"Don’t come into the office one day telling me out of the blue that you haven’t been happy for a while"
The fact that she finds such "out of the blue" IS the problem.
As for "why should I pay your full wage if you are only working at half force since you aren’t motivated anymore?": you pay full wage because he's doing full required work, demonstrated by the fact that she didn't notice anything was wrong and was content to pay him for it. Maybe he's unhappy because he wants to do more but she's not making it worth his time/effort to.
And obviously the disclosure is "out of the blue" precisely because her first reaction is to cut his pay.
The fact that she finds such "out of the blue" IS the problem.
As for "why should I pay your full wage if you are only working at half force since you aren’t motivated anymore?": you pay full wage because he's doing full required work, demonstrated by the fact that she didn't notice anything was wrong and was content to pay him for it. Maybe he's unhappy because he wants to do more but she's not making it worth his time/effort to.
And obviously the disclosure is "out of the blue" precisely because her first reaction is to cut his pay.