legacycentral bbs

OK, I'm having some work related trouble.

Myself and another guy are the head mechanics of one of the larger bike shops in the area (our store as a whole ranked in the top 5 outfitters in the country by Backpacker magazine).

We have a few mechanics under us, and other stores have their mechanics.

Lately, one of my mechanics has been slacking hardcore. He's not the friendliest of guys, kinda shady and flips out over lots of stuff (he got pissed when someone took his unassigned locker). Doesn't handle stress and frustration very well at all, and often doesn't relay important information to myself or the other head mechanic. This has caused numerous infractions with customers, and it simply does not sit well with either of us (head mechanics).

The other day, he spilled coffee all over and didn't clean it up, and he took a near 2 hour dinner (7:30 until 9pm).

He is very unorthodox in his methods, often "hacking" a solution together on a customers bike (something I am not opposed to doing on my own bike, or a well known customers bike whom I have a personal relationship with, and with their OK). He's good, and knows a good bit, but he doesn't do just about anything the way I, or the other mechanic, run things. It's very annoying, and I am sick of taking shit for him.

I've spoken with my manager, and his excuse is, "what am I going to do when Zach moves out west, and you go back to school? I can't get rid of him with you two gone."

I don't know how to go about this situation.

There is also a "mechanic" at one of our other stores that took my place as head mechanic there when I was transferred (more money, more hours, other store couldn't afford me). On a semi-daily basis, I get phone calls from him, asking me to tell him how to fix things. "How do I true a wheel?" "What do I do about this?" "Can this be fixed?"

He is wasting my time, and costing the company money, let alone allowing people to leave on potentially unsafe bikes. I spoke with my old manager at the store, and he gave me the guilt trip approach "if you can't answer a few questions, then that's fine." I spoke with the bike shop coordinator, and he was of no help. He is ALWAYS sending bikes down to me to fix and send back to him. It's a total pain in my ass.

The only people who see this as a very serious problem are myself and my other head mechanic. As well as 2 of my managers at my store, and 2 of my old managers at my old store.

That shit HAS to stop. He's got no place being a bike mechanic when he has no concept of the nature of fixing bikes, nor the willingness to accept the fact that he doesn't know what he's doing. He asks to learn, but has no intentions of doing so. I have attempted to instruct him on how to do things, but a week later, I get a phone call asking me to explain something again.

I know we, or at least I, started out in a similar boat, not knowing everything. He doesn't seem to have any drive to be a good mechanic, he acts like he just wants a title. He makes no concerted effort to learn things, and it really chaps my ass. I no longer want to be the baby sitter for him. Plus, he cheated on a good friend of mine, and that hurts me as much as it hurt her.

Anyone have any advice on how to approach this situation?

Sorry for the long rant. 40+ hour weeks, and little sleep will often do that to you.

About the slacker... sometimes there's not much you can do about that. Technically, it's your supervisor's responsibility, and if he sees fit to keep things how they are, then that's how it has to be. I've been in or been close to many workplace situations where someone's qualifications are inadequate but outside conditions make him/her indispensable. Sometimes they get away with being slackers; other times they turn into prima donnas.

I'm afraid the only thing you could do would be to make the situation hard for your boss, if you actually feel so strongly about it... tell him that you're unwilling to work in this kind of environment and that he needs to find a solution to keep you there. You could offer to help train a new mechanic, for example. Or you could appeal to his sense of reason -- from the sound of things, it seems like he'd be in trouble no matter what when you and Zach leave, since he'd either have no mechanic or an lazy cowboy mechanic. So it's in his best interest to get another good worker.

About the guy at the other shop... If it's part of your job description to advise mechanics at other shops, then you pretty much don't have a choice. It's the same kind of situation, except instead of laziness you have incompetence, right? Again, you could appeal to your supervisor to relieve you of that responsibility (I wouldn't let guilt trips worry you too much; this is professional business, and the unprofessional playing with your emotions deserves no response). If your manager agrees with you, then he should try to help you. After all, a good supervisor supports his employees when appropriate.

Does that make sense? I know I'm talking about an ideal world where people are perfectly split into professional and personal halves, and real life isn't really that way, but in my experience it's a good idea to keep business business.

I've had the same issues in jobs in the past and its very frustrating. Back then the work was low-pay for the people below me so all we could get was bottom-feeders. They didn't want to spend money on people who could do more than breathe and were willing to take a hit in quality as a result (seems all businesses neglect quality above all when it should be the last man standing). Sometimes there's nothing you can do. I just had to deal with it and handle more of it when my boss was in too pissed a mood to deal with the retards. Sometimes he would up and fire them and we'd all work harder to make up for it. Sometimes it was worth it. We'd get people you'd have to retrain every day as if it were their first day there. It was like someone wiped their brains of anything they learned at the end of the day and it was beyond frustrating. I don't know who feeds these type of people, but when I find out there is going to be a lot of starving morons. I will never be able to understand why businesses neglect their best workers and eventually drive them away when their aggravation level is too high and cater to the idiots who do more harm than good while they're there. In a few cases there's pressure from out of touch upper management, but not always.

Steve

It's my job to make sure things get done. When the others slack, I have to pick it up and get it done. The managers see the job as still getting done, while Zach and I pick up most of the work load.

It is my job to make the company money. I'm not doing that job when I am on the phone with yee-haw's at our other stores. It's worth it to the company to pay a reasonable amount to a qualified person. Afterall, they pay me almost as much as they pay the part-time-managers.

It totally sucks that I keep getting shafted like this. I'm almost glad to be going back to school in the fall.

With the lazy guy, what I would do is let him fuck up and take the fall. Wait for the right circumstance, let him make a costly mistake and don't cover his ass. The only problem is that it can reflect badly on you if it's your job to make sure he does his job but where there's a will there's a way. Then if it does come down on you take Vikash's advice and explain that the guy is effecting the entire department. Have the other head mechanic back you up too. If that doesn't work then just be a complete asshole to the guy.

With the other guy, I don't know. If it's part of your job title then you're kinda screwed. You could try being hostile to him and make him feel uncomfortable with calling you for advice but again, that could reflect poorly on you.

Are you going to be working there once you go back to school? If not then it's only another month that you'll have to deal with these asshats. Just keep your chin up, do your best and leave the better man.

See, I will be working at the shop over breaks and next summer, things like that. So I do need to leave a good impression so that I am welcome back with open arms.

However, during the year, I MIGHT take a job as a tech at Summit Point Raceway (working for Myles @ Racecompengineering.com) on the weekends.

I dunno, I'll let it play out. If the shop isn't perfect, then my employees aren't doing their jobs, which means I'm not doing my job, and the managers arent doing their job. It unfortunate that I don't have manager status, because then my word would be the final word. I've cracked down a lot, and it's worked a bit, but because I don't have any official status, I'm not always taken seriously.

There was no 'babysitter clause' in my job description.

Since it seems like you pretty much don't have enough power to control these problems, you just have to decide whether or not you're willing to work in this kind of environment...

The only bit of control you have is over what yourself do (this is true in most of life), and the possibility of you leaving is the only potential bargaining chip you have with the higher-ups. Unfortunately, it looks to me like you don't have that bargaining chip; it sounds like you are willing to continue dealing with this situation at this shop, since you would like to return in the future. Somehow, the benefits are outweighing the pain. Is that right?

If I leave, the company loses one of it's best mechanics, and there are not enough available mechanics in the area to hire a good one to replace me.

The only benefits are a good mark on my resume' and the significant pay checks that I get.

I'm willing to wade through assholes, so long as the job gets done. Hell, a guy could come to work in a bunny suit, so long as he got the job done, it wouldn't bother me one bit. It's the problem that some people aren't getting the job done.

Zach and I are having a meeting tonight with all of our employees. Going to set some standards and get things working smoothly.

This is why I'm so happy with the position I've newly acquired at my Toyota dealership. We have an offsite parking lot for employees about a 1/4 mile away, and it is now my job, from 3pm to 10:30pm Mon-Fri to drive them to and from the dealer. I get to sit in an air-conditioned Ford van and drive around in circles listening to tunes, and get paid $9/hr for it. I get more hours than I used to, do waaaay less work than I used to, and I get weekends off. How could I say no???

I used to head the stock order in Parts every weeknight. It was back-breaking work, lifting heavy boxes (sometimes an engine/tranny) and it was stressful, coz whenever one of the other guys fubared the parts up, my ass got chapped for it. I stuck with it for 2 years, doing that weeknights and driving the same van 12 hours a day on Saturday. I worked 6 days a week for them for 2 years. Still only came out to about 35 hrs coz I was only there for maybe 3-4 hours at night during the week.

But I'd say start making noise about this clown. He's not taking his job seriously, and all you need is a customer to be injured from riding a bike that was thrown together, and things will get serious.

I'm not willing to let it escalate to the point that a customer gets hurt, just to prove a point. That's not worth it to me.

all you need is a customer to be injured from riding a bike that was thrown together, and things will get serious.

I'm not willing to let it escalate to the point that a customer gets hurt, just to prove a point. That's not worth it to me.

I don't think he was actually suggesting that you DO so, but rather warning you of the potential dangers.

ahh, my bad. Yea, I totally agree. One mess up could cost the company a LOT of money.

I worked out what was happening with the phone-caller today with the manager at the other store. Things should be good on that end.

BAC5.2 wrote:
I worked out what was happening with the phone-caller today with the manager at the other store. Things should be good on that end.

Cool! So are you exempt from that responsibility now?

Well, I have to train him, but it is now his responsibility to set it up. He's gotta conform to MY schedule, not the other way around.

If he doesn't, he gets the boot. Easy

Sweet, that's one less headache at least.

I'm not trying to hijack your post but man do I feel your pain. Only it's the other way around...sort of. My stress comes from the management people in my shop. They dump a ton of work on me (especially sh*t they should be taking care of), couple that with being not only the shift supervisor (they come to me to get things done) but the lead guy on most all issues affecting the way we do business (things from what do we do about this to make sure everyone accomplishes this to why didn't the list of 200 tasks I gave to you get done. You only accomplished 199 of them). This stuff really weighs on me. I took a month off in mid April and I need another month right now. The real kicker is I won't let you go work anywhere else even though you've been here for 5 years because you're my "go-to-guy". These guys talk a good game but I really don't trust them for good reasons also. And no I can't quit because I'm in the military. I've tried getting an assignment to Florida but have been unsuccessful at this too. What advice do you guys have for me? Hell, if I step down, (which I really don't think they'd let me)it could prove detrimental to my career. The Air Force has something called "failure to progress" and that could keep me from making rank. I guess I'm just screwed.

That sucks, James. A guy I know who was in the Army told me that there are procedures (at least in the Army) to apply for transferral that don't go through your commanding officer. The idea is to give personnel a means to escape being under a misbehaving commanding officer's control in bad situations like these. He used it to escape a similarly unfair situation several decades ago. If you'd like me to ask him more about it, let me know.

Vikash, if you get a chance, ask your friend about that for me. I'm just at wits end with some of the people here. Thay know it too because they can see it in my facial expressions when I walk into the office. It's gotten to the point that I won't even go into their off unless they call me in.

Okay, I'll try to remember to ask him. If you haven't gotten an email from me by Wednesday or so, send me a reminder.

Somehow, even though you are in a weak position to do so since your are "leaving" for school, but coming BACK!, you need to drive home the value you give them. If you are as valuable as you say you are (not doubting you, just have to say that), then you really can stand up and say "listen up baby, I need to know how much you value me!" It is one of the biggest gambles in the hourly paid workers life (I know, I got fired, ok, I called the owner a thief and lier) but if you are A- quitting, B- going back to school C- that good a bike mechanic, then D- have no fears. If they do fire you, then you can get a job anywhere because you kick ass. Be positive in both your confrontation and if you get your ass fired, your job applications. I fucking hate companies that take a dime over a dollar and cant see the value of the good understated qualified employees.

I admit I am self employed and have not had to look for work in 10+ years but I did call my boss once (cause he was a fuckwad) and I would do it again. Good Luck!

Have you ever spoken directly to the lazy guy about these issues? It's possible that he may have issues outside of work that are preventing him from concentrating. I'm not saying to befriend him but there's always the chance that some kind of pep talk may do the trick. Don't provoke the guy verbally but there may be a diplomatic way of letting him know that he's disrupting the work environment without actually stating it that way. Sometimes words can bring people around if they are used carefully. If the guy feels that you respect him in the workplace he may be more willing to listen to you. Usually, a person can tell if someone has a negative or condescending attitude towards them and it usually just makes things worse. Some people just can't be dealt with though. In that case you can either confront him or if that won't work then do your best to ignore him I guess.

Had to edit that a bit, it was too wordy.

I gave up trying to get a job at bike shops. I am an excellent bike mechanic(been racing xc for almost 10 years now, DH for 4, can build wheels and overhaul suspension stuf) but the damn shops won't hire me because I've never worked for a bike shop before. then I hear about this asshole friend of a friend getting a job at the shop because he knows the manager! its not what you know its who you know.
as far as the problem with the co-worker I'd say make a mental note of all the fuck ups he does, and use them as specific examples to your boss to get him fired. and next time he flips out, take him aside and tell him to cool down and explain to him what he's doing and why he's doing it. maybe include the manager on this or arrange to have a big meeting. also sounds like he should stop drinking coffee.
I actually have a similar situation at my job right now(home remodel), a guy of 25 who claims all this crap that he use to be a framer. I'm an apprentice of sorts, only been doing the job for 2 months a summer for the past 3 years but have been learning a lot. I am constantly having to fix his screw-ups(many) and he asks me how to do the simplest things which wastes my time. He's also really annoying, self reighteous and rude. he regularly makes expensive mistakes(just busted out the back window of the bosses brand new dodge 3500) and is really hard to work with because he's constantly second guessing me AND the skilled carpenters with stupid ass suggestions. at least the boss bitches him out all the time and has hinted to me that his job's on borrowed time.

That sucks man. If you have those skills you would only need to press them into an interview where you should be able to talk them into knowing you have what it takes. I'd even request a hands on test of some kind to prove it. Never just rely on the paper application, demand to be seen and tell them they'll lose a good mechanic if they let it pass by. A lot of times the person that interviews peopl has no way of knowing what the terms and skills of the trade are so they wind up only looking at the official experience listed. It doesn't seem right that you should be denied if you can have some other person or a test to demonstrate your skill. I'd keep trying - screw the way of the world, nothing is written in stone!!!!!

Yeah, its tough getting hired without prior formal experience, which you can't get unless you're hired ... Just try walking in and asking if they're hiring and talk up what you've done. If you're friendly with a particular shop first that'll be a great way in as they'll know you already and that you know your stuff.

Steve

oh man I HOUNDED the shops I wanted to work at. brought in my bikes to show them how dialled they were, offered to do a test build, was super nice, kept callin em every few days even when they wouldnt return my calls etc. took me a month or so of this to find out from the manager that they flat out wouldnt hire me because of my inexperience of being EMPLOYED by a bike shop. I guess it doesnt matter that my basement looks like a small bike shop
another shop agreed to hire me and I built a bike for em, then they said they couldnt afford to hire me.
Oh well, I'm happy with what I do now as a summer job. pays great, excellent skills to have, good fallback plan If I'm ever laid off ffrom any "real" jobs I have in the future, etc. 50 hr weeks are starting to catch up with me though