Looking back on their careers, experienced leaders’ number one regret is not moving faster on people. While that can mean promoting people faster or moving them to other jobs faster, most of the time they are referring to firing people for one of three reasons in order of urgency:
- Poor role or organization fit
- Poor performance
- Violations of law, policy, or culture
Poor role or organization fit
When people are in the wrong role or the wrong organization, not hurting the team, but not going to succeed over time, help them make the choice to leave on their own terms and own timing.
In this case, it’s in their best interest and your best interest for them to be somewhere else. You’re not trying to teach them anything or to send a signal to anyone else. There’s no reason to hurt them or their self-confidence.
This was the case with one leader in my organization in Coca-Cola Japan. I had him do a long-term career plan. Through that effort, he came to the conclusion that he probably needed to be in a different role or organization. I agreed to help him work that through.
Over the next two months, I helped him craft his resume and talking points for interviews and the like. He found two solid opportunities outside of Coca-Cola. For my part, I identified two solid opportunities in other countries in the Coca-Cola system.
We then sat down and reviewed the four options together. He chose one of the opportunities outside of Coca-Cola. We agreed he’d stay another three weeks to manage the transition. He announced his departure a year later and left after we’d thrown him a blow-out goodbye party.
Neither he, nor anyone else, felt he had been forced out. It was his decision, implemented on his timing.
Poor performance
Relatively poor performance means their performance is not bad in any way, It’s just not as good as others in the group. In those cases, you can ease people out over time. One good way is to do that as part of a layoff or reorganization.
There’s a fine line between generally poor and unacceptably poor performance. In this case, I’m referring to performance that is barely acceptable, not helping the team, but not hurting it either. In these cases, you have time to find a replacement for these people before you fire them. As one of our partners used to say, “Never fire anyone until you know who’s going to do their job.” Witness Starbucks naming Brian Niccol as CEO in the same breath as announcing Laxman Narasimhan’s “departure.”
The first exception to that rule applies to people whose performance is poor enough for the team to be better off without them – unacceptably poor. In that case, fire them now and then find their replacement.
Violations of law, policy, culture
In many cases, if people violate the law, do something against a corporate policy, or do things against the culture you’re building, you have no choice and must fire them now – most likely with a public hanging.
One CFO was a bully. The new CEO called him out on the behavior. Then he did it again. The CEO called the CFO into her office and told him he was terminated immediately.
When the CFO asked if he could have input into the messaging around why he was leaving, the CEO replied, “No. We’re telling people you’re being fired because you’re a bully and that’s unacceptable here.”
A guard walked the CFO out of the building while the CEO told her direct reports, the CFO’s direct reports, and the top three customers the CFO had interacted with. That’s what I mean by a public hanging.
Antecedents, Behaviors, Consequences
When leaders finally fire someone that needs to be fired, others on the team often ask “What took you so long?” They knew. They watch what leaders do and don’t do. To a large degree, you communicate what really matters by what you’re willing to overlook. In line with Michael Brown’s ABC model of antecedents, behaviors, and consequences, the absence of negative consequences for poor behavior communicates your acceptance of that poor behavior.
On the one hand, firing is one of the harshest consequences you can apply. On the other hand, when faced with one of these three reasons to fire someone, you’ll end up regretting it if you don’t move with the appropriate urgency.
John Hall
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