Running a Small Business

Lesson 4: Subcontractors and employees

Getting rid of problem employees

Although you carefully prepare yourself for hiring, analyze the jobs, get referrals for promising candidates, test and confirm their skills and check their references, you will still, sooner or later, end up with a problem employee. A problem employee is one that consistently doesn't perform or one that keeps other employees from performing as well as they could. Either way, he is not an effective member of your team.

If you've been consistent with all your employees, including this one, with regular performance reviews, then the employee will be aware of his position and you will already have given him an appropriate number of chances to change and improve. He will not have been able to carry through on agreed activities nor meet goals which you set together. In fact, many employees in this kind of situation will already have left your company at this point. But, if he's still there, you will have to give him a final push.

In your dealings with problem employees your approach is very important. Blaming the employee for his failures is not productive. Your approach to the problem employee will be much more effective if you, in your mind, take full responsibility for having hired someone who didn't work out. Then, just as you usually do with all your employees, you can approach the problem employee, tell him that things are not working out as he can see for himself, give him several options, tell him what the consequences will be and ask him what he wants to do.

A common way of dealing with problem employees is to call them in, terminate their employment and then escort them out of the building. This method is extremely bad for the morale of your team - after all he was a promising team member at one point or you wouldn't have hired him. Some team members will wonder if they will be next. With one action you will have damaged the positive atmosphere you have been careful to cultivate and introduced an adversarial relationship. If you just want bodies to do the work you assign, that's fine - if you want self-motivated superior performers who will take initiatives on their own, that's not the way to run your team.

Instead, ease the problem employee out. Keep treating him with respect and always treat him fairly. If you keep in mind that it was your mistake in hiring the wrong person, there will be no rancour or resentment and the problem employee will not have any reason to try to damage you or your company. By taking responsibility for the problem, you will earn the respect of your team and they will not think that they might be next - after all it is obvious that you have given the problem employee every chance possible.

Why spend so much time on someone who is going to leave the company? As your business grows, you will be spending more and more time on goals, orientation and improvements and less on the day-to-day running of the business. Part of that is identifying and fixing problems. Things that work can be left to your employees - things that don't, need your attention and your time so they are fixed properly. Fixing them means that they no longer hurt or hold back your business. A problem employee takes a lot of time to fix in such a way that your business, in particular your team, is not hurt. When you've fixed that problem, your business will be much stronger and your team better - it's worth a lot of time to get to that point.

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