A veterinary practice manager asks: How do I tell an employee she has bad body odor? I have a direct report who is absolutely awesome at her job, is professional and has a lovely personality, but unfortunately for the rest of us, she has really poor personal hygiene and bad body odor. To make matters worse, she is a very affectionate person and greets coworkers by hugging them. Were it not for the odor, this in itself wouldn’t be an issue. I struggled for a long time deciding if and how to bring this up with her, and last week I finally did it. I waited until the end of her shift and of course spoke to her in private. I began by saying it was going to be an uncomfortable conversation and it’s not my intention to offend her, but that I had noticed she had an unpleasant body odor. I suggested that she might need to wash her clothes more frequently or shower more. I even suggested it might be a medical problem. I explained that this is something people often don’t notice about themselves, which is why I was bringing it to her attention and I finished off by asking what she can do about it. I thought I handled that pretty well! Here’s the thing — she said that the problem is not her personal hygiene, but that she lives in an apartment where there is mold and as a result her clothes smell of mold, regardless of how much she washes them. This doesn’t really sound plausible to me, and I suspect that even if mold is an issue at her place, not showering daily still has something to do with it. What do I do now?! Wow, talk about a curve ball, I did not see that coming! The question of body odor and how to have this conversation is not that uncommon, so I really thought that’s where this was going, but you added a whole new layer here! You handled the initial conversation brilliantly, well done. I’m sure it wasn’t pleasant, but as you know, as practice managers we get to have lots of unpleasant conversations. It sounds like as far as the employee in question is concerned, this issue has been dealt with and this is the end of the story. She told you what the problem was, and from what you said, it doesn’t seem like she offered any solutions. However, her odor is affecting other team members, so this needs to be addressed again and rectified. Just like you have a company policy stating that employees must come to work at a certain time, you require all employees to come to work with a minimum expected level of hygiene. She needs to meet this level of hygiene. How she does that is not your concern (OK, that sounds a little harsh, you don’t need to use those words when speaking to her!) It may mean solving the mold problem, moving to a different apartment, storing her clothes differently or finding other ways to protect them from mold, showering more frequently ... whatever. You just need her to understand the expectations and commit to meeting them. That’s the only part of your initial conversation with this team member that was missing: she presented you with a problem, and you are trying to find a solution, but it’s not up to you to fix her mold problem. It is her responsibility, however, to come to work with appropriate personal hygiene. I’m afraid you’re going to have to talk to her again about this. I suggest structuring the conversation a little like this: “I recently raised my concerns with you about your personal hygiene and you explained to me that you have a mold problem in your apartment, which causes your clothes to smell bad. I understand and I am sympathetic towards that, but it’s my responsibility to ensure we are providing a pleasant working environment for all employees, and that company policies are adhered to. I need you to rectify this problem and meet our minimum expected standards of dress and hygiene. Can you do that?” If she says “yes” — great! Hopefully, she realizes this is serious, as in any breach of a company policy, and she resolves the problem. If she says “no” — you treat it as any breach of company policy. Unfortunately, that may mean going down the formal warning path and even termination. It’s not going be an easy conversation, I wish you luck — let us know how it goes! ConsultMates Beta will be open shortly. To join and be one of the first to test Consultmates when it launches, visit www.consultmates.com. Want to submit a HR question of your own? Send it to hr@consultmates.com.
