[dtaylor]

Hi David,

In my 28+ years running a shop, I have dealt with this more times than I care to admit. The bottom line is you are worrying about this more than the tech is. You have taken his problem and made it your own. Believe me, I have done the same thing and will continue to do so from time to time because I care about people. You have a responsibility to this guy to help him and that is most likely in the form of booting him out the door. Anything else, will just enable him to continue on his downward spiral.

My most recent experience with this lasted about 3 years. We had two techs screwing up big time, so I called them both in and told them I was done propping them up to do subpar work and the next careless mistake would be corrected on their dime. Both techs immediately went down to having almost no come backs or costly mistakes. This lasted for about 2.5 years until one of the techs started behaving erratically and calling in sick alot. I let it go a couple times and the 3rd time had him drug tested when he came back to work. He failed the test and I fired him on the spot. My stress level went down and the rest of my crew, (who knew he had a drug problem), had better attitudes as a result.

Don’t let other people’s problems worry you more than they worry them. It will put you in an early grave.

Blessings to you as you try to work through this. I know it’s tough.