A reader writes:
I handle a really seasonal enterprise, one the place I can solely retain one individual within the low season, as we are able to’t afford (nor have the work for) anybody else throughout that point. In my six years right here, we’ve constructed up a superb core workers who return most years, and I’ve promoted one individual to the full-time, year-round assistant supervisor place. She’s been with me 4 years.
Within the final yr, her efficiency has dropped to the purpose that her job is in jeopardy. She calls in usually to say she’s going to be late, and about half the time that occurs, she merely doesn’t present up. She is completely non-communicative when she’s out of the workplace — she doesn’t have her personal cellphone, so is unimaginable to get in contact with. To cap it off, she has begun dropping duties completely, to the purpose the place I’ve taken over quite a few her duties as a result of I can’t rely on her to care for issues.
Right here’s the complicating issue: she’s in what I consider to be an abusive relationship. Lots of her call-outs are associated to a sequence of accidents, all of which have fantastical tales explaining them. Final yr, we really moved her onto the property (that is hospitality) to present her a number of months to get her toes underneath her, and on the finish of the three months she went again to him.
I’m on the finish of my rope. She and I are going to must have a critical dialogue in regards to the realities of her efficiency, however on the similar time, I don’t wish to make her life even worse. I truthfully don’t know the place to begin, however the scenario can’t proceed as-is. What do I do, and the way do I do it compassionately?
I reply this query over at Inc. at present, the place I’m revisiting letters which have been buried within the archives right here from years in the past (and generally updating/increasing my solutions to them). You can read it here.