Had to fire someone - first time

I had to fire a woman earlier this week because she was unable to meet clearly spelled out requirements (and she signed a document confirming she understood), 8-5 working hours (1 hour unpaid lunch), in the office, no remote work. She did good work, but left at 3pm each day her first two (and only days), saying she had to get her kids from school. No emergency, it turns out. This would have been an everyday thing. She did not ask for any accommodations during the interview process. We had to let her go on the morning of third day after a talk. She expected to work 6 hours, but get paid for 8. She handed me back unfinished work each day before she left. It doesn’t work that way. She was excellent and we offered a 8-3 or 9-3 schedule, but she didn’t want it. Due to policy constraints from owners, remote work or flexing hours not an option at all. I was sorry to have to let her go, but I had no choice in the matter.

Firing people sucks. I had to fire my project manager because my boss pretty much told me I had to, even though she had worked extremely diligently on her performance improvement plan. I always felt that he wanted me to fire her because she didn't fit into the corporate culture. She was very quiet to the point of being socially awkward, but she was trainable and worked hard.

I had no issue with this one. Chick had an entitled attitude that I was not going to put up with. Other people (not in the office) told me I should have allowed her to work from home or flex her hours. Neither is a possibility due to owner policies. No control over that. And I’m not going to go to bat for a new employee to WFH when it’s not regularly allowed for long term employees.

Getting ready to fire some people. Tired of the eye rolls, and a kid who thinks she can get an owner fired and she can just stand around, or a kid, who thinks they run the business.

I myself have had to fire a couole of people and it was not easy nor pleasant. I will say those few people were not just ambushed fired, however - they were told more than once that their performance was not up to par and they were given more than one chance to improve. Under these conditions, I don't feel so horrible as I would otherwise and I don't feel that I am disrespecting my heritage in the name of tawdry profit. But it was not easy. Rob

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Originally Posted by gimmethesimplelife

I myself have had to fire a couole of people and it was not easy nor pleasant. I will say those few people were not just ambushed fired, however - they were told more than once that their performance was not up to par and they were given more than one chance to improve. Under these conditions, I don't feel so horrible as I would otherwise and I don't feel that I am disrespecting my heritage in the name of tawdry profit. But it was not easy. Rob

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Yeah, I don’t feel bad at all about firing this woman since she signed a document that outlined work hours.

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Originally Posted by Tradd

Yeah, I don’t feel bad at all about firing this woman since she signed a document that outlined work hours.

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Years ago I had to let go someone on their second day. They were hired with all job requirements being explicitly laid out. By the second day, she was arguing over the job responsibilities, and then started with "maybe she didn't want this job anyway" and, oh btw, she was interviewing at another company in the area that might be better. After consulting with HR, she agreed to leave only to call from the train station asking if we could spring for her train fare. She was a real piece of work.

Felt zero guilt over it. Incidentally this other company that she said she was interviewing was a local company that had run into serious financial trouble, it was well known employees were jumping ship so I found it interesting she mentioned she might want to work there instead. Could have been bluffing but if she was serious and got hired there, she didn't last very long as the company folded a couple of months later.

Sort of update to original post:

I’ve mentioned the situation to people who I know are managers to see what they thought. I was floored that a LOT of them told me we should have worked with the woman to get her a flexible full time schedule, allowing her to flex hours or WFH. Hell, regular WFH is not allowed for 15-20 year employees. Why do people think we should treat a new employee differently and give her things regular long term employees aren’t allowed to do? Do they actually think the existing employees would take this well? Hell, no! All because she was a parent. She was offered different hours that would fit her schedule and turned them down.

I went through all the freight forwarder open positions listed online in my area and they’re ALL in the office. Regardless of what people in other industries believe, regular desk level positions in my industry are still very much in the office.

For my library department, which was not a publicly accessible department but operated behind-the-scenes, I was able to provide some flexibility in work hours for employees. We had moms who started way early in the morning like 6:30 AM to 7 AM sometimes. I came in way late. I did this to attract employees. I think it was helpful for some of them And may have added to retention success.

But in the end, there was probably only 2-3 hour daily difference in work hours among employees. I required that they set a predictable schedule, they couldn’t work a different schedule every day or even weekly.

No one was working from home.

okay----this one place hired this local yahoo as a manager of production, and he was very similar to that supervisor in the moo-vee "office Space"(see photo)
, just a real dxxxxxwad. Anyway---to assert himself, he waent around randomly firing(as my study revealed) single people! "Dick" is one a those neo-conservative church people, who values marriage so much that he lined up his terminally-ill wifes in-home hospice caregiver as his next wife! But yeah--3-4 months after the sick one passed, it wuz here-comes-the-bride!! So where was I? Well, one o' my co-workers(a single boy) had been thinking about moving backtsa Callyfornya, so he started conspicuously loafing, and right away--he got canned. I had many, many home projects that needed attending to, and was sicka the place, so yeah---I used that strategy, too! Bingo--Due to no real malfeasance on my part, I got ta collect unemployment ins. for closeta two years, due to extended benefits! Ha. But yeah--"Dick" ended up having to move on, himself. The owner found a slightly more competent manager that didn't go around canning hard-to-replace hired help, for stoopid reasons. Yup. Hope that helps you kids some. Thankk Mee.Attachment 5897