Well. She threatened you so I guess that means you weren’t friends? That would make me feel better about it.

Why you’d be sore about it when they THREATENED you, is beyond me. Let it go, you did yourself a favor.

You pay them so they don’t have to be your friends.

It’s never easy to fire anyone, even if they were terrible hires. My advice, don’t live in fear. Many people don’t mean what they say when they are angry. At the end, it comes down to what your company needs to survive. You have people (including yourself) that depend on the paycheck(s) your company provides, so having a healthy business is your #1 priority.

You ripped off the bandaid. Feeling badly makes you human. Trying to run a business where you avoid ever firing people makes you a horrible businessperson.

Good move doing it before Hanukkah/Christmas time. At least there’s less of a shock.

Good jobs OP.

She couldn’t compartmentalize and that isn’t your fault.

First of all, congrats on your first firing. It means you are doing what needs to be done to take care of your business. Welcome to business ownership.

Firing sucks. It is never fun. You feel bad, which means you have empathy.That’s good, it means you are a normal human and not a psycho.

I have probably fired 100 or so people over the years. I have 1 that comes by a couple times a year and we eat lunch. I would say we aren’t "friends ", but we are friendly. We share pics from trips and keep each other updated on dumb stuff our kids did.

Your employees are not your friends. They provide a service to you for providing them money. Your accountant is also not your friend. Neither are your suppliers.

Friendly is ok, but they are not your friends. Dont believe me, change accountants, and see if your current accountant still wants to have lunch.

You will lose less sleep with each firing, but you wont ever feel good about it.

An old boss who once gave me advice around letting people go that you should be ruthless in decision but compassionate in delivery.

Sounds like you made the right choice and I promise you will feel more relieved and positive about your decision as you see the benefits of them no longer working for you.

It will get a lot easier! And this will really help focus your recruiting and interviewing skills.

The second one is easier. At number ten it’s like, we need to find a dignified way to get you on the exit the ramp. (That’s my go to phrase.) Then, go pack your shit and if you behave you’ll get a check in two weeks. Now, back to my sandwich.

I’d say a few things…

First, its ok to feel shitty firing some one, it should never be a “Great” feeling, even if you aren’t their friend, unless they are acting maliciously you aren’t really going to be happy about it, its just something that is necessary, either because they aren’t pulling their weight, or because they are too much of a liability in one way or another…

Its good, even great to have a sense of camaraderie with your coworkers and even for people to be friends with eachother, you spend a third or more of your day there, you should at least try to spend your day with people you respect even if you don’t like them all…

However, as a person in a leadership position you need to both be hyper-aware of how much your authority over your team affects the relationship, “Hey can you help me after work”, can feel like a request to a friend from you, but a demand to your employee… and because of that awkwardness, what can feel like a friendship to you, can just be an employee being polite trying to keep their job.

Does this mean its better to be removed/detached… not necessarily… it might make it easier to fire some one, and prevent your feelings from getting hurt as badly when you do. But having leadership that genuinely cares about their employees and doesn’t just see them as robots, or act fake polite… is how you are going to attract the best quality employees who genuinely care about your business and you, because they know you want them to succeed as well…

I made this same mistake as a theatre producer. Thought I had genuine friends, they were just friendly with me to get roles or their projects done.

Never become friends with employees, or hire friends.

You are not alone, I’ve always found it difficult to fire someone, fortunately is has been a rare occurrence. However, it has always been a huge relief once it was done. All of the tension is gone and the whole company can feel it around the office, just a better atmosphere. This presupposes that it was a legitimate firing of course.

My experience has actually been the other employees are even happier than I am the person is gone, no hard working honest employee likes it when a co-worker is shirking. If action wasn’t taken, you can be sure someone else would soon be saying to themselves, why am I busting my butt?

As others have mentioned, no firing should be unexpected if management has been doing their job…still doesn’t mean the person will take it reasonably…reasonable people don’t typically get fired from good companies. With time and distance you will gain ever better perspective on the whole situation/relationship and this experience will help you going forward.

Business is a process. Relationships are a personal matter.

If you damage the process then you hurt everyone.

The simplest way to justify any change is to review the process with your team member, make sure to list the performance criteria that is essential for success, and then discuss why you need to move forward with change.

If you comment on your employee’s shortcoming, it is taken as a personal attack with matching emotional responses.

If you talk about process and NOT comment on your team member, then you are discussing options with your team member. The business has needs. And your job is to make sure that those needs are met.