That's crazy. I don't know what I would have done after he sat back down and started working again, haha!

Aust Ag said:

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That's crazy. I don't know what I would have done after he sat back down and started working again, haha!

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No kidding, sounds like something George Costanza would do!

Aust Ag said:

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That's crazy. I don't know what I would have done after he sat back down and started working again, haha!

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Yea my boss teams messaged me and said. "When is he going to leave?" We wanted to go to lunch but couldnt leave till he left. Sat there an hour before taking him out. IT dept was already locking his credentials.

In today's world you probably should have kept him.

He is 28. He is smack dab in the middle of the age bracket that has no desire to work. He wanted to work.


I bet at some point in the next few months you are going to wish you had kept him.

agsalaska said:

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In today's world you probably should have kept him.

He is 28. He is smack dab in the middle of the age bracket that has no desire to work. He wanted to work.


I bet at some point in the next few months you are going to wish you had kept him.

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That's a good point but 5 months and can't perform basic functions of the job is too much. I'd rather have nobody and just do extra work. At that point it's more work dragging this person along

Be careful with this one. Sounds like an unstable person that would come back and be violent.

agsalaska said:

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In today's world you probably should have kept him.

He is 28. He is smack dab in the middle of the age bracket that has no desire to work. He wanted to work.


I bet at some point in the next few months you are going to wish you had kept him.

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Why? He didnt do his job. He milked it.

Unacceptable behavior.

Y'all were much nicer than I would have been. When he sat down and started working again I would have said, you have 30 minutes to collect your things and leave the premises or the authorities will be called.

His reaction is pretty alarming. Someone that behaves that way could be dangerous and you don't need them hanging around.

The Fall Guy said:

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Today we had to let somebody go. Just didnt cut it with learning what we do. Didn't ask questions. Expected everything to be written down in writing on how to do daily tasks.

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So do you guys not have written processes? Do y'all not have a training program for a new hire that goes through all the steps needed? Maybe this is a great opportunity for you guys to sit down and go over the interview and new hire process and make sure there's nothing there that can't be improved to save the company a little money on hiring / firing.

Not trying to place blame at all, but sometimes being a manager means setting expectations. Even if that means you expect them to take notes on the training that are reviewed with a mentor. Or asking them to have any questions ready to go over first thing in the am and after lunch.

The Fall Guy said:

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Any advice to give others on how to deal with this situation? He was given all the opportunity and training but had no initiative.

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1.) I think it's generally best that termination for performance not come as a surprise. Was there a point where you sat down and said "you're not meeting our expectations, we need to see X output by Y date or we should part ways" to him? When you very explicitly and unambiguously get that point across, my observation is that people will either try to shape up or plan their own exit before you have to swing the axe. And if they don't improve, then they can't really act surprised in the end.

2.) I would recommend locking IT and other company resources before terminating - if possible.

Being a company of about 60 people we interview and pick more from experience than education being in land surveying. Its a hands on field. We have people with 4 year degrees, 2 year degress and no degree. Ewperience is a big help but we do train if needed. Our dept has 8 employees. All open to training or helping. What we dont do is go sit behind a person for days on end. If there are questions we ask others and get the help. This guy said he knew about maps, lidar. He had no survey experience so we put him on the most basic tasks. Through all the Quality Control we do he had 15 tp 40 rounds of QC when the others are 2 rounds. He did not pick up anything. He would be on his phone constantly, come in at 9, take over hours lunches. We gave him all the opportunity to grow but didnt. I wish the owner had ditched him 2 months ago.

His actions did freak me out some. That is not normal.

The Fall Guy said:

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Aust Ag said:

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That's crazy. I don't know what I would have done after he sat back down and started working again, haha!

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Yea my boss teams messaged me and said. "When is he going to leave?" We wanted to go to lunch but couldnt leave till he left. Sat there an hour before taking him out. IT dept was already locking his credentials.

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This is nearly as big an eye opener to me as the guy going back to his desk and attempting to work.
Y'all let him sit there for an hour and try to work?
I obviously don't know anything other than what you wrote, but like someone else mentioned above, you need much more clear procedures on how to handle terminations.

You learn a little more every time you have to let somebody go. Big thing I've learned after doing this a few times in my career is that it's never a one way street. There's always something you could have done better too.

This is why documentation of everything from the interview process to ongoing performance management. It's not just cover your ass… it's remembering what you've done, what didn't work and why. Had a similar situation years ago. A low performer I never interviewed became my direct report. Pretty lazy but worst of all just didn't have the technical skills needed to do their job. Went back to the interview process, read the notes, saw the CV. CV advertised this person had been using various software and doing things it was clear they just had no real experience in. In the interview notes? No technical questions pertaining to those items. Lesson learned for the company? Dig in and make sure you get an understanding of technical expertise.

And on the person going back to their desk? I dunno… no offense sounds like your company hasn't fired many people and the handling of it was amateur hour. When people are let go where I'm at, it's well coordinated. They are met at the door and taken aside. IT access is automatically cut the night before and not being done the morning of. If the person is volatile, security is nearby to get them off premises as quickly as possible… nobody gets the opportunity to go back to their desk. This sounds patronizing, but I'd argue it is less so than just letting the person sit down and embarrass themselves. You are also only ruining a few people's day and not a whole workplace's day.

Small company so I'm not expecting a lot of the formal processes and security escorts and things that you would see at a big company.

Now is probably a good time to build those procedures based on what just happened.

The first part is continuous documentation and acceptance by the employee that they understand they are being placed on a performance improvement plan are expected to be able to perform specific tasks to specific standards by such and such dates.

Review with the employee during that period so that you and they understand whether the standards are being met. I'd say a weekly meeting at the minimum with a more formal review monthly.

Like ATM9000's situation, I'm currently dealing with a poor performer that I didn't hire but got transferred to me.

This guy said all the right things and in this remote working world, it's difficult to figure out if somebody is just having bad luck or if they genuinely just suck.

I need my direct reports to be able to do about ten things and this guy can only do about one out of the ten.

This problem is further exacerbated by the fact the guy had already been with the company for five years in a different role before he was transferred to me and nobody bothered to document anything regarding how much he sucks.

And this dude is over 50 so it's not like he's all of a sudden going to develop better skills or better work habits.

Back around 2006, I had a similar situation with a peer who nobody would work with because he was terrible and our manager wouldn't fire him because he had hired him (and probably also because he was Black).

What one of my sales reps explained to me is that by keeping that non-performer on board, he was stealing from us. It took me a while to understand that but he was correct.

So, you did the right thing by letting the guy go. Whatever he had going on outside work, or why he wasn't able to learn anything is not your problem.

911sAg said:

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Sounds like a poorly run company yall ultimately hired someone who has no clue how to do the job what kind of interview process do yall have?

LOL

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Yea. No one in hiring has ever hired anybody who is not who they say they are. Stupid quote. Lol

The Fall Guy said:

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911sAg said:

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Sounds like a poorly run company yall ultimately hired someone who has no clue how to do the job what kind of interview process do yall have?

LOL

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Yea. No one in hiring has ever hired anybody who is not who they say they are. Stupid quote. Lol

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Yeah that's not a fair comment. Anytime you lead and manage and hire, you are going to run into a dud from time to time. Happens in really good and really bad workplaces. The key is thinking about how you ensure it doesn't happen again specifically if where it was worst was incompetency in the technical ability needed to do a job.