Rough day at work.

[saffronhare]

I know a lot of folks gripe about their managers here, but damn. One of the people I manage has me seriously longing for the days when I could just lock somebody up against the wall and haze 'em until they crumpled.

SRSLY

Not that I think that's best practice or anything. But still. ::sigh::

I've got an appointment set up with MY boss on Monday to see if she's got any other ideas for getting timely and better-quality work out of this person, shy of sacrificing 40% of my own productivity to micromanage her immovable object ass into getting things done on time.

My sympathy for her as a Vulnerable Person, should layoffs come around again, is rapidly eroding in the face of the reality that the other writers churn out four to five times the amount of work; and that I tend not to assign her new work because I know it her existing work isn't getting done. I really, really hate that.

Reviews are coming up in August, too. Ack.

Comments

[fionnabhar.livejournal.com]

Let me guess. She's a middle school student?

There I go, being Not Helpful again. Sorry, it's all I got.

[capriciouslass.livejournal.com]

Listening to you and 8elements talk about managing people, along with the very small amount of supervision that I have to do makes me NOT want to move any higher up the food chain.
Good Luck. I can only imagine that the situation sucks rocks.

[tafl-hols.livejournal.com]

It appears she's in a position that isn't suited to her. Perhaps the best thing you could do--for her--is to usher her out the door. It appears she has no future writing, so the only way she's likely to advance in any fashion or even be productive is to do something else; you may only be enabling her in avoiding making a necessary change.

Yeah, it sucks to have to fire someone. I've done it before. I know in at least one instance, it provided some needed motivation for the former employee to reassess goals and focus on what he needed to do. Keeping him in a position that wasn't working for him wasn't doing anybody any good.

[saffronhare.livejournal.com]

She's actually a fine writer -- published and everything. She just really can't seem to produce commercial writing in an agency setting, which is a very particular *kind* of writing, you know?

Thanks for the perspective. I fear she'll be moving along sometime soon...she's increasingly unhappy; I'm increasingly frustrated; and corporate scrutiny of marginal productivity is sharpening.

[tafl-hols.livejournal.com]

Yeah...copywriting is different from technical writing is different from fiction writing is different from op-ed writing and on down the line. I'm an English weenie, ya know, and a sometimes freelance writer with pub credits myself.

I should have clarified that it appears she doesn't have a future with that type of writing, where the need for production far outweighs the needs of that inner critic who wants everything just perfect. I don't think she would have landed the position without having some writing skills. It's just a question of whether she has the mad skillz for that type of writing.