Put on your pretend hats.

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Originally Posted by cuda

Ok, scenario.

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You are a manager.

You have 4 employees under you.

One employee is expecting a child (well, his wife is)

He knows how long he will be out.

He knows when the baby will be born due to cesarean.

He refuses to inform others, including you (the boss) when the birth is, and subsequently, when he will be out.

You have a major project coming up in the time frame of this possible date (company dependent type project .. like the company shuts down due to this not happening on time).

He is in charge of 75% of this project.

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Got that all?

Here is the question I want you to answer.

Are you pissed?

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Yes (at the person), and No, because I transition the critical project activities from him to another right now. A big impact to a project is the loss of a PM, or change of personnel on the project. This is a standard risk in PM work and the mitigation plan is to have a transition plan, if he is a good PM, he is well aware of how critical schedules are. Especially his wife's delivery date or expected time period!

Move him off the critical path work for sure or at a minimum (critical path is those activities that have no float and any delay, will delay the project delivery). I would also assign him to activities or another project, that are not in a key role. That way, he can take off as needed, you do not lose delivery of the project or deliverables.

And yes, I would make it part of the discussion if a raise or promotion comes up. Relative or not...

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Originally Posted by MarkS

How long is his leave for? Is this a paid leave? Perhaps he originally was not planning on taking any time off and now something has changed? Would he have been passed over for a project that he wanted had he told anyone? How would you have juggled things had he fallen down a flight of stairs and broken his leg, necessitating that he be out for an even longer period of time? How is how he handles his personal life, any of your business whatsoever?

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That's I think what his argument is. Why does he have to? The rest of the department is not happy because he hold a major stock in this project the entire group will be judged on and he may or may not be here .. and he knows the answer!

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Originally Posted by OhBalls

LOL...in that case, ask his wife when she goes in! :D

I feel for you, I really do. I made the mistake of hiring my daughter (her first job) as a stocker and I had to fire her because she never showed up on time. That was fun. :rolleyes:

Hm, perhaps a one on one is in order - away from work. Just let him know that it's not negotiable due to the company needing a specific time frame. If you kept it in a personal level, perhaps he would be more forthcoming.

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I am not the manager, though I am one of the employees under said manager.

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Originally Posted by boboso

Yes (at the person), and No, because I transition the critical project activities from him to another right now. A big impact to a project is the loss of a PM, or change of personnel on the project. This is a standard risk in PM work and the mitigation plan is to have a transition plan, if he is a good PM, he is well aware of how critical schedules are. Especially his wife's delivery date or expected time period!

Move him off the critical path work for sure or at a minimum (critical path is those activities that have no float and any delay, will delay the project delivery). I would also assign him to activities or another project, that are not in a key role. That way, he can take off as needed, you do not lose delivery of the project or deliverables.

And yes, I would make it part of the discussion if a raise or promotion comes up. Relative or not...

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That's the hard part. The things he knows .. the ins and outs of the equipment we are working with, no ones else knows (or we knows generalities .. but not specifics) and it would not be as easy to take him away from this project. He is not just filling this roles in this project, but his job is to manage this set of equipment ... we would be taking away his job title.

At the company that I retired from, in order to take the family leave that was instituted by Bill Clinton you had to fill out a paper in advance of known situations like this.I don't really understand what this guy could be thinking about. Could there possibly be more to this?

I don't get why he wouldn't say when he will be out. That isn't his personal business - that is work business if he needs the time off.

I think that shows a distinct lack of responsiblity and I wouldn't want an employee like that working for me at all.

We still haven't learned WHY he doesn't want anyone else to know the delivery date.. I don't get it.

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Originally Posted by mainbutter

We still haven't learned WHY he doesn't want anyone else to know the delivery date.. I don't get it.

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I can't answer that. His wife said she wanted to be kept a secret, he agreed .. and that's all I know.

How many employees work at the business a day, is it more than 50? How many hours has this employee worked in the last year, has he worked there 12 months and atleast 1250 hours?

If the employee qualifys for FMLA than I would be careful on any reprimands or future denying of promotions or raises or you can find yourself in a whole heap of problems down the line.

http://www.dol.gov/esa/whd/fmla/

I will be going on FMLA in January when my wife gives birth and honestly I could care less whats going on at work or what Im going to miss or how the job is going to get done when Im gone.