One-quarter of bosses have an employee they would like to see leave company: Survey

Issuing a formal warning most common action

More than one-quarter (27 per cent) of bosses in the United States have a current direct report that they would like to see leave their company, found a survey by CareerBuilder. The results were nearly equal by gender, but varied significantly by age, with younger managers (ages 25 to 34) more likely to report having an employee they would like to leave than older managers (ages 55 and over) by a margin of eight percentage points—32 per cent to 24 per cent, respectively, found the survey of 2,184 hiring managers in the U.S.

“It’s important that managers be as direct as possible when dealing with employees that, for whatever reason, aren’t a good fit for their teams,” said Rosemary Haefner, vice-president of human resources for CareerBuilder. “Fortunately, a plurality of managers in our survey were open to confronting the situation through a formal discussion or warning; however, some will do nothing at all, or even resort to passive aggressive behaviours that can only prolong a negative working arrangement.”

When dealing with an employee they would like to leave, managers are likely to:

• issue a formal warning (42 per cent)
• point out shortcomings in employee’s performance more often (27 per cent)
• reduce responsibilities (21 per cent)
• hire someone else to eventually replace the employee (12 per cent).

Nearly one-third (32 per cent) of managers said they would do none of the above.

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