What to Do and Say during the Termination Meeting

The moment of dread has arrived: You are sitting in the room, with your employee, the HR rep next to you, and everybody’s looking at each other wondering how to start. That’s your cue: this is your employee, it is your team, and now it’s your job to start this most undesirable act. “Joshua, I have bad news for you. The company has made the decision to terminate your employment, effective immediately. As we’ve discussed before, the quality of the code you’ve turned in over the last two months has been unacceptable, and opportunities given to you to correct this have not been taken.”

That’s usually all it takes: You’ve stated that they’re being fired, and you’ve stated why. This meeting is not the time for debate, discussion, or negotiation—any or all of that should’ve already been done as part of the “corrections” phase of the cycle. When telling someone ...