Bad Drafter Disciplinary Actions

[charlie.bauer341340]

Time off for the infraction would also send a message to the others in the department that this behavior will no longer be tolerated, but that being said if you have an ostrage for a boss then let the individual and the rest of the department of how much additional time was required to make the deadline. Bring it home in dollars and cents. Say it cost an additional $5,000 dollars and say your organization gives out bonuses. Divide that loss among the drafting department say you have 10 drafters that could be a potential loss of $500 per drafter. When someone has to think of their own pocket they may think about changing their attitude.

[robert.1.hall72202]

If hourly:
I would recommend time off without pay for someone that doesn't like to get
with the program.

If salary:
I would recommend making giving 2-3 weeks of full day weeked work to fix
the issue and/or push ahead on other projects because of the time loss in
fixing the problematic drawing.


I would hesistate to fire somebody for messing up a print. It happens every
once in awhile in any CAD position. If the drafter has excellent CAD skills,
then reinforce their training. Give them a break! In my book, 1 or 2 snafoos
in a quarter is human error.

[stusic]

If hourly:
I would recommend time off without pay for someone that doesn't like to get
with the program.

If salary:
I would recommend making giving 2-3 weeks of full day weeked work to fix
the issue and/or push ahead on other projects because of the time loss in
fixing the problematic drawing.


I would hesistate to fire somebody for messing up a print. It happens every
once in awhile in any CAD position. If the drafter has excellent CAD skills,
then reinforce their training. Give them a break! In my book, 1 or 2 snafoos
in a quarter is human error.

Not a bad idea, however: 1) He messes up a lot, this just happened to be a major error. 2) He knows CAD, but he's old school and doesn't like to use tools (that are required to follow standards) that weren't available when he started using CAD.

He copies things from other drawings and modifies them to fit the current job. For example, at the end of a job he'll have copied enough stuff from other jobs that there'll be 8 different layers for cold water piping because he's copied this from this job and that from that job, etc. And he doesn't put them on the correct layer.

He doesn't use Osnaps (for the most part), so all his drawings are incredibly hard to work on. No, correction, they're wrong. And the head cheeses don't want to take any disciplinary actions because he's been here so long; it might hurt his feelings.

I mean geez, I had to tell him that he had to make a new PDF every time he changed a drawing. C'mon, give me a break...

We're in the process of preparing to upgrade to 2006 and I'm terrified at what he'll do to things we're going to implement, like sheet sets and dynamic blocks. It's scary; I have nightmares...

It seems like that a lot around here, he's just the worst of the lot. I know the first question I'm going to get is "How do I get my old command line back?".

What's the sense in upgrading and ignoring all the new tools - tools that increase your productivity? That's why companies upgrade - to get new tools that help drafters and designers be more efficient, more productive. If you're going to take a new release and turn it into the old release, why upgrade at all?

It's people like this guy that keep my company from getting streamlined in our projects. I've said that moving in the direction of a 3D environment would be especially beneficial to our company because we handle all aspects of design on many of our projects, from conception to construction, and my bosses have all agreed. However, this guy, along with a few others, would not be able to make that move, hence, we cannot make that move. This is slowing our whole company down.

How do you get fresh talent in a company that won't let go of the old, lame dogs?

[Doodlemusmaximus]

I can see that it must be frustrating to have to do all that back work. I would suggest as others give them a chance to redeam themselves, that way you're not on a loseing streak with having to re-train personel and for that mater finding them in the first place. If need be just suggest a talking to rather than a warning, but just keep a note of it somewhere so that you remember it. Not that I think you would forget it in a hurry.
I know they made a mistake that is a cardinal sin for most firms but in the grand scheme of things there may have been a reason whuy they did what they did. You need to find that out as they may not be totally to blame for it. They may have been under pressure else where to make the changes required.

What ever happens bare in mind that it is a small select industry that you might end up relying on this person to vouch for you at some time in the furture, so be aware.

[stusic]

I can see that it must be frustrating to have to do all that back work. I would suggest as others give them a chance to redeam themselves, that way you're not on a loseing streak with having to re-train personel and for that mater finding them in the first place. If need be just suggest a talking to rather than a warning, but just keep a note of it somewhere so that you remember it. Not that I think you would forget it in a hurry.
I know they made a mistake that is a cardinal sin for most firms but in the grand scheme of things there may have been a reason whuy they did what they did. You need to find that out as they may not be totally to blame for it. They may have been under pressure else where to make the changes required.

What ever happens bare in mind that it is a small select industry that you might end up relying on this person to vouch for you at some time in the furture, so be aware.

Yeah, I'm not trying to be unfair or harsh, but he's slowing EVERYONE down with his inability to keep up. I said let him go because I'm fed up. I still don't think it'd be a bad idea, but I do see where a little flexibility could be useful too. But geez, he needs to get with the times or I'm going to have to spend all my time fixing his problems until he or I retire, whichever comes first. Most likely it'll be me. From a heart attack.

[charlie.bauer341340]

If you can talk dollars to higher ups they will listen. Keep track of how long it takes different individuals to do the same task in your group. That way you can document how much money they are loosing allowing someone to not use tools designed to expedite the design process. Most companies are in business to make money and when they are shown an area where it is loosing money they will try to correct the problem. The only way to overcome the hands off attitude is show them how it affects their pocketbook.

[stusic]

If you can talk dollars to higher ups they will listen. Keep track of how long it takes different individuals to do the same task in your group. That way you can document how much money they are loosing allowing someone to not use tools designed to expedite the design process. Most companies are in business to make money and when they are shown an area where it is loosing money they will try to correct the problem. The only way to overcome the hands off attitude is show them how it affects their pocketbook.

You know, you're right. I was thinking that, through all the complaining from other drafters, they would have seen their dollars going down the drain, but you may be right. If I can show them how long a standard task should take and show them how long it takes them to complete the task and convert that over into a dollar amount, they may just listen.

Next question: What kind of task should it be? Every projects a little different and presents different obstacles, so how can I make it standard enough to use for something like this? If someone's job may depend on it, it certainly needs to be fair and well thought out.

[charlie.bauer341340]

Base your calculations on sq. footage, say 100,000 sf. Keep track of all drafters. After several jobs there will be a pattern start to emerge, do this for 6 mos. to a year and do it as a general observation not publishing who took how long to do anything just categorize it by degrees of tool usage. If you can demonstrate that the new way is really faster a lot of people will try to make the change. Do this with the idea of motivating current operators, later it can easily be converted to dollars and cents it the need would arise

[H-Angus]

Do your staff have to keep track of what hours they have worked on certain jobs for billing purposes? We basically have an excel file per job (We call them project history sheets) and any time spent on a particular job gets logged so that at the end of each month I can calculate which work has been previously quoted for and which work together with number of hours I can charge as an extra.

Anyway what I'm getting at if you do have some sort of hour logging then you could compare this persons work hours with some of your other staff. If its as bad as your making out then you can give these comparisons to your superiors and let them act accordingly.

[robert.1.hall72202]

He copies things from other drawings and modifies them to fit the current job. For example, at the end of a job he'll have copied enough stuff from other jobs that there'll be 8 different layers for cold water piping because he's copied this from this job and that from that job, etc. And he doesn't put them on the correct layer.

I completely agree with you on that one! Took me awhile to convince my Cad comrad that it pays to create things from scratch. I still find instances where objects have been copied.
I think this is an issue that can never be corrected. There is always a sense that reusing older data will speed up a project.