Dismissing an Employee: The 5-Step Process You Can’t Afford to Skip
<div class="grey-callout"><h2>Key Takeaways</h2><ul>
<li>Turnaround process: A structured five-step approach helps manage poor performance, aiming for improvement before considering dismissal.</li>
<li>Increase frequency of performance reviews: So everyone knows what expectations need to be fulfilled.</li>
<li>Dismissing employees: Conduct dismissals quickly, clearly, and face-to-face, with respect and adherence to company procedures.</li>
<li>Focus on remaining staff: After a dismissal, concentrate on supporting remaining employees to prevent further attrition and maintain morale.</li>
<li>Gross misconduct: There is no need to perform for the 5-step turnaround process in these cases.</li>
</ul></div>
It doesn’t matter good you get at recruiting and managing staff, it’s a sad fact of employing staff that you’ll have to dismiss some as well.
Dismissal for gross misconduct is the immediate termination of an employee’s contract due to a serious violation of company policy or the law. Examples of gross misconduct include:
- Theft, fraud, serious dishonesty.
- Violence.
- Harassment or discrimination.
- Gross insubordination.
- Misuse of company property.
- Being under the influence of drugs or alcohol at work.
In these situations, it’s important you follow your written policies on what constitutes gross misconduct and the process for handling such cases. A typical dismissal process may include:
- Conducting an investigation, which may involve interviewing witnesses and reviewing evidence.
- Holding a disciplinary meeting where the employee has an opportunity to respond to the allegations before any action is taken.
- The employee appealing the decision if they have the right to do so.
Dismissing someone for gross misconduct is relatively clear-cut.
For other situations, it can be challenging and isn’t always straightforward. It doesn’t matter how good you get at recruiting and managing staff; you’ll have to dismiss an employee eventually.
Some people say you should never tolerate employees who create a toxic atmosphere. I take a more pragmatic approach because they may be difficult to replace or be adding a lot of value; they might be the biggest biller, the best problem solver, or the only specialist with unique knowledge that the business couldn’t survive without. So frankly, they can be worth putting up with in the short term, but you may want to reduce your dependency on them by developing other staff, so you can eventually dismiss them.
<span class="grey-callout"><p><span class="text-color-purple">Important:</span> This is when you need quality legal advice.</p>
<p>Some solicitors would like to tell you why you can’t do something. They make everything seem so complex that it is impossible to get a straight answer.</p>
<p>But I’ve found some outstanding employment solicitors who are worth paying for. They take time to understand your circumstances and give specific, pragmatic advice. They can also help mediate and negotiate a resolution when things go wrong.</p></span>
There may be general Poor Performers that you can afford to dismiss, but because retention is better than recruitment, I recommend my Five Step Turnaround Process, explained next.
The Five Step Turnaround Process
For Poor Performers, you may want to make one last attempt at rescuing the situation with a turnaround process. The employee should be dismissed if this doesn’t lead to adequate improvements.
The turnaround process typically lasts three months. This is a reasonable amount of time to improve an employee’s skills or behaviour, or to be reasonably satisfied that they will not change.
The process follows five steps that escalate if a Poor Performer doesn’t improve:
- Identifying why they haven’t met your expectations.
- Conducting frequent performance reviews and verifying their understanding.
- Issuing a verbal or written warning.
- Have a sanity check.
- Dismiss the employee.
Step 1: Identify why they haven’t met your expectations
After reviewing the Great Performance Profile, score the employee against the Minimum Acceptable Standards. Highlight where the employee’s score is too low and make objective and job relevant comments about why you reached your decision.
Step 2: Conduct frequent performance reviews and verify their understanding
Performance reviews need to be weekly for the duration of the turnaround process. Ask the employees to confirm their understanding of desired actions and outcomes.
<span class="grey-callout"><span class="text-color-purple">Note:</span> At this point, employees may be aware they can’t improve, and dismissal is inevitable. This may encourage them to resign before being dismissed. However, you should not intentionally make them feel like this. Instead, you are trying to create a win-win outcome for everyone.</span>
Step 3: Issue a verbal or written warning
Subject to employment contracts and policies, the next step is a verbal or written warning. Make it clear that their position will become untenable if they don’t meet Minimum Acceptable Standards in a specified time. (Or as we used to say at one company I consulted at, “You’ll have to find your happiness elsewhere!”)
Step 4: Sanity check
Before dismissing an employee, consider the following:
- Could they be a Great Performer in a different job? While you shouldn’t create a new position unnecessarily, if the employee was a good cultural fit and was good enough to be hired, they might succeed in a different role.
- Do you need to rehire for the position? It may be prudent to outsource or automate parts of the role. Could you redistribute the role to other employees, or give someone a promotion?
- Do you want to start the recruitment process confidentially before dismissing the employee? Challenging market conditions may demonstrate that it is nearly impossible to replace them, and so force you to temporarily retain a Poor Performer.
Step 5: Employee dismissal
If you want to dismiss an employee and can do this legally, then do so.
It is quite normal to struggle with the decision – I have certainly had restless nights considering dismissals. But once you’ve decided, do it quickly out of respect for everyone. In six months, you’ll wish you’d done it sooner.
I’d strongly recommend that you have a fellow director or HR specialist as a witness. You should also observe company policies that may allow the employee to bring a representative.
Hold the meeting face-to-face if possible and state your decision as soon as you sit down. Communicate quickly, directly, and honestly that they’re being dismissed. The worst thing is to create a sense of ambiguity or to seem unsure of your decision. As a leader, your job is to do what must be done, when it needs to be done, whether liked or not.
The best conversation during this process is to say, “We’ve talked about this regularly, and we’ve been coaching you to improve. Unfortunately, despite our efforts, it hasn’t worked out, so I’m going to have to let you go”.
They may be disappointed, but it should never be a surprise because you should have communicated clear expectations during your frequent performance review meetings.
If necessary, I like to remind departing employees that restrictive covenants are enforced.
Finally, after a handover, I like to put the employee on garden leave, which has three significant benefits:
- You, and most importantly the team, can quickly move on.
- The departing employee has less opportunity to create a toxic work environment.
- The departing employee is available to answer questions from their replacement about the role.
<span class="grey-callout"><p><span class="text-color-purple">Tips:</span> If you have a choice, dismiss staff on a Monday; they will have time to digest the news and immediately take action. Whereas if you dismiss staff on a Friday, they will feel horrible all weekend and can’t take much action to pick themselves up.</p>
<p>If a recruitment agency introduced the employee, you may be eligible for a partial refund or a replacement if they are dismissed within their guarantee period.</p></span>
<span class="purple-callout"><p>Quick note – I'm available for advice and assistance if you need it (get your free consultation).</p><p>You'll find my recruiting book helpful, too - it's a bestseller!</p><p>And my flat-fee recruiter service can help advertise jobs on the best UK job sites for just £199.</p></span>
Focus on Remaining Staff
Regardless of why an employee leaves, once announced, you should focus your time and effort on the remaining staff.
Some staff may have known an employee was leaving before they formally announced it. So you may be on the back foot.
The remaining employees may feel various emotions, from indifference to sorrow. Employees may think more about their futures and lose faith in the organisation – especially if there is a high staff attrition rate, or redundancies have been announced. You must stop this contagion. If appropriate, address concerns raised in the Exit Interview. At the very least, show employees they are appreciated.
A failure to focus on remaining staff may cause Great Performers to leave.
Pause Before Hiring Again
<span class="grey-callout"><span class="text-color-purple">Note:</span> If an employee is made redundant, you may not be able to replace the role for typically six months.</span>
Regardless of why an employee has been let go, pause, and think. Ask yourself, “How did that happen?” and write down some reasons. Be careful not to write down symptoms such as that they didn’t fit in with the team. Instead, look for the actual underlying problem. Common reasons include:
- It wasn’t a valuable role: The job didn’t add value that customers were willing to pay for.
- The Great Performance Profile was wrong: Key Competencies were missing, or Minimum Acceptable Standards were unrealistic.
- The recruitment process wasn’t thorough: Steps were skipped, most often Job Simulations and Reference Calls.
- Did the employee oversell their capabilities during the recruitment process? If so, how will you spot similar issues in future Structured Interviews, Job Simulations and Reference Calls?
- Poor management: The employee didn’t receive effective performance management.
A good follow-up question is, “What would improve the situation for next time?”
Additional Resources
- Talent Acquisition Book; The Secrets of Great Recruitment: How to Recruit Great Employees
- Downloadable PDF guide; Strategies for Handling & Dismissing Poor Performers.
- Article; How to Dismiss an Employee: A Simple Guide to Handling Employee Termination.
- Article; Exit Interviews: The Unexpected Goldmine for Business Growth!
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