The Core
Why We Are Here => Water Cooler => Topic started by: Rupert on December 13, 2010, 06:38:00 PM
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One of my elfs said to me today:
One thing where is my Christmas gift?
I nearly went straight back with :
Why, where is mine?
Where I come from you do not ask for gifts..... I appreciate elsewhere might be different. It really irked me though.
What do you reckon?
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I agree with you... I'm grateful for any gifts given to me, to expect them is a bit rich. No point in gifting if it's considered automatic.
If the elf was under 13 years old I'd let them off with the expectation.
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If they are very good or if you are working them cheap, why not spoil them? It's amazing what loyalty you can get if you spend a few squids on them.
IMHO
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Get or ask for a photo of said elf for some reason.
Then send an elf yourself e-card for Christmas, using their photo.
http://www.elfyourself.com/
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Well, one of us used to give out cool widgets instead of bonuses, as a way saving some money, because a bonus is never enough... but, say, an ipod, is... well, cool.... a nice gift, if you get me. And nice and thoughtful gifts are always in good taste... and if that is the standard, well, then, that is the standard. Many places give out a turkey, etc. but I do think employers should show some sort of appreciation. I think it is warranted.
But asking for a present is not in good taste.
Although you may want to ask yourself, had you already purchased said elf a present, would you still have wondered where yours was? Or would you have come up with a slightly different reply? The kneejerk reaction sometimes sheds a little light into darker corners of motivations... not saying anyone's were wrong, just saying, a little hypersensitivity can sometimes cloud the issue.
Are you looking for me to tell you the person was rude, in multiple cultures? If so, then, yes. But that shouldn't make you happy enough not to give them anything. In fact, I would go so far as to guess that remark was intended to p##s you off, by someone that is slightly passive aggressive but not really brilliant... because it did lead you to the 'right question'.... eventually. But they didn't exactly drop you off there feeling that generous. If they were brighter, they might be better at manipulating you not only to the right conclusion, but so that you ended up happy you reached it once you arrived at it... and if they were really good, they would have planted the seed it was your idea all along... which would set them up for the best possible outcome.
But apparently the elf isn't all that bright... so f### him, and give him a $20 gift card to Applebees:)
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Send them $100 and they'll love you for the rest of 2011.
Always nice to know you're appreciated imo.
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considering its way too early to be wondering where your gift is anyway, are you sure they weren't making a joke which didn't translate because of lack of use of a smiley?
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she need to be taken into a secluded place and shot as its troublemakers like this one what upset the whole apple cart for the rest of them as they are not paid to think they are paid to do
in fact the thought behind wanting a gift at this time of year has been already been paid for in your time so its actually robbing you right under your nose, if you wait a while a trigger happy yank will come by who may do the job for you ;)
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I should have said, this Elf is in his late teens, and is in India. Culturally that might make a difference.
I am indeed inclined to ignore him, and then send him $100 on Christmas day. Can you time payments like that/? Never tried.
Just this asking... doesn't go down well in my part of the world.
A Turkey to India.... like the idea :) Christmas pud might be easier.
http://www.elfyourself.com/ ha ha!
Funny I never tell them they are elfs, but valued members of the team. 4eyes coined the phrase for me.
Thanks for ALL the insight.
Mick, keep taking the pills... :o
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>A Turkey to India
Nah, steak instead.
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We have several Indians working for us, so far they've never asked for any gift.
My answer would be "where was my gift for Diwali?" then sack/shoot em :P
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>>is in India
I was going to ask where this is. In Latin American countries, Singapore and the Philippines the "thirteenth month" payment is required or expected
Don't know about India, but it seems like there is some expecation of bonus based on teh 1965 Bonus Act or some such thing
http://www.tax4india.com/indian-laws/labour-law/payment-of-bonus/payment-of-bonus-2.html
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>a trigger happy yank will come by who may do the job for you
my only issue is all this talk about 'seclusion'...just tell me in meters and wind speed and let me work out the details;D
>india
ah, can't say then...
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>$100 and they'll love you for the rest of 2011.
wow, in Florida, that only gets you a drink and a 10 minute lap dance:)
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Unless he's really good, FIRE HIM!
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Fire him. Even if he is good, he's altered your working relationship.
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It's not just a muslim custom - as I was saying in the last post, this is often LAW, not custom. As near as I can tell, in India, the Bonus Act of 1965 requires most employers in India to pay a bonus
Under this Act, every employee who is receiving salary or wages upto Rs. 3,500 p.m. and is engaged in any kind of work whether skilled, unskilled, managerial, supervisory etc. is entitled to bonus for every accounting year if he has worked for at least 30 working days in that year. However, employees of L.I.C., Universities and Educational institutions, Hospitals, Chamber of Commerce, R.B.I., IFCI, U.T.I. Social Welfare institutions are not entitled to bonus under this Act.
http://www.tax4india.com/indian-laws/labour-law/payment-of-bonus/payment-of-bonus-2.html
The payment of Bonus Act, 1965, extends to the whole of India. This Act shall be applicable to:
1. every factory; and
2. every other establishment in which twenty or more persons are employed on any day during an accounting year.
...
Minimum bonus – Minimum bonus is 8.33 % of the salary or wages of an employee or Rs. 100 in case of employees above 15 years of age and Rs 60 in case of employees below 15 years of age. Maximum Bonus – When the allocable surplus exceeds the minimum bonus, the employer should pay bonus in proportion to the salary or wages earned by the employee subject to a maximum of 20% of such salary or wages.
In some special cases where the salary or wage of an employee exceeds Rs. 1600/- per month, minimum or maximum bonus payable to such employee shall be calculated as if his salary or wage were Rs. 1600/- per month.
http://www.tax4india.com/indian-laws/labour-law/payment-of-bonus/payment-of-bonus-1.html
Firing someone just because he has asked for his year end bonus which is typically mandated by law seems ridiculous.
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>Firing someone just because he has asked for his year end bonus which is typically mandated by law seems ridiculous.
?Why so, IF...
- I find he's made my working environment less enjoyable and
- I'm cognizant that it'll cost me to make a change and
- I'm still willing to pay that cost, directly or indirectly, to find another to replace him
Seems perfectly logical to nuke him if all of the above. Then again, I'm not noted for being warm & fuzzy.
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<added>
BTW, in case you haven't noticed, I'm heavily on the X side of Mcgregor's X-Y Theory when it comes to low-level employees.
We spent a lot of time debating x-y back in C-school. As liberal as college kids and professors tend to be, and as much as everyone wanted y to alway be the answer, it's safe to say we ended up in stalemate.
Reasons:
X (a.k.a. "put it in the paycheck") is well-understood and fairly cheap to manage. Long-term costs are questionable with x BUT managers can also become fairly adept at factoring in turnover in their hiring/firing plan. It's particularly cheap/effective if the job skills aren't hard to come by in the marketplace OR the job market is tight.
Y implementation requires the manager to be more involved and, IMHO, more gifted -more socially aware- ...this is a fairly rare skill relative to managing by the numbers. And once you do have a company policy complete with a HR manager who is capable of y-mode, then manager burnout is a problem. Y requires so much 'immersion' in the lives of the staff.
Another trouble is that no organization, even small ones, are homogeneous in need. Your mailroom crackhead may require heavy doses of negative stimulus. Your accounts receivable manager needs y. You can't swing from one mode to the other very easily and you very well might be charged with some sort of discrimination if you do.
Even the same individual changes. So you have a gifted 20-something, single guy in your art department who will walk in a heartbeat if you put the hammer on him. Saddle him with 2 kids, health care problems, and a mortgage and theory x works amazingly well with him now.
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The short term employees (college students) I have worked with that have an attitude of entitlement have been nothing but trouble. All of them I wish I had fired sooner than I did.
Asking for a gift is ridiculous IMO.
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Rupert:
>It really irked me though.
Once Rupert assigns a loss value to that "irked" factor, you and I are in perfect agreement, Jason.
BTW, though this may be cultural, the fellow needs to know that culture bites both ways.
Not everything that is counted counts, not everything that counts can be counted. --Albert Einstein
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correct me if i am wrong but we are talking about running a business are we not, not shall we give in at this time of year and go all soft in the head approach....if you give one a gift you give to all, if you don't start in the first place then what they never had they don't miss
someone i know took all the staff to a European city a couple of weeks ago, thats different in my opinion as it boost moral for weeks before hand with the buzz of knowing they are having a weekend away
another company I know 20 years ago bought the top sales guys rolex watches and gave them out at the Christmas party, half of them f###ed off to another company in the new year
so what ever you give is never enough so its better if you don't start in the first place....
I still stand by my first post and he needs to be taken out side and shot.....dogboy its 40 yards and wind speed 25 miles an hour he has black hair, tanned skin, smells and is called Abdul, go for it if you take one out the rest will panic
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What jurisdiction does an Indian court have over me in the UK? Well a fair bit actually, as they are signatories to the Hague convention, but it will mean (in effect) a retrial in the UK.
That's BS. Move to the country of Texas, not even the U.S. gov't has jurisdiction over them ;)
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I think asking for a gift is very different than asking for the 13th month or any expected (culturally or legally) bonus of any sort. The way it was written, if it came from one of my elves, I would be sure it was a joke, laugh it off and move on.
If they were dead serious, I'd have a hard time keeping them. If they were good enough to keep after this, they would have already been compensated well enough and shouldn't ever ask for squat.
Keep him long enough to train his replacement.
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>A Turkey to India
Nah, steak instead.
I can't believe people seemed to miss this absolutely hysterical comment. I had a wonderful belly laugh from this and wish to thank you, Drastic.
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And, if it is an Indian Law, the guy might have been asking an innocent question...Cut him a break and ask him what he meant. If he doesn't know, he doesn't know.
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I ignored it for a while, and then he came back with (after a bit a chat):
So,now what you gift me?
???
I have explained it is not customary to ask in the UK. I think we will be parting ways.
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>I think we will be parting ways.
Hahaha, amazing.
We believe in keeping guys happy and working and if it needs to be the case of giving them an xmas present, we're all there. I'd rather throw $100 their way and keep them ever grateful than ignore them and decrease the value of the relationship.
Case in point, yesterday one of our Ukrainian guys suddenly was away for the day. The other guy told me his wife was delivering a baby. Well, cool. We immediately asked the HR guys to run out and buy him $100 gift.
....but we're still letting him go before Xmas as we don't have enough work. Different situation, but being a nice employer works a lot better imo.
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>apply to the Vikings for a job and not RC
Drastic & I have been trying to toughen up the Vikings for almost 12 years now. Every time we get them trained barely UP to the "wussie" level, NFFC steps in and ruins them.
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I don't really understand the problem - its a simple equation for me.
'Cost of Ownership v. Benefit of Ownership'
If they are earning me enough money, they can call me an 'ugly fat capitalist bastard' and demand a new car as a gift - won't bother me (Mivox, no! ... OK .. just, no!)
It will, of course, be their problem to decide how to handle my 'f**k off' reply.
OTOH, if they are earning me very little then simply 'not replying' for 15mins when they are supposed to be at their desk can get them fired.
When you only have 4 or 5 staff who are located half way around the world you have more flexibility to match management to the employee without fear of legal action for discrimination.
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Rumbas,
I agree with you.
One of my team (been working 4 years for me on a contract basis) I have loaned to her to buy a PC, I pay most up front, (as the trust has to work both ways), and I cannot expect them to take no pay for a month. (Anyone in the UK has to cope with being paid after the event as that is the custom)
....one disappeared for 2 weeks, but when back, no problem, she caught up....
But this one, (part f the story I omitted, as It adds bias to the question I wanted to ask) had just disappeared for 6 days, and then comes back with that question.
It smacks of:
"What else can I get out of this Guy, he seems a soft touch"
Maybe it is a misunderstanding, there is room for that still. Just I doubt it :( Hope so
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Ah, but the Vikings have no work.... :(
* JasonD makes mental note to apply to the Vikings for a job and not RC
Rumbas, surely you could have waited until after Christmas :)
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It's a tricky one, isn't it? I think it comes down to a cost / benefit thing. If you pay once, he'll expect it every year, so that becomes a structural cost of employing him, and potentially anyone else he tells. There is also the "emotional cost" of your irked status, which is hard to put a montary value on.
On the plus side, if you do pay, you may be securing a happy, productive worker. If the quality of his work is good enough, it might be worth taking the financial hit, swallowing the irked feelings, and thinking of it as a cost of business.
A lot also depends on your sense of the motivation here. If he's a good, hard worker asking for a reward for a job well done, I'd be inclined to reward him. If he's just trying to see if he can get the stupid Westener to cough up a bit of cash for Christmas, cut your losses and dump him. In that case, it's clear that he sees your relationship in terms of what he can get from you, rather than what value he can provide for you, and it's likely an early signal of impending shoddiness. Since he has asked, it's clear he thinks he is entitled to a bonus. If you disappoint that sense of entitilement (deserved or not), you've got a disgruntled employee
<added>
>> It smacks of:
>> "What else can I get out of this Guy, he seems a soft touch"
Yeah, might be inclined to get rid then. Sounds like it's the tip of an iceberg, change course whilst ye may
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>So,now what you gift me?
Wow.
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Get the manual written so you cannot be held to ransom in the future
. Get him to write it. Give him the push when done.
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tell you what, save yourself the stress, give me the $100 and I'll sack him for you.
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http://idump4u.com/
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Perhaps this quotation is better here than in the quotations thread:
"A servant's too often an impudent elf ;
If it s business of consequence, do it yourself"
Richard Harris Barham, 1788-1845
:)
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>>If it s business of consequence, do it yourself
And never have a life?
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Thats why we have elves, and fairies. Jane is out fairy. She comes in on Fri, and after 4 hours the place is gleaming again.
There would be no play time without elves and fairies.
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'business of consequence' perhaps means something different to me than it does to others.
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No your right, just teasing really.
If its important do it yourself. I'm not letting a link builder near anything that important :)
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Ok, had to let the guy go today. Sad really, but it's either his or my money.
Would rather hire people than letting them off, but "it's business" as he said.
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Thanks Jason.
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Oh dear, sorry to hear that. Good luck in 2011 Rumbas
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Onya Ras for giving him a bonus before the boot, most probably wouldn't do that.
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Well, my man got a bonus too in the end. I got over my irkedness and thought of Christmas cheer... and good business.
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You keeping him?
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Yes, as 4eyes said... cost/benefit calc.
He cannot do damage, but he can do plenty of good work for me. This one has only been working for me for 4 months, so I am inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt, in all work ways he does reasonably well.