14. Time Strict
The job hours were from 8 am to 4:30 pm, Monday through Friday. Our new hire showed up about 10 minutes late on the first day. Normally 10 minutes late isn’t a big deal to me, but it was his first day.
I had pulled 3 other staff members into our 8 am meeting so we could discuss the training schedule with our new hire.
So we were already in our meeting when the new guy walked in. He did not apologize for being late – he just sat down as I was going over the training schedule for the week.
After a few minutes of listening to us discuss what he would be doing for the rest of this week, he raised his hand and said, “Can we reschedule the afternoon sessions planned for today and tomorrow? I have to leave at 11 today and 12:30 tomorrow.” This was the first time I was hearing about these plans.
I asked the 3 staff supervisors to give me an opportunity to speak with the new guy alone for a few minutes. They left the room, so I started talking to the guy about how he couldn’t just change his schedule without running it by management first.
As I was talking to this guy, he got a text. He looked down at his phone and put his hand up as if he were telling me, “I’ll be with you right after I finish reading this text”.
As soon as he finished reading the text and looked back at me, I said, “This isn’t going to work. Please make sure you take everything you brought with you and do not return. I’ll have HR email you your separation papers.”
He seemed pretty shocked and asked what he did wrong, so I told him. He tried to explain himself, but I told him that it’s best if he finds somewhere else to work.