Managing to Change the World, 2nd Edition

CHAPTER 9

ADDRESSING PERFORMANCE PROBLEMS AND LETTING PEOPLE GO

Even with the best efforts to hire well and develop your people, the reality is that you are going to have some staff members who simply don’t perform at the level that you need. This is an unavoidable reality of managing, and one of the most important things you can do as a manager is to address it head-on. By addressing these situations in a forthright and matter-of-fact manner, you can sometimes help an employee get to the level you need. But when that doesn’t work, you can lay the groundwork for letting the employee go in a way that is fair and compassionate to her. In this chapter, we’ll talk about how you can move employees who aren’t performing at the level you need “up or ...