So, after months of recruting we get a new developer (who doesnt quit after a day)

So a few of use go out for lunch, get back 15mins late. I think nothing of it. I get an email from middle managment, he has gone and looked at my timesheet and adjusted it (not sure if that legal).

However, I get paid salary, not per hour. We use CRM to log dev time against clients, so Im just assuming that timesheets are to record you being in for the day. As everyone who works in an office knows, 95% of the time you sit at your desk and eat, and dont take a full hour. So why bitch at 15mins? I told him this and he said its "the principle of you doing what i tell you to do"

Further more, not only 2 weeks ago i was working till 11pm on a Sunday to get a project over the line. To me this is just complete wank.

Should i just suck it up or ask upper managment for their comments? Any one else with similar experiences?

take off your skirt. man up and confront it

How much political swing does the idiot have.

If not much then I think it's worth making a point to HR or his manager that you didn't feel his actions were particularly productive based on your efforts and previous overtime.

s*** like that wouldn't fly at my work. General business attitude should be results based rather than time based. Provided someone is working ~38-40 a week and getting their s*** done then who cares about 15 minutes here are there.

Go over his helmet. Straight to upper management.

Yeah, that's not good, especially considering your overtime. You HAVE to take action or else you are doing all other employees in your company an injustice by NOT taking action.

The first rule of problem solving is to deal with the person you have a problem with. Clearly you have done that.

The number one rule of any problem in the workplace is to lay down a paper trail. Put your problem in a letter and send it to the middle-manager. Outline firstly the amount of overtime that you have worked recently and why you are in important asset to the company, and then secondly how it made you feel like you were not an important asset when he did what he has done. In the final paragraph demand a written apology.

It sounds like your company is a medium to large-sized business that has a proper organisational structure, so these steps are absolutely on your side.

Be careful. Middle managers have a lot of power and are generally believed over the grunts by upper management.

When I worked in the public service I worked in a highly political area (HR, terminations, ethics) and whenever I disagreed with my boss, I would wait for their decision to blow up in their face and compile a dirt file. Then when the time was right and I had either amassed a compelling weight of f***-ups or had a smoking gun I would dump it on my Director and my boss would be dealt with.

It's all about white-anting your superior to get ahead. Do not engage in active insubordination. be patient, and remember, when one person falls, two get promoted, so by you doing your undermining properly, the whole organisation can grow and be more productive.

why didn't you just adjust your timesheet to reflect the actual time spent on lunch?

ps reading this makes it sound like i've got it goooood.

It's all about white-anting your superior to get ahead. Do not engage in active insubordination. be patient, and remember, when one person falls, two get promoted, so by you doing your undermining properly, the whole organisation can grow and be more productive.

Yeh that there is infi in a nutshell!

The guy is being a dick but you'll possibly get burned if you take it to the seniors. After all, the timesheet that he amended became more accurate with the change.

I like timesheets to be as accurate as possible for a bunch of reasons. I'd definetly start properly sheeting all your overtime if you haven't been already.

last edited by Hogfather at 11:52:28 30/Jul/09

Haha, timesheets

ps reading this makes it sound like i've got it goooood.

Me too. Going to adjust a time-sheet right now to tell a guy he took to too long at lunch :-P

I like infi's response too. As a once-off case it does sound quite petty. Document all the issues and be able to regurgitate the correct data. As a general rule in that kind of working environment I would be documenting my working hours myself to be able to reproduce them at anytime when the s*** hits the fan, or when re-negotiating remuneration. If you're a hard worker it can only benefit you.

Managers get away with too much because employees get flustered and cannot think. Don't rely on your brain in a pressure situation like contract re-negotiation, rely on writing on a piece of paper in front of you.

A very wise old friend of mine once said, "slowly, slowly, catchy monkey."

It changed my outlook on office politics ever since.

Is your boss anything like this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tELL1cG2AeY (embedding disabled)

last edited by infi at 12:03:41 30/Jul/09

i'd be careful going over the manager's head without trying to resolve it directly with the manager first. if the guy's a c*** then he's a c*** and it probably won't do anything trying to have a reasonable discussion with him, but if you're going to take it further upper management will want to see that you've tried to resolve it on your own.

I was in this sort of situation (but also more stupid things around talking about non work related things etc) but the upper management told all us workers (there were about 10 of us that felt the same way) that middle management had their full support and we were always going to be wrong. 4 have left working there thus far and I have no doubt more will soon.

In some situations there is nothing you can do because middle management have been there so long etc other than just work elsewhere.

It is a perfect example of managers with bad people skills or people being put into positions that they are not trained for just because they are friends with the boss.

The number one rule of any problem in the workplace is to lay down a paper trail. Put your problem in a letter and send it to the middle-manager. Outline firstly the amount of overtime that you have worked recently and why you are in important asset to the company, and then secondly how it made you feel like you were not an important asset when he did what he has done. In the final paragraph demand a written apology.

woah, i definitely wouldn't be doing this.

also it's management

pro tip, if you follow these instructions you can get firefox to spellcheck text input fields, like the subject area

woah, i definitely wouldn't be doing this.

+1

yeah don't do that letter thing. written grievances just make middle managers angry and bent on revenge because you have humiliated them.

with middle managers, it's an attitude thing. either they are open to discussing these type of issues or they aren't.

woah, i definitely wouldn't be doing this.

+1

Yeah, I over-reacted. Just particularly angry at people with no idea at the moment.

Yeah I wouldnt go over his head, cause they will just talk to your manager and he will say "he had an unauthorised extended lunchbreak, I was just following the rules"

Basically I learnt that being the vocal person that stands up to middle managers doesnt get u anywhere, they will shaft u at the first chance they get, doesnt matter how good u are, the top managers dont care, they will listen to the middle managers, and they will bag u out cause they have a grudge against u.

With any luck the middle manager wont be around long, just keep doing good work and making sure everyone knows the extra hours you put in, like when u are having a friday bbq having a chat with the big managers, just mention in conversation the long hours u are doing etc.

If its a good place to work, they will appreciate you, if they dont, then its not the place to be working.

the squeaky wheel gets the grease, but it's the first to be replaced.

haha
I was working at this place for a while and we had a funny middle aged guy 2nd in command that was always doing things by the book so like if we all did a stocktake on a public holiday and took a day off without pay he'd take the day off and extra half to cover working on the public holiday.

We were there late one afternoon the 3 of us and he was 'in charge'.
We had 2 bells ring to finish day. one was warning for ten mins to finish up then last was end of day. he was in toilet and only heard first bell. Other guy and i said it was last bell and left. lolz

Get there following monday and he gives me a big serve about how irresponsible it was and yadda yadda yadda then walks off and doesnt wait for a reply.

next friday went over and manually set the bell to go 10 mins early lolz.

But yeah i hate clowns like that. They expect you to keep exact records when it suits them but dont mind asking you to start early or stay a bit late for special reasons.

If he wants to remove 15 minutes you didn't work then I'd probably amend the timesheet to put in all the extra hours you have worked. Do it before lunch so he comes to you during lunch to ask you about it. Then amend your timesheet again to reflect that you worked during lunch to answer his question.

Reminds me of another situation that arises.
Working Party Meetings where you are supposed to air any problems with the way things are run.
But what it became was top management telling us we had to do more work for no extra money and none of our problems were ever addressed.

Ammending your timesheet is bordering on Fraud.

I wouldnt go so far as fraud, especially if its not used for salary. I can see team leads modifying and adjusting as needed. It would be fraudulent if you were then using these modified times to charge the customer.

bottle all the angst up until they take away your stapler then go ballistic n burn the building down. imo.

Ammending your timesheet is bordering on Fraud

Haha - an amendment to the correct value is fraud? You're extra funny today Facey.

i'd hope he then checks your logs and sees you've been dicking around on qgl even after taking a long lunch.

If you were in the wrong, and theres no real penalty, i'd just get the f*** on with life.

f*** jerks like that, they make me angry;

Heh always situations like this there is no middle ground. You can refuse to do overtime and they call you out for not fitting into the culture.

I'd be more interested in letting it slide for something like that but if thats the trend for what he does, and you seriously do feel like you're not getting any give for all they take, then you should raise an issue above. I wouldn't walk in with just one example though..

Showing your dedication can really work out with upper management. They want good dedicated people to act as role models. They want people who bring a culture of hard work. If you're that kind of person they will listen to you. They will try to reinforce your manager to help nurture you to help nurture the culture.

No one is the winner if you don't take it up if it keeps happening, you'll just not work as hard and keep to your contract.

I've been in your position mooby, and I walked up to (the real) boss one morning and told him I was not going to work for him anymore because of all the management he has put between himself and me. I was hired to work for him when the company was small and only consisted of practical technicians. Once they started to hire fat chicks to sit around eating biscuits and tell me what to do and point out that I came in 5 minutes after office hours start, that they have a problem with me walking outside when I'm talking on the phone, and all this sort of s***. Nevermind that I answer client emails that come in at 11pm, have every project done on time, and have saved the company heaps of money and legal problems in various ways over three years, and am the only one that knows about several technologies used, and am the one that clients ask for when they ring up. They had big plans for growth this year, but without me I think they'll struggle to maintain the output they had at the start of the year.

You have to trust me there are much better jobs out there, with much nicer people - now I have a job where I wander in and spend all day on QGL while my manager plays quakeworld - can you beat that?

Complaining to upper management/HR about middle management never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever works and will usually just earn you a bad name.

Save your breath, energy and reputation by keeping your mouth shut and getting on with your work.

If the situation deteriorates, leave.

P.S. infi, you are my hero

last edited by Lits at 13:56:49 30/Jul/09

Sounds like we used to work at the same place thermite. Basically if they dont appreciate you at your current job and you are doing a good job and going above what you are required to do, it doesnt matter what you do or say, they arent ever going to appreciate you, they are just going to listen to the middle managers that bitch about you being 5mins late, they dont care that you worked late the night before etc.

Ive found that the people that managers think are good are the ones look like they are always busy, they probably only work the exact work hours they are required too, but that doesnt matter because the manager probably does the same.
They dont care if your are actually good at your job and that the only reason the person who looks like he is working hard is doing so becuase he is crap at his job.

just slash his tyres and smile at him in the hallway ;)

I fixed the typo (this time) cuz this is sort of interesting, but TURN ON SPELL CHECK IN INPUT TEXT FIELDS YOZ!

We had a someone in middle management here that would just still around do nothing and was of no value to the company at all. Clients began to notice and then I happened to highlight some issues that where not addressed at all in the design spec and the quote awhere he simply didn't listen to what they wanted, made worse that he should understand what they needed. All of a sudden its the clients bitching to the managing director about someone in middle management.

If done right then its suddenly but I was really happy with so and so, but the other f***wit, that f***wit has to go

Add some internet logging and asking for a great explanation why they were sitting on u tube and face book for 80% of the day and you start to draw rope for a hanging.

The moment that I starting logging peoples net activity we had some really really nervous middle management, then in the interest of trimming fat it was their phone calls, fuel usage and their expenses.

block facebook, block utube and then block seek and suddenly we have an employee with nothing to do. Then its all about justification as to why we employ them in the first place. I would be putting your efforts into making their life at work one step closer to suicide every day. Build your defences, undermine them, or if it calls for it f***ing ruin them.

last edited by HerbalLizard at 14:41:32 30/Jul/09

last edited by HerbalLizard at 14:42:45 30/Jul/09

I told him this and he said its "the principle of you doing what i tell you to do"

what'd you say when he said that?

Point out the extra hours you did to get a project in on time the week before, mention you're fuming over the 15minute change to your timesheet because of the extra hours and if he doesn't change then leave.

As long as he remains in that position nothing will change (no matter how many people say it will). Make a point of mentioning this incident as one of the reasons why you are leaving in your exit interview / letter of resignation (albeit word it nicely instead of X was a c*** and I hate him and he smells).

cheers guys. some good points there, i like the idea of a letter pinky. my concern is that upper managment will evaluate my perfomace based on his word too. so i guess i should clear this up now.

cheers again guys. lots to take in. I have been thinking ill just suck it up, make a note of it and move on. However, we just did a trip to tassy. 4 nights with one of the board of directors.

Over dinner and a quite a few company paid malts he said "we know theres problems, but we cant fix them if we dont know about them"

Hah, I posted almost the same thing on OCAU a while back, Fatman had a big whinge and said they're paying me so I should just accept anything and everything.

I ended up moving on after it got worse and worse, probably not a viable option for you.

It's pretty simple really. You've alluded to the fact you've got the ear of one of the board of directors, from here on in it's easy sailing.

What you need to do is keep contact with this director, and make subtle hints towards the KPI's of the company, specifically having something to do with the culture and everyone being one big happy family.

Once this director thinks this is his idea and the new KPI's are set and start to cascade down, any manger worth their salt will set up management-once-removed meetings with the teams indirectly under their control.

From here, if this guy is a generally bad manager, everyone in your team will agree with you and this will all come out in this manager-once-removed meeting as due to the new KPI's, they set them up to be an informal discussion about anything that's bothering you.

When your manager's manager sees that the whole team thinks this guy isn't any good and is destroying morale they will have to take action as they are now graded on this new KPI.

So in summary, all you really need to do is alter the company's driving ideals and that can only really come from the board.

Good luck!

Over dinner and a quite a few company paid malts he said "we know theres problems, but we cant fix them if we dont know about them"

every manager (with even half a clue) will say this, whether they will actually deliver on that promise and support their employees when issues like this are raised is another thing. just up to how well you think you know your boss and your organisation i suppose.

dude move on...

I have no idea of your ability or your resolve, though if you're able you'll learn from this to become one of the guys who hires 'those middle management' d*******s and bitches about them to your wife instead

do what you think you need to eh

I don't know if I'd be considered middle management, I'm the Shift Supervisor where I'm at and have had a few of my staff (20 on my shift) continually arriving 5-10 minutes late for work, yet always signing in that they were here ontime. I got sick of this and spoke to my Site Manager who okay'd it for me to deduct 30 minutes off of anyone who rocks up 5 minutes late. After I informed every one that this would be the case, everyone started turning up ontime.

Do you dress like this for work Tanaka?

http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/9742/1248952005724.jpg

I'd take that as a compliment cause Sean Connery rocks!

I'd think Lits is spot on. You got two types of middlemanagement:
- d*******s
- good managers
- useless pricks

... ok thats 3, usualy theres is more of the bad kind than the good kind and going against them usualy doesnt get anywhere.

Hehe, well played, sir.

On topic, I can understand your frustration somewhat - if it's all take take take with the employees then sure, pull them in line. But if they are coming in 10 min late and working back 10 min at the end of the day, no care.

In my case the only restriction I have is that employees must be in the office between 10am and 4pm. If they come in at 10am and leave at 6pm, fine. If they come in at 8am and leave at 4pm, fine. Rule works for early risers and late sleepers and keeps the business running.

I don't know if I'd be considered middle management, I'm the Shift Supervisor where I'm at

Probably more like low-level management - supervisor, foreman, team leader. Middle managers don't tend to have a lot to do with production itself, they take information from production-focused personnel leads and liaise with senior management for direction to provide back.

i thought there were laws now that everyone except senior management has to keep accurate start and end time as well as brake times?

He's doing you a favour by correcting it, you don't want the police arresting you for recording your wrong times!!@!@!

Further more, not only 2 weeks ago i was working till 11pm on a Sunday to get a project over the line. To me this is just complete wank.

If you work like a slave people will treat you like one.

Yep, I have the same problem at my workplace - we work like slaves to achieve unrealistic deadlines well into the early hours of the morning (4 am+), and sadly there is no management levels as it is only a small agency, and it stops with the boss whom I have talked to numerous times about, and when he says things will change, they never do.

I have looked the other way and put up with it for 3 years with lack of payslips, illegal payslips, illegal software, the list goes on. I now have a newborn, I am being paid half the salary of an average developer, and have essentially cracked my cool. Now looking for work elsewhere :)

But if they are coming in 10 min late and working back 10 min at the end of the day, no care.

More like comming in 10 minutes late, 5 minutes late from lunch, and are trying to leave 5-10 minutes before end of shift.

Further more, not only 2 weeks ago i was working till 11pm on a Sunday to get a project over the line. To me this is just complete wank.

While I understand your work ethic, you have to realise that getting the project in on time, budget and within scope is the job of the Project Manager.

If you are in fact the PM, then having to work these hours is something you'll have to look at in your own performance.

Remember, it's just as much a PM's job to manage the stakeholder's expectations as it is to deliver the deliverables.

Man it sounds like a lot of you work in s*** places, though the typical management style is retarded and the world is full of cockbag useless managers.

I'm a senior manager at the company I work at and I would totally want general staff to make me aware of situations like this, I'd then be able to take either subtly influenced or direct action to resolve.

It's not worth any organisations while to have s*** middle managers destroying morale and not achieving anything, their main job is to motivate and enable their workforce, so if their doing the opposite then they need to go.

Moobs your particular situation is just absolutely unforgiveable ego/insecurity issue based pettiness from that manager. If it's not the kind of workplace that encourages a positive working environment and you can't talk to someone about it then you should move on.

last edited by Viper119 at 06:44:20 31/Jul/09

But if they are coming in 10 min late and working back 10 min at the end of the day, no care.

Actually, thats a really stupid mis-conception. If you've got a normal start time, and the office has a normal start time, and you continually rock up late, it IS an issue for the whole office, even if you make it up.

Sets a really s*** example, and when you're not there, someone has to take your calls and give excuses on why you're too f***ing self involved to show up on time. I used to work with someone who did this, i stopped making excuses for them, they got s***ty that everyone else they worked with knew they were lazy self involved pricks.

And if you ever want to progress into management, leading by example of not giving a f*** about set rules by showing up when you feel like it, means you never should be management.

Get over your self and show up on time. Mooby was doing something different, his was a one off non-regular thing.

So, after months of recruting we get a new developer (who doesnt quit after a day)

So a few of use go out for lunch, get back 15mins late. I think nothing of it. I get an email from middle managment, he has gone and looked at my timesheet and adjusted it (not sure if that legal).

However, I get paid salary, not per hour. We use CRM to log dev time against clients, so Im just assuming that timesheets are to record you being in for the day. As everyone who works in an office knows, 95% of the time you sit at your desk and eat, and dont take a full hour. So why bitch at 15mins? I told him this and he said its "the principle of you doing what i tell you to do"

Further more, not only 2 weeks ago i was working till 11pm on a Sunday to get a project over the line. To me this is just complete wank.

Should i just suck it up or ask upper managment for their comments? Any one else with similar experiences?

I don't see the big deal? He's not docking your pay? He's not telling you you're not working hard enough, or putting in enough hours? He's just telling you to keep more accurate records.

Ensure those over hour days that you listed, are recorded as just that.

I am in management, and yes if people take longer lunch breaks than required i pull them up about it, how ever this is in a retail environment so sales are sales and you need the people on the floor. Bit different to your environment.

Just record or ensure the hours you do actually work are recorded. If your under your contracted salary hours, that's your fault, if your over, and constantly over, your putting yourself in a good place. Over can be just 1 hour over etc.