It is an unfortunate fact of life that individuals do not always perform to the standard expected of them. Often, their managers will find ways to avoid confronting the problem head-on. They will decide to leave matters alone in the mistaken belief that the situation will improve. This is not helpful to anyone, least of all to the employee whose personal development needs to be considered. The simple fact is that poor performance is most commonly caused by a lack of skills or motivation.

Whatever the cause and solutions considered, the first thing to do is for a manager to meet with the individual and make it clear that there is a problem. Whilst the manager should be sympathetic to the explanations offered by the employee, they do need to ensure that the difficult message that the individual is under performing, is delivered and understood by the employee.

If somebody needs training, the time scale for completing the agreed courses needs to be set and an assurance should be sought from the employee that once their skills are updated, there are no other obstacles to their performing satisfactorily.

If the individual who is failing to deliver is not motivated, then the manager may wish to examine their own part in that and whether there is anything they can do to improve matters. However, if an employee is not performing it is ultimately that individual’s problem and they need to understand the dire consequences if they do not improve.