To act or to suffer?

As managers, at some point we all
encounter an employee who frustrates us, and drains the life and energy out of the team.

When you are in this situation with someone, you know it in your heart that
you should act … particularly when they really annoy you … but you don’t act right away because you second guess yourself … and you keep thinking… they really do
some things very well… sometimes…

A colleague of mine shared this decision tree with me, and since then life has been easier.  It makes it pretty clear what you should do, when you are stuck questioning yourself about whether or not to act.

Individual attitude impacts team performance a lot!

A key issue in either increasing or decreasing team performance is the attitude of the individuals.  Think about each person on your team. Are they helping or hurting team performance?

If you come to the conclusion you have a  “Won’t” on your team – someone who may be capable, but is fighting you at every turn, annoying others, being negative, checking in and out, working against what you are trying to do, or damning it with superficial support — here are some ideas for you. And even more here:

Reasons Managers don’t act

• The person has flashes of true brilliance, interspersed with being a drain, so you keep changing your mind about their value to the team.
• You are afraid to lose a person doing some work even if it’s they’re not the best
• They are doing work that you don’t know how to cover without them
• They have political support from elsewhere in the organization that may be hard to manage
• There is a “no replacement” rule and you don’t want to lose a headcount
• It’s hard.  On any given day it’s easier to ignore the problem
• It’s not fun
• It takes time away from “real business”
• It’s legally complicated

Rewards for taking action

My experience has been 100% of the time, that getting a person out who won’t  has a definitive positive impact:

• You will be more productive, as you will no longer waste time dealing with the variety of annoying, draining, damaging, needing to be corrected or re-worked, “not good enough”, or otherwise apologized-for issues that this person causes.
• The motivation and productivity of whole team goes up, even if they have to cover the work. 
• Everyone feels the positive impact that results from the negative energy being removed.
• Your top performers stay motivated to keep performing because they see consequences being applied for not performing.
• You build trust with your team, by showing that good performance counts for something
• If you work with HR early, and position it with your boss and HR as a critical skill replacement, you will often get your replacement headcount,even if the rules say, No.
• Taking action reinforces your credibility.

This is the least fun part of management, but I bring it up from time to time because upgrading low performers has such a big impact on the success of your business, not to mention preserving your value – and your sanity.

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