Maybe this is a dumb question but why isn’t it possible that Mary is lying, fudging the truth, or simply confused about the details of the phone call? Something like this:
GF: “And she even knows what car you drive.”
Mary:“Is it a blue Corolla?”
GF: “Yes!”
can turn into Mary saying the the GF knows she drives a blue Corolla. Likewise, it’s June, most people will go on vacation in the next three months, saying “She’s even planning it around your summer vacation” can turn into “She knows you’re off a week on the 13th” when reported afterwards.
Apparently the dates and location of her vacation were mentioned. I am not sure about the car though. You may be right. Honestly, I was a little annoyed at Mary for engaging this person so long without getting her name and number and then immediately terminating the conversation. Although I believe Mary as I have said, I think she is enjoying the drama and wouldn’t mind Jane getting the boot over this. I did tell Mary that wasn’t going to happen nor was I going to reprimand Jane as per Mary’s request when she stormed into my office this morning wanting Jane’s head on a platter. Nothing actually happened to Mary’s property. I did tongue in cheek advise Jane to invest in a car watcher to make sure nothing happens to Mary 's car as she would be blamed by her at this point by her without any evidence whatsoever.
I wouldn’t be so quick to condemn Jane for the vacation information. I can see how, if she even has a semi-good relationship with the son, that that information might come up…“Oh, sorry, I can’t take the day off then to do XYZ, my coworker Mary is on vacation that week and I have to cover her calls. Can we do it next week? She’ll be back on the fourth.” Or even the car info…“You’re looking at that car to buy your girlfriend? My coworker Mary has one and she says it gets great mileage”. And if the son mentions things in chit-chat to his girlfriend, well, some people are sponges for saving up information.
This right here strikes me as being a huge problem. People have crap happen in their personal lives - that’s just a fact of life. A co-worker who tries to take that crap and turn it into a big friggin’ chocolate cake of drama with self indulgent sprinkles all over the top is not a good employee. They are a gossip and a drama whore and if anyone needs to be reprimanded it’s them.
Now that all seems very reasonable. I didn’t really comprehend that Mary wanted you to fire Jane. That deserved an “ahem, I make personnel decisions around here, thank you.”
While retention is not much of an issue these days, especially in Florida, the market will improve, and having the backs of your people will help them stay and also makes it more likely that they’ll come through if you ever need extra effort from them. I’ve seen studies showing that most people leave not because of pay but because they are pissed off at their bosses.
This is also critical. In some ways, at this point I’m leaning towards holding both of them responsible for this drama. Maybe you could try shaking things up by putting BOTH of them on probation, and saying that the next drama from either of them means termination. Mary is certainly old enough to know how to work without gossiping and drama and asking for retribution on other employees. Jane is almost certainly lying, and she is responsible for some of this drama, too.
I personally would fire them both, tomorrow. It’s just “business” as they say in the Godfather movies, nothing personal.
They are both guilty of unprofessional behavour and this is exposing the business to potential liabilities. You are there to run, and protect, the business, not to cater to the childish emotional antics of a few employees.
Jane didn’t bring her personal life into the office, the gf did. Mary is the one that took it a step further and invited it in and gave it her undivided attention. The gf made an unsolicited call, and instead of Mary stopping that train dead in its tracks, she decided to ride it for all it was worth.
If Jane gets fired over this, Mary should be too.
I should probably slow myself down as I know I’m coming off like an asshole boss who fires people because I’m bored. I’m really not. A few years back we had someone with a stalker boyfriend. The details aren’t important, but the boyfriend ended up making a lot of people uncomfortable. WE called the cops on him, WE convinced her to get a restraining order, WE hung up the phone when he called, WE got her to stop responding to his texts/emails etc. We even had the cops there at closing time to make sure our employees got to their cars safely. But then, she’s been with us for a long time and we consider her family.
If this was someone who had been working with us part time for the last few months and this started happening, she’d get a few chances to get it taken care of, but after a while she’d get the boot. Part time help in a mom and pop store is pretty expendable, we get people asking if we’re hiring every day. What do I need with a stalker when I can hire someone without a stalker tomorrow?
Back to Mary and Jane. Mary may be a gossip, but Jane said she’s going to attempt to put a stop to this by posting a facebook status that says she got fired? Yeah, I understand what she’s getting at, but that’s someone that’s loooooves drama. If she posts that status, then she get’s to tell all her friends and family (who will call and PM her) what’s going on at work and she’ll get to bad mouth GF up and down the block.
Sorry, I’m still for firing Jane. I know she’s the best employee you’ve had, but she’s a drama queen outside of work and she’s starting to drag you in to it. I’d be willing to bet most of the reasons that GF hates her are reasons Jane created. But that’s just a hunch.
IMO, Jane should get an ultimatum. Take care of this, I don’t care how, but it stops today. This last call was the third call I’ve had about you, if I get one more call, you’re done. This is disrupting your work and I can’t have it here. Or something along those lines. I’m guessing if you don’t put a stop to this now, it’s going to get worse, not better.
I’d rather have a gossip then a drama queen. BTW, I’d bet if you call Jane’s last employer, you’d hear a similar story or two.
I don’t know about the part with the last employer. I’ve always heard it is best if someone calls you as a reference check for a previous employee to confirm they worked for you, the time frame in which they worked for you, and leave it at that. I think you open yourself to problems otherwise. That is our standard procedure for handling “cold call” reference checks. If a previous employee calls us or emails us or something saying, “I’ve just interviewed for a job and they say they are going to need to contact my references, would you mind giving me a good reference?” then we are okay with doing a more detailed Q&A with the company soliciting information. However I’ve heard even that is considered too risky for some but being a small business we have a bit more of a personal relationship with a lot of former employees so we feel we’re willing to take the risk especially given the common sense truth is someone would not put us down as a reference if they hadn’t left on good terms and if we didn’t have good things to say about them.
I’m not suggesting the OP actually call her last employer. I was just saying that I’m guessing that this is the first time something like this has happened with Jane.
It may be that Jane does talk about Mary behind her back, but not to the degree that would rise to “shit-talking” in her opinion. So when you confronted her about it, she may have felt like she shouldn’t have to be called to the carpet for every little stupid comment she may have ever uttered within earshot of the girlfriend. However, that does not excuse her for not being upfront and honest. If things have gotten to a point where you’re being called into the boss’s office over drama, lying is not the best strategy to get out of it.
But I don’t think she was going to do those things that crazy girlfriend accused her of planning. Not in this economy. Even batshit crazy people have to eat.
Mary probably IS eating this all up, and you’ve got to keep an eye out on her. She might be tempted to stir the pot by falsely accusing Jane of keying her car or stealing her lunch or something on that level, now that she’s got everyone’s attention and Jane’s reputation has been tainted. If she comes to you whining, tell her that you aren’t tolerating any more petty high school drama. If her and Jane can’t get along, then let her know SOMETHING can be done to fix that. And it won’t be pretty.
Also, I might let Mary know that her slip is showing and she may need to tighten up her work ethic. Something like, “We all love you, but we need less gossip and more worky.” Because I believe that Mary is the ultimate problem here. Crazy girlfriend is crazy girlfriend, but if Jane is outperforming Mary, the Nellie Olson tattle-tell, then I’d be bitching about her too.
I tend to believe in an “old school” style of management. You don’t need to be a tyrant, but I think the bosses role is to be somewhat of a stern authority figure. I don’t believe in socializing with my subordinants or otherwise treating them as my “equal”. I don’t need their friendship or validation or even their approval. I need them to do their job properly.
As this applies to the OP, he needs to send a clear message that bringing this drama to the office has negative consequences.
I totally agree with this. To get the respect necessary to do a job, a boss can not be friends with anyone they supervise. It simply doesn’t work. Unfortunately, although I try very hard to promote from within, many times it does not work out since there were already friendships established between the would be supervisor and his/her underling.