The first time I came across Allen was when his manager contacted HR to ask how he should go about dismissing him! The manager was responsible for a specialist social work team. Allen was the newest member. It was a stable team consisting of three long serving social work assistants, two qualified social workers and Allen an experienced social worker. The three social work assistants were reliable and cooperative they dealt with the straight forward cases, arranging home help visits, meals on wheels and day care. The social workers deal with the complex cases, often people suffering from dementia, people whose behaviour put them at risk but never the less functioned better in the familiar environment of their own home.
The work involved liaising with GP’s and consultants, dealing with concerned family members, placating irate neighbours and generally finding innovative ways to reduce risk and support the individual. Allen had been recruited to fill a long standing vacancy in the team. During his 3 month probationary period his manager considered him an excellent appointment. He had an immediate positive impact on the team’s back log of urgent assessments and as an experienced worker was happy to take on a high case load. His willingness to take on extra work meant the team manager, to the benefit of his own stress levels, was no longer forced to carry unallocated cases. However six months in post and his manager wanted to be shot of a lazy, unreliable, uncooperative, insubordinate employee.
When Allen first joined the team he often beat the team manager to be first into the office and was frequently the last to leave such that he was entrusted with setting the alarm and locking up. These days he struggled in after everyone else. Before he spent little time in the office as he undertook home visits to check on his clients welfare now he never seemed to leave the office. His manager was often out of the office so hadn’t noticed this change in behaviour until he received a complaint that Allen had not turned up to an important case conformance. He latter explained his car had a puncture and by the time he had changed a stubborn wheel it was too late. But it turned out this was not the first meeting he had missed recently, often without an apology or explanation.
All this came to light after the manager in a team case allocation meeting had asked Allen to take on another case. His response ,”I’d rather not” surprised and irritated his manager who was used to team members doing what was asked. The manager allocated the case to another team member and asked to see Allen in his office after the meeting. That meeting did not go well. Subsequent one to one’s failed to illicit any explanation for the change in behaviour. Allen refused to discuss or share any information about his personal circumstances. Attempts at sympathy and understanding having failed his manager resorted to threats!
