Spin-Off: Co-Workers Get Away with What?

[mom2rtk]

(I haven't worked in 10 years)

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you probably did work very hard the last 10 years.

 

[DawnM]

I have to say that once I became a school counselor, most of our team were great. Not a whole lot of drama on the end of not working or doing the work.

But the teachers were a different story (as in, not ALL the teachers were great. Most were, but.....). We had teachers who came in late every single day. We had one teacher who became the drug free schools coordinator and no one checked on him until 10am because he was supposed to be in a private office doing paperwork from 7:30-10. Nope, he just didn't show up until 9:30 or so and if asked he would say he was out of the office doing other necessary things.

The only reason I found out is because I was asked to help him and another person out during 1st period. She finally broke down and told me. Apparently, this drug free schools guy was doing COKE every night late and couldn't get up in the am! ARGH!!!!!!

Then when I had a student coming in drunk and reported it, he called me an alarmist.

I wonder if he still is working?

We had many teachers who just assigned work but sat and read the paper or took out their computers and did other stuff.

Hard to fire. Very hard.

In fact, in my district, we had what we called "the rubber room" It is a place where teachers who should be fired go and push papers while their case is pending or until they retire. One teacher was there for animal endangerment, another there for bringing a firearm to class (or maybe it was fireworks), you get the picture.

 

[DawnM]

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you probably did work very hard the last 10 years.

You are sweet. I stayed home with my kids. I have one special needs child who really needed me home. He is doing well now and 18, so I feel confident going back to work.

 

[DawnM]

We had a school secretary (not in the main office) who had one of those boom boxes with a 3" TV on it. She had it on ALL day and would watch soaps while she "worked."

 

[Cannot_Wait_4Disney]

I had an interview with the efficiency experts. My co-workers tell me I'm getting away with a ton but I don't think so. I even recorded it.

 

[FairestOfThemAll37]

Reading through this thread makes me so grateful that I work at a place that cares about what people accomplish rather than policing everyone like they're children. People that don't add value to the team can easily be managed out without this nonsense. Some of the work environments described sound toxic.

This is me! I read some these and can't even imagine knowing the details of where my co-workers go.

Now, I work in an office setting so maybe it's different. One of my coworkers could put their computer on their desk in the am-leave all day and then grab it on their way home and I probably wouldn't notice lol. As long as they answered emails on their phone I don't think anybody else would either. Everybody just assumes a missing person is in a meeting or somewhere.

But then again we don't really have set working hours though 9-5 is pretty standard, people come and go throughout the day.

 

[morgan98]

UGH! I have my share of stories from my past work experience (I haven't worked in 10 years), but right now I keep thinking, "I am a hard worker, get to work on time, and do my job! And I am trying to get someone to hire me!"

Try not to stress out, I am confident you will find a job. The traits you mention above sound so simple, yet are not as easy to come by as one would think. There are plenty of people who interview just fine, then you find out that coming to work and doing a good job are not on their priority list.

 

[HeyIt'sMe]

I don't understand how some of the employees in my office stayed employed. They don't do anything - and have no interest in doing anything.

Last week I had a question regarding fees on one of our accounts. The primary account executive was not at his desk so I went to talk to the secondary account executive. She is pregnant and due in August. When I said I have a question about XYZ Co's fees she gestured towards the primary account executive's desk and said "He hasn't kept me in the loop on fees. He's working from home. Just e-mail him and he'll get back to you". I asked if she wanted me to copy her on the e-mail so she could 'get in the loop' as she should be and she said --- "No, I'm going on maternity leave in August'. Ah yeah, that's 6 months from now. You don't plan on working for the next 6 months??

 

[DawnM]

Try not to stress out, I am confident you will find a job. The traits you mention above sound so simple, yet are not as easy to come by as one would think. There are plenty of people who interview just fine, then you find out that coming to work and doing a good job are not on their priority list.

My stress is mainly because I worked in my former district for 16 years. I was well established, had a good reputation, and could get another job easily because of my networking. Here, all the way on the other side of the country, I am not known at all. I am also older (late 40s) and haven't worked in 10 years.

Truth be told, I found out quickly when I was first working, that if you show up on time, don't send students out for discipline issues, and don't complain, you are considered "an excellent teacher" on your evaluations.

But in our district, classroom management was 80% of the job. Maybe that is true everywhere, but definitely where I worked. Once I became a counselor and didn't have to do the 42 kids per hour management, I realized how much ENERGY I had expended doing the discipline part. It is exhausting, although once the year gets going, and the kids get to know you, it is much easier.

 

[ronandannette]

Reading through this thread makes me so grateful that I work at a place that cares about what people accomplish rather than policing everyone like they're children. People that don't add value to the team can easily be managed out without this nonsense. Some of the work environments described sound toxic.

Agree completely! We do have certain policies that are "cast in stone" and they're not always the most logical, like dress-code, no access to company wi-fi, no personal use of company vehicles are a few that come to mind and are relatively easy to "police". We're pretty flexible on practically everything else though and while we all benefit from that latitude, it does make it much trickier to "draw lines in the sand" with certain employees who seemingly take advantage and/or let their productivity suffer due to their habits (doing the same things that others do while still producing excellent results). I manage 8 staff and 1/2 of them work in the field - I couldn't keep them under my thumb moment-to-moment if I wanted to. The harsh fact is we simply terminate anybody who doesn't consistently meet their production benchmarks over time and the reasons why don't even matter. If someone is not self-disciplined enough to deliver the necessary results, they don't belong in our company.

I also chuckled at the earlier posts about smoking. This will not be well received and some may even call me a liar, but at my workplace the smokers (who are free to smoke at will outside the building in a designated area) waste WAY less time than the "vape'rs". The undeniable reason is that vape'ing has no "end". A smoker (and I'm one of them) will slip out, light a smoke, smoke it and be done in 5 or 7 minutes. Most (not all) of us go alone, maybe 4 or 5 times a day and have a certain efficiency to the process. Our vape'rs on the other hand, go 4 or 5 times also, but they tend to go in groups and because they are never "done", they easily lose track of time and stay as long as it takes them to finish whatever conversations they're having. For the record, none of this violates any particular policy, so it's never challenged, but it certainly is noticeable.

 

[DawnM]

Agree completely! We do have certain policies that are "cast in stone" and they're not always the most logical, like dress-code, no access to company wi-fi, no personal use of company vehicles are a few that come to mind and are relatively easy to "police". We're pretty flexible on practically everything else though and while we all benefit from that latitude, it does make it much trickier to "draw lines in the sand" with certain employees who seemingly take advantage and/or let their productivity suffer due to their habits (doing the same things that others do while still producing excellent results). I manage 8 staff and 1/2 of them work in the field - I couldn't keep them under my thumb moment-to-moment if I wanted to. The harsh fact is we simply terminate anybody who doesn't consistently meet their production benchmarks over time the reasons why don't even matter. If someone is not self-disciplined enough to deliver the necessary results, they don't belong in our company.

I also chuckled at the earlier posts about smoking. This will not be well received and some may even call me a liar, but at my workplace the smokers (who are free to smoke at will outside the building in a designated area) waste WAY less time than the "vape'rs". The undeniable reason is that vape'ing has no "end". A smoker (and I'm one of them) will slip out, light a smoke, smoke it and be done in 5 or 7 minutes. Most (not all) of us go alone, maybe 4 or 5 times a day and have a certain efficiency to the process. Our vape'rs on the other hand, go 4 or 5 times also, but they tend to go in groups and because they are never "done", they easily lose track of time and stay as long as it takes them to finish whatever conversations they're having. For the record, none of this violates any particular policy, so it's never challenged, but it certainly is noticeable.

Why no access to company wifi? I don't think I have ever heard of this one.

 

[ronandannette]

Why no access to company wifi? I don't think I have ever heard of this one.

As I understand it, it's an antiquated policy that throws back to the day when bandwidth limitations resulted in wi-fi traffic slowing down our internet access (or something like that - I'm no IT guy). It's super-lame and nowadays everybody just uses the 3G on their own personal phones for their necessary social-media fix (our desk-top network has most social-media sites blocked). Oh yeah - there's another thing - attempting to "hack" around our firewall without administrator privileges is a policy violation!

 

[DawnM]

As I understand it, it's an antiquated policy that throws back to the day when bandwidth limitations resulted in wi-fi traffic slowing down our internet access (or something like that - I'm no IT guy). It's super-lame and nowadays everybody just uses the 3G on their own personal phones for their necessary social-media fix (our desk-top network has most social-media sites blocked).

That really stinks! I don't even think DH's or my jobs would even know. In fact, both of us have to be on company wifi the entire day with company computers. They don't care if we check personal email or surf personal stuff as long as it isn't inappropriate.

The only thing DH has had to watch is surfing for other job openings or emailing his resume from work! He does that at home. Although he no longer wants to change jobs.

 

[ronandannette]

That really stinks! I don't even think DH's or my jobs would even know. In fact, both of us have to be on company wifi the entire day with company computers. They don't care if we check personal email or surf personal stuff as long as it isn't inappropriate.

The only thing DH has had to watch is surfing for other job openings or emailing his resume from work! He does that at home. Although he no longer wants to change jobs.

We have internet access on our desktops and laptops (behind a pretty restrictive firewall); just can't log on with mobile devices.

 

[DawnM]

We have internet access on our desktops and laptops (behind a pretty restrictive firewall); just can't log on with mobile devices.

OOOOOhhhhhh.....I see. I am not sure I ever tried, but again, I haven't worked in 10 years. DH doesn't feel the need and now that I think about it, that may be true for him as well. He was told he couldn't stream Pandora through their system but we have enough data to stream Pandora without an issue.

 

[spacemountainmom]

There was a guy at my old job that I swore had naked photos of someone higher up. He was constantly doing things that would have gotten anyone else fired and he was just allowed to continue his employment.

1. Take the district vehicle offsite to go buy breakfast while he was on the clock.
2. Tell everyone he was going to the bus garage to gas up the district vehicle and be gone for far longer than necessary. This usually involved him stopping for food, going to the bank or any other errand he needed to run.
3. "Borrow" the district vehicle while his personal vehicle was in for service.
4. Allowing favorite students to park in the lot without a permit.
5. Taking money "under the table" for student parking permits
6. Sexually harassing several female co-workers.
7. Completely inappropriate comments to and touching of female students.
8. Refused to do many aspects of his job and several times verbally refusing to do something when told. Twice he was on the "walkies" and directly told his supervisor that he would not do something. Everyone who carried a "walkie" heard him.
9. Pretty much walked out early every single day.
10. Fudged time sheet when he'd leave early when he was "sick".
11. Hid out in his little office (no one else had private space, he whined until he got one) not doing his job, multiple times a day.
12. If the weather was looking "bad", he would whine until he was allowed to go home early or not come in. Funny enough a co-worker lived a couple miles from him and would make it in and/or stay the entire day.

There's probably more that I am forgetting, but it's rather obvious the man should have been terminated. Any one of these alone should have done the job. I never could understand how he kept his job. I've moved on so really don't have to worry about it. I should since I am a taxpayer in this school district and it annoys me how he takes advantage.

 

[DebbieB]

Why no access to company wifi? I don't think I have ever heard of this one.

My office has wifi but it has the same filter as the computers - no facebook, personal mail, etc. And you have to login with your company ID and password so it's tracked.

We used to have someone who burned scented candles at her desk. One time she caught papers on fire! People complained but she got away with it.

 

[barkley]

short version-2 employees caught via live video surveillance (visible to more than just the pso monitoring it) having sex in a public area of a government office.

 

[ashley0139]

Wow, I'm realizing just how lenient my company is, and I'm very grateful for it. No one really keeps track of when you come and leave (within reason of course), no one cares if you leave in the middle of the day to run an errand, or out for a 4:00 pick me up snack. I take walks around the block all the time, and no one cares how long or often your smoke breaks are (that I can tell, I don't smoke). As long as you get your work done, they really don't care.

 

[barkley]

no one cares if you leave in the middle of the day to run an errand, or out for a 4:00 pick me up snack. I take walks around the block all the time

this was historically done w/my former employer-so long as it was within the time amounts of allowable breaks (so if you had a 30 minute errand you just didn't take your second 15 minute break that day) UNTIL 2 events occurred-

1-employee running an errand got into a BAD car accident. because he was on the time clock the courts said it was covered under an industrial injury (workman's comp) and was years of expenses for my employer. at that point we couldn't leave the property in our vehicals unless we were on our unpaid lunch break or put in a time card to clock out.

2-employee walking around the block tripped and broke her ankle. again the courts said b/c it was on the time clock it was an industrial injury so she got workman's comp. at that point we were not allowed to leave the property unless it was our unpaid lunch break or we put in a time card.