watching the company rules 8

[2dye4]

I have a person who works in my group that has become a master
at obeying the companies rules.
When given an assignment he will go far enough to find a
conflict with the company rules, like an obscure purchasing
procedure that requires a VP signature or a procedure
that requires many approvals but which has not in recent
history been observed as required. In short he looks for the
loopholes in the company procedures and uses them to
be a pain in the rear.
On the other hand the guy is obeying the rules. But only for
his benefit.

It is of course difficult to discipline this guy for this
kind of behavior since he has does nothing wrong.

My point is that every company has conflicting rules and
an understood way to do things and this guy is not playing
along.

How can we force the issue that he must be a team player???

 

[PSE]

Every beauracracy could use a good pruning now and then. If the exception has become the rule, it would be a very good time to look at overhauling some procedures. As companies evolve, the procedures or "rules" need to keep pace. Look at this as an opportunity to look at what needs to be done and if you can, get rid of the extraneous "stuff" that bogs down the process. Your "problem" employee is a good barometer as to how far procedure and practice have diverged.

Beauracracy creation and control is a managerial responsibility as it deals with the inputs and outputs of a department or organization. Your employee is perhaps showing you that there are some large $ out there that could be saved (either real or in liability avoidance) by reviewing official practice vs. current practice. This "problem" may in actuality be an opportunity.

Regards,

 

[GregLocock]

And wasn't that the useful lesson of ISO9000? If you treated it as a b/s paperwork exercise you hated it. If you used it as an opportunity to revamp and codify your procedures then sure, there was some agony, but at least you ended up with a system that had been thought about as opposed to merely accreting over time.



Cheers

Greg Locock

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

 

[jmw]

2dye4 you don't say in "my company" but "my group" and your discipline is military... do we assume you are subject to more than the ordinary stupid rules the rest of us have to abide by?

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[2dye4]

JMW

I am not directly in the Military. Just a part supplier.
I am subject to the rules also. But I bend them just the same.

The answear to my problem as outlined by many above posts is
an outdated rule system that is kept in place by a few who
have a vested interest in the confusion.

Many a time I have found a group of managers in one spot and
cornered them on what the correct action would be.

I learned to leave after about 20 min of there discussing
among themselves as I knew I would not get an answear.

It is true I work in a somewhat disfunctional organization
and my rule follower is just doing what RDK suggested by
stoping anything productive and just follow the rules.

He may actually be right about it. Precedent has been to just wing it though.

Thanks all

 

[TheTick]

<

http://www.answers.com/topic/martinet>

Word of the day is martinet.

 

[HVAC68]

If you find there are too many "unwritten" rules and they are being followed, "write" those rules !!! So, you start following written rules rather than unwritten rules.

Years back, I had the opportunity to write the work procredures for our department while we were qualifying/applying for ISO 9000 certification. I followed the simple rule of writing what we were doing. Of course, we had to fit those within the framework of ISO procedures. Also, once we started writing down the procedures, we realised some of them were not good and we changed those to what was right and yet practical to comply.

HVAC68

 

[rnd2]

2dye4
Have you taken the person side and in a non- threatening way elicited the reason why? Try and discover the agenda.
Remember, knowlege IS power.
Talking about winging, was it Icarus who winged it and paid the price?

 

[jmw]

So the Gods on Olympia look down on the confusion their rules create amongst the mortal folk and are amused.

Then the answer may be to put the problem and the solution under one ownership.

Unless this happens, nothing changes.

The trick would be to find out how to make bad rules a problem for the pople who create and maintain them and not for the people who follow them.

Any suggestions?


JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[EngJW]

Yes- just following the rules ought to do it. Schedules will slip, shipments won't be made, and parts won't come in. Then you tell management, you guys put the roadblocks there, now you take them out. Probably won't work in reality though.

 

[HgTX]

We have the opposite here--lots of unwritten rules that we're expected to follow, and that seem to change month to month. I annoy the hell out of our admin people because I always do exactly what it says to do when I file paperwork, and when they complain that I didn't do XYZ, I ask them to show it to me in the manual.

I guess I'm the same kind of pain in the ass as 2dye4's guy--I actually do have all the receipts and stuff that they want me to submit; I just refuse to submit any receipts that aren't specifically listed as mandatory. Why have the list if they're still going to want everything?

But every time I submit a form, they come up with some other unwritten policy that I apparently should have been following for the last several years and that no one asked about till just now. (The latest was that if I'm claiming personal vehicle mileage, I need to state explicitly on the expense report form that I did in fact use a personal vehicle. I think they're getting desperate.) So I'm a by-the-book pain in the ass in order to fight back. It won't really change anything, but it makes me feel a little bit better.

I bet 2dye4's guy is protesting something as well. rnd2 has the right idea--find out his agenda.

Hg

Eng-Tips policies: faq731-376

 

[GolfMeeting]

Your rule following friend is destined to upper management.

You better be nice to him. He will slow things down demanding more headcount for himself under the rules. Soon he will be a manager and his boss a Sr. Manager. As the new Sr. Manager sees the positive in having clumbersome rules by being rewarded with promotions and more bonuses, he will have more rules and more headcount.

Then when business really picks up, he will first hire many more people so he will become a VP until the workforce pool is drained. Then he will get a promotion to President by eliminating the rules to make things run faster when he can't hire any new people.

Its all about headcount.

 

[SomptingGuy]

Personal mileages...

Up until 1994 I didn't have a car licence. In common with many Brits, a bike licence was more important to me as a youngster. In '93 I was asked to go on a business trip by myself. Company rules stated that "In the absence of a suitable company vehicle, employees could take their own vehicle at a rate of 24p per mile (for gasoline vehicles less than 1.6L)". We had no bikes in our pool, so I took my personal bike (gasoline, 550cc). When I submitted an expenses claim, all hell broke loose. Within days a new rule said that motorcycle claims were only going to be rated at 12p per mile. As earlier in this thread I researched and followed rules. Again, shafted!

 

[IRstuff]

Only if you were trying to game the rules, which appears to be the case.

TTFN

 

[HgTX]

They asked what vehicle you drove?? Or did you have to state it in your rationale for why you didn't take a pool car?

Hg

Eng-Tips policies: faq731-376

 

[Ashereng]

SomptingGuy

At one company I worked at, the rule stated that we were not allowed to use personal vehicles, only rental vehicles (since we didn't have a car pool).

I always assumed that this was due to liability wrt to upkeep, maintenance, etc. I guess I now know of at least one more reason why this rule was implemented. Never really thought about using a motorcycle vs. car mileage difference. Hmmm. Interesting.

 

[HgTX]

Shouldn't matter to them if you happen to make more or less of a profit on it if they have a standard payout. If you choose to drive some huge gas-guzzler that gets 6 mpg, they wouldn't pay you extra, would they?

Kinda like if they give you a standard per diem for hotel & food rather than reimbursing based on receipts--should they pay less to vegetarians because vegetarian items typically cost less in restaurants? No, there's a standard rate and if the employee is more frugal for whatever reason, good for them.

Hg

Eng-Tips policies: faq731-376

 

[jmw]

Beware insurance companies.
Be very sure that your policy allows you to use your vehicle for business.
Read the small print, you may find in some policies that also includes travel to and from work.
If your company wants you to go some place they need to provide the transport. The mileage rates usually are applied to sales reps and service people who can have the option to pay their own mileage or provide their own vehicle, properly insured, in place of a company vehicle.


JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[SomptingGuy]

Answering the points raised above...

My company was pretty naive about insurance back then. I just checked our current policy document and it states:

Where there is no traveller on the trip with car benefit, then the company will either provide a pool car or a taxi or the traveller may opt (at their choice) to use their own vehicle, provided it is insured for business use and in a road worthy condition, in the same way as a person with car benefit.

And to answer IRstuff: I wasn't gaming the rules. They simply stated that "If there was no suitable comapany vehicle available..." and there wasn't - my driving license only permitted motorcycles (car licenses are expensive things to acquire in the UK, especially for recent graduates with negative bank balances). I thought it was quite amusing that my claim was worth 20% of the bike's value. But then again I only got 40mpg, so I wasn't going to profit any more than the driver of a diesel car.

 

[SomptingGuy]

And to answer HgTX:

From memory, I think you had to give a reason for not taking a pool car. So I did. Looking at today's wording, it seems that the choice would be mine. But then again, how many people would choose to insure their car for business use?

 

[RDK]

Where I live there is no insurance diference between business usage and simply driving to work daily.


The mileage rate should also take care of any increase in insurance rates anyway.

Rick Kitson MBA P.Eng

Construction Project Management
From conception to completion

http://www.kitsonengineering.com