What Not to Say When You Hand Out Pink Slips

Filed in archive Human Resources on November 11, 2009

© Mykl Roventine


BusinessWeek ran a good article this week on things not to say when the time comes to hand someone their pink slip.

People are getting laid off. Right and left, east and west, all over the place. And it's not always because they deserve to be let go.

Job cutting is never easy, but it often becomes progressively harder as we go deeper into an organization. At the beginning, employers may be able to lay off only weak employees they might have considered letting go anyway. While these weak performers are human beings worthy of dignity and respect, we can make ourselves feel okay about their terminations because they are based on merit.

The deeper we get, the less likely it is that we honestly can say that a job elimination is simply a matter of letting go those who should have been let go years ago. Now we are letting go of solid performers who would remain employed in a good economy.

If you have to do the deed, there are some basic things you should avoid saying. You can think of it as being sensitive (why would you feel the need to say mean things to someone you're not going to see anymore?) or you can think of it as reducing your corporate liability in the layoff. But it's really just an issue of being smart about it.

The BusinessWeek article gives some good guidance on the topic.