Not only must you document the problems you have had with the jobholder, but you also must prove that you effectively communicated your directives to them. Congress passed laws beginning in the 1930s and expanding to the late 1980s that keep employers from discriminating against workforce when sacking them. Be aware the jobholder's legal counsellor will use it to show you did something wrong, so you should write it carefully. As you may recall from Chapter 4, a high-risk lay off is one where the jobholder will sue for unlawful termination (if you fire him) and he'll win in a court trial. Even when the action becomes necessary through no fault of the jobholder, both the decision making procedure and the act of terminating are not pleasant duties. As the owner of a small company or as the Personnel Supervisor, you should realize it is important to have all your workers abide by the same rules - which are the rules established by the small company policies and processes. For example, the manager can rate the worker from a 1 to a 5 where 1 is an excellent employee and 5 is someone who needs continuous coaching and retraining. Give a contact individual if the employee needs to discuss the layoff after the meeting. If your group health plan has a third-party administrator (like Blue Cross Blue Shield), you have 30 days after the jobholder's termination to tell the administrator.

If you are sure that this individual is creating a poor work environment or detracting from the goals of the small business, then you shouldn't hesitate to let him go. Each firm has its own policies on severance agreements. As a boss, you may hope to never have to write a worker firing letter. You might even find yourself battling legal charges if the worker feels that your termination was discriminatory or that your layoff did not have a solid basis. An exit interview is a meeting between a manager and the jobholder after his separation. If you make reasonable accommodations and the jobholder still can't do the job, you can still separate her for poor performance. That is, certainly, if the supervisor has followed all the legalities associated with employee relations.