by Nicole Selley

Created on: November 17, 2009

Firing an employee is one of the hardest things a manager will ever have to do. This is particularly the case if you know that the employee is working hard and doing their best, but his or her performance is just not as good as it should be.

It is tempting to give the employee another chance after another chance until you feel it is too late to fire the employee.

So, how long should you wait before firing an employee for poor performance?

New employee

If an employee is new in the company you need to ensure that you give him sufficient support and time to learn the skills required and to understand the processes needed to perform. If within the first month you believe that the employee has not progressed sufficiently in his performance it is important to arrange a review meeting at this early stage.

The review meeting will ensure that the employee is aware of your concerns as well as expectations and can rectify any issues. At the same time it allows the employee to highlight any areas where he needs more support, training or help from fellow colleagues.

Ideally a further review meeting should be scheduled for 4 weeks later to either raise any ongoing concerns or to reassure the employee that the concerns have been sufficiently addressed and the manager is now satisfied with the performance.

If the employee consistently and considerably underperforms, weekly meetings can be more beneficial than waiting for a full month for a further review.

It is important to remember that new employees usually are employed subject to a notice period. This notice period is designed to give both the employer and employee the opportunity to identify if they are a good match. Once the notice period is over, it is considerably more difficult to let go of an employee and you will need to follow strict company disciplinary processes including verbal, written and potentially final warning.

Prior to the end of the probation period the employer or manager of an underperforming new employee should therefore carefully consider if the employee has improved sufficiently to be kept on or if the gap between what has been delivered and what was expected is too large to be acceptable.

If the latter is the case a good manager has little choice but to fire the employee prior to the end of the notice period in order to avoid other colleagues having to work harder to make up for a weak link or to avoid impacting negatively on the company performance. In the long-term this will also be better for

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