I am not an overly emotional person by nature, but there are certain things that happen to tug at my heart strings. YouTube videos of proposals and Cochlear implant patients hearing for the first time come to mind, but stories of personal tragedy from people whom I know or work with will also do the trick. And while this empathy is not necessarily a negative thing, it can become a burden when you have to manage those who are going through the personal strife.
Not only must managers determine just how much special consideration each individual team member should be given during their time of need, but in doing so we are making a subjective determination of which employee’s tragedy is “worse” based on just how much special consideration we opt to give them.
Sure, HR guidelines may allot a certain number of days of grievance time for a death in the family, and FMLA may help protect those in need of additional medical leave, but clearly those employees will be affected by whatever their personal tragedy is long after their statutory protection period lapses.
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I currently have a team member who was recently diagnosed with cancer. She missed numerous days of work, often with little advance notice, in the weeks leading up to her diagnosis. She will continue to miss many more days of work for various medical appointments as she undergoes chemotherapy and battles with the exhaustion that accompanies it.
Of course we helped her through the FMLA process, and I will continue to do anything I can to help her. However, I pose the awkward rhetorical question: as her manager, just how much special consideration should I give her during the days she is in the office?
Personally, I couldn’t care less what her productivity looks like as I want all of her energy focused on beating cancer, but as a manager responsible for a large team, at some point my other employees, colleagues, and superiors may begin to question my prioritization.
To her credit, she has been a model employee throughout her diagnosis and treatment and has given me as much advance notice as she can. And thankfully she was able to catch her cancer early enough for her prognosis to be good. But if she were a few months later in her diagnosis, I could be faced with some very difficult ethical questions I am not sure any manager is equipped to handle.
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If she were to exceed her FMLA protection, how long should I allow her to remain a member of the team, knowing if she is dismissed she could lose her health benefits and might be unable to secure new employment?
If on the days she were at work she was too weak or tired to perform her duties, would I need to document it as a performance issue?
Who can possibly make such determinations?
If managing in times of an employee’s personal medical strife are difficult, it can be even more challenging when managing a team member who is experiencing a tragedy with their loved ones.
One of my direct reports lost her mother over a year ago, but she continues to cite her death as a rationale for many of her performance issues. She frequently misses work at the last minute, citing the need to take a mental health day to help her cope with her loss. And when she discusses it with me, I can tell she is still in real pain, and I want to continue to give her special consideration — but I also recognize at some point it turns into a permanent accommodation I am not affording my other direct reports.
I recognize how fortunate I am that both of my parents are alive and in good health, and I cannot even begin to fathom how I could or would cope if I lost one of them, but at some point I know it would be necessary to minimize this personal strife on my professional life. But admittedly I do not know if that realization would come after a week, a month, a year, or never at all.
Clearly I have no good answer (and neither does the federal government, if you have ever read through FMLA). And without clear, or even conflicting, guidance, I am unable to apply my traditional legal reasoning to the situation to reach my conclusion. Instead, I am left to my best judgment and emotion, but as a guy who also turns on the waterworks during videos of flashmobs, this isn’t particularly helpful.
Stephen R. Williams is in-house counsel with a multi-facility hospital network in the Midwest. His column focuses on a little talked about area of the in-house life, management. You can reach Stephen at [email protected].