should you fire someone you wouldn’t hire now, coworker wanted to step back and then changed his mind, and more

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. Should you fire someone you wouldn’t hire now?

I recently attended an event where a speaker said that if a manager is evaluating to let go a lower-performing employee, they should ask themselves, “Would I hire them now?” And if the answer is no, then let them go.

I don’t believe in black and white decisions. The presenter probably didn’t think of it that way but it feels that way. What is your take on this?

If you’re trying to decide how to proceed with a low-performing employee, “Would I hire them today, knowing everything I know now?” is a useful question to ask yourself. I don’t agree that “no” should always point immediately to firing them, but it’s a useful question to reflect on. Very often, managers hold on to low performers long past the point that they should, and that type of question can be a way to bring clarity to the situation.

The question I prefer (and it’s discussed more extensively in the book on management I co-authored) is, “If you had a button which, if pushed, would lead to your staff member being replaced instantaneously, without any difficult conversations or the hassles of interviewing and training someone new, would you push it?” Very often, the main thing holding managers back from acting when they need to is not wanting to deal with what they imagine it will entail. Also useful is, “If the person walked into your office and told you she was leaving to take another job, would you feel concern or relief?”

But none of these mean “then you absolutely should fire the person.” They’re all just ways to get clarity on your thinking.

2. My coworker wanted to step back and then changed his mind, but I’m taking his job

I work as a middle manager. My department is fairly large, but most people only report to me for a small percentage of their time (i.e., they work in my department four hours out of their week, and the rest in their primary job).

Last year, my supervisor let me know that my colleague (Alf), who is at the same level but over a different team, was experiencing burnout and wanted to step back. Alf’s team works in an area related to the one I currently supervise, but is actually more aligned with my background and professional interests. There are also three full-time reports in his unit (or four with Alf returning to the team as a regular employee). I have been interested in getting more involved in managing the work of that unit, and my supervisor and I came up with a proposal to combine the two units under me (and dropping some other parts of my job that are not my favorite to ensure I had a reasonable workload). I love managing people and have been told many times that I am good at it and that the organization would be excited for me to be in this new role. I thought things were pretty set to transition this summer.

But now Alf has said that he wants to stay in his current manager role after all. However, our director (my boss’s boss) wants me to take this new role on anyway and for Alf to step down. Alf is a decent manager, but he’s not a big picture thinker, which we need due to massive changes coming in our field. My director feels I am the right person for the job at this moment. Still, I feel extremely awkward about this. I agreed because I was under the impression Alf wanted to step down. I don’t want him to feel like I am stealing his job against his will. To complicate things further, Alf was my supervisor for about seven years before I got my current job.

This is the kind of organization where people stay for their whole careers, so I will likely need to work with Alf for some time. It’s also possible he may continue doing work in one of the two units I oversee. Any advice for how I should approach him? Acknowledge that this is awkward AF? Reassure him I wasn’t trying to steal his job? Let him feel his very understandable feelings for a while before approaching? We are friendly, but don’t talk regularly now that I don’t report to him.

The primary messaging on this really needs to come from your director, who should be transparent with Alf about why this change is happening and what it means for his career there.

Once that’s done, your approach with Alf should be a positive one — you’re excited to work with him, he should let you know what he needs, etc. I would not say anything about it being awkward or reassure him that you weren’t trying to take his job; there’s too much risk that will make things more awkward for him than if you just keep things positive, matter-of-fact, and forward-looking. Give him some time to adjust to the change and operate as if of course he will adjust; if that doesn’t happen, you’ll have to address it at that point, but it’s a kindness to him to move forward without anticipating/assuming weirdness if you can.

3. HR thinks I completed an engagement survey but I didn’t

My organization recently used an outside company to conduct an employee engagement survey. I was on the fence about completing the survey because of how it was handled last year. I opened my unique survey link to click around and read the questions, but never submitted it.

At various points during the survey period, HR sent emails about survey completion by department. I noticed in one of these updates that my department had a 100% completion rate. I’m the head of the department, so I thought perhaps my own survey was not meant to count here and maybe rolled up into leadership instead, but none of the other categories made sense for where my survey would be counted. I assumed my survey results were slated to be yeeted into the abyss and decided not to submit it.

Today, I had a meeting with HR to review the results of the survey. They started the meeting by saying that my team had five people, including me, invited to take the survey and that all five, including me, did so. I didn’t confess that I didn’t because I didn’t want to derail the whole meeting or be slapped on the wrist for not participating, but I couldn’t help thinking that the results cannot possibly be accurate.

Should I have told them? I’m questioning if there are other issues with the survey or its analysis based on my knowledge that what I’m being presented is incorrect. What could have possibly happened?! Is it worth being chided by HR for my delinquency in order to shine a light on problems with the survey process?

Separately, what’s your take on employee engagement surveys? Are they valuable? Do organizations/companies make meaningful changes based on feedback provided in this manner?

As a department head, yeah, I think you should have flagged it. You’re part of the organization’s leadership and if you’re aware of major inaccuracies with the survey, you should say something. It doesn’t need to be a big deal — just, “Are you sure that’s right? I actually didn’t complete mine — happy to talk about why if you want — so I’m concerned that might indicate our numbers are off in other ways.”

And then if they wanted to know why you didn’t complete it, you could have explained the emails saying 100% of your department already had made you assume yours wasn’t being counted and thus wasn’t needed. Or you could have talked about whatever the issues were that made you on the fence about doing it in the first place, if that’s something you were willing to get into.

As for the value of these surveys, they vary widely by company. If your company is a place that welcome dissent and takes feedback seriously, they can be worthwhile. If they’re not, then they usually just breed cynicism and can in some cases make disengagement worse if feedback is solicited but always ignored.

4. My contact’s mentee thinks we’re hiring, but we’re not

A former coworker reached out asking if I’d do an informational interview with someone he’s mentoring who is applying for an open entry-level position in my division to talk about my work and the company. I am, of course, happy to meet with them.

Except I asked around about this position, including to the head of our division, who said she didn’t know what this job posting is because we are not hiring. I’m not sure how it got posted or if it got posted for the wrong division, but we are not hiring for any positions at this time due to budget issues.

I will still meet with this person, and they should probably still apply just to be in our system and perhaps they’d be considered for a real opening in another division. How transparent should I be that my understanding is that we are not actually hiring for this role? The job market is hard enough so I don’t want to give false hope or waste anyone’s time, but I’m also not really authorized to speak on hiring in this way.

There’s nothing wrong with saying, “As far as I know, we’re not currently hiring for this position. Where did you see the posting?” And if you wanted to, you could check with your manager to ask if it’s okay to officially relay that your division isn’t currently hiring; they may be fine with that.

5. What questions should I ask in an interview with a recruiter?

I’m searching for a new job and, after several years out of the interview process, I’ve noticed that many of my first-round interviews are now brief phone screens with HR recruiters rather than conversations with the hiring manager. I know it’s important to ask thoughtful questions at the end of an interview, but recruiters often don’t have deep insight into the day-to-day responsibilities or team dynamics of the role. What kinds of questions are most appropriate and effective to ask in that setting? Is it still important to have questions for recruiters?

Yes, you should still have questions — and most likely, you do have things you’d like them to answer if you think about it!

It’s true that anything nuanced about the job or the team is better saved for the hiring manager, but recruiters will be equipped to answer things about what qualifications and experience are most important for the role, the size and structure of the team, and why the position is open, as well as anything logistical, like the salary, remote vs. hybrid vs. in-office, the likely timeline for making a hire, and what they expect the process to look like.

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