The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 1,739,000 layoffs and discharges in May 2013 — 1.3 percent of the workforce. Director of HR for Intelligentsia Coffee, Lisa Hogan is no stranger to the firing process. “In HR we deal with it often, but you’re affecting somebody’s life, so you want to be respectful of the person,” Hogan says. “Firing somebody’s never, never easy.” She offers a few nuggets of wisdom borne of experience.
Do
• Empathize about the timing. Does getting fired suck less on Monday or Friday? Hogan says earlier in the week is better – it means ex-employees can jump right in on the job hunt or start applying for unemployment instead of being forced to nurse their wounds over the weekend.
• Allow for discretion. “Packing up your desk can probably be the most embarrassing situation from a professional standpoint,” Hogan says. Deliver the news at the end of the day, once the office has thinned out. Hogan even offers employees the option to just go home; someone from her team will pack up the desk and send personal items in the mail.
Don’t
• Draw it out. Mangers should keep things short and to the point. It’s not a negotiation. “I think the best way is to keep it as short as possible,” Hogan says. But you shouldn’t keep secrets. “Give the specific reason that it’s happening.”
• Be caught off guard. Hogan has seen it all; tears, screaming, quick exits. The key is to go in prepared for anything, preferably with a box of Kleenex in hand. And though handing over tissues to a sniffling employee is the decent thing to do, she adds that eventually things need to wrap up.