employee says he will una|!ve himself if fired, but is harassing other employees and needs to go
i co manage a small business with 7 total employees including myself and the other manager. i will assign fake names to the relevant parties
jake- my co manager. has worked there 10+ years
george- the party in question. has worked there 10+ years
steve- has worked there 2 years
betty- has worked there a few months
me- has worked there about a year
jake and i only became managers about 3 months ago because our previous manager was fired for sexually harassing another employee at the bar.
george is a difficult person. very sweet but not necessarily kind if that makes sense. rarely bathes which also makes him difficult to work with. usually drunk, often so drunk he can barely do his job or does it painfully slowly. george often makes jokes about how if it weren’t for the bar he’d unalive himself. like a LOT.
when steve started working there, he was young and impressionable and somehow he and george started hooking up. this continued about a year then fizzled out. george seemed very manipulative of steve and i was glad that steve wasn’t dealing with that any longer. steve has told me that george’s jokes about unaliving himself are indeed not jokes and that he has witnessed episodes.
a few months ago betty started working there and instantly she and steve had a connection and started dating. george was very upset for a multitude of reasons that didn’t make much sense when he tried to explain them but i tried to talk him through it and explain that he and steve haven’t been together for awhile and it’s okay for steve to date and i understand it’s difficult for him for work with them but he’s gotta figure out how to be okay with it. george has made many inappropriate comments about the situation.
it’s been a few months now and george is still consistently rude and weird towards betty and steve.
this morning i get a text from betty that george asked her inappropriate questions about her sex life and then got extra rude with her when she stood up for herself and then later came into the bar while she was working and continued to harass her.
IMO george has got to go, it’s long overdue. we just fired our manager for sexual harassment not long ago and are trying to protect our staff and reputation and george is perpetuating more sexual harassment and retaliation, and he wasn’t a good employee before any of this started. however, i realize there is the possibility of him hurting himself and i don’t know how to handle that.
it is more likely that jake would handle the conversation with george because he and jake have worked together so long and know each other well, but jake and i are talking it over later to decide what to do.
any suggestions or advice is welcome.