[HN Gopher] How do I manage an employee who doesn't need the job?
___________________________________________________________________
How do I manage an employee who doesn't need the job?
Author : mooreds
Score : 21 points
Date : 2021-08-17 22:20 UTC (39 minutes ago)
(HTM) web link (www.askamanager.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.askamanager.org)
| mv4 wrote:
| "I feel that we have no leverage over her at all."
|
| What a horrible approach to management.
| znpy wrote:
| The advice is even worse.
| samename wrote:
| How so?
| znpy wrote:
| See my other reply to the post itself --
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28215737
| hodgesrm wrote:
| Could you be more specific? Having a non-confrontational
| conversation to get what you need and figuring out how to
| reduce the dependency on a key employee are pretty obvious
| tactics.
|
| If there's anything "bad" about this advice, it's that
| adopting the detached attitude necessary for such
| conversations is hard when you are stressed about the
| situation yourself. My coping mechanism is to be relentlessly
| positive that things will work out but that clearly does not
| work for everyone. (Including me, sometimes.)
| znpy wrote:
| See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28215737
| Spivak wrote:
| Good lord. I hope this person either reevaluates their whole
| approach to management or stops being a manager. If the club
| you swing around as a manger is "or you're fired" then you got
| into management for very very wrong reasons.
| goindeep wrote:
| They can be your best or worst employee. I like Naval Ravikants
| attitudes where he just straight up tells them he doesnt expect
| them to work there forever and that he will help them start their
| own thing one day. Principal agent problem.
| MattGaiser wrote:
| I think so much would be gained from this, if simply graceful
| transitions between people.
|
| People are going to leave, but most companies prefer that it be
| a surprise plopped on their desk with two weeks of notice.
| MattGaiser wrote:
| "I feel that we have no leverage over her at all."
|
| This sentence explains so much about modern employee relations.
| grecy wrote:
| After living and working in North America for 5 years, my brother
| returned to Australia. The biggest difference he immediately
| noticed is how employees are treated.
|
| When everyone has healthcare as a human right, minimum wage is
| $20.33/hr[1] and a single person with no kids can easily get
| $1440/mo[2] in welfare (even if never had a job, been out of work
| for a decade, etc.) the playing field is vastly different.
|
| People are not stuck with their job, and so employers know they
| must treat them well if they want to retain them.
|
| [1] https://squareup.com/au/en/townsquare/minimum-wage-australia
|
| [2]
| https://www.servicesaustralia.gov.au/individuals/services/ce...
| poniko wrote:
| Geeez .. give the person a job they want to do and be proud of
| doing .. the need of a job is the worst reason to have a job.
| znpy wrote:
| The advice is even worse:
|
| > The way you motivate someone who doesn't need the money is the
| same way you should motivate people who do need the money: by
| giving them meaningful roles with real responsibility where they
| can see how their efforts contribute to a larger whole
|
| Completely misses the point.
|
| Not to mention, Jean could just plain refuse to take on the
| "meaningful" role, if she likes what she does now and how things
| are going currently.
|
| Whatcha gonna do if the "meaningful role" isn't so meaningful to
| her?
|
| Some people just don't understand: Jean is probably in a better
| position than both the manager asking the question and the person
| giving the "advice".
|
| The manager just can't have leverage over her.
| [deleted]
| rossdavidh wrote:
| The first thing I thought was, "what would you do if she died/had
| to take care of an ailing parent full-time/became a religious
| mystic/ran off with the person of her dreams/got
| arrested/whatever. Any given employee is always, potentially,
| gone tomorrow, whether they "need" the job or not.
| hellbannedguy wrote:
| "Jean is quite brilliant, but has made it clear several times in
| the four years she's been with us that she doesn't work for the
| money, but works because she loves the job."
|
| Kiss their ass.
|
| (I feel this blog post is 100% made up though.)
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-08-17 23:00 UTC)