When someone doesn't fit
Last week I brought up the subject of how to move someone along when they don’t fit. So, what does that exactly mean? It could be a conversation about personality, or skill set. Skill set is an easy discussion. If I get hired to do computer work, but I have never used a computer before, I’m probably not a good fit. I need computer skills, and if I have no idea how to turn the computer on, how can I be successful? If I have never cooked before, why would you hire me as a chef? Certain jobs have certain specific skills that you need to be able to do the job, if you don’t have those skills, you shouldn’t be doing that job. That isn’t rude, that is being honest. That is a complete waste of time to even try to attempt. What about personality? We live in a world where we have different kinds of personality tests to show you how you fit in somewhere, so shouldn’t we all be able to fit in anywhere? Personality is a tricky discussion, sometimes if everyone has the same personality and someone comes in who is different, they don’t fit in. At other times they have the same exact personality as someone else, so they aren’t necessary. In these situations, I believe that it’s going to be very hard for that person to be happy in the job and the hope is that they see it and move on. That doesn’t seem to be the case usually. Some people don’t like looking for jobs. The whole process seems overwhelming, so they would rather stay somewhere and be miserable than go look for something else. So, does that mean that we are completely stuck? The biggest issue I have found in this situation is expectations. Expectations could be about production, or even behavior. What about quality or attendance? I find that in most cases where someone doesn’t fit, but they don’t want to leave, they do an amazing job at hitting the bare minimum. They do poorly in some of those categories, but most of the time they hit the minimum. They also don’t seem to be motivated by money. So average reviews and in some cases no raise just don’t seem to matter. I’ve always said that the toughest conversation for me is the one where I talk about how they aren’t performing, and they want to argue and say that they are all good. They want to talk about all the outside things that are making it hard to do the job, but they never want to take any accountability. Even if you point out how no one else is having that issue, they still don’t want to take responsibility. Those are the times when I end the conversation earlier than I would like because I feel like I am in a situation where I can’t win. One of my rules is when I am in a situation where I can only lose, leave as quickly as possible. One thing I have been thinking about lately is how we have someone who doesn’t fit, but we treat them like they do fit. When they give a poor reason for not hitting expectations, we accept that answer. They say that they couldn’t do something because they didn’t have the materials to do the job. Instead of acknowledging how that may have been the case for a few of those situations, overall, it is not the main factor for not hitting expectations. Another factor is that we have accepted others not performing to expectations. If you have someone who is capable of being great, and day in and day out they are only good, we accept that. Instead of pushing them to be great, we are content with good and we in some cases may not ever even mention how they could be great. I worry that we live in a world where half of us is telling average people that they are great, when they clearly are not, and the other half only accepts perfection and puts down anyone who doesn’t meet our perfection expectations. How can we just give honest feedback? I think it starts with being able to give the proper assessment of a person. Can I look at someone and be able to tell how good they currently are and how much more potential they have? Can I look at someone and know that at their best they are a five out of ten? Also, what is the bare minimum they can be and still be a key player? If someone appears to only have the potential to be a five, shouldn’t I be able to move on right away? That leads us back to the original question, how do I move on if someone isn’t the right fit? Here are five things that we need to do as soon as possible:
1. Have expectations in place at all times.
2. Communicate as often as possible to all people what those expectations are.
3. Follow-up on a regular basis about their performance.
4. Communicate with an HR person your concerns.
5. Document all conversations you have with someone.
A few things I want to point out about these things. You need to overcommunicate and communicate often. Set expectations for the day, the week, or the month. If you set an expectation for a certain amount of time, you must check in with them multiple times and especially right after. It’s better to let HR in way too early than even a little late. And remember, if it’s not documented, it didn’t happen. If something happens fifteen times but you haven’t documented it, when time number sixteen comes and you finally document it, that is actually the first incident, not the sixteenth. Speaking of documenting, too often we only document what we say. We need to do a better job of documenting what they are saying. This is where later if they said it was an issue of not having the right materials, you can make sure that in the future they do and then you can eliminate that excuse. You can also let them say what they should be doing, then if they don’t hit the expectations, you have the ability to say that they did not do what they said that they would be able to do.