I fail to see how treating every employee as delicate flower to be loved and nurtured and given every chance to succeed automatically equates to treating them like cogs in a machine. No one in this thread has advocated firing employees for things such as going through a divorce.
I’m going to add “a stupid mistake which is technically illegal” to my everyday vocabulary. “Why, officer/IRS agent/judge/international tribunal, it was just a stupid mistake that was technically illegal. I’m only human! Please don’t give me a ticket/audit/Death Row/sanctions.”
Andymurph, if a cop lets you off with a warning not to speed, and catches you 5min later speeding, you can be sure that you won’t get another warning, you get a ticket. In this case, the manager warned everyone not to steal, and you got caught stealing. The punishment for speeding is a ticket, the punishment for stealing is being fired.
Your speeding example is moronic, since execution is not the punishment for speeding, a monetary fine is. And yes, if you get pulled over for speeding the officer should fine you (absent overwhelming circumstances, like a severely injured passenger you are trying to get to the hospital or something).
Termination was the punishment for theft. The PharmD stole and was terminated. Sucks for him, he should have followed the rules. No whining allowed.
See how my analogy is actually a correct one? Now, if Stemba had warned everyone that an employee caught stealing was a written warning, and then he fired the guy for it I would agree Stemba would be out of line.
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Maybe, maybe not. I doubt I’d give you a reason to fire me as I’ve never been so much as gotten a warning for poor conduct or poor work at a job. However, I’ve had managers that talked like you and I watched other employees walk all over them. Of course, I’m only getting this off a few posts on a message board, so it’s very likely my impressions are off. Not the most accurate way of assessing someone’s managing ability, to be sure.
Fighting for your employees doesn’t mean letting them get away with theft. It means treating them fairly, lobbying to get them raises and promotions when they deserve it, not shrieking at them for genuine mistakes and unintentional screw ups.
Just because a manager set a zero-tolerance policy for store theft then followed through with it doesn’t make him inflexible or unforgiving or uncaring. It means he set a zero-tolerance policy for a specific transgression and followed through on it. Stemba may be extremely flexible when it comes to scheduling, very understanding when it comes to geniune mistakes and the like.
You keep saying that everyone is only looking at it in black and white - you should look to see that you aren’t doing the same in the other direction.
And popping back into this thread over and over after you’ve been proved nothing but a lazy, imbecilic ne’er-do-well is not?
No, calling the cops is SOP when something ILLEGAL has been done. What part of CRIME = ILLEGAL = PUNISHMENT don’t you and andymurph understand?! Fer Chrissakes I can’t take this anymore. You two are both posterchildren for the Peter Principle, I swear.
I haven’t been “proven” anything, I just disagree with you. I don’t think it’s appropriate to waste law enforcement’s time on something as petty as a pharmacist pocketing some Tylenol. They have real criminals they can be chasing. They don’t need to get sidetracked so some manager can wave his dick around at his employees.
I bet you were one of those kids who went running to tattle to the teacher every time another kid said a bad word on the playground. It’s time to grow up now. Recess is over. Life is not about mindless adherence to THE RULES.
All you “Rules” lovers probably rooted for Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, and thought that Jack Nicholson was just a troublemaker.
Ah–now we’re getting somewhere. If you were at your wit’s end like Stemba was, and you had told your employees that the punishment for theft was termination, yes–it would be the best choice to fire him.
Stemba didn’t come into a store that was functioning fine on its own. The store he took over had a large problem with theft. So he did something about it. He held a meeting and warned his employees that if they stole something, they’d be fired.
I don’t know anything about your store. I especially don’t know the policies that you hold your employees too. If you have told them that they will be fired for stealing, then you should fire them.
It depends on the circumstance. If it has happened before with someone else and you just stopped the person and gave them a warning, you should probably do that this time, too. Anything else would look arbitrary and like you are playing favorites.
However, if you just had a meeting and said that anyone caught stealing office supplies would be fired on the spot, then you should fire them on the spot.
** andymurph64 **,you’re obviously a good manager and you care about your people.
I cared about my employee’s too.
I understood when they needed time off.
I bought them lunch when they were broke.
I gave bonuses whenever possible.
Ditto raises.
I never yelled or screamed and got shitty when some one made a mistake.
Here’s what I discovered:
Good employees tried their best. Like me, they had flaws but they tried.
Bad employees never really changed. They did as little as possible and their attitude sucked.
I have a question for you.
Some one new to your area contacts you seeking a sales position.
You tell him that all you can offer is a payment by commission planand he says “great”.
He establishes the terms of how much commission is paid per sale and is given a list of existing clients.
He can come in at 12 PM if he wants and only work until 1 PM if he so desires,
He is given an office to work out of, office supplies, a telephone, a computer etc.
However, he’s a slacker and more interested in his social life than he is in his job.
He spends most of the day surfing the net.
He lives off of cash advances and is always behind in what he owes the company.
He is only selling to your existing clientale and does not stimulate any sales from new clients.
Three days before Christmas you discover that he’s been secretly faxing all of your existing clients, trying to woo them over to a side business that he’s attempting to start-screwing you over in the process. Would you fire him?
I personally didn’t DtC, but let’s be honest here, your “stealing is ok” policy isn’t going to fly well with most people in a business environment. The reason I term it a “stealing is ok” policy is that when someone has been warned about something already, and they do it again, it’s an effective change of policy when it isn’t carried out.
When I add the, admittedly perceived, “stealing is ok” policy to your (Perceived) “Lazyness pays off” policy and your “Drugs are ok” policy it makes for an interesting picture of a person. Needless to say I wouldn’t be eating at your Wendy’s.
A “mistake” (which is not criminal) is not a “crime”. I know there are some real idiot-savant people in here, so I’ll say it again - a “mistake” (which is not criminal) is not a “crime”.
An otherwise good pharmacist who fucks up on accident and undercharges a customer $500 on their medicine would not be deserving of firing, under My Management. A stockgirl who knocked over a display and broke a $1000 register is not deserving of firing, under My Management. And even an employee who accidentally set the store on fire is not deserving of firing, under My Management. Those are accidents, mistakes, and not crimes.
A pharmacist who steals a $2 tin of Altoids does deserve firing, under MY Management. Especially after he had been specifically warned about it in a meeting.
I don’t think many here can say they have not broken the rules or laws. The difference is whether or not a person is adult enough and mature enough and, most importantly, honorable enough to take responsibility for their actions. When I get pulled over for speeding, I don’t cry, I don’t offer excuses, I don’t bullshit, I don’t lie about my speed - I just say “thank you” for the ticket, and go on my way. And then I pay it, and have done with it. That is honorable - taking responsibility for your own actions.
The pharmacist needed to take responsibility for his actions. This is simple. They teach this shit on Sesame Street.
First of all, my fast food days were a long time ago and I was a lot younger. I haven’t done drugs in years and I wasn’t lazy just very disgruntled. As i said before, I was fresh out of the Navy and I did bust my ass at first but I was still treated like shit so I gave it up.
I would like to say in my own defense that I did do some things right. I never missed a shift, I was never late and I rarely if ever called in sick. I did the basic job very well. I cooked the burgers and served the customers very efficiently, I kept up during rushes and I tried not to make extra work for everone else. I also didn’t steal. Despite my comments in this thread I’m a pretty honest person,
What I chafed against were the petty, overbearing rules that served to dehumanize the employees without offering anything in return. I “lost” my nametag. I wouldn’t cut my hair. I didn’t use an ice scoop. Sometimes I stood around and took it easy if there was nothing in particular to do. I don’t believe in “busy” work. I figure if I’ve got time to clean I’ve got time to lean.
Those fast food jobs are the only jobs I ever had where I took a negative attitude. I’ve done jobs that were harder and paid less (yes, less. AmeriCorps pays less than minimum wage) without being coming sullen and resentful. Those hamburger jobs are just soul drainers.
As for tolerating theft, I’m saying for the third time now that I don’t object to the firing so much as to calling the cops. Firing would have gotten the job done and made the same point. Calling the cops was just mean-spirited, gratuitous and sadistic. I don’t see why it’s necessary to ruin a guy’s life over a five dollar bottle of Tylenol. A little bit of mercy is not going to kill anybody.
jlzania Not only would he be fired, I would sue his ass. For reference, all sales people sign a contract that does not allow trying to take clients.
However, he would not last long without producing. The company is hard on sales people. I have the utmost respect for sales people. The job is hard and demanding. If they are good I don’t begrudge them any of the money they make. They deserve it.
A more interesting question, IMO, would a star salesman that only works 4 hours a day but surpasses what is expected of him.
Don’t laugh. I’ve seen it happen. Drove senior management nuts because he was a top salesman. He just could do it in a small amount of time and had no real desire to work more
I must point out, as several others have done, that the pharmacist in question reportedly did get another job elsewhere. And, surprise of surprises, he stole from them too. While I admit Stemba could not have had foreknowledge this would happen, I would say Stemba has a pretty good judge of character. Bringing the cops in on the incident as well as the firing itself obviously wasn’t going to ruin this guy’s career–he did it himself.
Personally, I’m amazed that someone who got fired for stealing, especially in such a manner as Stemba conducted it, would have the balls or the lack of brains to do it again. But then, I’ve seen worse, so it’s believable.
