BETA
This is a BETA experience. You may opt-out by clicking here

More From Forbes

Edit Story

Tolerating Low Performance Employees In A Tight Labor Market

Following
This article is more than 2 years old.

Business leaders know that tolerating poor performance by employees is bad practice. But today’s labor market is so tight that replacing an employee is very difficult. What is a manager to do with poor workers? There’s no pat answer applicable across the board, but there are several key issues to consider.

Remember why tolerance of poor employees is bad. First, the employee does poor work, but that is the least of the problems. Other workers see the poor performer coming to work and collecting a paycheck. Nobody feels motivated. And other workers often have to cover for the worker who comes in late, does the job poorly or finishes too little productive activity. The poor performing employee causes low motivation and low morale of all the nearby workers.

The low performing employee also sucks up too much of the manager’s time. The 80-20 rule may also apply to management, according to leadership coach David Rabiner: 80% of the manager’s time is taken up by 20% of the employees. And which 20% of employees get the attention? Hint: it’s not the top performers. Could the operation be improved if the manager spent more time recognizing the top performers and encouraging them to stay with the company? Would it help if the manager spent more time coaching the moderate performers to be better? Is the manager spending enough time talking to customers and planning for improvements in efficiency? The worst employees divert the manager’s time and energy from growth to damage control. And a business’s scarcest resource is the time of its leaders.

But before firing a low performing employee, the manager will contemplate how to find a replacement. That’s certainly a challenge. Unemployment is low, unfilled positions abound, radio stations play help-wanted commercials and nearly every business displays a “Now Hiring” sign.

The decision process must cover both short-run issues and long-run company performance. The short-run issue begins with whether the person needs to be replaced at all. Although usually the case, it’s not always true. When recessions force cost cutting, many companies are able to cut both production workers and administrative staff. Businesses often find that they can still get the work done with fewer employees.

Today, however, most companies run lean, not fat. Managers have seen departures and been unable to hire, so little slack is left.

In situations where people have narrowly defined jobs, the manager knows the impact of a departure. In many cases, especially in smaller businesses or departments, people have accumulated multiple responsibilities. A person may, for example, be primarily an accounts payable clerk, but also help out with ordering or payroll. The manager wonders how to find someone who can handle all of those tasks. The bright side reflects that the person probably grew into the role organically, with additional tasks added over time. So the manager might focus on finding someone to do the primary task while reallocating the other responsibilities to other employees.

Another short-term consideration in dismissing a low performing employee is whether other workers are likely to quit because of the poor performer. The other workers have options in this economy. If the problem employee is disruptive or angers other employees, then firing the person may retain the other workers. The decision becomes simpler: Who would the manager rather keep, the disruptive employee or the nearby workers who are unhappy with the disruptive person?

The long-term question for the manager faced with a low performing employee is what kind of company culture to emphasize. Company culture comes not from the platitudes on posters in the break room but from the daily decisions that business leaders make. If the daily decisions tolerate low performance, than the company culture becomes “just get by.” But if daily decisions emphasize higher productivity, then most staff members step up to do their best work. People who enjoy doing good work stay, and the slackers either don’t apply for jobs there or they leave of their own volition pretty soon.

A manager can be supportive of people with temporary setbacks because of health or personal issues without weakening a high-performance culture. Employees understand that their colleagues go through times of trouble. But when workers take advantage of the manager’s kindly nature to malinger or disrupt operations, the entire business is threatened.

Dismissing a low performer is difficult, the worst task for most managers. But even in this tight job market, it’s a task that must be done.

Follow me on Twitter or LinkedInCheck out my website