Too Many Dave's

I haven't bitched too much here about work lately as things have been relatively good with the exception of the passive aggressive co-worker-wife-of-business-partner. fiwa's the lucky one that gets to hear about that and not you gentle reader. Well today was the exception.

If you've read this blog for anytime you know I have 'growth opportunities' with my service tech's. One in particular. I've used a code word before on other posts (too lazy to go see what I used) but for here and now I'll use the slackers name, Dave.

Dave drives me nuts because he 'sold' himself to our company as having 20 years of experience working in the California market before moving up here. Turns out he was one of those guys who just went out and looked at a furnace and told the homeowner that nothing could be done and the system had to be replaced. We don't do that. Well do anything it takes to get a system working while still telling the customer when it makes sense to replace the equipment.

Dave is paid a premium for his supposed experience. That man doesn't have a clue as a mechanic. Jay has only been doing this for 4 years and he can run circles around this guy.

I'm getting off point. Back to today. I spend a fair amount of time planing Dave's and Jason's days. A reasonable work load and enough time to do it in. A route that makes sense gas economy wise and in general one that makes their day easier.

Dave lives quite away out to the south of downtown Seattle so I gave him a route that started near our shop and worked out and would leave him at the end of the day near home. We discussed it and I gave him his paper work and he was out the door. I did this partly so he would be close to town and available if any service calls came in during the day. I got the first call in from him at about 10:00 am saying he was done at the customer closest to his place. (WTF?) When I asked him why he wasn't following the plan he claimed he must have mis-understood. Bullshit - your milking us for hours, I thought.

Mid-afternoon he calls me to say I've overloaded him and he can get the last two calls in. (he has three and a half hours of work time left for the day) At this point I'm raising my voice and saying "Fine, go take care of customer X and then you'll be done for the day. I'll call customer 'Y' and explain you'll be there on Monday'

Two and a half hours later he calls me to tell me he's now at customer 'Y's and can't complete the job as he has no access to the unit as the customer is gone for the day.

Brad: What the hell are you doing there? Your suppose to be at customer X's.

Dave: Oh I finished that, it wasn't as hard as I thought.

Brad:

I'd hung up as my first thought was to fire him on the spot. If you only knew the crap I've put up with from him you'd understand.

An overly emotional thought I'd concede. But it was what I was thinking.

OK - This is not the slightest entertaining and only me getting my frustrations out. Sorry about that. But if your still reading, thanks.

So I'll offer up this my favorite Dr. Suess poem:

Did I ever tell you that Mrs. McCave
Had twenty-three sons, and she named them all Dave?
Well, she did. And that wasn't a smart thing to do.
You see, when she wants one, and calls out "Yoo-Hoo!
Come into the house, Dave!" she doesn't get one.
All twenty-three Daves of hers come on the run!

This makes things quite difficult at the McCaves'
As you can imagine, with so many Daves.
And often she wishes that, when they were born,
She had named one of them Bodkin Van Horn.
And one of them Hoos-Foos. And one of them Snimm.
And one of them Hot-Shot. And one Sunny Jim.
And one of them Shadrack. And one of them Blinkey.
And one of them Stuffy. And one of them Stinkey.
Another one Putt-Putt. Another one Moon Face.
Another one Marvin O'Gravel Balloon Face.
And one of them Ziggy. And one Soggy Muff.
One Buffalo Bill. And one Biffalo Buff.
And one of them Sneepy. And one Weepy Weed.
And one Paris Garters. And one Harris Tweed.
And one of them Sir Michael Carmichael Zutt.
And one of them Oliver Boliver Butt.
And one of them Zanzibar Buck-Buck McFate . . . .
But she didn't do it. And now it's too late.

Jay is out mowing the lawn (it takes an hour on the riding mower) singing his heart out. The man is tone deaf and this is his way of getting his natural need to voice song with out offending others. It's very cute to see him pass by near the house.

Lolli's out doing farm chores so I should get my butt in gear and go help.

We're going to a friends (Angie who was here last weekend) church choir concert tomorrow night. Angie told me the program and it's all stuff I love so that should be good. (I was in choir for many years. I used to be able to sing second tenor down to bass back in the day)

I'm off - sorry for boring you so - Have a fine weekend.