When to Use a Performance Improvement Plan
You have that feeling. Something is off. A person on your team is not performing the way you’d expect. Maybe it’s the quality of their work. Maybe it’s how they interact with others. Maybe they are just not delivering.
Trust that feeling. But then try to find out what the root cause of the problem is first. Sometimes it is a personal hardship. Problems in the family. Anyone can and will have a hard time. But if you can’t find a good explanation for the underperformance — and especially if you have doubts that the underperformance is temporary — then you have to act. The Performance Improvement Plan is your best way to do so in an objective fashion.
A Performance Improvement Plan Is Not a Disguised Firing
This is important: If you want to fire someone, then fire them. Don’t abuse the Performance Improvement Plan as a slow, bureaucratic way to push someone out. That’s dishonest and everyone will see through it.
A Performance Improvement Plan is open-ended. It should give the person a real chance to improve. Sit down with your report. Discuss what you expect. Make these expectations as objective and measurable as possible. Set a timeframe. And then support the person in getting there.
The conversation will be awkward. Do it anyway. It is your duty as a manager.
You Owe It to Your Team
Here’s what happens when you tolerate underperformance: Your high performers notice. They always do. And they start asking themselves why they are putting in the extra effort when the person next to them gets away with doing the bare minimum.
If you accept underperformance, your best people will leave. Not immediately. But slowly, quietly, one by one. The Performance Improvement Plan is not just about the person under the plan. It’s about the integrity of your entire team.
You Owe It to the Person
Sometimes people are simply misplaced. They ended up in a role that doesn’t match their strengths. Or they have a blind spot they are genuinely unaware of.
I once had a colleague who had a very rude way of communicating. She was alienating Sales, Marketing, and other stakeholders left and right. We created a Performance Improvement Plan for her. She was genuinely surprised. She had no idea how her communication style was perceived by others.
But here’s the thing: Once she understood the problem, she was able to adapt and change her behavior. The Performance Improvement Plan worked. It gave her clarity she didn’t have before.
A Performance Improvement Plan can be the wake-up call that turns someone’s career around.
The Hard Conversations
These discussions are uncomfortable. Nobody enjoys telling someone that they are not meeting expectations. But avoiding them is not kindness. It’s negligence.
As a manager, having difficult conversations is part of the job. You owe it to the person, to the team, and to the organization. The longer you wait, the harder it gets and the more damage is done.
Resources
Two resources I recommend:
- GitLab’s Handbook on Underperformance is an excellent, practical guide on how to handle underperformance. It’s open, transparent, and very well thought through.
- “The Manager’s Path” by Camille Fournier covers this topic and many more. Must read for any engineering leader.
More
- Photo on top by Etienne Boulanger
