extending class solidarity to incapable co-worker?

[flickerx]

I work with someone who can't do their job properly. He's constantly making mistakes, completely fucking things up which means someone else has to come along and fix it up and put it back together properly, annoying other people to help him out with stuff that is pretty basic (and he's been trained on countless times before), unwilling to learn new things, always late, comes in and talks shit to other people for fifteen minutes before getting on with the job. His shit attitude means all of us end up having to do a bit more time to get our work completed by the end of the week / month / quarter / etc.

Now management are finally getting around to getting the ball rolling with firing him. Our workplace is unionised, and the manager will have to go through a process of capability demonstration, e.g. gathering evidence of incapability, mistakes, etc. In this case people are usually given one last chance to improve or they're out the door.

Thing is, he's an alright guy generally, we get on fine, and he's popular with people on the floor, and the floor below. And I always think in my mind that as a leftie, I should be extending the arm of workers solidarity etc etc to him in his coming hour of clashing with management. But I know he's fucking useless and I really wouldn't care if he's fired. In fact I'd be quite happy to see someone else get the job. He might be in trouble financially if he gets fired, but it's gotten to the point where I don't care what personally happens to him. I'm tiring of other people making excuses for him or covering for him.

Has anyone else ever been in this situation? I feel bad... but less and less bad every day...

 

[Libertad]

Talk to him and make him aware of the position that he's in maybe?

 

[quimcunx]

I assume part of the process is looking at how the company can support him in improving his performance?

Ultimately I can't imagine being in a job one is incapable of is great for one's mental/emotional well-being. If he is not suited to the job then in the long-term he might be better off out of it. You mention a shit attitude. And if he doesn't actually care about others having to pick up the slack then that not great solidarity from his end.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Yeah it's a question of attitude I'd say. If you're constantly making life harder for your colleagues because you can't really be bothered, and you know full well that this is what's going on, then you're being selfish. Capability doesn't really enter into it, especially if the training and support from co-workers is all there already.

 

[Duncan2]

otoh if he is in what is called on Urban a 'no-money' job and I mean if maybe he has a right to swing the lead.

 

[friendofdorothy]

I work with someone who can't do their job properly. He's constantly making mistakes, completely fucking things up which means someone else has to come along and fix it up and put it back together properly, annoying other people to help him out with stuff that is pretty basic (and he's been trained on countless times before), unwilling to learn new things, always late, comes in and talks shit to other people for fifteen minutes before getting on with the job. His shit attitude means all of us end up having to do a bit more time to get our work completed by the end of the week / month / quarter / etc.

Now management are finally getting around to getting the ball rolling with firing him. Our workplace is unionised, and the manager will have to go through a process of capability demonstration, e.g. gathering evidence of incapability, mistakes, etc. In this case people are usually given one last chance to improve or they're out the door.

Thing is, he's an alright guy generally, we get on fine, and he's popular with people on the floor, and the floor below. And I always think in my mind that as a leftie, I should be extending the arm of workers solidarity etc etc to him in his coming hour of clashing with management. But I know he's fucking useless and I really wouldn't care if he's fired. In fact I'd be quite happy to see someone else get the job. He might be in trouble financially if he gets fired, but it's gotten to the point where I don't care what personally happens to him. I'm tiring of other people making excuses for him or covering for him.

Has anyone else ever been in this situation? I feel bad... but less and less bad every day...

I'm in a similar position. A team of us do the same role in shifts and we are all paid the same - and I do the shift at the busiest time of day and have a small extra responsibility too. The people on the quietest shifts often leave lots of small tasks undone, things unfiled, stuff not updated, messages not passed on, etc, so that the first thing I have to do on my busy shift is deal with what they haven't. One person in particular seems to never do very much and even tells people to call back on my shift. Pisses me off no end.
It's hard to feel any solidarity when I feel so unsupported by the 'team'.

 

[flickerx]

Thanks for your responses to this, helpful, put me at ease about how I am feeling, definitely.

 

[nogojones]

otoh if he is in what is called on Urban a 'no-money' job and I mean if maybe he has a right to swing the lead.

If these are the slackers circumstances, then the problem might be you working too hard

 

[crossthebreeze]

Have a chat with him about the situation. Be honest with him about him creating more work for you, but show willingness to help him with things he finds hard (even if they seem like easy, obvious things to you). For example, if its a case of "sorry, i will do my best to not create work for you by doing x,y,z, but I'm easily distracted so need reminding after 5 minutes chat to get to work, and can't get my head round using machine A (even tough everyone else thinks its easy) so need more support with that" then thats how you extend class solidarity. If, on the other hand he doesn't care about the difficulties he's creating for you then there's nothing you can do. I say that as someone who has had problems at work before.

Also, remember that most of us do work harder than we should, and a bit of a bad attitude to work is natural (though problems arise when we act on this selfishly rather than together).