What to Do With An Underperforming Employee

This week's video is about how to address an underperforming employee. Improving employee performance starts with being honest. Once you acknowledge poor performance you can start to create employee engagement.

Turning a blind eye to poor behavior can be detrimental to your workplace culture and it can be a motivation killer for the rest of the team. Once one person begins to lose interest or give less to the job, that behavior could spread to others. That’s why it’s important to address any attitude or performance issues head-on. By being direct, you can avoid making the problem worse.

Being honest with an underperforming employee about their performance is crucial because often a poorly performing employee is simply disinterested or disengaged. Maybe they just don’t feel like they belong. Or maybe they don’t yet have the skills to be successful in their position.

As a manager, improving employee performance begins by offering additional resources like mentoring or job shadowing. These kinds of resources can help employees develop their abilities and can create excitement. The more training you can give to your team, the more likely that they’ll be successful and thus feel connected to their work.

By showing that you care about their success and that you value having them on your team, you can foster deeper engagement and better performance.

An underperforming employee is only a problem if you ignore them. Your job as a leader is to help your poor performers by showing you care and by helping them to be successful. Start improving employee performance by offering training and by creating more opportunities for engagement.