8.10 Managing Performance Issues
As you know from reading this book so far, the time and money investment in a new employee is significant. The cost to select, hire, and train a new employee is staggering. But what if that new employee is not working out? This next section will provide some examples of performance issues and examples of processes to handle these types of employee problems.
One of the most difficult parts of managing others is not when they are doing a great job—it is when they are not doing a good job. In this section, we will address some examples of performance issues and how to handle them.
Constantly Late or Leaves Early
While we know that flexible schedules can provide a work-life balance, managing this flexible schedule is key. Some employees may take advantage, and instead of working at home, perform nonwork-related tasks instead.
Too Much Time Spent Doing Personal Things at Work
Most companies have a policy about using a computer or phone for personal use. For most companies, some personal use is acceptable, but it can become a problem if someone does not know where to draw the line.
Inability to Handle Proprietary Information
Many companies handle important client and patient information. The ability to keep this information private for the protection of others is important to the success of the company.
Family Issues
Child-care issues, divorce, or other family challenges can cause absenteeism, but also poor work quality. Absenteeism is defined as a habitual pattern of not being at work.
Drug and Alcohol Abuse
The US Department of Labor says that 40 percent of industrial fatalities and 47 percent of industrial injury can be linked to alcohol consumption. The US Department of Labor estimates that employees who use substances are 25–30 percent less productive and miss work three times more often than non-abusing employees (US Department of Labor, 2011). Please keep in mind that when we talk about substance abuse, we are talking about not only illegal drugs but prescription drug abuse as well. In fact, the National Institute on Drug Abuse says that 15.2 million Americans have taken a prescription pain reliever, tranquilizer, or sedative for non-medical purposes at least once (Fisher, 2011). Substance abuse can cause obvious problems, such as tardiness, absenteeism, and nonperformance, but it can also result in accidents or other more serious issues.
Non-performing
Sometimes employees are just not performing at their peak. Some causes may include family or personal issues, but frequently it can mean motivational issues or lack of tools and/or ability to do their current job.
Conflicts with Management or Other Employees
While it is normal to have the occasional conflict at work, some employees seem to have more than the average owing to personality issues. Of course, this affects an organization’s productivity.
Theft
Theft is a common problem in companies and rising. According to Insights for Professionals (2023), “..the percentage of cases involving corruption continues to rise, having increased from 33% in 2012 to 50% in 2022. Last year, at least $3.6 billion was caused in total losses, with organizations estimated to lose 5% of revenue to fraud each year.” The types of theft may include money, payroll, data, time, and inventory. Theft is a criminal offence. Police may become involved. Human Resources needs to investigate and, if necessary, disciplinary action needs to be taken.
Ethical Breaches
The most commonly reported ethical breaches by employees include lying, withholding information, abusive behaviour, and misreporting time or hours worked, according to a National Business Ethics study. Sharing certain proprietary information when it is against company policy and violating non-compete agreements are also considered ethical violations. Many companies also have a fraternization policy that restricts managers from socializing with non-management employees.
Harassment
Engagement of sexual harassment, bullying, or other types of harassment would be considered an issue to be dealt with immediately and, depending on the severity, may result in immediate termination.
Employee Conduct Outside the Workplace
Speaking poorly of the organization on blogs or Facebook is an example of conduct occurring outside the workplace that could violate company policy. Violating specific company policies outside work could also result in termination. For example, in 2010, thirteen Virgin Atlantic employees were fired after posting criticisms about customers and joking about the lack of safety on Virgin airplanes in a public Facebook group (Smith, 2010).
While certainly not exhaustive, this list provides some insight into the types of problems that may be experienced. As you can see, some of these problems are more serious than others. Some issues may only require a warning, while some may require immediate dismissal. As an HR professional, it is your job to develop policies and procedures for dealing with such problems. Let’s discuss these next.
What Influences Performance Issues?
When an employee is not performing as expected, it can be very disappointing. When you consider the amount of time it takes to recruit, hire, and train someone, it can be disappointing to find that a person has performance issues. Sometimes performance issues can be related to something personal, such as drug or alcohol abuse, but often it is a combination of factors. Some of these factors can be internal while others may be external. Internal factors may include the following:
- Career goals are not being met with the job.
- There is conflict with other employees or the manager.
- The goals or expectations are not in line with the employee’s abilities.
- The employee views unfairness in the workplace.
- The employee manages time poorly.
- The employee is dissatisfied with the job.
Some of the external factors may include the following:
- The employee does not have the correct equipment or tools to perform the job.
- The job design is incorrect.
- External motivation factors are absent.
- There is a lack of management support.
- The employee’s skills and job are mismatched.
All the internal reasons speak to the importance once again of hiring the right person from the start. The external reasons may be something that can be easily addressed and fixed. Whether the reason is internal or external, performance issues must be handled promptly.
“8.10 Managing Performance Issues” from Human Resources Management – 3rd Edition by Debra Patterson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.
