Employee Troubles

As most people know, I own a mainstream business outside of the escort industry.

I am having some trouble with an employee since the pandemic hit and I don’t really know what to do about it. Well I do, but I am having a hard time with it and I guess I am looking for other options.

So here is the story,

When the pandemic hit, we went totally remote. It was pretty easy for me based on my line of work. I saw an upswing in contracts and it was good. Everyone was able to get onboard with the work and zoom and all the stuff I changed to remote working except one employee. Which made no sense really because we are all tech savvy, we need to be, but this employee took awhile to get with program, often siting internet issues. Modem this, speed that, blah, blah, blah. Finally they get all that fixed. No more issues.

Then we go back to the office part time, things are ok, but on days that this employee is not in the office, work is not getting done. Deadlines are not being met. To counter this, I changed all deadline dates to correspond with that employees in-office days.

COVID numbers started rising again, so I went back to total remote working a few weeks ago and this employee has now gone back to missing deadlines. Saying they are working on it, but often have not being able to be reached. If they are available, it is at the end of the day and then the famous line is “First thing in the morning, I will finish.” I often don’t get the work until 5 minutes before the end of the next day, not in the morning and the last two times, it as been the morning but the day after.

This employee handles a niche part of our business. Something that was actually created just for them. Something I can do without in the business personally but we have clients now that will need this maintained. Which I can learn the basics, but if something major happens, I can’t do anything. I would have to hire out.

I’m already struggling with keeping our reception since I am not renewing my office lease. We have all been successful at remote working, I am transitioning to total remote working from now on. It saves me money in the long run and I find all the other employees actually work better. My basement will become the new ”office” for filing, etc and I can host meetings at home if need be once the pandemic is over. So I won’t be needing our receptionist any longer. I am trying to find them a new position to keep them employed with me.

But this part- time slacking, pain in my butt is going to completely slack off now and I know it. I don’t want to be an ass and fire this person right after Christmas, during a pandemic and when there is no new help from the government except regular EI now. I mean CERB was not as much as their salary but it was more then EI I believe.

I am trying to figure out a way to motivate them into better work performance. I don’t want to fire them if I don’t have it. Remote work has really changed the employee/employer dynamic. Some of the usual techniques don’t seem to be working.

Wish me luck people. I will need it. I will update this post and let you all know what happened.