In my job, 3 of us are each assigned our own workloads, which are scheduled out some 5-6 months in advance. Periodically, if someone is sick or out on short notice, the office will ask if any of the rest of us can pick up that day’s workload. If they do not get picked up, they just need to be rescheduled - either at a date the assigned employee can handle them - or another 5-6 months out.
I just got an email from mgmt saying one cow-orker will be out from mid March through June, asking if I and the other could pick up any of the scheduled cases. Some of the matters occur on dates I COULD pick them up, but it isn’t as though I get paid piecework or would get any bonus or anything. The employee who will be out is a hard worker - consistently the top producer. But they and I aren’t particularly close.
Personally, I’m not sure that over 14 years in this job I have ever asked anyone to pick up my work for an unscheduled absence of mine. In the past, I’ve picked up such work on occasion. (Pretty much seems like anytime you do, it turns out to be a pain in the ass. And some of these matters CLEARLY look to tend that way.) But as of late, I’ve pretty much figured that doing my work was all I owed my employer.
Would you pick up as much as you could? Offer to do a token amount? Or say, “Sorry”?
That depends on what kind of work we are talking about - writing reports , no I wouldn’t voluntarily pick that sort of work up. But my jobs never involved the sort of work where if I had cases scheduled on 2/25 and I was sick, they could just be kicked down the road. To use a couple of semi-familiar examples , my work was more like a prosecutor’s or a detective’s (depending on which of my jobs) If the assigned detective isn’t working when the perpetrator is found, the arrest doesn’t wait for the detective to return. And if the prosecutor is sick on the day of a court hearing, some other prosecutor is going to have to stand up in court to reschedule the case. So I would have had to pick up the work whether I wanted to or not. Which also meant I couldn’t always take a day off at short notice just because - that would piss people off.
Our boss assumed that staff being out would be a quid-pro-quo so you picked up my absence, I picked up Alice’s and Alice picked up yours. In the end everything would work out although it was obvious that some got more quid than quo in this system. In other words, like you some get extra work but never take time off to foist their work on their coworkers.
Also, are they looking to fire you? Because not picking up that work means you are “not a team player.” But if you do pick it up they’ll fire you anyways for that or another reason. On the other hand if they want to keep you then make sure your own work is done and don’t worry about it.
What sort of compensation will you get? Three months is a lot of slave labor. Or do you have a situation where you have to take care of each other because no one else will? Will management help pick up the slack?
Generally speaking, I’ll pick up some slack when a coworker of mine is on vacation or out for some other reason. Sometimes this happens when someone quits and I’ll need to pick up slack until a new person is hired. In your position, I’d take cases when I could but wouldn’t bury myself in work.
These are scheduled administrative hearings. So you need to prepare for and conduct the hearing, write up instructions, and edit and sign decisions. No aspect of that is exactly rewarding.
Sure, there are people awaiting their hearing/decision. But there is a never-ending list of such folk. I could double my output, and that would not make a dent. Very much a “bailing out the ocean with a teaspoon” situation. Last I checked, in terms of production I was #2 out of some 1100 in my job. I doubt either I or the person who will be absent have ever been out of the top 10%. So neither of us has a track record of trying to do as little as we can get away with.
A VERY minor aspect is, not knowing why the other employee will be out. Sure, they are entitled to their privacy. But 2.5 months is A LONG TIME. It MIGHT make me more inclined to pick up their work if I knew why they were going to be out. Respecting their privacy - or whatever other reasons, mildly lessens my eagerness to step forward.
On edit, no, I’m not going to be fired if I decline to pick this work up. I would not get paid 1 cent more if I did twice the work I currently do, and I am ineligible for any bonuses.
Here’s the thing, you’re a good worker with strong work ethic, as is your colleague, by the sounds of it. So I don’t believe anyone will get dinged for anything, reputation wise.
Here’s what I think you should do! If you’re feeling it, keener, ready to jump on it and help out, then do that. But if you’re NOT feeling it, and it sounds like you’re not, then don’t be silly. Leave it for someone else.
Leave room for folks who could use the reputation upgrade to step up.
Don’t let your good work ethic work against your interests. You don’t need to take this on, in my humble opinion.
What are management’s other options and constraints?
It doesn’t sound like they have much choice, this sort of job isn’t something you can hire a short-term replacement person for. But if there are currently 1100 people doing it, it seems hard that all the slack for this long an absence has to fall on two people.
Anyway, if it were me, I would pick up a small amount where I knew I had openings, but not make myself crazy over it. My father had what sounds like that kind of job (administrative law judge for workmen’s compensation cases) and he was slammed most of the time.
Yeah, I would pitch in a little but not pick-up the entirety of the other person’s assignments. If there are others on the team, perhaps the load can be spread to them, too. That is, if you have some capacity. If you are already full, then yeah, what’s in it for you?
I had a situation a few months ago similar - a colleague was going to be out for 6 months (for cancer treatments), so I was tapped to see if I could take-over his role. I had some available capacity so agreed. I got in there and restructured/streamlined most of what he was doing, to the delight of the team. As a result later, a hefty and juicy assignment emerged and I was top of the list. Now I am full with that assignment and had to transition his stuff to a 3rd person, who is making more improvements to what I was doing. Anyway, the point being if you stand to gain other than money, it could be worth your while, but again constrained by the assignments you already have and your availability.
tl/dr: you should offer a little support (be a “team player” (if I know you right, you will lurv that one!)) but only within the amount of availability you have, and what you are comfortable with.
Actually, one of those jobs involved administrative hearings - but they were apparently different from yours. The ALJs didn’t really have to prepare for the hearings. The people in my job sometimes needed to prepare for a hearing but a lot of the time it was essentially negotiating plea bargains - the hearings were about parole violations and involved whether/how long someone would remain in jail and for a variety of reasons, you don’t want to reschedule those hearings for weeks or months later because someone is on some kind of leave.
There are 1100 nationwide - down from 16-1700. 3 in our office - which, when fully staffed had 10. So if folk wanted these handled more expeditiously, they could hire new staff to replace attrition… I believe there are currently approx 300k hearing requests pending - close to an all time low.
Any work I and my cow-orker aren’t able to pick up, they’ll expand their scope and see if anyone else in the region/nation can pick them up. Any that aren’t picked up, will just get rescheduled.
Like I said, if my cow-orker came to me and said, “Dinsdale, my mom is going to have surgery and I will have to care for her.” Or, “I’m going to be out for medical reasons,” I’d at least consider picking some up. But I have no idea if they are going on a detail, a vacation, or what.
At least 2/3 of them directly conflict with my scheduled caseload. I briefly toyed with picking and choosing a few of the remaining third, but just decided I didn’t feel any strong urge to do so. Also, gotta admit with all the positive energy coming the way of federal employees lately, my urge to go above and beyond is not exactly at an all time high…
If it were me, I would split the work with the other employee based on our current workloads. If that means I ended up doing a few more than my coworker, so be it. If my coworker said they can’t or won’t take any of these cases, I would pick some that don’t conflict with my schedule, and not worry about the rest. It really isn’t my problem to solve.
What is the effect on the people who those cases are about if the case is delayed another 5 or 6 months?
Because it’s highly unlikely to be only your co-worker who’s being affected here. In picking up the cases, you wouldn’t be helping only the co-worker, but all those other people. If you’ve got the time, why wouldn’t you do it?
It would make a very large dent for the ones you actually did help. And that’s who you’re actually supposed to be working for, isn’t it?
There’s no sense in taking on so much that it screws up the work you’ve already got. But if it doesn’t: help the starfish, or the lost dog, or the human that you do have capacity to help.
Yeah - they are awaiting decisions. But that does not mean that they are disabled. Or even in financial need.
Nationally approx 40% of hearings result in favorable decisions. So 60% of folk will just get their unfavorable decisions quicker. In fact, my pay rate is a little below average, so I would be doing some folk a favor by letting their cases be heard by someone with a higher pay rate.
Not at all. Of the 40%, some are on LT disability - so their benefits will go straight to their insurer. Others are financially comfortable - there is no financial need requirement for DIB.
Just FYI - I found out why she will be absent - she’s retiring. Never mentioned it before a month ago. And is picking mid-March to avoid any budget kerfuffle. Probably the most productive colleague I have ever known.
Another colleague was planning on retiring, but moved it up to this Friday. Both are just sick and tired of the recent nonsense.
We are talking about 2 tremendously experienced and productive employees w/ 55 years experience between them. Leaving us - a 10-11-person office, with TWO.
So if anyone concerned about delay times or reduced services, they might want to look elsewhere than the folk who are still trying to do the job, with less and less support.
Not looking for sympathy or anything. Just observing that this is really rolling downhill fast.
I sent off an email to the person I deal with at HUD, saying that I hope she’s able to keep her job.
I got back a standard out-of-office autoreply. I really hope that it’s coincidence. If she hasn’t got the job, of course, she’ll never see the email; I don’t have her personal contact info. But she’s a state employee, and NY is trying to step up, I think (despite snarls about expensive budgets by the “Republican” state minority in the legislature.)
Before I read your note about the person retiring, I was going to say that if the rest of team takes this person’s cases for 3 months then what’s the guarantee that management won’t permanently eliminate that position and use 2 people to do the work of 3. Now that this person is retiring, this is even more alarming.