A feeling of entitlement

[JBK405]

Right now my company is hiring for the summer months and, as the head of the department, I'm personally planning on hiring about thirty people for the upcoming season. Earlier today I gave the first training course of the year, it's a one afternoon affair, about three or four hours, where we go over the details and procedures of the position. This is not a rigorous or intensive event, in essence if you just show up you have the job, but there is one hitch: It's unpaid training. Always has been and, unless something changes drastically, always will be. I don't try to hide that from applicants, if anybody asks I explain that the training is not paid, but I also don't go out of my way to explain to everybody that there's no money, I always asumed that, if they didn't ask, they would assume that the training was unpaid. Afterall, I assume that most of the things I do in life will be unpaid unless somebody tells me othewrise. However, not everyody is on the same wavelength as me, and many people showed up today under the impression that it would be a paid affair. When informed that it would not be paid, after they asked more than halfway through the event, one of the people actually got up and left. Then, and here's the kicker, he called me and left an irate voicemail about how we dare have unpaid training, and what is wrong with us, and he could not believe we thought anybody should be forced to show up without getting paid.

Now, I can completely understand wanting to have paid training. Most of our current employees, when I asked their opinions, explained that they also thought that their training should have been paid, and if I was in their position, I'd want to be paid, too. However, I would have checked. I personally spoke to this applicant a few weeks ago when he first applied, it was a ten-minute meet-and-greet where I outlined the general position, and I mentioned that there was a one-day training session. During this meeting I asked, it must have been ten times, if he had any questions. Asking if he had any questions was literally the first and last things I said to him, not counting "Thanks for coming" and "Have a nice day." Last week our secretaries called him to inform him of the training date and time and when to come in. When he got here earlier today he spent close to an hour in the front office filling out additional paperwork, then about five minutes with me before we began the actual course. At no point during any of this, which is spoken conversations on three separate occasions, did he ask in any way, shape or form if there was compensation for this days course. Then, when we were already two hours into the session and after we had already finished the training and were about to move onto their demonstration of capablity, he asks if it's paid, and leaves in a huff when he learns it wasn't. Two hours in.

Like I said, I have absolutely no objection to a person wanting paid training. This is a low-paying job (I managed to get a raise into the position for this year, but it's still low-paying) and I'd want as much more money as I could get, but to assume that you are automatically entitled to paid training? Before you've demonstrated that you can do the job? To be insulted when we don't offer paid training? To actually call and berate me over that?

I completely understand deciding to pass on the job if there isn't paid training, some people are looking for work to supplement jobs they already have and need to take time off and can't afford to just skip a day of work, but if you don't bother to check, I don't think you have a right to complain afterwards. I won't hold it against you to not come to the training, but to come and leave tells me one thing: You're a doche. Everybody I spoke to about the incident, including those who also believe that the training should be paid, agree that he should have checked himself, and not bothered to show up if it mattered that much to him. As it is, when he didn't even think to ask the question in advance, he was not entitled to anything.

Thoughts?

[Corrina]

First, the guy was totally out of line to behave like that when he found out. That's completely unprofessional and wrong.

Second, if I was filling out paperwork and going to a company site, yeah, I'd absolutely assume I was getting paid. You've in a business environment, there's no clue to lead you to believe that you are not being paid.

I think that's something you should tell people right up front "you have the job but there's a one-day training session that is not paid." I would state it explicitly so there's no misunderstanding. If someone objects and refuses to show up for an unpaid session, well, then you'll weed out the troublemakers right away.

[Reverend Smooth]

What she said.

[Jose]

Absolutely, you should tell people that they are not getting paid for training.

[Ravenwing263]

I believe that whether or not training is paid says a lot about what a company thinks about it's employees. To be more specific (and more blunt), I think that mandatory, unpaid training is a major indicator that a company does not in any way have it's new employees' best interests at heart and that the company should be avoided as a workplace at all costs. In fact I would go so far as to argue that unpaid training constitutes an unethical business practice and ought to be illegal.

As for whether one ought to check, I can see where you're coming from, but I can also see (and, in fact, am far more sympathetic to) the view that the day your boss tells you to show up for work the first time is the day you start earning your salary, and that unpaid training, not paid, is the anomaly. I'd argue that in any contract agreement, the person asking for the unusual/potentially problematic concession should be the one to bring that concession up, and that the other party should not be expected to intuit that they are being asked to make such a concession.

Sorry.

Edit:

I'm afraid I'm going to have to part with Corrina where she says the fellow's behavior was unprofessional and wrong. While it's certainly possible that he behaved inappropriately, given the description, we have no reason to believe he did. If the OP cares to elaborate on his behavior, I may be able to make a better assessment, but it seems to me that unless he yelled, cursed or offered insult, he was perfectly within his rights to exit the premises when he suddenly found out we was being asked to work for no pay, and perfectly within the compass of good form to let the folks around him know that he was dissatisfied to be treated so, without notice.. I guess it depends what "in a huff" means. For me, "a huff" is a mild demonstration of anger, characterized by walking at a quick pace, having a sullen expression, and maybe grumbling under the breath. Perhaps Corrina understands the word differently, or the OP meant it differently, then I understand it, and if so, I apologize. But it seems to be that a few "huffs" are in order when people are being asked to worth without pay.

[Corrina]

It was the irate voicemail that I would call unprofessional, not so much leaving the session, huff or not. I read "irate" to mean that the person who left lost his temper on the phone--and that's *never* a good thing to do in a professional setting.

But, yes, definitely start telling people up front, JBK. I've had training before. It's always been paid.

[Pia Guerra]

When I was young and looking for one of my first jobs I responded to an ad to a PR company to hand out fliers. I arrived at the office, filled out the forms and was put into a group of four or five people to head over to a music/stereo equipment store to hand out fliers. We were given train tickets to get to the site, got onboard and on the bridge to Surrey the group leader tells us this was going to be a training day with no pay. I believe he said it wasn't just that day either, that it was more than a couple of days unpaid work. I told him this wasn't what I signed up for, got off the train, went back to office and complained to the person who hired me that it was ridiculous to profit off my work handing out fliers in the freezing cold and call it 'training'. He tried to explain that was how it was done and I told him he should have been up front so I could have spent my time instead looking for paying work. The whole thing just seemed fishy to me, like they knew people would quit the work before making it to being paid and therefore saved money.

Sorry, but if a company profits off the work of a trainee, the trainee needs to be paid.

[Ravenwing263]

Yeah, I once had to spend an hour at a T.G.I. Friday's filling out paperwork. I was paid. I did have one job that withheld my training pay until I completed my training (the training involved two days of classroom work before I got out onto the floor and started making the company money) and had started to work for real, but it was paid and the unusual circumstances were detailed to me at the end of my interview, once they had decided to hire me.

And, I'm sorry, I actually missed the voicemail part of the story. I suppose it's possible his tone or something went past the line, but all the things JBK405 says he said, ("how we dare have unpaid training, and what is wrong with us, and he could not believe we thought anybody should be forced to show up without getting paid.") are not only within the compass of good behavior ("good" being distinct from "polite" in that in "good behavior", one only reacts with anger when one is treated unfairly while in "polite behavior", one never reacts with anger at all) but things that people absolutely should be saying to a company that has mandatory, unpaid training and doesn't tell its prospective employees about it.

It seems to me that his behavior - again, allowing for the possibility that he yelled, or cursed, or offered threat or insult or did something else beyond the pale that has not been detailed - is completely appropriate given his treatment by JBK405's company.

Again, sorry.

[Cassandra]

I must admit I'm with Corrina on this one too, sure the guy acted like a jerk but I don't think it was up to him to ask if the training was paid or not. He didn't know; you guys did, so why didn't you tell him? I suspect it's because you're assuming that if you tell people they won't show up. Which they are well with-in their rights to do.

I once did a full-day's worth of on-the-job training in a cafe and beforehand the boss informed me it was unpaid which I was cool with but during that entire day he basically threw me into the deep end and berated me all day on how I should be thankful that he 'gave me this opportunity' because having me there was 'costing him money.' (Yeah, free staff are weird like that.) I'm fine with attending free training at my pre-existing job but I do appreciate that my employers are up-front about it and it's usually not a full day's worth of work.

[Andreas]

In low-paying jobs it has almost become standard to have new employees work a couple of days without pay. Many companies count on you not wanting to go through the hassle with your papers and the employment agency and then having to wait for your papers again, if you decide not to return after a day or two. So these companies are getting hundreds of hours for free this way.

The company should definitely mention it in the job advertisement, so it's not a waste of time for both sides.