What's missing from the equation is what it does to others. Sure one person got fired, bam! easy peasy.
Well not so easy because everyone else in the company witnessed that. It becomes a message to everyone else. "As soon you hit the first bump, or maybe you are sick, or have a family emergency we'll throw you under a bus". Everyone pays attention to that message.
Actions speak louder than words is a cliche, but it is true. Especially because management is used to talk in superlatives and in market-speak. "We are doing great! We are a people's company. We value our employees. We are a meritocracy. We are here to help you grow, blah, blah,...", but then they fire Steve because his code hit a segfault in production twice that week.
Which message will people listen to?
> Erik Wolpaw, a writer at Valve fell ill (diagnosed with ulcerative colitis) in 2004. He knew he couldn’t fulfil his duties at work and made the choice to leave Valve. Erik tried to quit, Gabe refused to accept his resignation and said “Your job is to get better. That is your job description at Valve. So go home to your wife and come back when you are better.” On leaving Erik turned to fellow Valver Chet and said “Well, I guess we know where we’re working for the rest of our lives.”
So she did, and they did.
Guess how committed she is to working there now.
If you work at a company where you believe this is the case, you should leave so you are leaving on your terms and on your timeline.
The way I think of it is this. On the day you are fired, when you get called in a room, if I ask you, "why do you think you're here?", you'd reply: "I think I'm getting fired". Because I want us to have had so many conversations about it, and been so direct, that the actual firing is incredibly unsurprising.
I think any manager owes this to their employees, as a matter of basic human decency.
Personally I'd prefer a place where I could do X and X+1 so it'd be a bit of a negative in choosing where to go, but I can live with it. OTOH I'd be extremely pissed if I walked in one day and was told "we think you're awesome, but you don't konw X+1 so see ya later"
But they think they can because they got VC money and they are high on their own fumes.
Fire fast if someone is clearly not a right fit, but "Fast" should be after giving them plenty of warning.
Ideally both sides are on the same page at any point of time as to what the situation is.
I'd like to think (and try to only work for) people would be professional enough on both sides to realize that not everyone (either side) is going to be happy 100% of the time but a) both sides can work on it to make it better and b) if it doesn't work out, try to be supportive of each other so that both come out stronger overall.
But some companies aren't great at feedback, particularly young ones where the mechanisms for regular, structured feedback aren't really in place yet.
That said, I was laid off once at a company that was not doing well and had to make cuts across the board. They were very sad to have to let me go, but did one of the classiest things I've seen a company do in my entire career...as part of my 2 weeks severance, they let me continue telling companies I was currently employed there still. I had three competitive offers in a week, and I feel I was in a much stronger position because of how they handled that.
1. This person is having to fire a lot of people, something is up that needs to be investigated.
2. People are surprised, this person may not be the best manager.
The specific details are everything in this case, so it really depends. It can definitely come back and screw the manager though if it is indeed their own fault. Often times it may not be theirs alone though.
Beyond that it creates a morale problem. People who work together form social attachments and get upset when a coworker disappears. People who are in no actual danger of being fired will assume they're next. People who make mistakes or miss deadlines will start looking for new jobs because job-hunting is easier when you have a job. And good people will start to leave because it's just not a fun place to work with the black cloud hanging over the office.
That is not to say you should never fire someone. Sometimes it's unavoidable. But it's not something you should do lightly.
I guess I meant "the one thing that bothers me from the perspective of someone who might be fired at any moment" :) - I could survive in a fire fast iff they were open about everything, although I probably wouldn't choose to work there in the first place, if that makes sense.
The amount of months's notice you get changes with your age and years of employement as well. Sometimes you have to sack entire departments just to defeat the LIFO policy.
Now I think Sweden's laws can be a bit too strict, companies are deathly afraid to hire the wrong people (after the six month trial period) since they can't get rid of them, and companies should be able to get rid of underperformers, but living in a country where your boss can go Donald Trump on your ass on a whim isn't exactly ideal either...
If you're leaving a company, you might not have told the manager that you were interviewing around, but you certainly should have talked to them about being unhappy.
If you're firing an employee, they should have known (almost as long as you've known) that there was some culture mismatch, or that their performance wasn't meeting expectations, or whatever.
There are of course always exceptions, where you think someone is crazy or an asshole, but most people are reasonable and can handle hearing that things aren't great.
>> there was some culture mismatch, or that their performance wasn't meeting expectations
I had trouble reading this: culture, or performance. If their performance was good, but they didn't match the 'culture' then it is arbitrary in the greatest order. If 'culture; is important, as I agree it is but in qualifiable ways, so culture is qualifiable, and if an organization cannot put 'culture; into its performance expections, it is likely doomed or very very young, but likely doomed.
Zach was there for five years. Why are we talking about "fire fast"?
I am going to hug my country's employment law. "Fire fast" sounds inherently abusive towards employees.
I'm fine with that, but make sure that I know it's likely coming well in advance. Make sure I understand that I'm not pulling my weight. Make sure I understand that the company is moving in a different direction and you'd rather part ways with me than let me retool. It's all good, just don't drop a bomb on me one day.