Reply to What do you all think - nanny called in sick today after only one week on the job

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP, I'm an MB.

Keep looking.  Let this nanny take you through the holidays (and through the trial period you've established - and good for you for setting that up!).  In the meantime find someone about whom you have a better "gut" instinct.

[b]I totally agree that someone can get sick at any time - we're all human.  And I don't want my child getting sick through someone not taking a sick day when it's necessary.  But if I were in my second week on a job and wanted to keep the job I would give as much notice as possible, call not text, be extremely apologetic and try to sincerely convey that I would only be taking the day off if it was critically necessary.[/b]

It doesn't sound like your nanny exerted herself at all to build/develop/maintain your confidence in her.  And it sounds like you already have some other concerns about her performance.  This is what a trial period is for.

If you decide to let her go right before xmas (assuming that's even a holiday for you and/or her) then you can always be generous with severance to acknowledge the holiday.

Your child will bond with other people also.  Turnover is a nightmare but you want a strong, long-term, trusting relationship with your nanny.  When you have concerns on day 6 that's a problem.

Good luck![/quote]

I agree with most of your points, however, [b]we don't really know that the nanny DIDN'T do these things. We know she texted. That's it.[/b] 
We don't know what their agreement on calling out was (I have had employers who prefer a text, especially if it is at 5:30 AM). We don't know what she said or how apologetic she was.

The assumption, it seems like all of the time, is that the nanny is being shady and that somehow every MBs "gut" feelings are always 100% accurate (definitely never influenced by uncertainty with a new nanny, external stressors, etc).  Presumably, OP put a lot of effort into finding this nanny, shouldn't she exert a bit more find out if she is worth keeping around?[/quote]

Yes, that's true.  I find it's often difficult to respond effectively because we can never know the full situation - only one side of things, as presented in a pretty limited way.  So there may very well be another side to the story (as there often is).  But my basic point is that if you're new on a job and have to take time off there are ways to be cavalier about it, or ways to communicate sincere intentions about commitment etc...   And I guess that could be done by text (at least to some extent) but it just didn't sound like this person way trying particularly hard to let her brand new employer know that she would be at work if she could.

So I was going w/ what I was reading between OP's lines.    And I do put a lot of faith in gut instincts - but that goes for nannies as well as MBs (and for kids also BTW).   I don't always assume the nanny is shady - I think there are plenty of rotten bosses also.  But with this forum we can only work with what we're given - which is automatically limited and biased from the get go.

If the OP loves the job the nanny is doing then absolutely work with her and hope this was an aberration.  If this is just one more worrisome thing to happen in the first 6 days on the job then I think that there are many more qualified, excellent, trust-worthy nannies out there.

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