When an employee throws a temper tantrum

(MoneyWatch) Dear Evil HR Lady,
I supervise a group of creatives for an internet business. I have a new addition to the team who is pretty young and 1.5 years into a career. The past month since this employee joined, the rest of the team has had to endure bursts of screams and yelling at the screen from said employee. The team members are getting very irritated and can't handle the "fits of rage" that seem to be an almost daily occurrence. Neither do they enjoy the lack of team play and critical nature of ideas that bounce around the office, and neither can I. The "fits" seem to come from a lack of technical skills, because that is when they actually start.

I have tried to talk to the employee and ask that they quiet down and control themselves to no avail. What ways are available to win the employee over to play for the team and help them learn to calm down and think instead of burst into rage?

Your help would be greatly appreciated.

Do you know why (neurotypical) people throw raging temper tantrums? Because they work.

Yes, I am totally blaming this employees' parents. Somewhere along the line the tantrums that junior threw stopped being cute little 1 year old tantrums and turned into the mess you've got yourself today. Mom and Dad should have stopped giving into him long, long ago.

And they are still working because when he freaks out, he gets attention from the new mom (you) and probably massive attempts to soothe him.

So, stop it.

Your job, tonight, is to sit down and write up a performance improvement plan according to your company guidelines. Talk with HR about it. Make sure your i's are dotted and t's are crossed. Then sit down with the tantrum thrower and the HR person (if HR isn't available, one of your peers.You need a witness.)

Explain that such fits are inappropriate. They are detrimental to the team. That if they continue he will be fired. 

That last part needs to be stunningly clear. This behavior stops or he is out the door. Gone. Adios. There is no farewell party. He is gone. There should be a date in this document that is his last day to work if all the conditions of the performance improvement plan are not met.

I realize this is harsh. But the reality is, this is the real world. And in the real world you can't throw temper tantrums and not experience negative consequences. As the  manager, your job is to build the best team possible. This sometimes means firing. 

You can give him tips and tricks. For instance, when he feels frustrated, he can get up and take a walk around the building. He can go get a drink of water. He can ask for help. But he cannot throw a fit.

Now, the reality is, he may fail miserably and you may have to fire him. Remember that he is bringing this on himself. As an adult, it's his responsibility to learn to control his temper.

I don't suggest a one more fit and he's out the door plan (although I probably would have fired him after the first week of tantrums), but he needs to make reasonable progress as dictated in the performance improvement plan. 

It's also possible that he'll pull himself together and become a great employee. 

Oh, and prepare yourself for a phone call from his mother. The proper response is, "I'm sorry, but he is an adult and I cannot discuss his performance with you." And then you hang up before she says anything else. 

Have a workplace dilemma? Send your questions to [e-mail].

[lkbeck1]

Since this has gone on so long, I would probably wait for the next eruption, then walk up behind the employee and quietly ask him to step into my office while he is in mid-tantrum. What I will be looking for is whether he can cut off the tantrum and talk to me rationally, or if the tantrum continues with the boss standing there talking to him.

If he can stop in mid-tantrum, then it is not loss of control, it is just poor response to frustration. I would give my "I would not be doing either of us a favor if I did not tell you a few things about how you are being seen by others" talk, and try to mentor him into a better way of handling situations. If the mentoring does not bring fast improvement, he gets a final warning.

If he cannot or will not control the tantrum, then I would use that incident of him refusing to comply with my directions to give a final warning, and then fire him on the next tantrum to avoid one of his co-workers being stressed, or even worse, being injured by this knucklehead, and getting slammed with a negligent retention suit.

Regarding whether the company will be sued for letting this guy go, as I tell my supervisors, "Sue me now or sue me later; most likely we are going to get sued." You cannot avoid taking action because these knuckleheads can find a hungry lawyer on every street corner.

[heamcb99]

I agree with who is the root cause of these temper tantrums - it is always the parents fault, or some other adult figure who modeled the effectiveness of tantrums, right? LOL! I would suggest that a slightly more conservative approach would be better than going straight to final written warning.

Let's be fair. The supervisor is slightly to blame for these temper tantrums going on for so long. He has allowed the employee to get away with it for some time and it has impacted the whole team.

How about writing the Final Written and sitting down with HR, or peer, with a Written Warning. Threatening to fire the employee with the next temper tantrum doesn't give the guy, or gal, a chance. If another tantrum happens, then swoop in with the Final Written warning. You have a paper trail that you gave the employee a chance. If another tantrum happens, he is out the door - and the company has a better chance of winning the unemployment claim. Because, let's face it, the guy wouldn't deserve unemployment with that much warning. A little suffering will keep the tantrums away in the next job...maybe. - Heather McBride, SPHR at www.purposeworks.com

[Darltk40]

I know an employee like this and it is constant. He is not a young person but has been with the company for a while. It has just become acceptable behavior. The thought is that, "Oh, it's just the way he is." Nice guy overall but can't handle pressure. He starts spewing words at his screen any time there is an issue he does not like. Sure, everyone may do this on occasion but this is a regular occurrence with them. So unprofessional.

[dfwenigma]

I was one of those people who threw a fit too as a new, young employee - but for good reason. Sadly managers who have been around for a while - and employees just buck up and take it - they want and need the job. The younger employee may be living at home or may be in a situation where getting fired isn't that big of a deal. Firing them by the way won't matter - and it doesn't solve your problems. If you're a manager who has an employee who is unpleasant ask a reasonable question - do they have a point? Are all of you older than dirt and you've just learned to tolerate really bad management or conditions? I walked into an interview environment recently for a major telecommunications company. Wow what a really shabby office environment. You could tell that the employees reflected the culture - they were just as sloppy as the offices they were forced to sit in. Sadly we may be putting up with far too much and the fear of losing the job means nothing gets better as managers and owners continue to cash in while line and staff people must endure sometimes pretty awful conditions. In my case the tools for the job just weren't there, the computers were ancient, the management was just - well brain dead. Other people new it - but they had become sheep. Usually a misbehaving employee has a good reason to misbehave - check your own biases managers.

[DFLEP1]

None of this justifies acting like a child in the work place.

[_Aule_]

But sometimes, an employee tantrum in the right place at the right time can be the most appropriate thing to do, especially if the company's fortunes are at stake.

Here's what happened. About 15 years ago I was designing firmware (software stored in eprom) for a small company in south Denver. I was the 3rd engineer there, a notoriously unstable slot for this firm especially when the owner and the vice president were also both engineers.

The owner was a relic from the 70's, where they wrote software byte by byte in assembly language, and I was hired on help us make the transition to structured programming in C. The owner seemed to want all of the benefits but was not willing to make the effort or changes in discipline necessary for me to accomplish my mission.

He was especially bad about debugging. The owner insisted on us using a ROM emulator device which had no facilities whatever for symbolic or single step debugging in C code. Worse still, the emulator device was in a different section of processor's memory map than the intended final location for the program memory.

The number two engineer advised me to stick in debugging print statements to fence in the bug. But as most engineers are aware, the extra code can actually hide a problem from being repeatable.

This sets the stage for my tantrum. I knew what we needed: a RAM device that was wired to resemble a permanent memory device (EPROM); so that not only could the RAM be connected to the debugger for single-stepping in C code, but also so that the program being debugged ould now be in exactly the same location as the program in the field.

So the owner comes in to my lab and asks me status on a bug I was trying to hunt down. At first I'm polite, telling him that I was having trouble because the print statements were hiding the bug. So he tells me in a condescending manner that perhaps I am not nearly as good an engineer as I think I am.

I lost it. I grabbed my hand-sized notebook and slammed it on the floor. "We're flying blind here!", I said while raising my voice, "and this solution is USELESS!", I shouted. "Can't you please consider wiring us up a RAM on a daughterboard to plug into the ROM so this job can be done right?"

He did it. I proved I was right. He hated me forever after and managed to hound me out of the company with a series of sham reviews citing inadequate interpersonal skills, but I was still satisfied to know that I not only saved the company but also saved his ass.

[stobak2]

You're absolutely right, Suzanne.

It's also remarkable that the supervisor had to even ask the question. Perhaps that's where political correctness is taking us. It's sad, really.

Steve Tobak

[nancy_naive]

We had a fellow threw a bookcase across the office after a long string of temper rages.

After some consultation, we suggested that the company would pay him to seek professional help. Created an overhead account and let him charge 4 hours a week for 3 months.

He's now one of our most valued engineers.

[rebecca27183]

Thanks for giving him a chance. Many times individuals that are difficult to work with are the most valuable in terms of their work and creativity, etc.

[tmittelstaed]

A huge amount of this is situational. Years ago I worked in a machine shop with a bunch of union members. The shop manager (who was not part of the union) had 1 employee who did stupid stuff all the time. Bolting together parts upside down and stuff like that. One day this guy dropped a 500 pound part off his bench because it wasn't secured, came within an inch of his foot. The shop manager screamed at him so loud from his office across the shop that it drowned out the punch presses. In talking with the other employees I heard that this sort of thing was a fairly regular occurance. Sadly, that shop closed down about 15 years after I left, there's a Staples there now.

I also agree with the other posters, the supervisor lost this battle when he or she didn't discipline the employee the first time he threw a tantrum. As for lack of technical skills, that's completely unimportant. What this company really needs to do now if they want to keep this employee is recognize that they want the impossible and get used to the idea that this employee is going to have to be fired. Sure they can get stern now but it's not going to work.

[nojoy01]

Sure they can get stern now but it's not going to work.
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Absolutely. Management is "behind the curve" (or the eight-ball) on this one and there is no way to recover gracefully, or w/o risking a major lawsuit. Speaking of lawsuits, perhaps one of the tantrum throwers co-workers could put a stop to the behaviour by filing a lawsuit claiming that he (the tantrum thrower) has created a "hostile work environment", caused fear of personal injury and/or death, and causing emotional pain and suffering because of these fears caused by the respondent. :) It's mostly B/S, but it's the kind of B/S that lawyers love to roll in. And who knows, it might even get the attenion of the "bad boy". :)

[harvyk100]

Has anyone actually suggested asking the person, "are you ok?" All this talk of lawyering up and getting HR involved and alerting cops incase this employee goes postal, and no one has suggested actually asking the employee if everything is ok.

It amazing how much those 3 little words can mean to someone who is going through a bit of a rough patch. You don't need a degree to do it, just buy them a beer / coffee and let them spill their guts. You'll prob get far better results than making things official warnings.

[nojoy01]

Obviously everything is NOT ok or he wouldn't be throwing temper tantrums. As a member of management your priority is to get product out the door, not armchair psychiatry. If the company you/he works for has/supports a "counseling" staff then mandatory referral/attendence is the first step, followed by the steps already delineated if that is unsuccessful. Most companies, however, do not have such a staff & will not tolerate personal problems interfering with productivity. Sadly, most corporations in existence today do not care about their employees as a person but rather as part of the "resources" necessary to accomplish the common goal of all corporations. To make a profit.

[harvyk100]

@nojoy01 So you feel that asking an employee if they are ok does not fall within "management"? If thats the case I'd be calling you a pretty poor excuse for a manager.

Also I never said anything about armchair psychiatry, I said simply ask them if they are ok. It opens them up to realising that they may need some help, and then refer onto appropriate services.

You are right, your job as a manager is to get product out the door, one of the best ways of doing that is to realise that it's people making your product, they are not machines, and thus to get bet results you need to treat them as human beings.

[nojoy01]

What ways are available to win the employee over to play for the team and help them learn to calm down and think instead of burst into rage?
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Technical competence and team playing are issues that can be handled w/o necessarily being a "deal breaker". But temper tantrums? Uh-uh. Nope. No-way. By failing to react immediately, strongly, & w/o ambiguity, the supervisor has already lost control of the situation. The correct procedure is: Temper tantrum #1. The employee is sat down by the supervisor w/a representative of HR present and given a written warning that such behaviour is unacceptable, and that any future occurence will result in suspension w/o pay. This document is signed by the employee, witnessed by the HR rep, & placed in their file. Tantrum #2. Employee, supervisor, & HR rep are present when employee is notified of their 10 (business) day suspension w/o pay and informed that another occurrence will result in termination. This also is signed by employee & placed in their file. Tantrum #3. Security arrives at the employees' workstation and the employee is allowed to collect their personal effects and then the employee is escorted by security from the company's property. The last thing said by security to the former employee after the former employee is out the door is that if they return to the property they will be arrested and prosecuted for criminal tresspass. Two points to be made here. 1. It is not the company's job to wet-nurse a disruptive/dangerous employee no matter how much potential said employee may have. 2. If the supervisor is unwilling/unable to handle this situation immediately, professionally, and firmly then perhaps the supervisor should find employment better suited to their personality. 3. (ok, so I miscounted) If the company's environment/hierarchy does not allow you, the supervisor, to implement this solution then you need to find someplace else to work because if you don't you will end up frustrated, ulcerated, and terminated. You will eventually be terminated because "your team" will fail to be as productive as it should be and as the supervisor you will be held responsible for said failure.

[TimeToStepUp]

This is certainly accurate ... textbook, even. These ARE the right things to do.
However, fairly new Managers need to be aware of downsides.
Case in point: One of my Managers followed the rules to a "T", just as stated above.
A year later: Lawsuit. Neither General Counsel nor Court found any specific failures, BUT the ex-employee claimed undue stress and anxiety for being released, "felt" injured, and "felt" undue discrimination and "punishment". This was in California.
She won.
We lost - we settled to avoid a huge settlement if it finished trial. "Cut losses, get out, avoid publicity" Counsel said.
We paid.

[TimeToStepUp]

P.S. Missed a point, a word to the new manager.
Age "discrimination" was claimed because the plaintiff/ex-employee had voluntarily (without being asked) given a complete birth date to the Manager, so that he would recognize plaintiff's birthday in the next staff meeting.
Plaintiff was 36, peers were under 30.
Go figure! You CANNOT be too careful. There is a reason General Counsels hold update session annually.