Complacent Employee, Sharon B. Buchbinder - Case Study Example

Case study: The Case of the Complacent Employee, Sharon B. Buchbinder .pgs 379-381. Introduction The case of the complacent employee involves a school psychologist counselor, Bob Miller, at Louisa May Alcott Elementary School. He feels beleaguered with all the busy schedule and work load and believes that his work is loved by all teachers and students. He works for long hours and stays at school till late hours to attend to all the needs and requirements of the students in the school. He is dedicated to his work assisting troubled kids and at times their families. His office is often filled with kids that need to be psychological assistance and are troubled from problem arising from either at school or home. This case involves Miller, who is satisfied with is work being fired by the administration because it aims to cut down on its cut backs and budgets. It is during one of this session that he receives an unexpected visitor. The unexpected visitor was his Boss miss Harriet who rarely visited. It was the first time for her to come to Miller’s office. When, he saw her miller immediately suspected that something was amiss. Her visits to the elementary school were always brief as she only greeted and at times grinned to people and left the premises shortly after. However in this occasion she had something, to share with Miller and, he suspected that it was something serious. According to Miller his job entailed counseling troubled kids and ensuring that they did not end up in any stupid act. For instance, the kid he was tending to shortly before Harriet arrived was threatening to kill herself by taking several pills (Buchbinder, 380). Although, Miller was a hard worker and concentrated fully on his main task of counseling he was wrong on ignoring other prescriptions of his work. The job entitled him to write reports to administration to illustrate his contribution to the school. However, he ignored this thus leading to the administration to conclude that he was doing nothing. Although he explains to his boss that he is industrious, and works for lengthy hours he was wrong to ignore writing of reports which was significant to the administration. By ignoring his duties, and assuming the reports could wait was wrong. Bob also assumed that the reports meant for the superiors were unnecessary (Buchbinder, 379). This was detrimental to his career because part of the consequence would be him losing his job. Without those reports, this was because his superiors could not know whether he was performing his duties but assume that he was sitting at his desk doing nothing. The administration way of assessing its employees is ineffective. This is because no one supervises Bob or requests for the reports. This indicates the weakness of the school administration. It does not have a personal touch with it employees thus leading to the situation such as Bob’s. It is only ethical that when someone makes a mistake mostly in the working place, they should be warned at least once before firing them. It came as a shock to Bob when the news of his lay off was broken to him as he was not aware. Everything was done in a short notice that did not even prepare him psychologically. Bad news, such as a person losing a job is not something that should be done in a hurried manner, for they might cause serious repercussions (Sims, 1). The administration should have at least notified its employees of the planned layoffs. This was unfair to the employees such as Bob who are left jobless without an arranged plan B. Using a short notice to fire puts Bob in a peculiar position as he believes he has devoted his life to labor for the school; thus he deserves a decent treatment despite his flaws. It is also disheartening to discover that the administration has already lined up a replacement for Bob even before he has left. The administration has already hired the services of a part-time psychologist from Melville middle School to take Bob’s position (Buchbinder, 380). However, it is true that Bob’s work was not easier. All things to be considered regarding those moments, even the new employee, will acknowledge he only managed to do the available workload mostly during part time. The situation between Bob and the administration serves to display the unfortunate connection between the management and employee. The administration is totally unaware of Bob’s work. They majorly depend on reports to assess people efficiency. This is ironic as one may prepare reports to satisfy the administration yet they are doing nothing of significance to the institution. Even the school principal thinks that Bob is diligent, but cannot tell how many kids Bob attends to in a day (Buchbinder, 380). Therefore, Miss Daniels the school principal can be considered in her administrative duties and supervision as she should be monitoring the progress and input of her subordinates. This situation depicts the weak link between the employee and the administration, which in a way can be one of the reasons as to why Bob lost his job. Even when firing him, the administration should have at least given Bob an opportunity to make his case or at least give a prior lengthy notice for him to prepare to leave the school. It was insensitive of the organization to go ahead and hire another person before notifying the current employ that his work is over. Most companies and institutions aim at maintaining a high profile and exceptional image in society. Therefore, this entails them to operate within boundaries that aim in satisfying their employees, clients and the community at large. The institutions do this to through incentives such as promotion to employees, quality services to clients and ethical responsibility to the society (www.reputationrevenue.com, 1). The school in the quest to achieve this should have first considered the significance of the job and the employee to the institution before laying him off. This is because Bob worked hard in counseling the kids they did not commit any stress or psychological, related indiscipline cases. This depicts that Bob’s work was effective thus helping the institution to maintain it status in society. However, by firing him and hiring a part time psychologist it can be deemed that the new psychologist may fail to manage all cases in such a short time. Bob worked for long hours, thus part time alone may not be enough to attend to the several kids in the school. This may lead to some cases being unattended causing detrimental results, which in turn will affect the School’s image. If the school’s image is tainted by happenings such as child suicide its image in society will be affected, thus leading to a decrease in the number of clients admitted. It is clear that Bob is doing an exceptional work with the kids, but his flaws are in writing reports and forms. The school should have been integral in assisting it employee to identify his personal values, hence equipping him to avoid pitfalls of avoiding conflicts with the administration. The school administration should have at some point demanded reports from Bob thus reminding him of the vitality of the reports to the administration. If, this had been done the case situation would have no arisen. Also, the administration should develop a culture of engaged employees to be wholly involved in, and the association will help employees to mingle and share school values thus learning of the things expected of them (Sims, 1). This could have helped Bob understand the significance of the forms and reports to the administration; thus he could not have disregarded them as inconsequential helping him save his job. Conclusion The case study of the case of the complacent employee involves a psychologist who is fired because the administration is not seeing results of his work. This is because the employee did not forward reports of his work to the administration. During the layoff, he was notified that he will be fired as the school administration seeks fire him due to cut backs and budgets it is encountering. This case is critical in highlighting the predicament of the employee and how the situation happens. It depicts the consequences of employees not following company stipulation as well as the way companies treat their employees. The case in a way displays the injustice and insensitivity of organizations when lying off employees. Works cited Buchbinder, Sharon B, and Nancy H. Shanks. Introduction to Health Care Management. Burlington, Mass: Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2012. Pp 379-381. Print. Entitlement and Complacency. Reputation revenue. Accessed at, < http://www.reputationrevenue.com/index.htm> Sims, Peter. Case study: How to avoid complacency. Financial Times. Ft.com/management. Accessed at, < http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4d48deb4-6b84-11e0-a53e-00144feab49a.html#axzz1vfAT7D9w> Read More