I like to give teens a chance to earn holiday money. It’s a good lesson for them.
Didn’t work out too well today. I advertised on the bulletin at work and a lady’s 17 year old son came by to rake a typical suburban yard. Fairly small really, and something I can rake & bag in about 5 hours.
He’s been at it three hours and hasn’t even finished the front. :dubious: Only has four yard bags full at the curb. Four hours? :smack:
After observation, I noticed he’s averaging about 2 to 3 strokes with the rake a minute. No way will he finish today before dark. He’s not getting paid either unless he comes back Monday and finishes.
Guess I learned a lesson too today. Next time I better confirm the teen actually has some experience with a rake. I learned by age twelve the faster I worked the faster I got back in the house on the sofa. You got to get that rake swinging fast if you want to finish a yard in an afternoon. By the time I was 15, I had 9 yards in my neighborhood that I kept raked.
Oh well. He’ll get done eventually. I took pity on him and went out and swept off the driveway and sidewalk myself. Even bagged those leaves for him.
I’m old and worked from the age of 11 (poor family.)
I also own a business and hire people, both as real employees and casual/cash labor. Have done for over 30 years.
I have utterly given up on hiring teens or people in their early 20s unless I have a clue that they actually have a work ethic…because (sorry) it’s a rare one that does. No, I am not paying you to spend at least 50% of your time to text or twitter or whatever the fuck you feel you must do. Yes, it’s hard work, get over it or GTFO. Yes, when I say 9 am, I mean 9 am and not whenever you roll out of bed. No, having a headache (aww poor wittle baby) is not a valid excuse to blow off work obligations.
I just talked to the kid. He’s coming back tomorrow to finish. That surprised me. A lot of teens these days will give up if something is harder than they expected.
Turns out this is his first yard that he’s raked. 17 and he’s never raked a year before. <Ace shakes head>
I really pay more than I should for this. $65 to rake a yard is top money. But, seeing how long this guy is taking, he’ll probably think he’s underpaid. Not my fault he’s so slow. Lots of other people have raked & bagged the whole yard in 5 hours or less.
To the guy who hired me for just one day, to clean up horse poop: I was just getting organized. I had it all raked up for raking glory the next day.
Awww, this guy is a tool. I’ve got kids all over the place who’ve been eyeing that lawn for weeks. He needs to be more hungry!
With jobs like this, you really have to set the pay according to the tasks done, not the hours that the person spends on the job. And yeah, a lot of younger people seem to think that it’s OK to play on their cells between one unit of work and the next.
I got my hair done the other day…the stylist seemed to think that EVERYONE needed to see her new phone, and play with it, and to hell with her customer in the chair…after all, I wasn’t going to go anywhere, right? And I had nothing better to do than to wait for her to show all her friends all the features on her new phone, right? Usually I tip. This time, no tip, and I bitched to the manager.
I have an early teen, 13 or 14, who walks my dog 2 days a week. After we got through some basics of job communication skills, it has worked out well for me. There was definitely a learning curve for him though. He has learned that if he can’t make it due to school or ill health, that is fine, but I need to know BEFORE the end of the work day. Telling me at 8pm is too late for me to make sure I get home earlier than I would’ve planned.
Why do you think we have so many immigrants here? They’re cheaper, work harder, and know how to get the job done. Hiring American teens is cute and all, but as you’ve found, just won’t get you the same results.
To be fair, my company employs a huge number of part timers including teens and I would say it’s about 50/50 for teens. We let a lot of teens go, but for every one teen that is awful, there is another one that is great.
And I’ll admit, we need to do a better job weeding out the crummy ones but so many have no work experience, it’s hard to do and I do like to give everyone a chance.
The “on time” thing though does extend beyond teen aged years. It seems those 30 and younger seem to have less of a desire to be “on time.” And I don’t mean they don’t work hard, they do, but they just don’t seem to see the need of a rigid schedule. Which I try to get through their heads, is not so much for the company as it is for your co-worker, who would like to go home on time.
lots of kids grow up living in apartments where raking leaves is unnecessary.
ah yes, “kids these days.” used to love listening to my grandfather complain about how crappy kids were, only to later hear him recount to other people about the shit he and his friends pulled when they were kids.
Adults can be amazing hypocrites at times. or at least have very selective memories.
We haven’t paid any teenagers to rake, but we’ve had really excellent luck paying neighborhood teenagers to shovel snow for us. They have been quick and efficient, and they did a decent job. I hope they’re still up for it this year.
I started giving music lessons when I was 14 to elementary kids. A few parents wouldn’t call to inform me their child wouldn’t be at their scheduled time, figuring since I was so young I didn’t care. Yes, I did.
This past spring I hired a college guy and his buddy to clean up the yard. They did a crap job and tried to leave me a Chick tract on their way out (after I refused to pay the entire amount - they did not do the agreed upon work). I ended up putting the word out to TheKid’s friends, had one over within a few hours and he did a great job. In all other aspects, her friend is lazy as all get out, but if there’s money involved he’s Johnny-on-the-spot.
That’s not lazy, that’s smart. If he isn’t getting paid, then he has no reason to hurry, or be efficient. Whatever it is he’s doing is essentially a favor and he has every right to do it in his own time.
Not quite. He’s lost two ‘legit’ jobs due to his laziness. The school bus comes by at 650, it’s common to see him strolling by around 715, shuffling his way to being tardy. His mother has given up - if she wants him in clean clothes she has to do it. He would rather be smoking pot and playing video games. Yet, when I wave a $20, he’s all Eddie Haskell helpful.
So you just disagree with his priorities then. He’ll either learn the balance needed to hold down an hourly job when mum kicks him out, or he’ll continue on a pay for play odd job basis. Nothing wrong with that, Landscapers make an excellent living on that model here in Florida for example. Working as a crew they make x dollars per account finished. The more lawns they do in a day, the more they make.
You got to get that rake swinging fast if you want to finish a yard in an afternoon. By the time I was 15, I had 9 yards in my neighborhood that I kept raked.
and worked from the age of 11 (poor family.)