Dear Bob …
Have you ever written about PIPs (Performance Improvement Plans – official HR hand slapping)?
I am faced with one now for the first time in my almost 35 years of IT. It basically sets me up to fail — strict requirements to be completed in 30 days over vacation and holidays.
What I’m curious to know is whether there are any statistics out there showing what percentage of those put on these types of plans ever really succeed, and how many result in employees leaving on their own steam. The view from here is that these are mainly used as a management tool to remove a team member without actually firing them. Or am I just being paranoid?
Thanks,
– PIPped off
Dear Ticked off …
I don’t think I’ve ever written about this subject, although there was a time in my career when I was responsible for instituting the process (I headed up HR for a client for a year).
Answers to the questions you asked first: I don’t know what kinds of statistics exist for this sort of thing. I’m pretty sure, though, that any statistics that are available won’t mean very much. The reason: The only useful statistics would come from comparing the performance of pairs of similar employees, led by similar managers, with one in each pair given a PIP and the other left unaware of his/her performance deficiencies.
I know enough about business “research” to be confident no studies like this have been conducted. Among the reasons for my confidence: The unlikelihood that a researcher could ever persuade a company to engage in research like this, especially as the use of performance improvement plans for non-performing employees is widely considered “best practice” among HR professionals.
So from the perspective of whether or not these things are useful, I doubt there’s any reliable evidence either way.
But really, that doesn’t matter. Here’s what does: You’ve been handed one. Your decision is what to do about it.
The best advice I have is to take it seriously, whether or not it deserves to be taken seriously.
Take it seriously because your employer is taking it seriously. Do what it asks you to do, do it by the numbers, and document that you’ve done it. Even if your plan is to leave because of it, this is a key step in leaving under your own steam.
And while you’re doing so, figure out which of the concerns expressed in the plan would be worth your time and attention to address, whether or not you deserve to have been put on the plan.
Here’s what I expect your biggest challenge will be: In a very real sense you’re dealing with the proverbial stages of grief right now. In your case, your sense of loss is your 35-year unbroken string of positive performance, which is now being called into question.
30 days is just about enough time for you to progress from denial to anger — a singularly unhelpful phase in your current situation. To succeed you’ll have to put all of that in a box and find something in all of this that really is an opportunity to improve.
And you’ll have to find a way to do it that doesn’t impinge on either your self-respect or your intellectual integrity, because from your description of the situation it appears you don’t agree with your manager’s assessment that resulted in this situation.
It isn’t merely hard to say, “You’re right — my performance in this area really has been awful,” when you think you’ve been doing well at it. It feels cowardly, like failing to stand up to a schoolyard bully.
And yet, as you’ve already discovered, arguing about it isn’t going to get you anywhere. Your manager has made up his/her mind, HR agrees, and that’s a fact you have to deal with, not a problem you can solve.
A professional marriage counselor once told me the advice she gave clients that most found both helpful and most difficult to follow was to hear the message while ignoring the tone of voice with which it’s delivered: Just because someone is screaming doesn’t mean their message is wrong.
There are parallels to your situation. So with that, a suggestion: Whether or not you think your performance in an area is deficient, you can still find ways to improve at it. Focus on that, not on the assessment that led to it.
Good luck. It’s a rotten thing to have to go through. But finding another job while unemployed because you failed at it is a whole lot worse.
– Bob
== “A professional marriage counselor once told me the advice she gave clients that most found both helpful and most difficult to follow was to hear the message while ignoring the tone of voice with which it’s delivered: Just because someone is screaming doesn’t mean their message is wrong.” ==
What *great* advice. I like it so much that I am adding it to my list of advice that focuses on living a better life, improving myself, provide inspiration. I review this list (or a portion of it) regularly.
Thank you, Bob.
Excellent advice Bob! I had been in HR and been involved in several of these situations. Good news is that most of the times the employee stayed on after the first PIP. It is HR’s job to ensure the PIP is feasible/doable. So if T.O. does what is in the PIP then almost by definition, the company can’t fire the employee. If the company really wants the employee gone, then there may be another PIP, but at least the employee has had more time to think about next steps. Even if the PIP is completed satisfactorily, relationships between employee and manager may be irreparably strained. But if the employee keeps calm and non-accusatory, there could be a fruitful discussion over several weeks/months about a ‘transition’ or ‘separation agreement’. Company might offer a good reference, or something extra in severance pay or benefits, especially if employee is close to a key retirement benefit milestone. (And in parallel, employee could be sending out job feelers.)
As someone who has had to deliver PIPs or oversee them being delivered, I have some thoughts for T.O.
Starting point is were you given feedback prior to the PIP? Be honest with yourself. Good managers try to avoid PIPs by giving constant feedback and making adjustments. They may even do a verbal type of warning prior to a PIP.
Next thing to ponder is how were you performing? We you gliding along or were you working everyday to add value?
I say this because I see two scenarios with PIPs. In my case most turn out poorly because of all the feedback given before them. Usually the PIP is put in place, behaviors change for 30 days, and things start to slide again.
If this is new news then there is much more hope, but also I’d try to figure out why your not getting daily feedback.
Many years ago I learned a valuable lesson. I was put on probation suddenly without warning at a job. Not feedback, no communication. I felt I was doing my job well. So I went out and found a new job and quit. I’m still at that job and now the CIO. My former boss? Things didn’t go so well for him.
For strong workers there is always an answer out there. Good luck T.O.!
I was on the receiving end of one while at IBM. I was a high performer my entire career until this point (does it always happen to high performers?). It wasn’t deserved, but I couldn’t get it reversed because the executive I “Open Doored” with wouldn’t interview anyone who could verify my claims. So I began “improving” my performance.
I had no intentions of leaving IBM. I was 1/2 to 2/3 through my improvement plan when IBM decided it didn’t want service employees any more. First it started “surplussing” the employees it no longer wanted. Then IBM created a joint venture with Kodak to shift most of the service people into which would force them out of IBM.
Even though I was on an improvement plan, I wasn’t surplussed. However, at a certain point, I read the handwriting on the wall & figured out that IBM’s future plans for everyone in the same position as I was (service), wasn’t in my best interests. That’s when I made the decision to take the separation package & get out of Dodge.
Even though I had planned on retiring from IBM when the time came (I was in 19 yrs.), leaving when IBM no longer cared about its core beliefs was a wise decision.
Sound advise, though very difficult. Jobs availability determines much of this.
Regards
AT LEAST YOU GOT A PIP.
WARNING: Rant below (with some useful legal information regarding at-will employment embedded)
In most states, employment is at will. This means your employer can fire you for any or no reason without consequences/liability. This is “balanced” however by the fact that you can quit for any or no reason without consequences/liability. (Yeah, right… like the Average Joe would have the resources to “fight” their more-deeply-pocketed ex-employer.)
More than a decade ago, with more than a decade of tenure in my job at a Fortune 500 company with nothing but 4.5+ ratings on an annual 5-point performance scale, I was led into a conference room by my boss (dragging along another person as a “witness”) and told that my performance was so bad that I must choose between one of three things before leaving the room: 1) quit, 2) take a demotion, or 3) be fired.
To say I was shocked is an understatement. The only feedback I’d received from that boss in the prior months was a gift of a coffee mug that said “Success is in the details, sweat the small stuff.”
I was managing an IT Service Desk software implementation/customization project that was way behind schedule due to a severe lack of resources from my leadership, and no cooperation by the departments the implementation would affect. The uncooperative departments were those whose lack of process and productivity would be documented/exposed by the new application. (I had the lack of cooperation confirmed a year or two later when my former liason with the uncooperative departments left the company and confessed that his leadership at the VP level told him to “agree to everything, but do nothing” on the project.)
Anyway, my boss’s boss — a loudmouth, braggart Executive VP who made promises that couldn’t possibly have been kept — was called to task about the million dollar project’s apparent failure. You know what they say goes downhill and comes to rest at the bottom… My boss (the mug-giver), was suddenly accusing me of all sorts of things that were first mentioned in that conference room. PIP? What PIP?
Did I mention this was a Fortune 500 company? Yes, there was an official Employee Handbook that outlined a required formal and detailed 30-60-90-day PIP process with partnering between the employee, the supervisor and HR. HR wasn’t even at the meeting! When I subsequently appealed to them, I was basically given a “no comment” response.
So what happened? I refused to sign anything that day, left immediately, and called in sick for the next two days. Over those 2 days, I consulted with 3 different employment attornies. All with the same summation: due to at-will-employment, unless I could prove that the action was related to age, race, disablilty or sex, there was NOTHING ILLEGAL about what was happening. The only other hope would be if there was an employment contract in place (think union or executive).
One attorney made it clearest with the following example. He asked me which side I normally parted my hair on. I said on the left. He says, say you decided to part it on the right side one morning. You go into work and your boss states, “Out of the 5 folks reporting to me that do a similar job, you are by far the best at doing that job. However, I don’t like folks who part their hair on the right side, so I’m firing you right here, right now, for that reason alone. It has nothing to do with your performance.”
Unless there was some way to prove that his objection to parting my hair on the right had something to do with age, race, disability or sex, it was legal! In fact, even if the boss didn’t give me any reason, it’s not illegal! Improper? Unfair? Unprofessional? Unscrupulous? Wrong? Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes… but NOT ILLEGAL. So “legal” and all those other words have no connection to each other!
How did it turn out? Best legal advice was to not quit, take the demotion, give a written point-by-point response to the complaints and insist a copy be in my employment file with HR. Additionally, I asked for formal written reviews by HR of my ongoing performance every 30 days until my leadership agreed I was back on track. I also requested to report to someone other than the person who blind-sided me. Both requests were granted. (I figured I could always look for another job if things didn’t work out.)
Thankfully, my salary was frozen even though it exceeded my demoted-to job grade’s maximum. I had only 1 meeting with HR before they kept rescheduling them into Neverland. My new boss turned out to be one of the best leaders I’ve ever had, and got me promoted above my former job grade withing 2 years.
I share this in the hope it enlightens the unknowing and avoids pain for someone. At first, most folks I share this story with can’t believe what I’m telling them about at-will employement. Just do some googling…
I haven’t gone through a PIP however I have been in IT for 35+ years and thus am an older worker. We can feel vulnerable — the younger sharks are circling and if we get thrown out the door there is nowhere to go since people will rarely hire technical people in their 60s.
‘PIPpedOff’ says: “[The PIP] basically sets me up to fail …”
I agree with Bob that PIPpedOff does need to listen through the screaming and see if the PIP does address valid points. And I agree with Allison that HR should make sure that the PIP is “feasible/doable”. But what if the PIP is not feasible or does not address valid points? What if the PIP is merely a disguise to fire PIPpedOff without the company facing post-firing recuperations (e.g., lawsuits; unemployment benefits)? Faced with this should PIPpedOff even bother trying to spend the energy to treat the PIP seriously?
Allison/Dave/Mike: You all talk about the next job. Sometime that option is simply not there … or at least feels like too large of a chasm to be able to jump across. If PIPpedOff is indeed being setup for failure … well, depression is part of the grieving process as well as well as the acceptance of early non-voluntary retirement.
Rick – what to do if the PIP doesn’t seem reasonable, especially if job hunting isn’t an option. If the goal is then to hold on to the job, do whatever it takes, including treating the PIP seriously. While legally employees can be fired for any reason, most reputable organizations prefer to have a ’cause’, so don’t give them a reason (e.g., insubordination), which should at least retain your right to unemployment. Ask them to explain the PIP (vs accusing them of it being unreasonable). Don’t get too picky about the language and get too hypothetical. Keep saying you really want to do things better, but you need more clarity. Ask for 30 minute daily or weekly reviews – ‘Is this what you were looking for?’ ‘Did I handle this the way you expected?’ ‘How could I have done this differently/better?’ If a manager dreads the meetings with you because you are trying, it will be much harder for them to fire you (vs if you are being very obnoxious) You may also want to consult with a lawyer or other trusted adviser re: what kind of terms to try to negotiate, if it does come to termination.
Thanks for the reply. If and when then I’ll use your advice (and dadsnave rant) to just keep my nose to the grindstone and do my best with the insistence on constant reviews with the boss and/or HR.
After 35 years, you are costing the company too much. They save a bundle in pension by getting rid of you. Start putting together a resume and your LinkedIn profile. Grab a lawyer to negotiate good discharge language. Do all this why you play their game.
The writing is on the wall. PIPs are a farce.
dadsnave is 100% correct about employment at will. was in hr for 30 years and was blindsided similarly. most companies will have written you off. mind your p’s and q’s as Bob suggests until you find a soft landing. follow Andy’s advice and get a good lawyer. they are expensive but just the consultation will make you feel better. 20/20 hindsight – sometimes being forced to move can save you from toxic boss and company, reduce your stress and save your health. good luck
Grade school taught Pillow Talk as an exercise in hearing through the grief/tone of voice: think through each, identifying each with the side of a pillow…
I’m right/he’s wrong
He’s right/I’m wrong
We’re both wrong
We’re both right
It doesn’t matter because ____ (and thump the pillow)
I was shocked when I received a Verbal Warning about performance from a manager to whom I had reported for less than a year. I talked with her, with co-workers, with HR, and other managers in an attempt to find out what I was doing wrong and what I needed to improve on.
After several weeks, the manager said I showed no improvement, and it became a Written PIP. Continuing to meet with her, and HR, and others, still had me confused and uncertain how to “improve.” She related how all of my co-workers insisted that I was probably the most important person in the group, but apparently none of them could really say what it was that I did!
Since the initial Verbal Warning, as she had insisted she had no idea what I really did, I had been providing her with weekly detailed reports of my time and work (as she requested), and when it became a Written PIP, she related that she still did not understand what I did, what I worked on, who I worked with, etc.
One of my complaints to HR about this was the fact that my manager did not practice the “Management By Walking Around” that was a part of Corporate Culture (and Leadership Training), and I would point out that if she wanted to know what I was doing, she could come by any time to watch and question and learn. However, she apparently had “no time” for that (and it apparently was “not her style” of management). She wanted me to come by and visit with her — yet she was often not there, and when she was, she was usually meeting with someone else (in person or on the phone).
To shorten this story: it finally came down to communication, and not my actual work or performance. I changed my detailed weekly reports to have a “management summary” at the top, which listed projects I was working (and progress on each, in percentage), plus major issues that I had to deal with which kept me from making progress on projects. Since she wanted verbal communication more than written, I learned to leave voice-mail about issues and updates.
Once I changed my communication style to one she wanted, in a way that she could understand (such as less details), she withdrew the PIP. I did NOT change any of the work I was doing, the projects I was working on, the people I was working with, etc.
A few months later a company-wide project came down, and my manager selected me (because of my aptitude, interest, and knowledge of the subject for the project)) to lead the planning and implementation at our site. Several months later I was effectively “her hero” as our site (she, and her leadership) received praise for having the smoothest, cleanest implementation throughout the company (with managers across the company asking her how she accomplished this amazing feat). It had been only about a year since she had tried to eliminate me as the person she least wanted in her site IT group. And I didn’t change — except the way I communicated with her.
Your advice to ties a point in last week’s column, what is actionable? Even if you could provide solid statistics, what good would they do PIPped off?
But whether the PIP is intended to address a problem or provide cover for soft firing does effect the priorities. If the PIP doesn’t identify any resources or support for implementing the plan, that would indicate that finding a quick exit is at least as important as addressing improvements.
A PIP as cover isn’t unknown, but it’s not the worse way companies have for non-procedural dismissals. A security consultant who spoke to a Computer Forensics class I took told us that the large majority of consultations aren’t to conduct audits or identify suspected or detected problems. Usually the consultant is given a target and told to find security violations or other dirt to justify summary dismissal.
I suppose that’s sort of good bad news. As PIPped pointed out, 30 days isn’t much time to work on whatever priorities this PIP provides. As you said, it needs to be taken seriously.