Hey, it’s Collin. Welcome to Engineering Echelons, a newsletter full of ideas and insights to help engineers excel at management.

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Sometimes a resume or interview oversells a person’s true capabilities, but you don’t truly understand that until after they are hired and in the role. Maybe it’s the wrong role. Maybe you are paying them too much. Whatever it is, you need to address it, and it’s not an easy conversation.

You may find yourself in this situation because interviews are a sales pitch, a glimpse into how well a person may do a role based on how well they talk about it.

I’ve written about the limits of interviews before in this newsletter. Today, let’s focus on corrective actions after the person is hired.

It’s a tricky situation, and because of this, managers often try to wait it out. Maybe the employee will grow into it by themselves. Maybe someone else will say something. Maybe they will notice how they don’t stack up to others on the team, and they’ll step it up or leave.

This is wishful thinking. It’s unreasonable to believe that other people will change without clear feedback. And providing that feedback is the responsibility of the manager.

An effective leader approaches the conversation calmly and identifies the issues plainly. An example is, “Here’s what the role requires and here’s the gap I’m seeing.” It’s not accusatory, and it comes from a personal perspective (I’m seeing).

It provides an opportunity for the employee to internalize the feedback and provide their own input. Maybe the role wasn’t communicated effectively to them in the first place, and they never had an accurate understanding of what they were signing up for.

Ultimately, it’s one example of a starting point for a conversation. From there, expectations need to be made clear, as well as definitive timelines for achieving certain outcomes. Set up check-ins (if you aren’t having them already) to review progress and provide additional feedback.

The end result may still be termination. Remember, not 100% of your hires will be successful. But when you have an issue with a new hire, waiting is the wrong thing to do. It just pushes the hard conversation down the road, which makes it even harder to address then.

Tim Ferriss (author, podcaster) on success in life:

“A person’s success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have.”

—

Biz Stone (cofounder of Twitter) on constraints:

“Embrace your constraints, whether they are creative, physical, economic, or self-imposed. They are provocative. They are challenging. They wake you up. They make you more creative. They make you better.”

—

James Dyson (inventor, businessman) on the danger of experts:

“Experts are dangerous. There’s an assumption that experts are doing things correctly or in the most clever way. It’s not true.”

Not a new concept, but a new spin and a new name. This article reflects on the balance between efficiency and collaboration in the workplace.

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Looking forward to hearing from you. See you next time.

Collin