I hate firing employees, HELP!

“I am not doing well today, I need to fire an employee and I hate doing that!” said a fellow CEO to me in confidence.

I told her that I used to feel that way and I read a line in Good to Great that turned around my perspective. Before I went to go share my experience, I wanted to know why she hated the idea of firing her employee.

“She looks at me like a mother and I feel like I am putting my child out of work. It pains me to see her suffer like that.”

I smiled because I remember that I used to have a similar perspective when I had to fire someone I was mentoring personally.

I asked her why she was firing her in the first place. She explained to me that the person just does not get the job and they are not capable of doing what needs to be done. She held on to her for an extra 6 months hoping that things would turn around and they are not going to turn around. She has been dreading this moment for weeks and today is the day.

“The longest time in the life of an entrepreneur is when he decides to let someone go, until she finally lets them go.” When you do finally let them go, all the other employees will be asking “What took you so long!”

Who suffers when you keep someone around that is not working out?

In my opinion, EVERYONE suffers. You are enabling bad behavior and as a leader, you MUST make the decision even if it's hard.

The decision does not need to be a hard one!

There was one an employee that I knew I needed to let go. I really like this employee very much, I mentored him. I was a friend with this employee. They were the most reliable employee I had because what they did was always predictable. The problem was that he did not want the job and he did not “get it”.

After pulling my hair for way too long, I read Good to Great again and a passage stuck out to me.

“Letting the wrong people hang around is unfair to all the right people, as they inevitably find themselves compensating for the inadequacies of the wrong people. Worse, it can drive away the best people. Strong performers are intrinsically motivated by performance, and when they see their efforts impeded by carrying extra weight, they eventually become frustrated.”

― James C. Collins, Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't

I realized that I had it all wrong!

I was doing this person a disservice by keeping them around. They did not have the courage to leave and go find something more suitable for them.

Instead of thinking that I was hurting them, I started to realize that by letting this person go, I was actually serving them, myself, our other employees and most importantly our clients!

I went for a really long walk and thought about the best way to do this. I decided that I will create the possibility that this is really a GOOD thing and that I will help this employee find a new job at a more suitable place.

After all, they are a GOOD person and they just did not fit into our company anymore.

I put on my biz dev hat on and realized that I can place this employee at a potential client's office, teach them how to get a job and how to excel there and they would want to hire us as their agency because they already knew how we work.

It would be a win-win situation.

I sat down with this employee and explained that I have decided that I will be letting them go. It's a good thing I explained because they have no future at this company and I really care about their future and the future of this company.

The plan was for them to get a job within two weeks and I would cover the two weeks as a severance. I would also coach them on how to find the perfect job.

Within two weeks, he got an offer and they even paid him more than what we were paying him.

Before the end of the month, he hired us as his Agency and we worked with that client for over 3 years helping them grow their business.

Three things happened. I took a bad situation that I hated and I turned it into a new opportunity for an employee I cared about, I served a potential client with a good person and I served my own business by getting a new client with a previous employee running the account.

Talk about a win-win.

This might not work with all employees and with all situations. My point is, find a way to make it positive, make it win-win and make it work so that you can move the action forward and make sure that everyone benefits.

How do you feel about letting people got?

Let me know in the comments below.

Joe Apfelbaum is the CEO of digital marketing agency Ajax Union. He is a public speaker, certified Google Trainer, and published business author. Joe enjoys speaking and writing about a broad range of business topics in his seminars, webinars and articles. Joe is the host of the popular podcast CEO Mojo and the producer of GrowTime.tv. In 2016 Joe was named the King of Kings County Brooklyn for his contribution to the business community in Brooklyn. Joe is proud of all his accomplishments, but most of all he is proud of his beautiful amazing kids.

For more about Joe, follow Joe Apfelbaum on social media @joeapfelbaum