By Gary Markle
Sandra was an international auditor who had faithfully traveled to inspect company billing procedures in countries all around the world for more than sixteen years. Jet lag was an occupational hazard.
But the second time in three weeks her boss caught her snoring at her desk in the early afternoon, he was ready to put her employment to an end.
Once upon a time, Sandra had earned high praise from those she audited. Positive feedback was plentiful as she moved steadily up the professional ladder.
Now all concerned wanted her fired. Embarrassed, Sandra’s CFO accompanied the Audit Director to HR to make it so.
Robert, the company’s HR Director, not uncharacteristically, put a monkey wrench in the pathway to rapid resolution. Sandra’s personnel file was full of nothing but superlatives. In fact, he recalled vividly the push from management to give Sandra a larger-than-standard budget for the tough duty she pulled on a grueling six-month assignment in Israel.
Neither executive could logically explain Sandra’s sudden and profound fall from grace. They had turned the other cheek for more than a month now. They had a job to fill and they needed to move on.
Robert asked to personally interview Sandra before they made a final decision.
That’s when the Audit Director reported that Sandra’s excuse was going to be that her son was fighting in the Gulf war. She literally cries about him being a Marine on the front lines. “Yes, he’s in the Marines, but the truth is he is just a cook!”
The HR Director had to bite his tongue. Slowly he proceeded to say that it might not look good for the company to terminate a long-term recently high-performing employee suffering from stress caused by her youngest son fighting for our flag and country.
Sitting down with Sandra, the HR leader confirmed everything said previously. With dark lines under each eye and a slumped-over zombie-like posture, Sandra looked and spoke like someone under enormous pressure. Technically her son was a cook, but he was cooking in a war zone and she was terrified for his well-being. She had been staying up all night for weeks glued to cable news listening for any updates about US soldiers.
That story had worn paper thin with the overtaxed accounting executives who had important work that was not getting done. They continued to push for dismissal. There was ample precedent for terminating employees found sleeping on the job in operations. Why should it be different for office staff?
The HR Director put Sandra on temporary leave and required her to get a physical to see if there was anything physically wrong with her. She also submitted to a comprehensive drug test. She passed both. She had no clear illness and was not on drugs.
Without a name for the problem, it was about to be declared a willful dereliction of duty. A decision to dismiss seemed the only logical outcome.
Robert tried one final Hail Mary. A comprehensive sleep test. He called a university hospital with expertise in this area and set up an overnight sleep study.
Two days later, the results were in. Sandra had an acute medical condition that made it physically impossible for her to sleep. No matter how long she lay in bed each night, she was getting almost no REM sleep. The senior clinician who administered the test reported that these were some of the worst numbers he’d ever seen. Sandra was diagnosed with both severe sleep Apnea and Hypopnea. At this rate, she was risking serious long term health issues if her sleep habits weren’t drastically improved. No wonder she couldn’t function at work!
Robert initiated medical leave for Sandra and she was given a treatment plan that included both medication and a newly invented device called a CPAP machine.
The improvement was almost instantaneous. Within six weeks, she was able to return to work with a smile on her face and gratitude in her heart.
It’s infuriating when a worker does something completely irresponsible and self-destructive – like sleeping on the job. On closer examination, however, sometimes the illogical actually makes sense. By taking a team approach and digging for a root cause, they not only saved a valuable employee’s job, but also her life.
Have you ever experienced a many-layered puzzle like the one posed by Sandra? Did you take the easy path or the high road in resolving it? What does the option taken say about your company? How do decisions like this define your culture?
I’d like to hear your experiences with this.
Garold (Gary) Markle is the creator of Catalytic Coaching and author of Catalytic Coaching: The End of the Performance Review. He brings real world experience from 17 years in HR leadership in major corporations coupled with over 20 years of teaching small and mid-sized organizations how to cultivate their leadership, retain employees, develop their talent, and increase profitability by ditching their detrimental performance reviews for a proven Coaching process.
