In his e-pinion on this page a few weeks ago, Dan Oswald suggested that when two employees hate each other, the best course may be keeping the most valuable employee and firing the other one. Most readers didn’t agree.
Oswald’s original story is found here in The Oswald Letter. The full text of all the reader comments is found here. Below is representative selection of readers’ e-pinions.
Firing One Hater Might Be Discrimination
“I agreed with your thoughts until the very end. If you have done a thorough investigation and found both are engaging in unproductive conflict and you’ve counseled both on their behavior, you must let BOTH of the people go. Allow one person to keep his/her job not only reinforces the bad behavior but also opens the company up to possible discrimination charges from the person let go.”
“I disagree with terminating one employee. This is a dual problem and both should face the same consequence. What if you have a race or gender difference? The termination of someone has discrimination written all over it.”
“A dangerous position to be put in when only one of the two is terminated. Suggesting the “less valuable” employee be dropped is a best case scenario but unless that employee committed a zero tolerance action (physical violence, swearing, etc.) there is a door opened wide for retaliation… . A fine way to end up on a witness stand.”
Abandon Both
“If both employees fail to work together to meet agency/company goals and/or objectives then both employees should be released. Why would you keep two employees who refuse to adjust their attitude at work? Professional attitude is just as important as professional skills.”
Keep Both
“If the end result is to lose a talented employee, then the better solution is to split them up. Why abandon a talented employee to be hired by a competitor, especially one you just gave a good reason to want to see you fail since you chose his antagonist over him?”
No Talking—Only E-Mail
“My method is unorthodox but it worked. The two employees who hated each other were brought into my office with a caveat—I was told that I could not terminate them until they finished a very important project. … My request to them, and it shocked them, was to not talk to each other for a week. Use emails, boards, post it notes to communicate. And they did in fact, but not for long. To my surprise they soon realized that they needed each other’s support to succeed. …The truce was lifted and today they are best friends.”
“In many cases, the individuals involved made the decision that their livelihood was more important than their real or perceived differences.”
“Do your whole team a favor and ask some detailed questions. Bring in EAP, Ombuds, or a talented HR manager that works from a proactive stance to reduce these types of behavioral risks to the workplace. That sends a message that while you are interested in maintaining productivity you are invested in your people.”
“Some people just lack emotional maturity, and the organization has to decide how long it wants to allow those individuals to drag the business through their daily dramas.”
NOT a Good Way to Handle It
“I worked with a person that left no doubt that she hated my guts. The problem and accompanying tension was magnified when the supervisor said ‘you two solve this yourselves.’ FYI—this is NOT a good way to handle this kind of employee problem.”
“As the target of hatred by my male co-workers it is interesting to see this being addressed. Unfortunately, the harassment became so bad I had to leave but not before I had contacted one of the top law firms in the state.”
Put on Your Business Face
If two employees strongly dislike each other, after reminding them of the need to be respectful and “put on their business face,” my first instinct is to see if there is any way to separate them. Easiest and best for everyone.
See the full text of all the comments here. Thanks to all who responded.
Too much time is wasted on the manure, when you should be examining the feed. What caused the hatred and solve the problem. Creating a new problem only results in more manure.
We often have had to deal with this situation. Our coaching is always the same – people need to respect each other and if they can’t get along we don’t have a place for either one. We have often had to tell very good people that it doesn’t matter how well you perform otherwise – if you can’t get along with each other both may be terminated.
Did you reviewers not ‘read’ the entire article? Oswald clearly states you may have to lose both employees. He wasn’t advocating fire one and not the other. I’ve been in this position and I was willing to lose both. After a employee counseling session with both employees and being warned about the potential of both of them losing their jobs, they were able to work together in the short term. Eventually one employee’s behavior began to noticeably faulter and I was able to document sufficiently and terminate her. It was a painful process for everyone involved.
Employees should understand that their job is not high school and should be counseled that way. Are they going to fight each other after work in the parking lot or in the ladies restroom? One chance is all either should get. Second offenses should be immediate termination for both. Firing both would cause them to grow up and live in the real world.
As I often teach in my Conflict resolution workshops, all conflicts will be resolved, sooner or later, and for better or worse; an H-bomb, metaphorical or real, may be one person’s preferred resolution. So make sure you know all the options out there. Oswald’s commentary and solution may reflect his experience, yet is merely the easy solution, not the only one, and certainly may not be in the best interests of the organization. Over my 20 years as an organizational mediator, I had many client-employees who thought, and said to me, that they hated a co-worker, or even a group of people they worked with. However, as many of your readers have indicated, there are many options which may prove more effective than termination. In fact, termination should only be used as the last resort. It is a demonstrated fact that when conflict blossoms in an organizational setting, there is significant fall-out. There are also many studies which have proved that power used indiscriminately does little to motivate staff, and certainly hampers creativity and innovation, both necessary attributes of any successful organization. I would suggest that next time interpersonal conflict gets in the way of your organizational goals and objectives, bring in someone with the knowledge, experience, and expertise to get to the root of the problems, be they psycho-dynamic or systemic. I don’t mean that HR person with 21 hours of training; I mean the professional conflict resolver. You wouldn’t have your plumber perform heart surgery on a loved one; so why would you choose to settle for the ‘easy’ when dealing with the well-being of your organization. Finally, it pays to remember Einstein’s aphorism paraphrased here; functional insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting different outcomes. This truth applies equally to individuals, to groups, and to organizations.
We are in the midst of this very situation, now. Counseling through conflict resolution has yielded one who recognizes the issue, is listening/participating and taking progressive ownership as awareness developes while the other strays to unrelated topics, stays with the derogatory, accustory and disruptive comments. Both are fulfilling job requirements and valuable from an operational perspective. However, it appears “the other” may not make it through the resolution process. The well-being of our organization is strongly affected by the unwilling participant who fuels dissention. Definitely not “merely easy” as we work through and may have to make the decision to terminate. I clearly see Dan’s point knowing that the obvious resides in his statement: keep both if at all possible and use professional resolution options. Then, if necessary don’t waver, make the decision. Why would I terminate both?