| and the amazing difficulty of getting rid of them once they're identified as such Everyone always talks about how "amazingly difficult" it is to get under-performing people to leave, but really, why is that so? I find that simply saying "You know, we don't think this arrangement is working out for either of us. Can you please do us a huge favor, and resign? BTW if you agree, here's $X, a perfectly respectable severance package that acknowledges that you are human being, and that this was just as much our mistake as yours." pretty much always works (provided the company is willing to swallow $X, which if they have any integrity they should have no problem doing). You don't have to say the "this was our mistake part" of course, but that's what the $X is for, because it says it implicitly (and in a more substantial way than mere words ever could). Of course, there's also the task of getting other people to see that someone is under-performing, which can be quite difficult sometimes -- but that's a separate issue (and if it really is especially difficult to have these kinds of conversations with persons of authority in your group, then maybe you should be moving on, as well). |