Employees on Cell Phones

[Texas_Signmaker]

Tell ya what dodge.......... you work for any respectable company of any size or any industry and spout off with your theories, ideas of laws or rules and your inept capabilities and see how long the owner's rules aren't the law(s). It's no wonder you work for yourself........ and by yourself. The mere thought probably sends shivers through the west when your name comes up. In a good kinda way, though.............

Huh??? Is this a compliment? The west??? What?

BTW, don't mix pain pills with drinking.. You'll get some nasty effects.

 

[Bly]

I'm surprised no wrap shop employees have thought of this.

 

[sign girl]

We average 9 employees and have run through 7 in the past 4 months but no core guys. We used to hardly have any turnover but any new hires have seem to be a game of musical chairs. They (the problem ones) are all unskilled general labor that has to be trained but its expensive to keep doing this. With this in mind, what is a middle ground? Zero tolerance just exacerbates turnover but ignoring it is not fair to the good core guys either.

We have the same problem. Everyone is hiring around here so employees have the freedom to flip you the bird, walk out and have a new job by the next day. And they want $16+ to start with no experience. It's frustrating. My favorite was when I told an employee that they did something wrong (nicely) and they said "Why are you bullying me?".

 

[ddarlak]

"Why are you bullying me?"

My kids say this to me, It's something they learned in School from all the anti-Bullying.... it's kinda meant as a joke, you must be too old to get it...

 

[sign girl]

My kids say this to me, It's something they learned in School from all the anti-Bullying.... it's kinda meant as a joke, you must be too old to get it...

I hope I am because I actually have work ethics unlike most of the morons we hire.

 

[clarizeyale]

This question has been on my mind for a bit cuz of this thread.

To those who are not the proprietor/business/shop owner.... should employees, like myself, be banned from hopping on forums like this during work?

LOL

 

[ikarasu]

Every position likely has downtime in it. When I'm printing on the flatbed and I have no cutting or roll to roll to do, I usually sit here and browse S101. Sometimes I watch tutorials... Sometimes I'm bored and just browse Reddit or something else.

Ask your boss I'd he cares or not if your on the forums during work. I've learned a lot of tips/tricks from here, and it's made me more profficient at my job. Before me, we only did 1 Sign at a time on our flatbed .Now I do 6-7, increased production 10fold.. No one knew how to color match... Now while it's not perfect, I can manually match any color our machine is capable of.

There's tons of stuff I've learned, reading these forums or another during downtime at work.

My bosses are ok with it. They see the value in it. Your boss may too!

 

[OADesign]

WOW. Just. WOW.

I waited to see how far the thread would go before I read through it. I'm just amazed at the thinking process here.
I guess I'm fortunate to have had gigs in this industry, over the years, with employees and owners that think differently.

First of all: What kind of people are you owners / managers hiring? To the point where cell phone use is actually an issue? I mean what pool of people are you pulling from? You actually have to create policy to control employee cell phone use? I chuckle as I type that. I sounds odd to me even saying it out loud. I don't want to come off reading like I'm holier-than-thou or anything but wow. For real? Adult employees have this issue? We're talking about able minded individuals that can wipe with out assistance, right? Of voting age?

Maybe because I've always worked in smaller shops or on smaller teams. Or maybe its the work ethic I've grown into, over time. You work. You stay focused. Period. Phone rings/chirps. Check it later. Or pick it up and say, "I'm busy, "I'll call you back...". If it ain't on fire, it can wait. And if it is, you should have probably dialed 911, not my number. And isn't it kind of common sense that if your using a tool that can ruin expensive materials, or sever a finger, or cause you to fall to your death, you shouldn't be worrying about your phone? But your going to fire me if you catch me on my phone !?! LOL So confusing.

I mean there is this big fat magnum sharpie line of common sense that runs through this entire concept. Adults that wish to be (or stay) gainfully employed individuals: Stay focused. Work (really) hard. Be nice to people. Try not to eph up. Generous owner/manager offering income earning opportunity: Don't offer opportunities to individuals who don't stay in first group. Hire from pools of individuals in first group. Be nice to people. Rinse repeat. Seems like simple math to me. I wonder if it just not busy enough to keep hands moving? Too many employees? I dunno.

In my current position, cell phone use is part of the gig. We use phones when the shop lines are all in use. We text each other details from the shop to the field and vice versa. Vendors text each of my team members individually when specific details are needed or group text info that needs to be shared. We take completion pics of jobs from the field to be emailed along with invoices moments after jobs are done. Or to communicate when conditions of a project have changed or don't match the original specs. I've even received the miffed call from the guy who writes my paychecks, because I turned off my phone, in an effort to stay extra focused on a day when I had several detailed projects due. "I've been trying to reach you, are you at the shop?" lol. And we all take turns connecting or phone's bluetooth music to the shop speaker to play tunes. I get more turns than everyone else, but I digress.

I'm just amazed that this is an issue that people actually have, to the point where you're adding paragraphs to your employee hand books and writing multi-paragraph posts on industry internet forums so much that they grow to 5 gd pages long (that is, as of the time of this post).