Question And Answers: Handling Family Deadwood
By Ted Garrison, Garrison Associates
“Can you offer any ideas on how to get rid of family member employees who aren’t worth what I’m paying them? They started out as good workers but now aren’t pulling their weight.”
The above question was asked of DesignandBuildwithMetal.com. Sadly, this is a common problem in family-run businesses, but sometimes the situation can be corrected.
The first issue to assess is whether the company is providing income for family members. In other words, is the company providing a means to disperse income to various family members by providing a position and a certain level of respectability instead of just doling out money to support the family member? In these cases the family member has a title with little or no significant responsibility. This effort may not fool anyone in the company, but it offers the family member a certain amount of cover in the outside world. However, from the tone of the question, this does not appear to be the questioner’s situation.
Probably one of the biggest mistakes made by management is not clearly identifying what a person’s responsibilities are, what is expected of them and how their performance will be measured. An environment such as this usually leads to disaster, whether it’s done with a family member or any employee. However, the problem is usually aggravated with relatives because it creates additional tensions.
I often tease audiences by saying that we give people too much credit for being incompetent. The reason is that people are often doing a great job on the wrong tasks. While the end result is the same as poor performance, the actual problem is poor communication, not poor performance. The employee’s supervisor needs to sit down with the employee to review the job requirements to ensure they are understood and that the employee is committed to meeting them. Specifically, the discussion must focus on the employee’s responsibilities, what’s expected and how performance will be measured. This discussion should be a give-and-take process between the employee and the supervisor to ensure the employee understands the job’s requirements. This is true whether the individual is a family member or not. However, if you are dealing with a relative, there are two other suggestions.
First, if possible, the employee should report to someone who isn’t a family member. It will be easier for the nonrelative to hold the family member accountable. In essence, the supervisor simply treats the family member like all his or her other direct reports. If the supervisor is challenged, the response would be, “Look, my performance and job security are based on my team’s performance. I’m not going to take the blame for you not doing your job.” It will be easier for the nonrelative to hold the line because when family members reports to an outsider , they can’t expect special treatment.
Second, the senior family member in the company should sit in on the initial discussion between the supervisor and the family member employee. The supervisor should handle the meeting, but the senior relative should reinforce that the family member will be held accountable as described in the meeting. In essence, it will be made clear that family members must do their jobs just like anyone else.
If in the end the family member doesn’t perform the job’s responsibilities, the evidence will speak for itself. Any family members who challenge a relative’s being terminated can get an answer such as this: “The family member agreed to do X for so much money, but from all the performance records, he’s not doing it, and the company simply can’t afford to pay him for nonperformance. The company needs someone to perform that critical work. I’m sorry, but my first responsibility is to worry about the welfare of the entire company.”
This situation will never be easy, but in reality you should set a family member up the same way you do any employee. You need to be fair and document his or her performance and attempt to correct the problem based on hard facts. If no improvements are made, you have no choice but to terminate the individual’s employment. Anything else will undermine the organization and is clearly not fair to everyone else. It’s your responsibility to do your job, as painful as it might be on a personal level.
Ted Garrison, president of Garrison Associates, is a consultant, author and speaker to the construction industry. Ted is the host of the Internet radio program, New Construction Strategies. He can be reached at Ted@TedGarrison.com.
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