<story><title>Advice to New Managers: Don&apos;t Joke About Firing People (2020)</title><url>https://staysaasy.com/engineering/2020/06/09/Don%27t-Joke.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ransom1538</author><text>Off topic. Do firings come out of the blue though? I was a VP for a while (not anymore) - but when the person I had to fire was about to get fired, they KNEW it as soon as the door opened.  Firing someone is the worst experience ever - the only reason I had to fire someone was because WE screwed up in the interview process.</text></item><item><author>simias</author><text>That&amp;#x27;s excellent advice that many have learned the hard way...&lt;p&gt;Honestly even as a non-manager it&amp;#x27;s a very bad idea. When I was a junior one of my colleagues was called to the manager&amp;#x27;s office. I assumed it would be for some mundane project scheduling or whatever, so I jokingly said &amp;quot;you&amp;#x27;re getting fired&amp;quot; as he was going there. And he was.&lt;p&gt;This is one of these memories that come back to haunt you late at night when you&amp;#x27;re trying to sleep...</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>gumby</author><text>&amp;gt; the only reason I had to fire someone was because WE screwed up in the interview process.&lt;p&gt;This is a very important realization.  Firing someone is bad all around.  They lose their job, they probably quit another job to join, they feel shame&amp;#x27; etc.  For the company: you not only need to go hire someone but the person you fired was probably not productive so it’s a double whammy.  And you didn’t manage to somehow (if it was even possible) give this person what they needed to succeed.  Bad bad bad all around.  Hiring someone is a responsibility not only to the company but to them; terminating someone who can’t be productive is the right thing to do but is the company’s failure.&lt;p&gt;The converse to the “don’t joke about firing someone” is, when firing someone don’t mention how you feel about it; also be unambiguous and don’t accidentally give false hope.</text></comment>
<story><title>Advice to New Managers: Don&apos;t Joke About Firing People (2020)</title><url>https://staysaasy.com/engineering/2020/06/09/Don%27t-Joke.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ransom1538</author><text>Off topic. Do firings come out of the blue though? I was a VP for a while (not anymore) - but when the person I had to fire was about to get fired, they KNEW it as soon as the door opened.  Firing someone is the worst experience ever - the only reason I had to fire someone was because WE screwed up in the interview process.</text></item><item><author>simias</author><text>That&amp;#x27;s excellent advice that many have learned the hard way...&lt;p&gt;Honestly even as a non-manager it&amp;#x27;s a very bad idea. When I was a junior one of my colleagues was called to the manager&amp;#x27;s office. I assumed it would be for some mundane project scheduling or whatever, so I jokingly said &amp;quot;you&amp;#x27;re getting fired&amp;quot; as he was going there. And he was.&lt;p&gt;This is one of these memories that come back to haunt you late at night when you&amp;#x27;re trying to sleep...</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>indigochill</author><text>I&amp;#x27;ve seen a couple of mass layoffs. How much you see that coming can be a function of how close to the decision-making you are and how familiar you are with the process. As I&amp;#x27;ve advanced, I&amp;#x27;ve progressively seen it coming farther out. But the first one was totally out of the blue to me.&lt;p&gt;Individual firings seem a bit more predictable.</text></comment>