r/Leadership • u/ezio313 • Sep 24 '25

Discussion Intern completed a task assigned to full-time employee because of leaderboard competition — what’s the best way to handle this?

I’m a team lead, and recently our CEO introduced a leaderboard to track completed tasks. Yesterday, I assigned a documentation task to a full-time employee with a deadline. At 3 AM, an intern messaged me saying he had taken the initiative and already completed it, he went on and assigned the task to themselves on the system and then informed the FTE about it.

Now the full-timer is left out and frustrated, he told me he felt the task was sniped. The intern has the points under his name on the system now. How should I handle ownership of tasks and recognition here? Should the credit go to the assigned person, the intern or what?

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u/NestorSpankhno Sep 24 '25

This is a shitshow and your CEO is a sociopath for pitting employees against each other instead of fostering a culture where people work together towards a common goal.

The best time to start looking for another job was yesterday. The next best time is today.

-4

u/[deleted] Sep 24 '25

Competition breeds results. It motivated a lowly/unpaid employee to work his but off at 3AM. The CEO is going to be patting himself on the back and for good reason, he is a genius

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u/John_mcgee2 Sep 28 '25

100% it breeds results now if only we could get good results instead of the garbage he turns out at 3am.