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> You’ll have to fire some really nice, hard-working people. But you have to do it with dignity.

I wonder if this is part of the reason why there are not too many Netflix-like high achieving companies in Europe -- firing people is not possible. Even totally sucking at your job isn't acceptable reason for employment contract termination, that'd be just a reason for further training. You'll have to go through different hoops, usually concerning the company's financial needs -- and which high achiever would want to join a company that announces dire economical times?

This (easier to get rid of people) is also a reason behind a recent trend of people-for-hire companies and freelancers-only requirements.

Disclaimer: probably does not apply to all of Europe.

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I was working in an office that had to follow French laws and norms, and I had a _contractor_* that refused to do her job. She wouldn't show up for work, when she did she'd play Farmville or be on Facebook. It was a data entry job with an objective way to measure performance, and she was accomplishing about 1/3rd of the other employees.

I couldn't just not renew her contract. I had to document her shortcomings, have her sign letters, take her to meetings with HR, etc. IIRC, it took two months to get rid of her after the end of her final contract (we had to keep her on a provisional contract until we finally satisfied all the requirements).

*We were paying salaries based on annual grants from other organizations, so all the positions were advertised (and accepted) as one year contracts.

>I wonder if this is part of the reason why there are not too many Netflix-like high achieving companies in Europe -- firing people is not possible.

This probably explains why I've never seen my German counterparts ever being fired. The lowest performers are endlessly shuffled between projects, maybe hoping they would leave voluntarily ?

That's perhaps one way. Or assigning the employee no tasks at all, just an empty room with a desk and chair, and a requirement to be there during normal working hours. No sane person takes that for a longer time.

Companies do have longish probation periods (say, 6-9 months) before the contract is final. Within this period either party can cancel the employment at will, with no notice period. This is meant to be the testing time during which both parties can confirm that they are happy with the deal.

I saw an article a year back or so about an administrative office in Germany that was dismantled. But because they couldn't fire the officers, they put them in a building with nothing to do until everyone quit voluntarily. The toughest made it about over a year. (Can't find the original article, sadly.)

In New York City, for example, unionized teachers sometimes end up in "Rubber Rooms" that are basically this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reassignment_centers

> Or assigning the employee no tasks at all, just an empty room with a desk and chair, and a requirement to be there during normal working hours.

Note that this is legally Constructive Dismissal and is likely to wind you up in front of a tribunal.

How? They are still getting paid.

Removing an employee's duties with negative effect to the employee with the intention of causing them to quit is constructive dismissal in at least the UK, and likely the rest of Europe as much of it has better labour laws than us.

Demoting someone is generally OK provided that you have good reason and can provide reasonable evidence that the intention wasn't to cause the employee to leave. It's unlikely that you'd have any good evidence that sticking someone in a room with no duties is something your company actually wants to continue paying the person for.

I reckon this is correct in France: As an employer, if you attempt to fire someone, you will almost automtically end up in a trial and be condemned, whatever indemnities you gave upfront. My father fired someone at age 55 (before it was forbidden to fire people >50yo) and paid cash for the difference between his unemployment benefits and his former salary until retirement. He landed at Prod'hommes (ombudsman) and lost.

Even when your company is underweather (Bouygues telecom fired 900 people if I remember, Renault Trucks a few hundreds too), it's a long agony for employees who stay: If you quit, you lose all allowances for unemployment benefits and all severance package; If you stay it's 1-3 years until they sign your severance package, under a shitty ambiance where they'll search for proof that you're abandoning your job.

France is the contry which consumes the most anti-depressant per inhabitant, by the way.

Reminds me of this: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2853251/US-tycoon-re...

Isn't it only difficult to let go employees who've been in the job for more than 2 years? I'm pretty sure that how it is in the UK at least.

Even then, there's the option of a PIP, which allows you to quantify their ineffectiveness and give you good cause for letting them go.

I can imagine UK being a bit different from the continental Europe. In the two countries I've worked in this is handled with a probation period of 6-9 months, but after this it gets much much harder.

Yes, it's like that in Germany. The probation period is typically 3-6 months (although you can be hired without one). After that, the company may only fire you because of financial problems (and that is basically prohibited in larger companies by the worker's council), or if you misbehave (show up late for work repeatedly, steal intellectual property, etc.).

These are not firings technically - you are being paid a bonus on the condition that you resign, as I understand it. Has anyone ever said no or are the payouts that much?

The payouts are good and if you said no they would just fire you instead.

It is probably the case that in the US, choosing not to leave gracefully means you will get the boot. In countries that make it hard to fire, someone could say "No thanks" to the resignation package and keep working for a significant amount of time.

In Norway it is typical to start a new company to develope a business idea and transfer employees there through various insensitives like stocks or options. That do allow to "fire" people by closing down an unsuccessful business. The big upside is that one looses the job not alone which feels much better. Also one does not need to explain why one was fired on previous position when looking for new one.

So someone can get hired, stop showing up and still get paid?

No they can't, they have a requirement to be at work and to perform their assigned duties. If they suck at their duties, well, employer should provide training I suppose. But they have to work of course, no question about that -- this was just about firing not being possible "at will" as it is often the case in the US.

Also, stuff like coming to work drunk is a valid reason for immediate firing.

Is it legal to negotiate terms for them to leave voluntarily?

Yes, of course. For example in Finland it's ~common in big companies to offer "packages" for employees that leave voluntarily if the company needs to downsize. The problem with this approach, of course, is that the best people take the package and get a job elsewhere. This could perhaps be tailored just for the lower achievers too, but I don't think the big companies have such ranking systems in place because they aren't part of the work culture.

Yes, that is a common way of firing people under permanent contracts in Europe. You give them a crappy position for a few months until they get bored to death and then offer them to leave for X months/years of salary.

You used an employment concept here that isn't typical or well-understood by American workers: permanent contract. Americans are well-versed in short term contracts, mostly because of sports, but I doubt more than a few percent of them ever consider that, absent any specification otherwise, all employment contracts are presented as permanent.

>all employment contracts are presented as permanent

On the contrary, the vast majority of employees in the US are under "at will" conditions, where their employment can be terminated at any time. There is nothing permanent about any employment contract in the US.

That's what he meant -- that in Europe almost all employment contracts are permanent, which may not be obvious to an American reader without explicit mention.

You're right, it wasn't obvious. I had hit submit too early, I had meant to ask how long the contracts typically last for and if maybe it was better for a company to just use shorter contracts. Are they required to be permanent for the most part? Sorry for getting way OT here.

We're getting so detailed that I'll mention the following applying specifically to Finland.

It's possible to have temporary/fixed-time contracts too, and lots of people do. It's however illegal for the employer to chain temporary contracts one after another instead of offering a permanent contract if there's a continuous need.

If this happens, the employee may sue on grounds of it being de facto permanent employment. If successful, they will get all the associated benefits, including things such as compensation for wrongful contract termination and withheld bonus payments only available for permanent employees. Suing is pretty easy/risk-free if the wronged person is in an union, and the unionization of workforce is around 60%-70%.

I'll explain how it typically works in the Netherlands, for non-self-employed people at least (that I'm not familiar with; note also that there has recently been some controversy where companies will classify employees as contractors to get around the stricter permanent contract laws, e.g. PostNL delivery people being contracters instead of full employees).

Typically two temporary one-year contracts will be offered (or some variation of this; four six-month contracts, etc.) Once this temporary contract duration is up an employer can either not renew the contract, or if they do renew it is by law an indefinite contract. If, for instance, you were hired at a company through a recruitment agency and your employment contract was through said recruitment agency, your clock would be reset at the company if you were to negotiate a direct contract with the company after leaving the recruitment agency contract.

It's also typical for a probationary period at the start of the first contract; in my case it was only one month, though I'm not sure if this is usual or if it could be longer for others.

NB: Previously, the law allowed three years of temporary contracts before the indefinite one, but this was changed several years ago.

> but I doubt more than a few percent of them ever consider that, absent any specification otherwise, all employment contracts are presented as permanent.

While much social expectation and institutions are based around that kind of essentially feudal lord/tenant relationship, that's not actually the case with at-will employment in law: employment contracts without specificity of term are indefinite but not permanent (were they permanent, it would be illegal for an employer to terminate them without a breach of a nature that made the contract voidable.)

Probably not, because that'd be a breach of contract (assuming you're contractually obligated to show up). But being good at what you've been hired to do is usually not a contractual obligation.

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