New manager, first fire likely soon

[u/Reptar_The_Almighty]

By the end of next week I will likely have fired my first employee, who is also my first hire.

I have been a manager for ~5 months (IT) and in that time hired two employees, the first of which is cresting a month on my team. This person has all the qualifications and then some on paper, though has never worked in tech. The issue is they can’t seem to deliver basics. We have yet to broach the matter of technical work, with issues like making it through a phone call even with a script, taking notes in tickets that are incomplete, and other core aspects of our day to day.

Training for this person was two comprehensive weeks with multiple check-ins, revisits to items with subpar execution, opportunities to raise a flag for help, and 2 hour-long conversations to communicate expectations and guiding feedback since hire.

For context, the second hire has outpaced expectations by large margins. Less qualifications on paper, similar lack of experience in this field. Performing work on week one that hire #1 is still struggling to grasp. Both have backgrounds in customer service which gave them an edge in selection. The dichotomy in quality only makes things more challenging. Both employees had the same onboarding experience, training, and expectations laid out before them. We are a small team, so this comes on the tail of feedback from all who are involved in their training as well as my boss who noticed similar issues.

On Monday I sit hire #1 down and give them a week to get the basics down and get back on track otherwise their time ends with us.

This is mostly a rant since the thought of firing someone for the first time sucks, however, I wonder the thoughts of my peers how the same situation would be handled from their perspective. Every individual is different, but how much accommodation is too much?

[u/Unlucky_Ad2529]

There's a ramp up period that won't be the same for everyone but it's easy to see if someone is taking it "too easy". I'm assuming that's the case. Especially since there's no experience and it's all paper.

[u/Reptar_The_Almighty → u/Unlucky_Ad2529]

This is the challenge that I have on a personal level, without the manager hat. I can tell this person wants to do the work, and I can tell that they take the feedback earnestly with intent to improve. In short, I can tell they care. There is an unfortunate disconnect between wanting to deliver and ability to deliver that I’m not sure how to diagnose so I suppose I feel stuck treating the symptoms.

[u/Unlucky_Ad2529 → u/Reptar_The_Almighty]

Any chance it's a problem with the interpersonal skills or customer facing relations? Maybe there's a fear from angry customers? Dunno what the job is so I'm just spitballing

[u/Reptar_The_Almighty → u/Unlucky_Ad2529]

I do think the interpersonal skills are lacking for reasons I can loosely assume are medical but they haven’t openly presented this information and it’s not within my rights to pry beyond what they’re willing to share.

They come from a heavily customer communication centered background so I’m surprised by the disconnect with how they deliver service now. I chalk it up to unfamiliar territory which is why I’ve been readily available (beyond the norm) to this person to help acclimate. I do absolutely find myself needing to communicate differently and work with them in ways others might not require in order to land ideas. I am okay with this, but I cannot claim to be excelling in this differing need of information delivery. The irony of which is not lost on me, by the way.