The Real Costs of an Ineffective Employee

The Real Costs

Do You Know What a Bad Employee is Costing You?

Almost every company has an employee that just isn’t measuring up to the others.  You might think that it isn’t a big deal…after all, the rest of your employees are fantastic.

But you’ll be surprised at how much that one employee is really costing you.

If you step back and think about it you will realize that no one is winning when you have a bad apple.

Here are some of the Real Costs of having an ineffective employee.

Decreased Productivity

A CareerBuilder study found 40% of surveyed companies experienced a drastic decline in productivity as a result of bad employees. Not only was the bad apple failing to do their job, but the productivity of everyone else on the team went down as well.

In fact, one poor worker can cause overall productivity of a team to drop by more than 30%. You may think the rest of the team can compensate for the one bad apple, but they can’t.

You will also find that you spend so much time trying to manage them, train them and deal with all the issues and drama they cause that your own productivity starts to go down.

Dampened Morale

The longer a bad apple is on the team the more it will cause the good apples to rot. 

The morale of the entire team will start to go down and eventually you will start losing even your best employees because they don’t want to be in an environment that is full of drama and not being productive.

You might think that you are doing that employee a favor by keeping them around but you are not. 

They are not benefitting from being the low performer just as much as you are not benefitting from having them there.  The stress of coming into a job that they don’t fully measure up to can be emotionally draining for them.

They would be better off in a different position or job that fits there skillset and strengths so they can shine.

Decreased Teamwork

Teamwork is critical to getting projects done and having your business run smoothly. 

However, when you have someone on the team that is not living up to the standards the others start to feel the pressure and want to work less with each other.

What once was a great team all working together to accomplish the same goal now becomes individual silos of people doing their own thing because they get frustrated when they work with members that are not contributing as much. 

Deadlines start to get missed because there wasn’t collaboration and you will have to find a way to break down the silos.

Reputational Damage

Most importantly is the reputational damage which can impact your customers, vendors, direct reports and management.

If your customers perspective of your company starts to decline because you have someone who messes up or doesn’t treat them with respect you are going to start losing customers. 

It also impacts your reputation with your team and they start to question your ability to make smart decisions.  This will be hard to overcome even after the bad employee is gone.

If you are in a larger organization then your management is also going to start questioning your ability to manage and lead if they know you have low performers on your team that you haven’t found a way to transform or let go.

Your reputation and the reputation of your business is worth protecting.

Can you see how these costs can add up quickly and how if you let things linger it just gets worse? 

The studies have shown that the costs of keeping a bad employee can be up to 15 times their annual salary!  This is huge and it is because of all the “real costs” not just the salary you are paying that one person.

It’s time you dealt with your bad apple. 

Need help or support in the process? Schedule a free consult here.