Legitimate run of bad luck, or lazy cow-orker?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

the new guy here at work, lets call him “Dave”, seems to be having a run of bad luck recently…

we’re a 3 man operation (right now, 4, but one guy is leaving to go back to college), so when one of us can’t come in, it negatively impacts the others…

he’s supposed to be here at 9:30, and leaves at 5:30, but the past week, he’s been late (around 1/2 hr to an hour) on a regular basis…

we had a snowstorm a week ago, and he refused to come in, claiming that since he was a schoolteacher originally, he’d “never learned how to drive in the snow”, he’s lived in New England his whole life, snow is a fact of life here, i find it impossible to believe that he “doesn’t know how to drive in the snow”, apparently he told the bossman this before he was hired, and the bossman was okay with it, whatever, i still think it smacks of laziness to claim “i can’t come in because it’s snowing”, the other excuse is “i live an hour away, so if it snows, it’ll take me 2 hours to get in”

so get up 2 hours earlier and make it in

later that week, his new (used) car gave him trouble with the “sensors” and he came in late a few times

yesterday, he had a “morning doctor appointment” in Boston (he lives in Derry, NH), and was stuck in traffic, again he came in late, claiming he left a message on the answering machine (he didn’t) and blaming “traffic”

today, he’s not in either, he e-mailed the co-worker who is leaving to go to college to let him know he was “bitten by a dog last night, is in pain and needs to see his doctor” and he won’t be in, no call on the answering machine, no e-mail to myself or the other sales guy…

normally, i wouldn’t think anything of these issues, after all, car trouble’s always a possibility, but the sheer concentration of his absences and their blatancy strikes me as…odd

he’s a nice guy, easy to get along with, just a bit lazy, and i admit to being quite suspicious about the “dog bite”, especially as it happened last night, and he had plenty of opportunities between then and now to leave a message on the answering machine and e-mail all of us, not just college-bound guy

let me just say that when (if) he comes in tomorrow, i’ll be looking for proof of a dog bite…

i can’t figure out if he’s just unlucky, clueless, or just plain lazy…

2

All this happened within a week, it seems? Chances are he’s out looking for a new job.

As for the snow, I have a hard time accepting that excuse from anyone who’s lived in the NE one winter. I’ll give you one winter’s excuse, and quite graciously, provided you make an effort.

3

The company could ask for a doctor’s note on the dog bite/painkillers thing.

There should be a policy made, if there isn’t already, that if you have a thing like a morning doctor/dentist/lawyer/whatever appointment, that you provide notification as soon as such a thing is scheduled, if you can’t schedule it outside of business hours.

Also, a person who arrives late should be making up the time at the end of the day.

If he’s new, is this his first time in the real world workplace? It may be that he’s having trouble getting out of bed in the morning, which would fit with your opinion that he’s a bit lazy.

I’d say that whoever the supervisor is should have a talk with him, especially if he’s not pulling his weight in other areas.

4

My vote is for either looking for a new job, as mentioned, or overall lazy, or possibly just someone who is used to a lot of slack over the holidays. In any case, he sounds like the kind of person who will make the boss appreciate you and your work ethic that much more.

5

I also vote for out looking for a new job. When the company I was with announced layoffs, I went out on interviews pretty regularly. I had 3 dentist appointments, a doctors appointment, and a generic “appointment” that I didn’t tell them what it was for. Every one of those was a job interview. If it sounds like he is making it up, the odds are pretty good that he is indeed making stuff up so he doesn’t have to come in to work.