The Best Approach to the Worst Conversation: "You're Fired"

http://firstround.com/article/The-Best-Approach-to-the-Worst-Conversation

by ca98am79 • 13 years ago

51 64 13 years ago

rfnslyr2• 13 years ago

"But there’s something off. He’s not productive. He’s not a culture fit."

I've interviewed at a company before for about a week. 4 interviews later they tell me they won't go through with me for undisclosed reasons. This was before I had seen the company or anyone besides the immediate people interviewing. I then asked just to see what the company layout was like and they gave me a tour of the offices.

Jesus fucking H christ, everyone was the same. It was all 20-25 year olds, glasses, beards, tshirts, jeans, all white males. If that's ever a reason to not hire someone or even fire someone it's not a company you want to work at in the first place.

If the word "culture" is in any sentence when you're hiring/firing me, I'm punching you right in the fucking face (not actually though) and leaving. It's basically saying "for some arbitrary reason we're going to fire you, but we don't really know why and neither do you, bye!" Sorry for not having a beard, thick rim glasses, and not liking the same N64 video games as you.

I'm probably just bitter though.

anoncowherd2• 13 years ago

I get the sentiment, but don't you think punching someone in the face is a bit too much?

packetslave• 13 years ago

Only if you're under the impression Mr. Internet Tough-guy would actually do it.

msandford4• 13 years ago

I doubt he'd actually punch someone in the face, it's a bit of bravado to make a point: a lot of the "company culture" doesn't have anything to do with making the business work and more to do with people's personal preferences.

rfnslyr2• 13 years ago

Obviously yes I'm kidding.

I think it's extremely insulting to disregard the years I have put into perfecting my craft because I don't have the same outward appearance/attitude as everyone else.

No matter how much of a cultural fit you are, that doesn't get the work done, the expertise does.

I work at a team right now that has: Indian men/women in their mid 40's. Young teenage interns from. People ranging from Indian, to Asian, to White, to Jewish, to men, to women, to gay, to straight, you name it. We have not gotten along better. It really doesn't matter.

"Culture fit" is just a poor patch to cover up insecurity.

leothekim• 13 years ago

In the U.S., we have 'at-will employment' laws. So, unless you're caught stealing, engaging in racial or sexual discrimination or harassment, doing drugs, or committing some felonious criminal offense (though even then those last two cases it is still arguable), you can be fired without just cause and without warning, and any court will dismiss any standing claims against the employer. Thus, if you're told you're not a 'culture fit', that's actually more than most companies need to tell you when they boot you out the door.

michaelochurch4• 13 years ago

At-will employment: very complicated. http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/12/21/what-is-at-wi...

Laws on termination are very complex in general. You need a lawyer to navigate that stuff. There are a lot of things that it's illegal to fire someone for doing (including, for example, discussing salary with co-workers). If you're under threat of a PIP/firing you can usually make one apply in the 30-90 days of the PIP.

More than a lawsuit, companies fear disparagement (unless their reputations are in the toilet already) and that's a good enough reason, in general, to write decent severance packages. Warning: never explicitly threat disparagement in a severance negotiation. That gets into extortion territory and while you're unlikely to be taken to jail, you've lost all leverage.

Generally, you should aim for a fair (not unreasonably high) severance and more important try to work out a good reference even when let go. Always, after any termination, check your own references. Employment suits become he-said/she-said affairs very quickly, so the behavior of the people involved will determine a lot. If they're giving good references, reasonable severance offers, etc. then the odds are very strongly in their favor. If they give a bad reference, the situation is much to your advantage and your argument that you were fired 2 days after disclosing migraines suddenly finds a more receptive audience.

rayiner2• 13 years ago

(Obligatory disclaimer: this isn't legal advice, I'm not your lawyer, etc):

It doesn't quite work like that. You can fire someone for any reason at all, as long as it isn't one of the disallowed reasons (discrimination on the basis race, gender, religion, age, etc). However, the reason you give need not be taken at face value. A jury is entitled to conclude that your stated reason is pretextual, and a discriminatory reason is the real one. There's an evidentiary showing the plaintiff must meet first, but it can be purely circumstantial and pretext is often what the claim really boils down to.

That's where shit like "he's not a cultural fit" can get you into trouble. It's basically begging the jury (or a judge at summary judgment) to disbelieve you and conclude that you really fired someone for a discriminatory reason. I.e. "he's not a cultural fit... because he's black and we're all white" or "she's not a cultural fit... because she's a woman and we're all men."

A sibling comment to yours recasts "culture" to "process and management structure." That's much more firm ground. "He's ineffective at his job because he can't work well with our internal processes" or "she's ineffective at her job because she doesn't take direction from our management."

Also, this isn't just a legal issue. Talking about "process and management structure," which is specific and grounded in the ultimate question of whether someone is doing a good job, instead of culture, which is amorphous and can encompass things that have nothing to do with the work, focuses your thinking on factors that you should actually care about.

smacktoward• 13 years ago

One reason people form unions is to get a contract with their employer that sets up a grievance process so that you can't be fired because your manager got up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.

Just sayin'.

asolove2• 13 years ago

I agree that some companies use "culture fit" as an excuse to eliminate diversity. But that doesn't mean that "culture fit" isn't a real thing when not abused in this way.

I have found "culture fit" to often mean problems with adjusting to the process and management structure of an organization.

I have worked with folks from corporate environments who never adjusted to having to find their own work and set their own goals in the startup world. And I have worked (briefly) at companies where I liked the people and the work but could not be productive or happy with the kind of micro-management I was expected to put up with.

That's why it's valuable to interview for "culture" (both when hiring and being hired). You need to talk out loud about expectations of how we work together and how we decide what to do. Have this conversation enough times, both in interviews and just chatting with peers, and you'll see things you agree with, things you disagree with but don't mind, and things that are absolute warning signs of toxic environments.

protonfish2• 13 years ago

I disagree with your definition. If you can't get your work done because you need micromanagement then it is simply a case of not doing your job, and there is no value bringing "culture" into the discussion. The term "cultural fit" is a contrast to competency and productivity, not a subsection.

Any business that's sole focus is not accomplishing their mission is dysfunctional. "Cultural Fit" is always toxic - unfairly discriminatory in hiring and non productive in practice.

rhizome2• 13 years ago

Do you see what you did there? You defined "culture fit" as a codeword for a lack of management and process!

yawz• 13 years ago

If we believe that companies have their culture (I certainly do) then it's not so surprising that someone may or may not be "culture-fit".

However, I'd question the health of the organization if the so-called culture is in the way that people dress or trim their facial hair. It is hopefully much more related to things like company's structure, employee's attitude and interpersonal skills, people's approach to team management, problem solving methods, work ethics etc.

southpawgirl3• 13 years ago

I've never worked in a very small company, but I've been working in very small teams. While claiming a 'culture clash' seems pretty much of a copt-out from the employer's part, it's true that one single person can make or break a small team. Sometimes the clash is purely of personality (an example I've witnessed: one very competitive and personal-win-orientated alpha male in a group of laid back, traditional geeks), sometimes it's procedural (i.e. a former start-up guy in a corporate environment) but I do see potential so-called culture problems as very real and potentially unsolvable, if not by the removal of the "offending" party.

Having said that, the threat of an established monoculture is probably much worse for productivity, morale and sheer fairness that having to put up with one sour (or clashing) apple.

btilly2• 13 years ago

The last interview that I was on where someone was not hired because of "culture" was because when an experienced devop was asked for an interesting disaster story, he had none. Then, when pushed, he had one, but one with parenthetical comments about how he had told them not to make the mistake.

We said "culture" but what we really meant was, "He's showing the kind of defensive behavior that you REALLY do not want in a devop when things go pear shaped."

And, given defensive behavior was already seen, do you think we really want to try to justify what was clear to us?

msandford4• 13 years ago

Or maybe he was exactly right and management was extremely foolish not to listen to him.

If your plan is to have excellent punching bags for when things go south who you can blame and who will not fight back early on, then your not hiring him was a good plan. If you wanted to avoid disasters, well, perhaps you should think about it.

I can't blame the guy for not wanting to talk badly about his former management; it's not a way to win friends in a job interview.

incision• 13 years ago

What an interesting dance interviewing is.

'Then, when pushed, he had one, but one with parenthetical comments about how he had told them not to make the mistake. We said "culture" but what we really meant was, "He's showing the kind of defensive behavior that you REALLY do not want in a devop when things go pear shaped."'

I had an interview where I responded to a "greatest challenge" question with a true story about recovering a disastrous project from the brink. I related the story in a very "what we did" as opposed to "what was wrong" sense.

Afterwards, the interviewer pressed on about what actually went wrong in the project to throw it into a death spiral to begin with.

I generally try to avoid talking about previous employers, particularly in a negative light when interviewing, but I provided an honest answer - a short tale of cronyism, incompetence and prior efforts made to save the project.

I don't think the interviewer took too well to that response and I had to wonder if I'd been pegged as being defensive or accusatory there? I expect I was.

In the end, I'm thinking questions which might beg or demand talking ill of a past situation can be a no-win situation for the interviewee and not necessarily informative for the interviewer.

logicallee• 13 years ago

Look, a startup can't afford not to look like that. We'll likely hire a male college swim team[1] to put on decorative glasses - yes all of them will - and wear our t-shirt in a group photo. Then we'll put it on our Team page with a satirical heading "Just a typical startup team" with a very small disclaimer that the photo is representative, satirical, and contains none of our employees.

Anyone who "needs" to see it will see it, and immediately check it off in their head then click through our other tabs. Meanwhile we can continue hiring the best people from all over the world regardless of age, gender, looks, or location. They also don't have to spend two thirds of their salary on rent, pizza, gaming gear, and lattes to fit in, and you will be more than welcome wherever you are located or if we open a regional office. Keep us in mind.

[1] representative picture: http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/oakl/sports/c-swim/auto_...

codegeek• 13 years ago

" everyone was the same. It was all 20-25 year olds, glasses, beards, tshirts, jeans, all white males."

Culture is not just about ethnicity or how you look like or what hobbies do you have ? At work, culture is about how you work together with the team to accomplish the same goal that the company has. Whether it is making shitload of money for shareholders or building the most beautiful product, you should ideally believe in that culture. I care less if all co-workers around me are white or black or orange, what I do care about is how they treat me, their work, their company, their attitude. What kind of work environment does the company promote ? Open door ? Face to face conversations ? These are the examples of "culture".

georgeecollins• 13 years ago

I worry that "culture fit" leads to group think.

auggierose• 13 years ago

What a load of bull. The best part: "Take the threat out of it".

Yeah. If the employee does not realise the threat imposed by a PIP then he/she is an idiot and should be fired immediately.

ash• 13 years ago

I think the speaker said it's better to try to fix things for 3 months without signing any formal agreement at first (== threat).

invalidOrTaken• 13 years ago

...formal agreement (== threat).

Sorry, it just ain't so. Like the grandparent said, the employee's probably not an idiot, and threat is present from the very beginning, even if unintentionally.

joshyeager2• 13 years ago

I think his point is that a formal PIP ratchets up the pressure and reduces the employee's ability to focus on actually improving. If delaying the formal PIP helps them improve their performance enough so that you don't have to fire them, that is a great outcome.

japaget• 13 years ago

Site appears to be down, Google cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://...

michaelochurch4• 13 years ago

Formal PIP is a bad idea. Once things are at that point, fire immediately but with severance. A 3-month severance is much cheaper than a 1-month PIP, while this "walking dead" employee pisses all over morale and has divider effects all around him.

From the OP: 50% of people who are put on performance improvement plans become repeat offenders.

Even when someone recovers from a PIP, they can't transfer internally in most companies-- they're not blocked, but no one wants them-- and the stink never goes away. Promotion is out of the question, too, even 2-3 years later. Good people (wrongly PIP'd, it happens) leave and bad people stay.

Most "repeat offenders" on PIPs are people the manager still wanted to fire. HR said "no, we're not willing to take the legal risk of firing this person." PIPs are rarely passed. Either they fail (leading to termination) or are ruled "inconclusive"-- which makes the manager look bad (HR declined his firing request) and more pissed off. The only time PIPs seem to be "successful" is when there's a change of manager (or, if possible, the team).

Why do PIPs persist? Two words: externalized costs. An HR department can claim it saved money on severance payments, while the cost is externalized (and multiplied) to that employee's team and manager.

It may be counterintuitive that "rewarding failure" is the best strategy, but it's just another cost of doing business.

buckbova• 13 years ago

Once things are at that point, fire immediately but with severance. A 3-month severance is much cheaper than a 1-month PIP,

Just fire on the spot with no severance. I've never known anyone to go on a PIP and remain at a company. They are either fired "eventually" or they find another job.

danielweber2• 13 years ago

Severance takes all legal threat off the table.

michaelochurch4• 13 years ago

Just fire on the spot with no severance.

Bad play, risk-wise. Severance requires them to sign a non-litigation agreement and usually non-disparagement as well. PIP provides a paper trail and insures you somewhat against lawsuit (but not disparagement)-- they could argue for a "wrongful PIP", but you have paper. I don't recommend going that way, but it is better (risk-wise) than just cold-firing.

If you cold-fire, you're taking a major risk. With no severance and no warning, he will be pissed off-- and it's not hard to damage a company's reputation.

It's also not as hard as you think to build a termination case, although I'm not getting into the details here. Let's just say that some people (esp. termination lawyers) are as good at playing that game as we are at programming. Even if you win, he can make it a pyrrhic victory.

I've never known anyone to go on a PIP and remain at a company. They are either fired "eventually" or they find another job.

Agree. I covered that. You're 100% right.

rayiner2• 13 years ago

Why do PIPs persist? Two words: externalized costs. An HR department can claim it saved money on severance payments, while the cost is externalized (and multiplied) to that employee's team and manager.

Very insightful. I wonder how much silliness in corporate America can be explained in terms of HR externalizing costs to other departments. I'm specifically thinking of the articles always talking about HR blocking good but unconventional hires.

rdl• 13 years ago

Absolutely agree -- if you combine "fast to fire" (as soon as you've decided) with generous severance, you're probably at the optimal spot.

The "HR (outsourced) exists to handle payroll/benefits compliance; founders and line managers deal with everything else for as long as possible" seems like the only way to make this work, though.

bowlofpetunias• 13 years ago

Unfortunatey, formal PIP is an absolute necessity in countries with strong labor protection laws (i.e., most of Western Europ). You cannot easily fire someone without a big fat dossier that shows you tried, or else the judge or labor authority will simply tell you to try harder.

That also makes them even more horrible and useless. Once you start going down this route, everyone knows what the score is, and it's extremely demoralizing. Nobody takes them seriously, and employers often stack the deck so there is no other possible outcome but failure.

Which is why many companies choose to offer a shitload of severance pay in exchange for the employee voluntarily "resigning".

yuhong• 13 years ago

Not that I like the design of these laws of course.

gaius2• 13 years ago

A PIP is a stitch up. It's a legal way to do constructive dismissal. Remember the HR department's job is the same as the tax accountant's job: to enable the company's management to sail as close as they can to the legal wind.

joshyeager2• 13 years ago

Manager Tools has an excellent recommendation for this. As soon as you recognize that someone is on a path towards needing to be fired, begin to give intense feedback with the goal of rebuilding their performance. Record all of the feedback, and intentionally spend 3-6 months on the process. You have a chance to turn them around before it's too late and it's more likely to succeed without the pressure of a formal PIP. If you do have to fire them, your documentation should be enough to meet all of HR's requirements immediately.

http://www.manager-tools.com/2006/02/how-to-fire-someone-wel...

001sky2• 13 years ago

I only made it 3/4 through this, but this seems like paint-by-numbers advice, and lacks the real-world flavour that make "following a textbook" in these cases <actually hard>.

Feedback needs to be immediate. As soon as someone steps off the path or veers into dangerous territory, let them know. Ideally during the first 90 days, give people “an exorbitant amount of feedback,” Lopp says. “Just think, you could have fixed it six or nine months earlier by pulling Jeff aside and saying, hey you really frustrated people in that last meeting because you weren’t listening.”

People that are being "jerks" are typically not leaving obvious footprints when they "step off the path" nor do they tend to make obvious and transparent mistakes or mis-steps in pubic. You are typically dealting with people well versed in passive agression. Plausibly deniability, and adding unwanted "drama" by abusing their authority, or bullying their staff or doing a whole range of things which if the junior staff report to (skip-level) management, they (not the mid-level-manager) will be on the hook for "insubordination" to the business discretion of the middle boss. This is the type of opaque, catch-22 that many people face in reality and dealing with it is a PITA, time consuming and risky (for senior and junior staff). Its not a paint-by-numbers situation at all, those are ovbious and people with blatant incompetence tend to not make past interviews. The types of problems that tend to result after effective interviewing are rightly seens as variations of incompetence, and bad leadership though... because they impair the ability to "get shit done". But dealing with them requires more than a nudge on the tiller when something is headed off course. It requires (1) a system and approach to make performance transparent; (2) a system to compartmentalize risk; and (3) a system that generates enough observations to for reliable systemic data on performance and accountability. Without such a struture in place in these fronts, "bad apples" will underperform without consequence for long periods of time, because they will cover their tracks, blend in, and otherwise obfuscate situations to manipulative effect.

If all this seems "overly complicated" and not anything like following an HR handbook, that's probably about par for the course !!

leokun• 13 years ago

Eh, if someone is being a problem and is creating negativity, as manager you should be able to pick up on it. It shouldn't be that hard, that's most of your job as a manager is to be able to read the people that work for you and evaluate them. You don't need proof of passive aggressive behavior to fire anyone. Just fire them and wish them the best on their next venture.

001sky2• 13 years ago

Right, but your trivializing the problem. Only a clown "inserts negativity", because inserting <ambiguity> equally if nor moreso effective at undermining your authority as a manager.

Firing someone for <creating> "an ambiguous situation" might in fact be the simple, correct action.

But if you fired someone evertime you were just <in> an ambiguous situation? Not so much. Good luck with that, because your boss might probably fire you next=D.

Its also why you'll find a "good leader" is never surrounded by this crap. If you think about the "broken windows" theory of policing, where low-level crime creates an atmoshere conducive to "real crime", there is probably a decent analogy. Good leaders are adept at working through <uncertainty>, but distinguish this from <ambiguity> for this reason. IMHO.

serverascode• 13 years ago

I think it's interesting that he says if it gets to this point then it's your fault, but then doesn't say fire yourself. ;)

auctiontheory• 13 years ago

What percentage of employees improve to acceptability (from the employer's perspective) after being put on a PIP or a pre-PIP? 10%? 50% 90%?

If it's on the low end of the range, then a generous severance would seem to be the better choice for all concerned.

The Best Approach to the Worst Conversation: "You're Fired"

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