It’s never easy to fire someone, but when it’s time to let someone go, you have to do it in the right way so you don’t end up in court facing unfair dismissal charges. When you take the time to fire someone correctly, it shows your employees that you value them and won’t put them through emotional turmoil needlessly, which builds trust and respect between you and your staff and helps avoid later wrongful dismissal lawsuits. Here are five simple steps on firing a person at work properly.
1) Do it face-to-face
That way you can make sure they understand what happened, how it happened, and why it happened. Don’t fire an employee over email or over text; you never know if they’ll take it as a joke and take no offense. In addition to being an obvious professional courtesy, doing it in person is also a fair business practice. You owe them that much respect. Make sure they have enough time: If your company has less than 10 employees, let them go with two weeks pay. For companies with more than 10 employees, give them one month’s pay for every year of service up to a maximum of 12 months’ pay. Be careful about firing someone who has been at your company for less than 6 months: It could be considered illegal unless you have just cause—for example, if they were hired under false pretenses or failed their probationary period. If you do decide to fire someone for these reasons, be ready to prove it in court should your ex-employee try suing you for wrongful termination.
2) Be honest and straight to the point
There is no right or wrong way to fire someone. However, there are bad ways to do it, which usually leads to less than desirable outcomes. It’s important to be honest and straight to the point, especially in a corporate environment. Keep things professional, even if you know your colleague isn’t always on time and has questionable social skills. You never know what your colleagues say about you behind your back; likewise, they don’t know what you say about them either. Not everyone gets along with everyone else at work and that’s fine – but it doesn’t mean that one person deserves more respect than another just because they have a title or make more money. If you feel like someone needs to go, then go ahead and let them go. Don’t drag out a firing for too long as it can cause unneeded stress for both parties involved. If you want to maintain a good relationship with your team members, consider being transparent from day one so everyone knows how things will run in terms of performance expectations and accountability.
3) State the reason clearly
Don’t sugarcoat it. The main reason you’re firing someone is because they aren’t producing and it isn’t worth your time to try to fix that. Address any performance issues and problems you may have had with them, but make sure they know that they were not met expectations. After all, there should be no surprises when someone gets fired—they should understand what’s expected of them and have a chance to correct it before anything worse happens. Be kind: There are some things you can’t control about firing people, like how upset or emotional they become as a result of your decision.
4) Give your employee time off for good behavior
In most situations, an employee is entitled to be let go with pay if they have worked at your company for more than a month. If you let them go earlier than that, but give them some time to find another job or come up with severance, it can sometimes be treated as a disciplinary action; avoid it by giving them a few weeks of paid vacation instead. Not only is it better for your employee in their current position, but you’ll also be doing yourself a favor—nobody likes having to fire someone, so do what you can to make things easier on both parties involved.
5) Follow up after firing them
One of your most difficult tasks as a manager or business owner is firing someone who isn’t meeting expectations. Although it’s important to do so, you don’t want to wait too long in case they can no longer perform up to standards or if their attitude disrupts team morale. Take care of terminations quickly and effectively with these 5 steps: 1. Meet with your employee one-on-one for a performance review. Discuss how he’s doing on specific work duties and address any questions he may have about his role or what more he needs to do to meet company goals. 2. When it comes time for an annual raise, let him know that there won’t be one because his performance hasn’t been stellar enough lately.
Conclusion
Try not to fire people. Ideally, you should be looking for ways to avoid letting go of great employees. However, in some cases it becomes necessary. As a manager, you’re probably already aware that firing is never easy for anyone involved and can pose legal challenges. However, when managed with tact and care, firing someone can be accomplished with both dignity and efficiency—no matter how difficult it might seem at first glance.