By Colleen Gallion
"Colleen, I need you to fire them!” is not my favorite way to start a day. However, it seemed that the company’s owner felt this was urgent.
“What happened?” I asked. I’m expecting to hear about someone punching a co-worker, stealing money from the company, or showing up to work under the influence. Nope! This person had annoyed the owner one too many times and he wanted them GONE!
I was new to the company, and a key part of my role was implementing proper processes and procedures to ensure they were compliant with labor laws. This meant I had to explain to the owner that “being annoying” was not a fireable offense. More importantly, I needed him to understand that whatever action we took needed to be the right thing for the company, the customers, and this employee.
Here are some tools to help you navigate personnel challenges.
The employee handbook
Your employee handbook can usually be found gathering dust on a bookshelf, but ancient tomes gathering dust can be a secret treasure! They can also be outdated, so get a digital copy to keep on your computer for reference. Why? Because you and everyone else signed something that said, in effect, “I agree to follow the rules in this handbook.”
If your handbook was created by a human resource (HR) professional or an employment attorney, it will outline the employment guidelines of the company, protocols for escalating an issue, and the consequences for behavior that falls outside the rules. If someone keeps showing up late, calling in sick, taking personal phone calls, or hitting on customers, the handbook probably covers it.
Gather objective information
Objective information is not a matter of opinion or perspective, which makes it a solid place to start gathering the facts of a personnel issue. An easy way to determine if something is objective is to imagine someone has filmed the situation. If it would show up in the footage, it’s objective.
For example, “I swear Judy clicks her pen JUST to annoy me!” is subjective. We have no way of knowing why Judy clicks her pen. “Judy clicks her pen repeatedly throughout meetings” is objective. Everyone in the meeting could confirm that Judy clicked her pen.
Assume good intent
When a person’s behavior annoys us or conflicts with our values, it’s very easy to start making up a story about WHY that person is behaving that way, and that story will usually paint them as the villain and you as the victim. “She knows her pen clicking drives me crazy! She’s just doing it to annoy me.”
Because this is our natural tendency, take a moment to imagine that the other person has good intentions. Let’s assume Judy values you as a coworker and is oblivious to the effect her pen clicking habit has on you. When we assume good intentions, or at least neutral ones, we pull people out of “villain” mode and view them as a person.
Have a BEER with them
The acronym BEER, which stands for behavior, effect, expectation, and result, is a handy feedback model to help you keep track of the key things you need to communicate:
• Behavior: “Judy, you may not realize it, but you have a habit of clicking your pen in meetings.”
• Effect: “Members of the team find it difficult to concentrate on the presentation because they are distracted by the pen clicking.”
• Expectation. “I would like you to stop clicking your pen in meetings. We can order you different pens that don’t click, or you can take notes on your laptop.”
• Result: “It may seem like a small thing, but eliminating the distraction will go a long way toward improving the quality of our team meetings.”
Document with an email recap
If you’ve had a feedback conversation with someone, your next step is to send them a recap email. It creates a timestamp of when the conversation happened and creates an opportunity for further clarification if necessary.
Building good habits around addressing personnel issues early and documenting them well enables you to focus on creating a great experience for your people and your customers.
COLLEEN GALLION is an ICF-certified professional coach whose passion is supporting entrepreneurs and founders in building healthy and sustainable teams. For more information, visit www.gallioncoaching.com.
