consider to be reasonable. You just have to look at the words. If you didn't explicitly mandate cameras on, then that is on you. Take this as an important lesson.

coming into the office - that feels like something that should be contractual. If I signed a remote contract, I have done so with the understanding that I won't need to come in. Perhaps I can't? If I needed to, I likely wouldn't have applied. Hybrid or flexible contracts, or ones that state that you will need to come in some time etc. all fine, and she should.

The camera thing though - something like that shouldn't need to be in a contract. It is just basic work etiquette. At most it could be included in a code of conduct, but even then, I would have thought that this should be something that a boss should just be able to say, without having to contractually justify it.

Completely agree.

Although as been’s said, cameras on are positively helpful for people with hearing impairment. I have ADHD and cameras on make it much easier for me to work out turn taking - in purely audio conversations I constantly talk over other people in an unhelpful way. There is no ‘right way’ that meets all needs that might be covered by EA accommodations.

^ This. Or go one better and hire a 50+ who loves to bake and bring in a wonderful assortment of cakes & delicious things to eat. She won't just switch her camera on but also show you pictures of her cute cats and regale you with fun stories of their goings on. She'll even take your washing home and do it for you... OK, she won't. I made that last bit up. We don't do that. Older people make excellent workers and have a sound, dependable, no nonsense work ethic. Also we make other people feel good, especially younger workers, who take a look at us and think, 'Look at the state of her.'

OP in the corporate world, even in remote roles, at some point out of courtesy, u usually meet your team in the flesh at least just once? Any remote roles myself, or friends, have done, you usually meet your team/manager for lunch/dinner or pop into the main office to say hello, when u start a job, even if u have a ‘remote’ contract. You need to plan a call with her, and diplomatically say you’ve noticed she’s always off camera on zoom, and ask delicately if any reason for this, and go from there. Say being on camera a bit more, would be great, and will help to continue building your new working relationship. Also I presume you do her 121 meetings? You can’t really gauge her facial reactions to your feedback if u can’t see her face

I hate having my camera on, so unless it's absolutely necessary I don't. Everyone accepts this as a foible of mine - but I also spend most of my time IN work rather than WFH. I think you need to discuss exactly what is expected, but I really don't 🤔 you can enforce the camera rule.

I'm gobsmacked at so many posts that seem to think that the employee (and a grad at that) should be able to dictate every element of their employment.

Maybe she is abroad and at the beach and can't come?

I've been where you are. These are terrible signs, that are increasingly common, and never work out IMHO. Talk to HR. If you have a way out (probation period for example) take it now.

I haven’t said cameras should always be on, I said there need to be policy guidelines as to where its useful and beneficial and where it impairs productivity. Hence the examples I gave upthread.

I’ve said nothing about contracts with respect to camera on/off policies which don’t belong in the contract. Occasional attendance in person should be in the contract but contracts can of course be varied within reason.

Unless you are advancing a theory that the UKs productivity problem is because employees are mandated to have cameras on ?

What on earth did I say which caused you to think I’d suggested this?

In my company, where cameras on is the usual approach that everyone follows, they are often off (without any issues) when it makes sense to do so:

1. If someone is eating - no one wants to watch each other chewing
2. In large meetings when most people are just listening
3. When someone else is presenting in a meeting or the meeting is being hosted in person and the rest of us are dialling in (the tech involved would usually mean either you'd appear in vast size on a display screen or alternatively no one is looking at a screen of people at all)
4. If your Wifi is playing up and the bandwidth isn't there (and this applies to some people more or less all the time - they'll explain to new people generally)
5. If there's disruption where you are and the visuals would be distracting - eg pet has wandered in
6. If your camera isn't working.

Otherwise they're on but there is scope for individual adjustments in line with the law obviously. I'm sure most people have a bad day every now and then and keep them off but that's rare.

It's perfectly possible to have an Equality Act compliant cameras-on policy. You simply make it clear that you will make reasonable adjustments for evidenced disabilities. If you apply for a remotely based job, it can't possibly automatically mean that your employers are never entitled to see you. The assumption would have to be that you will work to your employers' direction and will attend meetings with cameras on unless you can show there is a good reason why you particularly can't work that way.