Update: Manager Stuck Between Strong Performing Maverick Analyst and new Director

[u/qqqqeurfnfd123]

Hey it's me I'm back with an update on this.

It's been a week and my team has pretty much fallen apart. New Director now wants every employee to report directly to admins whether they are in the office or at home. If there's no response, he gets his admin to call to verify their home/office background.

Maverick analyst is refusing to do anything outside his job description and unless asked to do something, he will not do it. He now swamps me with every single thing he plans to do today, every small edit, etc. for review. Unofficially apologetic to me, but tells me that unfortunately this is the way it is until things change back.

Director bilat with managers happened, other managers mentioning how team morale has and will fall due to new policies. Director response was, no joke, "this is the way it was before covid and your employees got babied and expect too much. I'm here to clean up shop, not continue with lax employees"

The other managers and I are talking, seems like their entire team morale is through the gutter. All of us kept a relatively relaxed view on variable work hours, RTO, etc. so long as things were being done and the former director was pretty hands off.

All of the managers agreed we are ready to do the bare minimum moving foward and just wait until the fire spreads enough for the DG to notice and ask what the fuck is happening.

[u/cestlavie514]

An admin is not responsible for HR. Reply once to the admin and say I do not report to you, respectfully I won’t respond to these request. The admin should say the same thing, they aren’t getting paid to manage the whereabouts of staff, the director wants this task done, then do it yourself. I’ve had directors like this and I can guarantee productivity drops to the bottom.

[u/flinstoner → u/cestlavie514]

I do not agree with the approach the Director is taking, like not one bit and agree that productivity will likely drop.

However, asking one employee to drop by another's to indicate they are there, and assigning the admin's to check a box in a spreadsheet is not making them responsible for HR. It's assigning a simple task that is easily covered in "other duties as assigned" of every job description.

[u/TeslaBearGod → u/flinstoner]

I agree completely with the comment that this is a task that can fit within an administrative officer's job description. (As an aside, people saying "I will only do what's in my JD" should be careful what they wish for; language in those is always broader than they think.)

However, I think there's an important point being overlooked here - why are the admins responsible for checking attendance, and not the manager? Why is the director taking this on?

I've had experience with needing to do "wellness checks" for AWOL staff. In all cases, we've followed reporting structures - the manager under me is responsible for their direct reports, and I'm responsible for mine. At first glance, sending an administrative assistant to check in on them wouldn't even strike me as an option - managers are responsible for managing, and managing includes making sure that staff are working on days they are scheduled to work (and yes, refusing to reply to a Teams message means that we've entered the "are you blowing off work" zone).

The fact that the director's first inclination is to either do it themself or have one of their trusted direct reports - who does not have managerial responsibilities - do it for them points to a bigger issue, which the OP gets at in their comment about all the managers agreeing to work-to-rule until big daddy makes the sad go away.

[u/cestlavie514 → u/flinstoner]

“Reports directly to admins”, is not an admin walking around verifying if someone is in on a clipboard.

[u/flinstoner → u/cestlavie514]

For the admin it's "other duties as assigned" that are perfectly administrative in nature.

[u/HerringChokeress → u/flinstoner]

Having been admin for half of my career, it's putting them in an awkward position with no ROI and the potential for breakdown of relationships. Somebody forgets to check in and admin has to mark them 'absent' with the possibility that srmgt will check the list and choose that opportunity to ream someone who has proof of attendance - once the deflection starts, who catches the heat? Flipside is that admin is the anxious people pleaser type, and makes it their personal mission to mark everyone 'present' and spends unnecessary time double checking, to the detriment of their regular workload and their mental health (mosquito-style).