Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did they actually say "manage out"? Because that term specifically means making the person quit / move on, not firing them.

I'm not saying that you should make these employees miserable until they leave voluntarily -- but that is what the term typically means. Nag and document and warn and take away flexibilities and generally be terrible = managing people out.
Setting them up for a retirement or promotion elsewhere also falls in this category, but is usually used for too-expensive high performers.

+1. They want you to make these folks lives miserable so they quit. If they were going to fire them, they would already done so.

They won’t quit. I’m making my own life miserable doing this. Perhaps that’s what they want.

Anonymous wrote:Did they actually say "manage out"? Because that term specifically means making the person quit / move on, not firing them.

I'm not saying that you should make these employees miserable until they leave voluntarily -- but that is what the term typically means. Nag and document and warn and take away flexibilities and generally be terrible = managing people out.
Setting them up for a retirement or promotion elsewhere also falls in this category, but is usually used for too-expensive high performers.

+1. They want you to make these folks lives miserable so they quit. If they were going to fire them, they would already done so.

Anonymous wrote:Did they actually say "manage out"? Because that term specifically means making the person quit / move on, not firing them.

I'm not saying that you should make these employees miserable until they leave voluntarily -- but that is what the term typically means. Nag and document and warn and take away flexibilities and generally be terrible = managing people out.
Setting them up for a retirement or promotion elsewhere also falls in this category, but is usually used for too-expensive high performers.

That’s a really good point. I don’t think they used the phrase but that is what it feels like is happening. I took the message as one of support for firing people — it was delivered with an acknowledgement that the organization had made it too hard for management to discipline and terminate people with known issues. I’m not willing to push any more, given the fact that every time I want to take action, HR backs off or asks for more support. People aren’t going to voluntarily give up jobs they know they’ll never be fired from. In my case, no amount of coaching or nagging is fixing their issues. In fact, the more I push without imposing real consequences, the worse they get. Maybe they’re managing me out!

Did they actually say "manage out"? Because that term specifically means making the person quit / move on, not firing them.

I'm not saying that you should make these employees miserable until they leave voluntarily -- but that is what the term typically means. Nag and document and warn and take away flexibilities and generally be terrible = managing people out.
Setting them up for a retirement or promotion elsewhere also falls in this category, but is usually used for too-expensive high performers.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did you bring up the problem team members, and heard, "we want you to manage out difficult staff"? Or did management bring up specific people and ask you to begin managing them out?

It was a message delivered from the top to all of senior management, they want a culture change. But… I’m concerned that I misread the room. I’m about to cut my losses and stop pushing this rock up a hill. Some of these folks have been problems for years—I thought they hired me to shake things up, but the lack of traction I’m getting with HR is concerning me. I promise with my whole heart that the people I’m trying to move along are toxic and underperforming, but this experience is making me doubt myself big time.

Then I wouldn't push too hard. Document issues, but not to harass. Leadership wants to make themselves feel like they're being good leaders, but from my experience, you are just wasting your capital, especially if the work product is getting better overall. Just be careful, foo, that others don't come to see you as toxic.

Thanks. Solid advice.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did you bring up the problem team members, and heard, "we want you to manage out difficult staff"? Or did management bring up specific people and ask you to begin managing them out?

It was a message delivered from the top to all of senior management, they want a culture change. But… I’m concerned that I misread the room. I’m about to cut my losses and stop pushing this rock up a hill. Some of these folks have been problems for years—I thought they hired me to shake things up, but the lack of traction I’m getting with HR is concerning me. I promise with my whole heart that the people I’m trying to move along are toxic and underperforming, but this experience is making me doubt myself big time.

Then I wouldn't push too hard. Document issues, but not to harass. Leadership wants to make themselves feel like they're being good leaders, but from my experience, you are just wasting your capital, especially if the work product is getting better overall. Just be careful, foo, that others don't come to see you as toxic.

Anonymous wrote:Did you bring up the problem team members, and heard, "we want you to manage out difficult staff"? Or did management bring up specific people and ask you to begin managing them out?

It was a message delivered from the top to all of senior management, they want a culture change. But… I’m concerned that I misread the room. I’m about to cut my losses and stop pushing this rock up a hill. Some of these folks have been problems for years—I thought they hired me to shake things up, but the lack of traction I’m getting with HR is concerning me. I promise with my whole heart that the people I’m trying to move along are toxic and underperforming, but this experience is making me doubt myself big time.

Why are they asking you to do this?

Is it because people might sue them?

Or is it because they don’t want the vacancies/cost of hiring?

If the former, I think you have to just do it.

If the latter, do it and get better at hiring. Proactively work on your hiring practices and work with hr to make them better. The back end won’t stress you out as much if you make better hiring choices up front.

Did you bring up the problem team members, and heard, "we want you to manage out difficult staff"? Or did management bring up specific people and ask you to begin managing them out?

Hire H 1 B visa people. You do not have to deal with this nonsense.

Anonymous wrote:If you're going to leave anyway, you might as well try to solve this first.

Well, I don’t want to leave. Solving this would be great, and would make me want to stay on. I’m trying but this place is full of missing stairs and I feel like I just don’t get it.

If you're going to leave anyway, you might as well try to solve this first.

Anonymous wrote:Is your manager aware of the situation? I would talk to them. If they don’t have your back, I’d start looking for a new job. This situation sounds miserable.

My manager is very senior so I don’t discuss personnel issues with them, I get the strong impression they don’t want the exposure and use HR as their shield.

You are probably right, and it is miserable.

Is your manager aware of the situation? I would talk to them. If they don’t have your back, I’d start looking for a new job. This situation sounds miserable.

I’m getting mixed signals from leadership about how to handle problem employees. On the one hand, senior leaders have flat out said “we want you to manage people out that are problems” and made a big song and dance with HR about how they were going to support us. So, I’ve attempted to do that. But now I feel like I’m getting a bad rep with HR, and that it was just theater, and I have badly misread the situation.

HR has been requiring such a high level of documentation to do anything, I have to be the kind of manager I loathe. I have to nag and document, and give people multiple warnings, and basically treat them like children before any consequences can be imposed. I hate it. I have a couple of people working for me that are serious drags on the organization and it’s been months of gaslighting and burden shifting from HR.

I feel like I can’t even hint to an employee that they are in danger of losing their job without HR undermining me. It’s crazy and I don’t know what to do other than just back off and let the problem people be problems, and potentially lose my job over it if someone wants to find a reason to can me. I am at risk of burn out from doing all of the work these people aren’t doing, and quit. I have some high performing people on my team who are complaining to me about the drag these other people are creating, and I don’t blame them, but I feel incredibly stuck.

Do I go above HR’s head to leadership at this point? Or is that suicidal?

For context, yes, the organization is totally dysfunctional and no one is really coaching me through this, or has my back. I was hired a year ago from somewhere else, and seem to be the right person for this job insofar as the work product my unit is putting out is better than ever—but my leadership is extremely hands off, and I’m pretty much on my own.

I think the answer I’m going to get here is that I need to leave this job. But I need the money, the market is crap, and I’m actually really good at the job and would love the opportunity to clean house and hire a some people that can actually do the work that needs doing. But, again, leadership doesn’t seem interested in fixing things beyond a lot of big words.

Any words of wisdom for me?