3 Reasons Your Employees Are Always Late

You see it day in and day out. In fact, you’re beginning to lose your patience with it. After all, you manage to arrive at your desk ahead of schedule and are ready to go when 9am rolls around, so why aren’t your employees? Don’t they care? Do they want to see your business go under? Are they being belligerent or just plain slovenly? You’ve tried to be nice about it. You made a few half-joking remarked that became unofficial verbal warnings that became official verbal warnings… And yet certain members of your team are still persistently turning up late.

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Before you hit them with both barrels, however, it’s worth employing a little empathy. Take the time to learn why your employees are consistently late. You may find that it’s easy to implement a solution. The reasons for employee tardiness are many and varied and unless you take steps to remedy it, you may find that the issue becomes compounded. Potential issues include…

They couldn’t find a parking space

Is it possible your small victim has become a victim of its own success, drawing in more customers and clients than you have the physical infrastructure to handle? If so, you may find that your diminutive carpark gets full faster than you’d imagined. So eager are your customers to get in early ahead of the crowds, that your employees may get onto the premises on time but struggle to get to their workstations by 9am (or whenever their shift starts). Perhaps it might be worth talking to Eastern Concrete about getting your car park extended. What’s more, an extension of your carpark projects an image of ongoing success for employees and customers alike.

They’re no longer as motivated as they used to be

You know where they live, you know how long it takes to get to work… And yet you still see them turn up late. It can be infuriating, but it may not actually be their fault. It could actually be yours. If your employees no longer feel motivated, stimulated or rewarded they may feel less inclined to make the extra effort to be at their desk on time.

Rather than reducing their emotional investment in their job further by instigating disciplinary measures, maybe you should have a talk with them and see how you can make them fall back in love with their job. Ask them what incentives you can offer that they’re not getting, how you can assist them in smashing their targets or how you can make them feel more supported.

They’re exhausted

Maybe the problem isn’t that they don’t care enough… It’s that they care too much. If your employees are the last in but they’re also the last out, maybe their dedication isn’t the problem… Maybe they’re just exhausted.

Highly motivated employees can not only find themselves staying behind for longer hours (even if there’s no overtime in it for them), they can also find themselves taking their work home with them literally and metaphorically causing them to lose sleep.

Give them an opportunity to take time off, even if they’re initially resistant to the idea. Plan company retreats and opportunities to relax and bond as a team. Your business will be all the better for it.

And best of all, you’ll wave goodbye to tardiness!