The Saturday Morning Post - Vol. 3 - A Work Story

One of the aspects of my job includes investigating major policy violations committed by employees of our company. When managers first become aware of these policy violations, they are required to report them to me, and then I do my thing. The conclusion of my investigation will include a directive of what action will be taken with the employee. So with that background for the benefit of those reading, and as promised in my kickoff post of this Saturday Morning Series, here's a story of a stupid thing done by an employee:

A manager of one of our facilities called me one fine Monday morning this past spring to report that he found an empty beer can in an office on a file cabinet. This manager was opening up that facility this particular morning after it had been closed for business the day before. This manager knew one of his subordinate supervisors was responsible for closing up the facility the day before that. By the time the manager had called me, he had already reviewed the security surveillance video. He described to me that there were two employees in the facility after the close of business, and that one was the supervisor responsible for closing up.

None of the video that the manager viewed showed either employee drinking anything. The video the manager viewed spanned the time frame from when customers and other employees left to when the motion-triggered cameras stopped filming (as there would be nothing to film if there are no employees left in the building). There was, however, one piece of video that appeared to show the supervisor holding something in his hand and bringing it up towards his head, but it took a lot of imagination to conclude that he was throwing back a brew. The lack of video evidence tells me a couple of things - they weren't drinking, or they drank somewhere out of the sight of the cameras.

In discussing the situation with the manager, we acknowledged that the video evidence was weak, so I had the manager interview his supervisor and report back to me afterwards. I told him to ask his supervisor if he knew about the beer can, and whether he or anyone else had been drinking on the premises. When he did, I fully expected to hear that the supervisor denied all knowledge of the beer can, or of at least knowing how it was found on a file cabinet in an office within the facility. Just when I thought I had heard it all . . .

The supervisor told his manager that the beer can was his, and that he intended to throw it away. The supervisor explained that he didn't drink it at our facility, but that he drank it at his other job, and didn't want to throw it away there. The manager and I discussed this shocking revelation further. He knew that his supervisor had a second job, which he worked on weeknights after completing his day job at our company.

So if there's an ounce of truth (or 12 oz's) to the supervisor's story, he would have worked at our facility on Friday, worked his 2nd job on Friday night - at which time he consumed at least this one beer, and then worked the closing shift for our company on Saturday. His explanation begs some questions: why didn't he throw the can of beer away after leaving his 2nd job on Friday night? Why didn't he throw it away at home? Why bring it to his day job, where he holds a position in management? Even if he brought it to our facility, there's a dumpster outside of the building. Why bring it inside and put it on top of the file cabinet? Was it there all day during business for customers and other employees to see?

Due to the lack of evidence in this case, we did not take any action against the supervisor. However, his credibility with his manager, regional manager, and yours truly - has tanked. I can advise management on what discipline to carryout on employees, I can help management craft a development plan to help their subordinates improve in their performance, but I can't fix stupid.

See you next Saturday morning.