Working with family sucks sometimes

[The Colorado Kid]

This is a safe place to vent... so feel free to ignore.



This past week has been god damned irritating. I became aware that a family member (whom I hired last year) has been slacking, and taking advantage of the situation. I was able to deal with (and hopefully resolve) the fallout with our customers (I have a good relationship with them) but time will tell. Dealing with the family aspect of this is going to be a huge pita. I'm trying to be very clear and up front about everything... but I feel there will likely be lingering hard feelings. I gave him a week to get things straightened out (which should have taken less than a day) but he didn't do anything. Today I switched him to a 20 hour salary, and put him in an 'On Call' status - meaning he won't go anywhere, or do anything without my authorization. He'll still get paid for 20 hours/week for the next couple of weeks. This is being done because he's family. Had he been anyone else he would have been terminated immediately.


The worst part is that he just became a father. While I sympathize with his situation - and gave him a paid week off - I still feel guilty about it.



Any advice on how to deal with this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[nailz]

"We're family, so I've cut you a lot of slack, but you're jeopardizing my livelyhood and ability to provide for myself and my family by not carrying your weight. As a business man, I can't keep an employee who cannot perform the job duties. It's not financially possible. It would be beneficial for you to go find something your passionate about. Here's a months severance."

Or..

"You ARE the weakest link, goodbye." - Fired.

 

[AeonicSlumber]

This is a tough call but it sounds like you're doing the best as a manager to handle the situation. If he keeps fucking up and in spite of all your efforts it sounds like you've got no other choice but to let him go.

Definitely not an easy decision though. Kudos for putting up with it as well as you have.

 

[The Colorado Kid]

Thanks guys. I'm going to talk to him this week, and find out where his head is at. I agree, Nailz, it doesn't sound like he's passionate about his job, nor does he seem too concerned with how it affects me and my ability to provide for my family, not too mention the other employees.

I spoke with my sister, and asked her to ground him. LOL.. she understands the situation, and said she doesn't have any issues.... then again, isn't that what we're supposed to say in this kind of situation?

 

[LunaTEKKE]

I’ve experienced both sides of working for family. When I was in college, I worked for a family-owned business where one of the owner’s kids worked there and was quite a slacker. This type of situation definitely affects the rest of the employees and their opinion of management.

Many years later, I did 3 months of contract work at the company where a family member worked, and ended up getting hired full time. Remembering the prior situation, I I absolutely went out of my way to bust my ass. I didn’t want to put my family member in a bad spot, nor did I want any other employees thinking I was taking advantage.

Can you help your family member figure out if there is a specific reason for the slacking (not enough training, tendency to procrastinate, conflict with some other obligation, sleepless nights, etc.) and work out a solution? Otherwise, if this individual can’t keep up, I don’t see any way around letting him go.