Employee not wanting to travel

acctgboy

I have an employee who refuses to travel by plane to long distance seminars. She is willing to drive to seminars that are 200-300 miles away but some seminars are too far to reasonably drive. The seminars are related to her job duties but she insists that she will not go. These seminars are offered once a year and we have to go where ever they are held. Do I have any recourse?

sonny

And she refuses to go because???

acctgboy

Her reason for not going is "personal reasons".

Travel was not a consideration for her hire. In the past all the pertinent seminars were within 200 miles. She has willingly attended these. But now the agency sponsoring the seminars is having them further away from our location.

JulieP

When she was hired, did she agree that this would be part of her job?

Don D

Although you would be home free (in terminating) if she agreed or knew of the requirement and you had it in writing as a pre-hire expectation, if you can demonstrate that the training is essential and without it she/he cannot provide value to the company, you should move toward termination if you cannot get her/him to budge. Now let's hear from the ADA prophets who see a disability caused by a flying phobia.

What you might consider is paying the lesser of the cost of a plane ticket or automobile travel and if the auto travel is more expensive and takes longer, let her/him handle the additional cost/time on their own.

Shawn

Have you thought of telling her that if she travels via car that she is responsible for eating the travel cost and using vacation time for her travel time? If she is willing to do that, then let her. If not, then require her to go via plane or face termination.

pecohr

Are any of the seminars available via another format, i.e. video, cd rom?

acctgboy

Not aware of any other format.

Don D

I wouldn't go there. You are under no obligation, nor does it make good business sense, to restructure your training objectives and methods simply because an employee has another preference. A video conference or on line seminar does not add nearly the value as an interactive classroom full of people eager to learn and participate. It's like comparing a correspondence course to a freshman college semester.

pecohr

Don D.
While I do not usually disagree with you (and must say that I have learned alot from your posts) I must respectfully disagree. As an experienced training and development coordinator I have often found the some people do very well with professionally prepared video or cd rom materials. Live presentations do not alway guarantee meaningful learning experiences (as demonstrated by a class I attended last night, presenter was clearly unprepared and had several errors in the materials presented). The stress of a phobia would potentially have a huge impact on this individuals ability to meaningfully participate in the seminar.

Now having said that if this individual just doesn't want to go that's another matter and should be dealt with as a performance issue.

IMHO

Stuart

Don D

Stuart: Thanks for your view. I perfectly agree. But, it's my assumption that the individual simply doesn't want to go. Now, if we do have any information that might reveal a fear or phobia or rational explanation for the refusal, I too might opt for something on-line or remote. But, only in that case.

acctgboy

Thanks for all your responses.

There's something wrong when the people who should be making decisions can't and don't and the people who shouldn't be making decisions can and do.

BTW, I understand the Dixie Chicks are giving an interview to apologize about there statement. My feeling is that there is a line between using and abusing a privilege. How many times have you sat still at a green light because a pedestrian casually strolls across the street assuming that because he/she has the right of way they have the right to hold up traffic. Oops. Sorry. Wrong forum.