Need to reboot. Help me set expectations.

[Anonymous]

New nanny has nine hours of her 40 hour work week without kids (three hours three days a week). During her first week, she was proactive and rearranged some toys and straightened up a bookshelf. Before she started, we discussed that she would use the time for family meal prep, errands as needed, and helping with light housekeeping: vacuuming and dusting of main level and kids rooms (no bathrooms, no scrubbing floors - just vacuum, help dust). Like I said, week one was fine. By week two, she was using her "free" time to run her own errands and apparently accomplish little no nothing at our house - not even keeping up with kids' laundry, something that has never been a problem in the nine years we've employed nannies, despite there being at least one child home all the time. This is the first year when there are hours with no children at all.

Help me hit the reset button with this nanny, without coming down on her like a ton of bricks. If I had nine hours of kid free time during the week, holy smokes would I be organized, clean, and on top of the short list of tasks she has. I think part of the problem is that we are a mismatch on what we consider "clean". For her, chunks of bread on the floor and carrot sticks under the counter (literally) aren't a big deal. I sweep after every meal. She thinks our house is immaculate when it is apparent to even my husband - someone who will NEVER be accused of being a clean freak - that the house needed a good cleaning (we have been cleaning ourselves but I skipped the last weekend knowing we'd have someone coming on Friday).

I would appreciate any advice from BTDT parents. This is honestly the first nanny I've had that seems to have a significantly lower housekeeping standard than I do, and a much lower work ethic as well. She seems to think she is a hard worker, yet is not completing the same work that other nannies have managed just fine with kids around, never mind the tasks she's supposed to be doing during her "free" hours.

To be clear, we don't leave a disaster to be cleaned up. We've done kids laundry this weekend, our kitchen is scrubbed, our fridge is stocked. Help me politely light a fire under this woman so she figures out that part of her job is DOING HER JOB.

[Anonymous]

I would write out a list that is explicit.

Not just "sweep kitchen floor" but "Sweep kitchen floor and make sure there is no food or crumbs on floor."

Not just "Do laundry" but "Do Kylie's laundry on Mondays, Kourtney's laundry on Wednesdays, and Khloe's laundry on Fridays."

Then tell her you'd like to sit down and go over how things are going. (Either pay overtime or get home early before she's scheduled to leave.) Tell her "The first week went really great - you totally hit it out of the park and did everything wonderfully. But beginning the second week we've noticed you've been using those kid-free nine hours to do your own errands during time we're paying you, and you're now leaving chunks of bread and carrot sticks on the kitchen floor. What happened from Week One to Week Two? Do you think you can see yourself getting back to your Week One Standard?"

[Anonymous]

Giver her a weekly list and the option of doing housework or not getting paid for those hours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would write out a list that is explicit.

Not just "sweep kitchen floor" but "Sweep kitchen floor and make sure there is no food or crumbs on floor."

Not just "Do laundry" but "Do Kylie's laundry on Mondays, Kourtney's laundry on Wednesdays, and Khloe's laundry on Fridays."

Then tell her you'd like to sit down and go over how things are going. (Either pay overtime or get home early before she's scheduled to leave.) Tell her "The first week went really great - you totally hit it out of the park and did everything wonderfully. But beginning the second week we've noticed you've been using those kid-free nine hours to do your own errands during time we're paying you, and you're now leaving chunks of bread and carrot sticks on the kitchen floor. What happened from Week One to Week Two? Do you think you can see yourself getting back to your Week One Standard?"

Nanny here. I definitely agree with this method! The only thing that I would change would be to ask her which day(s) she will be doing each task. Personally, I prefer to do all kid laundry on the same day, other kid tasks on other days. And if you ask which days, she's more likely to stick to the schedule. But sit down with her and write a schedule, include absolutely everything, even if there are things that only need to be done once or twice a month.

[Anonymous]

I think you should try being more specific with her about what it is that you want accomplished during those hours. You've listed a lot of things here and hopefully you both can have a realistic discussion of what you'd like to see done on a daily/weekly basis.

Also, try to be realistic about the amount of time she has to work with. 9 hours/week in a 5 day week is just under 2 hours per day. If she is doing preschool drop off and pick-up, she could very well only have an hour each day to get done what you're asking. She's not going to be able to do kid laundry, prep your meals, run errands, and vacuum your house in an hour a day.

[Anonymous]

The only way to deal with this is to be explicit and direct, without being rude or demeaning. Tell her respectfully that her performance seems to be off lately and there are some issues you need to address and then explain what they are. After this happened to us, we created a set of house rules and policies so that there would be no confusion regarding what we believed nanny's job responsibilities to be (and what was prohibited). We sat down with the nanny and went over it, and the work improved. Now, a new nanny gets a copy before they agree to take the job, so they can select out if they do not agree with our expectations or we can negotiate and attempt to resolve any issues ahead of time. It really has solved a lot of problems.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think you should try being more specific with her about what it is that you want accomplished during those hours. You've listed a lot of things here and hopefully you both can have a realistic discussion of what you'd like to see done on a daily/weekly basis.

Also, try to be realistic about the amount of time she has to work with. 9 hours/week in a 5 day week is just under 2 hours per day. If she is doing preschool drop off and pick-up, she could very well only have an hour each day to get done what you're asking. She's not going to be able to do kid laundry, prep your meals, run errands, and vacuum your house in an hour a day.

OP here. Agree that being more specific will be helpful. In an effort to avoid micromanaging, I figured I'd give her the general expectations and allow her to manage her time; that does not seem to be happening, though.

As for being realistic about the amount of time she has to work with, that nine hours per week is genuinely nine hours. She has three days with a three hour block of time between when she should be returning from preschool drop off to departing for preschool pick up. It's a 3.5 hour preschool day, and it's a ten minute drive to preschool, so at most it's 15 minutes for drop off and 15 minutes for pick up. That leaves her three hours to "kill" each of the three days. It's not an hour here or an hour there, it really is three hours. I also don't expect meals, errands and vacuuming to occur simultaneously; errands would be a once/week event, if that, and unless she is sitting in the laundry room watching the machines spin, kid laundry does not in any way come close to consuming that time. I do expect her to manage her time and be efficient. If she's just wildly inefficient, I don't have a desire to pay for that. If I can manage to throw in a load of laundry, prepare a meal for 30 minutes, throw laundry in the dryer, run a vacuum for 10-15 minutes, and then fold laundry in the afternoon, I am baffled as to why she's not able to do even less than that. And I am NOT superhero efficient by any means.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would write out a list that is explicit.

Not just "sweep kitchen floor" but "Sweep kitchen floor and make sure there is no food or crumbs on floor."

Not just "Do laundry" but "Do Kylie's laundry on Mondays, Kourtney's laundry on Wednesdays, and Khloe's laundry on Fridays."

Then tell her you'd like to sit down and go over how things are going. (Either pay overtime or get home early before she's scheduled to leave.) Tell her "The first week went really great - you totally hit it out of the park and did everything wonderfully. But beginning the second week we've noticed you've been using those kid-free nine hours to do your own errands during time we're paying you, and you're now leaving chunks of bread and carrot sticks on the kitchen floor. What happened from Week One to Week Two? Do you think you can see yourself getting back to your Week One Standard?"

Just wanted to note that I laughed when thinking of my kids as the Kardashians. I feel very fortunate right about now that they are not!

[Anonymous]

I think she is not a good fit for you.

I think you should try to find a nanny.

Reason #1- I think if you tried to work it out, you might make an angry nanny who takes it out on your kids (not directly but in some way.)

Reason #2- There are people who are mature enough to handle 9 hours of kid-free times. There are people who aren't. I think you just got someone who is not mature enough to act responsibility. You are not going to change a lifetime of bad habits by having one talk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think she is not a good fit for you.

I think you should try to find a nanny.

Reason #1- I think if you tried to work it out, you might make an angry nanny who takes it out on your kids (not directly but in some way.)

Reason #2- There are people who are mature enough to handle 9 hours of kid-free times. There are people who aren't. I think you just got someone who is not mature enough to act responsibility. You are not going to change a lifetime of bad habits by having one talk.

I also suspect this is true, but nothing is lost by giving her one more chance to make it right.

[Anonymous]

Maybe the nanny thinks OP isn't paying enough.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe the nanny thinks OP isn't paying enough.

Yes may be OP is not paying good and come on some many stuff to do in 2 hr and every nannies are supporting the OP.....come on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:New nanny has nine hours of her 40 hour work week without kids (three hours three days a week). During her first week, she was proactive and rearranged some toys and straightened up a bookshelf. Before she started, we discussed that she would use the time for family meal prep, errands as needed, and helping with light housekeeping: vacuuming and dusting of main level and kids rooms (no bathrooms, no scrubbing floors - just vacuum, help dust). Like I said, week one was fine. By week two, she was using her "free" time to run her own errands and apparently accomplish little no nothing at our house - not even keeping up with kids' laundry, something that has never been a problem in the nine years we've employed nannies, despite there being at least one child home all the time. This is the first year when there are hours with no children at all.

Help me hit the reset button with this nanny, without coming down on her like a ton of bricks. If I had nine hours of kid free time during the week, holy smokes would I be organized, clean, and on top of the short list of tasks she has. I think part of the problem is that we are a mismatch on what we consider "clean". For her, chunks of bread on the floor and carrot sticks under the counter (literally) aren't a big deal. I sweep after every meal. She thinks our house is immaculate when it is apparent to even my husband - someone who will NEVER be accused of being a clean freak - that the house needed a good cleaning (we have been cleaning ourselves but I skipped the last weekend knowing we'd have someone coming on Friday).

I would appreciate any advice from BTDT parents. This is honestly the first nanny I've had that seems to have a significantly lower housekeeping standard than I do, and a much lower work ethic as well. She seems to think she is a hard worker, yet is not completing the same work that other nannies have managed just fine with kids around, never mind the tasks she's supposed to be doing during her "free" hours.

To be clear, we don't leave a disaster to be cleaned up. We've done kids laundry this weekend, our kitchen is scrubbed, our fridge is stocked. Help me politely light a fire under this woman so she figures out that part of her job is DOING HER JOB.

I would never work with this OP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:New nanny has nine hours of her 40 hour work week without kids (three hours three days a week). During her first week, she was proactive and rearranged some toys and straightened up a bookshelf. Before she started, we discussed that she would use the time for family meal prep, errands as needed, and helping with light housekeeping: vacuuming and dusting of main level and kids rooms (no bathrooms, no scrubbing floors - just vacuum, help dust). Like I said, week one was fine. By week two, she was using her "free" time to run her own errands and apparently accomplish little no nothing at our house - not even keeping up with kids' laundry, something that has never been a problem in the nine years we've employed nannies, despite there being at least one child home all the time. This is the first year when there are hours with no children at all.

Help me hit the reset button with this nanny, without coming down on her like a ton of bricks. If I had nine hours of kid free time during the week, holy smokes would I be organized, clean, and on top of the short list of tasks she has. I think part of the problem is that we are a mismatch on what we consider "clean". For her, chunks of bread on the floor and carrot sticks under the counter (literally) aren't a big deal. I sweep after every meal. She thinks our house is immaculate when it is apparent to even my husband - someone who will NEVER be accused of being a clean freak - that the house needed a good cleaning (we have been cleaning ourselves but I skipped the last weekend knowing we'd have someone coming on Friday).

I would appreciate any advice from BTDT parents. This is honestly the first nanny I've had that seems to have a significantly lower housekeeping standard than I do, and a much lower work ethic as well. She seems to think she is a hard worker, yet is not completing the same work that other nannies have managed just fine with kids around, never mind the tasks she's supposed to be doing during her "free" hours.

To be clear, we don't leave a disaster to be cleaned up. We've done kids laundry this weekend, our kitchen is scrubbed, our fridge is stocked. Help me politely light a fire under this woman so she figures out that part of her job is DOING HER JOB.

I would never work with this OP.

9.37 here. You may not, but there are plenty of us (myself included) who would be happy to work with this family, depending on rate and benefits of course. Given that OP has never had this issue in 9 years of employing nannies, I think that speaks well of her as an employer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:New nanny has nine hours of her 40 hour work week without kids (three hours three days a week). During her first week, she was proactive and rearranged some toys and straightened up a bookshelf. Before she started, we discussed that she would use the time for family meal prep, errands as needed, and helping with light housekeeping: vacuuming and dusting of main level and kids rooms (no bathrooms, no scrubbing floors - just vacuum, help dust). Like I said, week one was fine. By week two, she was using her "free" time to run her own errands and apparently accomplish little no nothing at our house - not even keeping up with kids' laundry, something that has never been a problem in the nine years we've employed nannies, despite there being at least one child home all the time. This is the first year when there are hours with no children at all.

Help me hit the reset button with this nanny, without coming down on her like a ton of bricks. If I had nine hours of kid free time during the week, holy smokes would I be organized, clean, and on top of the short list of tasks she has. I think part of the problem is that we are a mismatch on what we consider "clean". For her, chunks of bread on the floor and carrot sticks under the counter (literally) aren't a big deal. I sweep after every meal. She thinks our house is immaculate when it is apparent to even my husband - someone who will NEVER be accused of being a clean freak - that the house needed a good cleaning (we have been cleaning ourselves but I skipped the last weekend knowing we'd have someone coming on Friday).

I would appreciate any advice from BTDT parents. This is honestly the first nanny I've had that seems to have a significantly lower housekeeping standard than I do, and a much lower work ethic as well. She seems to think she is a hard worker, yet is not completing the same work that other nannies have managed just fine with kids around, never mind the tasks she's supposed to be doing during her "free" hours.

To be clear, we don't leave a disaster to be cleaned up. We've done kids laundry this weekend, our kitchen is scrubbed, our fridge is stocked. Help me politely light a fire under this woman so she figures out that part of her job is DOING HER JOB.

I would never work with this OP.

9.37 here. You may not, but there are plenty of us (myself included) who would be happy to work with this family, depending on rate and benefits of course. Given that OP has never had this issue in 9 years of employing nannies, I think that speaks well of her as an employer.

So next time don't complain your MB is making you do all house work and how do you know her previous nannies not having any issues. This is a one sided story and we know nothing about the nanny , stop judging. You must be the OP.