I agree. Anything else is too close to slave labour. If they’re not worth minimum wage, they aren’t worth filling a position with you, period. Turn them loose and let them find another. If you hire someone who looks good and turns out to be useless - that’s what probationary periods are for.
As a keyboard monkey CSR for a State Government:
I appreciate the ‘atta boy’ notes from my supervisor. The boilerplate civil servant = salt of the earth, not as much, but at least we’re not ignored by the elected officials and their appointees. If they gave me a helium baloon, I’d probably inhale it, just before answering the phone.
As a manager, I am not responsible for my employees happiness. I can only attempt to provide a work environment where they are treated honestly, fairly and with respect. Fact is many employees will be unhappy simply by virtue of the fact that their perception of their appropriate level, salary, assignments or even their career may be very different from managements.
Look, before I became a manager, one of my coworkers used to complain constantly because he thought he was at too low a level. He thought he should be management even though he did not demonstrate the required competency or integrity. Since we were peers (title-wise at least), I basically told him that he just got promoted and had like 3 years work experience and to have some patience. Anyhow, nothing could make him happy so he quiet and joined one of out competetors. The difference is my firm has doubled in size while his has experience massive layoffs, a plumeting stock price and he demonstrates his commitment to his staff by eating goldfish in front of them. :rolleyes:
This seems pretty typical in IT consulting firms. They tend to be populated with people in their 20s who are generally single. By holding frequent social events, it helps foster a sort of college campus mentality. The problem is that one you get a bit older and have a life outside of work which may include friends, hobbies or a family, you can become almost like a commuter student at these companies. You can find yourself out of the loop, even if attendence isn’t mandatory at these events.
Not that it works anyway. On average, people never stay more than 1-3 years at those firms anyway.
Yes, that’s why I said your good performers. You can’t make everyone happy, but if your top performers are miserable, something is very wrong. If their expectations are all universally unreasonable, then there hasn’t been proper expectation-setting.
Managers require competency or integrity?! Do you work in heaven? 'Cause that’s not really my experience here on earth. 
I always got the feeling that it was a recruitment thing as much as a retention thing. Turnover IS high in IT consulting - so you need a constant influx of new people - and competition for those people in 1998 was tough. (And with constantly changing technology, constantly changing staff isn’t necessarily a bad idea - what was hot two years ago isn’t and SOME consultants spend too much time at happy hour than with the technical books). While the “we are one big family and spend Saturday afternoon at the beach” thing wasn’t appealing to me, Born really had a lot of good people and had a lot of people interested in working for them because they “treated their employees well.”
It mildly disturbs me that a few people have posted variations on “I don’t want to be friends with people from work and those that do are losers!”
Why are people like that losers?
Every organization around here considers the morale of employees the priority, at least theoretically, because recruitment and retention are problems for virtually everyone. The employment market is so hot that almost all dissatisfied employees can find themselves positions elsewhere pretty much at will.
However, you will find varying opinions regarding what improves morale out there in administrationland – there are people who honestly believe that celebratory events do the job, and they are hooked on the PR value that comes back. “Recognition” programs may have genuinely worked well in the eighties and nineties when people were surprised as hell just to not get bumped or laid off – and a bauble and a date square, too? – wow, what a great place to work! Today people are canny enough to figure out where the power differential lies, but the bigger the organization, the longer it takes for this information to trickle “up” and the greater reluctance to change what has seemingly worked in the past – and I work for the province’s largest employer.
I participate in whatever perk programs come down the pike – that’s the easiest way to give feedback regarding what people would really like, and in the meantime there are always some people who enjoy it. But in no way do I depend on those things to cover the task of expressing appreciation for going above and beyond the call of duty, or encouraging growth in employees. That’s a part of what I’m supposed to do. I sympathize, too, because at admin levels you get treated to really cringeworthy stuff like drum circles designed to “motivate” and “build teamwork.” Augh!
There are levels of appreciation as well. Good managers are supposed to handle individual appreciation at the lowest level - you can be a fry cook at McDonalds and have your shift supervisor say “thanks for working that extra shift on Saturday.” And better yet “we are working up the schedule for next week, what do you want?” However, it isn’t realistic for the regional manager to thank someone for working an unscheduled shift. The regional manager has both good managers under him and bad ones - and most of them terribly average, and the regional manager MAY be able to do something to make those under average managers feel appreciated, if not at a individual level, at a regional level. (The bad managers should be fired - along with those whiny employees). So the regional manager implements an “employee of the week” program which the good managers don’t need, the bad managers don’t get and give their favorite slackers the award each week - and most of the average ones say “oh, someone gave me a process - I’ll follow it” - and the employees aren’t likely to be worse off and some may actually feel like they are better treated.
They aren’t. I would suspect that people who don’t have a lot of friends at work also don’t have a lot of friends outside of work. Or they are in jobs that are either a horrible fit culturally or the nature of the work itself is isolating.
Work is very much like high school. You are forced to go to this institution every day where you are part of this structure that forces you to interact with a bunch of people not necessarily of your choosing. Considering that you all probably have a similar background and interest, it is not out of the question that you would become friendly with at least a few of them.
That said, I don’t want my company to be my ONLY source of social activity. My experience with work friends has been they tend to drift apart very quickly once you no longer have work in common. And quite often all you really have in common is work and drinking and bitching about work.
Most of your post seemed positive and realistic, but, seriously, this is a dilemma that only a manager could perceive. It’s very simple:
(1) Don’t make social events mandatory, or
(2) If they are mandatory, make them as convenient (to the employees) as possible and schedule them during paid, on-the-clock work hours that don’t have to be “made up.” There’s nothing worse than a “favor” that requires you to put in extra hours.
I don’t think anyone is saying that no one leaves over money. But money is definitely not always the most important factor. I changed careers and took almost a 50 percent pay cut, and in return, I got a much friendlier, happier, more casual environment (among other things). Even though my official vacation time was smaller, I could actually take it. And I wasn’t required to account for every goddamn minute of my time.
Justin_Bailey, I like most of the people I work with, but 40 hours a week is quite enough time to spend with them. I’d much, much rather spend my evenings and weekends with my family and non-work friends. What seems sad to me–and I see this a lot at my job–is when people have no friends outside of work. And as msmith537 says, work friendships often revolve around bitching about work. No way do I want to do that in my off hours.