Dealing with problem employees: how to manage performance & personality issues in the workplace
By Amy DelPo & Lisa Guerin
Introduction by Librarian
Employees are valuable asset in a company. A problem employee can be a nightmare for the employer, supervisor and colleagues. Employees with low productivity would affect the overall performance of the whole team or even the whole company. There can be plenty of reasons behind the poor performance of problem employees, such as mindset issues, disobedience, attendance problems, poor communication skill, personality issues and more.
It is never easy to tackle the matter but it is worth trying. Wise employers understand clearly that the cost of recruiting and training a new employee can be significant. Also, existing employees may have the insider information of a company and information drain to competitors can be catastrophic. Therefore, it is always sensible for employers to do their utmost to handle problem employees with soft tactics at the outset.
To improve the situation, employers can try to have better communication with the problem employees so that the latter can be aware of the expectations on them and what gaps to be bridged. Both sides should establish a mutually agreed mechanism, setting concrete targets with fair indicators to measure improvement.
If soft tactics do not work, employers may need to move beyond corrective measures and impose punitive ones. It can be a hard battle to deal with problem employees in such a way as problem employees would fight back to safeguard themselves at the expense of the company. For example, there may be complaints, allegations of being discriminated, employment lawsuits and so on. Daily operation of the company would be adversely affected as the managementwould need to spend considerable time to handle various disputes, not to mention the high cost of seeking legal advice in such cases.
After having gone through the challenges, employers should learn a lesson and review the prevailing practice in recruitment to avoid hiring problem employees. It is indeed possible that existing employees might become problem staff due to various reasons. Therefore, an effective mechanism to monitor the staff performance is important. A company with a carrot and stick policy can usually better manage its staff behaviour.