A warehouse worker started at my company about 2 months ago. His role is pick/pack and he is very slow (benchmarked to other employees). I have introduced KPIs but he is consistently not meeting them. Aside from this, he is a great culture fit and has other great qualities (initiative, independence, desire to learn, etc). He is just SO slow in his role even after trying multiple techniques to get him to improve efficiency. I’m often in on weekends to catch up his work. He is always actively working (not on his phone, not chatting) but for some reason just can’t pick up the pace. How do I politely tell him that he needs to hurry up and meet KPIs? He seems to work at one pace no matter how swamped we are with holiday orders. He is somewhat fragile and emotional so I worry that being blunt will result in hostile feelings.
Do I just let him go?
You’re better off to be blunt than to fire someone who has good qualities and is a good cultural fit.
Basically, he’s 75% of the way there. You just have to kick him in the ass to pick up his pace to reach his KPIs.
I would sit him down and explain that what he’s doing, he’s doing well, but he working so slow, you’re covering his ass by coming in on weekends to complete his work and you’re not going to do that anymore.
Show him on a graph or pie chart his productivity compared to others.
(I have a feeling he won’t comprehend verbal or visual numbers.) This should speak volumes to him and you won’t have to say a word.
Ask him what he thinks is holding him back from increasing his performance.(I don’t know is not acceptable.)
Put him on a 30 day written performance Improvement Plan where each day has to improve by X over the previous day. If he can increase his performance by x% or x pieces a day, you may have a winner in 30 days.
In my experience, some have worked out, some havent. It’s just one of those things.
Good luck.