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Communication Class - Blog #6 - Dealer's choice #2 - The End Doesn't Have to be Ugly
I was trying to think what I could ramble on about for this particular Dealer's Choice topic. I was feeling rather uninspired until I saw an email from a colleague. This week there was a termination in my Department.
I didn't have to do it for a change, which was nice.
My role was to keep the rest of the team entertained so that the person who did have to do it had an opportunity to do it quickly and with dignity for the employee involved.
It was, interestingly, one of the nicer terminations I've been involved in.
Call me crazy (It's been done before) but I love performance management. L.O.V.E. If I was told I had a million dollars and needed to open my own company I would consult on how to effectively manage people's performance. It's so amazingly easy! It's like a math equation. Like a piece of music. Follow the notes until you get to the part where you get to stand up and take a bow.
The first part of the concert has nothing to do with the music. It sets up the orchestra, putting the basses and the bassoons in the right place. Making sure the audience will be able to see and hear everything.
Policy. Process. Training. Expectations. Do the people who work with you know what they're supposed to be doing? Do they know how to do it? Have you told them what's expected?
Then the instruments tune up. Are the violins and the violas all playing in the right key? Does somebody need to take a second to listen to their own instrument to make adjustments? Sometimes it takes somebody else to hear the discord over the rest of the music and to point it out so it can be easily and quickly adjusted.
Sometimes people don't even recognize they're doing something wrong. I use an example of a receptionist that we'd hired ages ago. The people in my office have some very flexible work arrangements. Where and when are often irrelevant, as long as the work gets done. Customer meetings can run late, so 8:30 am start times aren't strictly enforced, and working from home is at the direction of each employee. Except the receptionist. The receptionist needs to be at his or her post from 8:30 until 5:00 to field calls, receive deliveries, etc. We hired what seemed to be a FABULOUS receptionist about 5 years ago. And she was fabulous for the first couple of weeks. Until she started coming in late. A lot. We were all boggled by what appeared to be a lack of enthusiasm for her role. She seemed so keen! How could we be so mistaken? And the lack of enthusiasm influenced how we interacted with her. And our new ways of interacting influenced her behaviours further until we got to the point we had to have a pretty serious conversation about her future.
Can you guess where this is going? In that conversation we unearthed the fact that NOBODY TOLD HER WHAT HER HOURS WERE! And she was following the lead of the rest of us and coming and going like everybody else.
We established her working hours, got a few other things out in the open and she's been a fabulous addition to the team ever since.
There's a bit of a lather, rinse, repeat when it comes to performance management. Oh, let me change that a bit. Lather, rinse, repeat, document. Documentation throughout every step in the process is a must. Identify the issue, identify expectations, both the employer and employee look for ways to support achieving those expectations (it's a team game - not just on the employer or employee alone!) and follow up to identify if goals have been met. If they have, reward the behaviour. If they haven't, lather, rinse, repeat until either the behaviour has been improved or you get to a point where it's been decided there's nothing more to be done other than terminate the relationship.
Which is where we were when I started this story.
If you follow this recipe the end will not come as a surprise and will go as smoothly as any termination can, like this one did.
I love this stuff. Don't get me wrong, I don't like conflict, I don't like firing people. I don't like seeing people unhappy, but I really really really love helping people figure out how to be successful, and if they can't be successful, let's figure out how to make them successful somewhere else with minimal negative impact on all involved, including the person who's being terminated.
And that's all I got to say about that.
I didn't have to do it for a change, which was nice.
My role was to keep the rest of the team entertained so that the person who did have to do it had an opportunity to do it quickly and with dignity for the employee involved.
It was, interestingly, one of the nicer terminations I've been involved in.
Call me crazy (It's been done before) but I love performance management. L.O.V.E. If I was told I had a million dollars and needed to open my own company I would consult on how to effectively manage people's performance. It's so amazingly easy! It's like a math equation. Like a piece of music. Follow the notes until you get to the part where you get to stand up and take a bow.
The first part of the concert has nothing to do with the music. It sets up the orchestra, putting the basses and the bassoons in the right place. Making sure the audience will be able to see and hear everything.
Policy. Process. Training. Expectations. Do the people who work with you know what they're supposed to be doing? Do they know how to do it? Have you told them what's expected?
Then the instruments tune up. Are the violins and the violas all playing in the right key? Does somebody need to take a second to listen to their own instrument to make adjustments? Sometimes it takes somebody else to hear the discord over the rest of the music and to point it out so it can be easily and quickly adjusted.
Sometimes people don't even recognize they're doing something wrong. I use an example of a receptionist that we'd hired ages ago. The people in my office have some very flexible work arrangements. Where and when are often irrelevant, as long as the work gets done. Customer meetings can run late, so 8:30 am start times aren't strictly enforced, and working from home is at the direction of each employee. Except the receptionist. The receptionist needs to be at his or her post from 8:30 until 5:00 to field calls, receive deliveries, etc. We hired what seemed to be a FABULOUS receptionist about 5 years ago. And she was fabulous for the first couple of weeks. Until she started coming in late. A lot. We were all boggled by what appeared to be a lack of enthusiasm for her role. She seemed so keen! How could we be so mistaken? And the lack of enthusiasm influenced how we interacted with her. And our new ways of interacting influenced her behaviours further until we got to the point we had to have a pretty serious conversation about her future.
Can you guess where this is going? In that conversation we unearthed the fact that NOBODY TOLD HER WHAT HER HOURS WERE! And she was following the lead of the rest of us and coming and going like everybody else.
We established her working hours, got a few other things out in the open and she's been a fabulous addition to the team ever since.
There's a bit of a lather, rinse, repeat when it comes to performance management. Oh, let me change that a bit. Lather, rinse, repeat, document. Documentation throughout every step in the process is a must. Identify the issue, identify expectations, both the employer and employee look for ways to support achieving those expectations (it's a team game - not just on the employer or employee alone!) and follow up to identify if goals have been met. If they have, reward the behaviour. If they haven't, lather, rinse, repeat until either the behaviour has been improved or you get to a point where it's been decided there's nothing more to be done other than terminate the relationship.
Which is where we were when I started this story.
If you follow this recipe the end will not come as a surprise and will go as smoothly as any termination can, like this one did.
I love this stuff. Don't get me wrong, I don't like conflict, I don't like firing people. I don't like seeing people unhappy, but I really really really love helping people figure out how to be successful, and if they can't be successful, let's figure out how to make them successful somewhere else with minimal negative impact on all involved, including the person who's being terminated.
And that's all I got to say about that.