Employee headaches

Hello All,

Well, the last few weeks have been very busy and stressful for poor David. As our business grows the more employees we need; and with more employees comes more headaches. We had 13 employees going into September; however one of our employees we had to let go 2 weeks ago because she just wasn't pulling her weight and we couldn't trust her. She spent most of her time talking with either her boyfriend or the customers. We had complaint after complaint from the other employees who would be working like crazy doing everything while she just stood around and chit chatted. We spoke to her on many occassions about this, but nothing seemed to change her work ethic. Then we caught her cheating on her timesheet, adding hours that she hadn't actually worked. When I confronted her about it she made up an excuse that was just as bad. "She filled in her timesheet earlier in the evening guessing what time she would finish."

Another of our employees (one of our best!) was planning to leave us in January because she is going away to college in Florida. She informed us 2 weeks ago that she was leaving this Friday instead. So David and I hired Sebastian, the 16 year-old son of some good friends of ours, Flip and Sue. Sue is also one of our employees; she bakes 5 nights a week for us. Her husband Flip is the one doing all the carpentry/design work with David on our new cafe building. (oh did I mention that the carpenter we hired bailed on us 3 weeks ago.) Anyhow, another employee, Tess, informed us last week that she had been offered a better position at her full-time work location. So she will be leaving us this week because they require her to now work weekends. So David and I hired Harrison to work weekends. Harrision was the second employee we hired when we first opened 3 1/2 years ago. He was then a highschool student. When he graduated 2 years ago he headed off to college in Florida. Well, now he is back in Connecticut going to college in Hartford. He'll work for us Friday and Saturday nights. Finally, this Monday rolled around and our employee Sarah, who has been with us for about 3 months working 3 mornings a week, didn't show up for work. After calling her she informed me that she really didn't want to work here anymore because the mornings were too early for her. It wasn't convenient for her late night partying. Maybe she could have told me that last week instead of just pulling a no-show.

Adding to the headaches of employee changes..... Sue informed us last week that she is going to England for 10 days to visit her sick father and taking Sebastian with her to look at colleges there. They left last night. So this coming week we are short 5 employees. My head is spinning. I'm not sure how any employees I have now. We'll also be losing yet another employee, Joy, in February...she'll be having a baby.

It would be much easier if my sister and her family, and my brother in California would all move back to this area. I know you would all love to work at the cafe....right? :-)