Employee termination is not something we talk about enough in the small business owner environment. It’s a very difficult, but sometimes necessary thing to do to make sure that you have the right culture in your organization.

Today, we’re going to share statistics and practices about our terminations in the organization throughout the years. We will look at the best way you can do it as it is a stressful process to go through for both the employee and the business owner.

 

Employment statistics

Trying to find quality people to join our team is one of the biggest problems. In 21 years, we had 89 people join the company; 75 people of which left, an average of 3.5 people yearly. The average tenure in the Australian team is about 7–8.5 years. About 40% of those who left were fired.

 

Why would you fire someone?

● Impact on customers
Human error is inevitable. We try to mitigate this by sending juniors to smaller customers and risk-assessing their assigned jobs, so they’re equipped to do the job and appear competent to the customer.

● Impact of a negative person on the team
When you have someone who slacks off and gets away with it, it becomes difficult to motivate the rest of the team. It’s your responsibility to look at how their impact is affecting your organization’s culture. If you don’t actively maintain that, it will grow of its own volition—without your leadership and input—and you might find a culture you’re not comfortable with.

 

Four principles

● Open and honest communication
This is the cornerstone of team management.

● Fair and honest treatment
Putting yourself in the shoes of the person potentially not doing too well.

● Hire slowly, fire quickly
During the interview, make sure not to let the wrong people in. Once they’re in, actively help the person succeed.

● No surprises
Make sure that people know their job is on the line and what they need to do in order to keep it.

 

Hiring Process

● Hire right
Get the right people; we use word-of-mouth referrals.

● Hire for values alignment
We look for people who share our four key values: fun, learning, ownership, and communication. We use oral and practical tests.

● Reference checks
Ensure to speak with people they’ve worked with.

 

Extreme Team Matrix

● Value vs. values
We work to get them to share both our values and train them to enhance their skills.

● Ongoing feedback
We ask them what can we do to make them epic.

● Performance reviews
Tough but critical; we make sure there’s role and performance clarity to avoid miscommunication.

 

Decision Process

● We get a witness and structure how the meeting would go.
● Reiterate issues and tasks that were asked beforehand of the person.
● Once a decision is made, we consult an expert about the legalities and requirements of the termination.
● Exit interviews with the HR consultant.

These are the things that could help you terminate employees with dignity and in the best way possible, in order to manage your team better.

 

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