Terminations, Part Two

Boil it  down, and there are only two performance problems on a job. Either the employee can't do the work or the employee won't do the work.

If the employee can't do the work, the reason might be that he isn't smart enough for the job - he has been promoted to  his level of incompetence. Or, perhaps he just doesn't have an apptitude for the particular job he's in. Or, he's not physically fit to do the work, or the work hasn't been explained adequately, or  he hasn't been trained well enough to function properly in the job.

Remedies in any of these cases are rather obvious. Further training, counseling, or  reassignment all can  be tried before a manager takes the drastic step of  terminating a worker.

An employee won't do the work for less apparent reasons. Perhaps she thinks the work is not part of her employment agreement, feels the work is  beneath her status or dignity, has some personal issue with another employee, management,  or difficulty at home that's affecting her performance. It could be she's just habituated to doing as little as possible on the job, is taking advantage of another employee's willingness to carry her load, is so soured by inept or callous management that she's trying to get revenge on the workplace.  

Once again, there are steps a good boss can take short of dumping the employee. Attitude adjustment is a difficult task, especially when a bad outlook has been festering for years, but it's a large part of the manager's job to rectify performance problems and it must be confronted. The old adage that one bad apple spoils the barrel is entirely true. When the whole barrel has already spoiled, well, that's when things become truly difficult for the manager.

Let me say just a few words about feather-bedding, employing more people than are needed or retaining people in redundant or obsolete jobs. The classic case was the railroads continuing to employ firemen on their diesels because the unions insisted on it when there wasn't any need for such a position any longer. This is often laid at the feet of the unions, but management did agree to it when negotiating employee contract terms. Extra costs were passed along to the traveling public and freighters. I'm sure employee morale was low, even though the goal of the union was to protect the workforce (and their membership and union dues). Management needed to work through the problem, not perpetuate it.

I'll close with a personal example of bad management. My supervisor once told me on a Christmas eve that she had made changes to the organizational structure that I had opposed and felt were to my detriment. She then said, "Well, I'm leaving now. Be sure to lock up behind you when you go home." I spent the rest of the day fuming. Now I'll grant you, there's no good time to give someone bad news, but that really just took the cake. Is it any wonder that many employees have bad morale when management behaves like that?