Sometimes, you will need to part ways with an underperforming team member.
When a decision like this becomes necessary, many leaders worry about hurting morale on the rest of the team. They worry about letting the person go gently and gracefully. But in doing so, they often end up unintentionally crueler than they mean to be.
Imagine somebody tries to be so gentle when they’re firing someone that they scramble the words on a whiteboard — transforming “you’re fired” into some nonsense like “I dreefy uro” — and then leave the room to let the person getting fired figure out what it says.
While I realize this isn’t literally what happens when leaders try to be gentle when letting someone go, the effect is often the same. Clarity is kindness, and if someone has to figure out for themselves that they are no longer employed with your organization (rather than you being straightforward with them to start), you are not doing them a kindness.
As negotiation expert Chris Voss teaches, it’s not really kind to “gently” cut someone’s head off. That’s torture. It’s kinder to be quick and get to the point (without being a jerk of course).
I believe it’s better to criticize in public than in private and to provide an underperformer with clarity around what they can do to improve and how they can grow. If you provide training and development opportunities, have these candid conversations up front, and lead with clarity — being let go should never be a surprise.
Now that’s graceful.
I’ll leave you with a final thought — and this is really the crux of the matter.
Sometimes (I’d even say often), firing someone who needs to be removed from the organization will actually boost morale.
If this sounds counterintuitive to you, let me elaborate.
High performers want to be around other high performers.
When it’s time to part ways with someone who’s not a good fit for your team, don’t worry about hurting morale.
What you’re really doing when you remove the low performers is addressing performance and raising the standard of the organization.
Winning is fun. Being successful is fun. The best people want to be at the best organizations.
Decide for yourself what type of organization you’re going to be and whether you’re going to tolerate low performance over high performance — because when you tiptoe around underperformers or let people stay who don’t belong, that’s exactly what you’re doing.
In that case, the high performers are just performing high because that’s just who they are. But if you’re willing to tolerate low performance, it’s only a matter of time before the high performers get fed up. They ask themselves why they are performing at this level when other people in your organization get to exist performing at a lower level. Then those former A-players lower their performance and your organization suffers as a whole.
They “quiet quit” and start to coast like the low performers you tolerate, doing just enough to not get fired.
On the other hand, if you instead make your non-negotiables clear, define and communicate the minimum standards of your organization, and refuse to tolerate anything less — your organization will thrive.
You may lose a few B- and C-players along the way, but if you take the time to clearly lay out expectations and provide every opportunity for them to improve, there’s nothing cruel about letting them go if they fail to live up to your standards.
If they’re not committed to doing better, they don’t want to be more successful, or they just don’t really want to buy into the standard that you’ve set for the organization, that’s not going to be an option at the organization. You can help them transition out so your A-players can thrive around other A-players.
So again, I recommend being less concerned about firing gracefully and more concerned about doing it effectively.
That will truly boost morale — and performance — on your team.
