OT: Employees and the snowflake generation

[R D S]

This got me thinking about my own early working experiences and how things are different now. Better?

Took an apprentice on, hes frankly not developing after 8 months. Been as patient as humanly possible but he's careless, untidy, poor punctuality, slow to the point where he's actually holding the job up.

He had a week off so I got a reminder of how absolutely piss easy his job is so decided to manage him better on his return.

20 years of age (19 when we took him on), not worked before, I don't want to just bin him off I'd rather right by him. We had words and i've been monitoring him more closely, encouraging him to work faster/more efficient & tidier and (gently) cracking the whip so to speak.

He's told his dad we are bullying him at work, dad's response rather than suggest he gets his shit together in the first paid employment he's had, or talk to us, was to call the training company and tell them we are depressing him.

So we had someone in today from the 'safeguarding' dept. No wonder this country is f***ed.

[The Marquis Saint Evremonde]

R D S [e-mail] posted

Are you receiving any government money for taking on an apprentice?

What "training company"?

[Tim Watts]

I'd fire him - he can laze around his dad's house forever then...

[R D S]

No, i'm actually paying £350 towards the NVQ he's doing.

[Max Demian]

It's possible that he just doesn't want to be an apprentice.

[Richard]

You shouldn't have waited 8 months plus. Eight days is enough to see if he's worth any more of your time.

[newshound]

Agreed. I count myself lucky never to have run my own business and been faced with this sort of issue (although I have seen it from time to time in recent years).

[Tim Streater]

Perhaps you need to point out to him (and his Dad), that he's not being bullied, he's being managed, and that lesson 1 is to learn the difference between them.

[TMH]

Totally f***ed.

[Pamela]

It's hard to see how adult safeguarding should get involved.

Fire him before he takes long term sick leave for his "depression" and then sues you for causing it.

[Brian Gaff]

Yes well, I do hope they see the real issue. However there are some people who are just not suited to some forms of work and not a lot you can do really. Brian

[Dave Liquorice]

Aye, call a meeting of everyone, apprentice, Dad, training Co. Then before wasteing any more time ask the lad if he's actually interested in the apprenticeship or would he much rather be doing (working/apprenticeship) something else, don't allow Dad or Training Co to answer. He may well have simply followed the course of least resistance when signing up rather than puting any effort into finding work/apprenticeship that he'd actually be interested in.

If he appears to be genuinely interested, explain the problem(s). Don't allow interjections during this otherwise the discussion is likely to get side tracked. If you have documentary evidence (time sheets, NVQ "work book"/records?) otherwise it's likely to become a "you said, he said".

Ultimately the bottom line being if the lad doesn't pull his finger out you can't justify the expense and you'll have to "let him go" and he won't get his NVQ.

How apt...

[R D S]

We've three employees.

An almost completely ineffective apprentice. Now i'm going to have to start a disciplinary procedure to dismiss him 'legally', whilst trying my best not to depress him further.

One past retirement age, surely not going to stick around *much* longer, but who knows, you aren't legally allowed to ask so we're skirting around the issue for clues.

Another who you can be relatively certain will have another kid in the near future, but again you can't go there without falling foul. God forbid we should be able to ask the questions necessary to be able to plan how best to run our business.

Who's protecting the employers?

[R D S]

His dysfunctional Kyle-worthy family (I could write a mini-series) have recently separated, pretty sure his dad is currently sofa surfing.

This has been conveniently forgotten while he's accusing us of damaging his mental health, while in fact it's one of the reasons we are being as patient as we are with him.

[charles]

nobody - you're all bloated capitalists and don't need protection. ;-)

[R D S]

I don't know the full ins and outs of it but it appears you can set up a private company and match trainees to businesses.

Sometimes there's an incentive to the business, sometimes the business makes a small contribution to their training, so the Govt must chuck money at it and given that 2 people per month come to train him, one for his NVQ and another in Maths and English and the execs of the business are earning 6 figures, it must be a fair sum per head.

[Robin]

I must have missed where Gordon Brown also abolished "clogs to clogs in

3 generations".

PS No insult intended to OP: nowt wrong with clogs :)

[AnthonyL]

I found the whole recruitment game and attitudes so depressingly awful towards the end of my career that I simply downsized and worked as a consultant. Then, despite having had my own company, premises (yes separate from home) and a number of clients the tax man came round with IR35 as his agenda.

Next time round I'll simply go on benefits claiming depression and awful employers.

[R D S]

With employment law the way it is, pension provision, IR35 (we are having a sweat about this too because we use locums in our opticians), Making Tax effing Digital, I am beginning to wonder if the government are trying to put common folk like me off running a small business.

[Bill]

I had 10 years as a partner in a 2-man business. What has hit me most is the requirement to hold onto documentation for 7 years and insurance info for 99 years. Now I still have tons of paper in the attic, and am only about halfway through checking it all before binning , shredding or keeping it.

The shredding started in 2012. I'm on the 4th shredder and a dab hand at dismantling and clearing it.

Never become the company secretary of a small business.