5 Steps for Healthy Confrontation

One of your most lucrative clients has admitted to unethical behavior and is entirely unwilling to change. Do you keep the account and tie your name to their misdealing? Or do you terminate the relationship and lose over a million dollars in sunk cost?

Your top salesman is accused of inappropriate behavior toward team members of the opposite sex. You believe the complaints, but the top-performer denies them. Do you fire the salesman and lose your rainmaker? Or do you tolerate the behavior and sacrifice integrity?

In this episode, we’ll give you five steps for dealing with a high-performing but bad-behaving employee.

Those weren’t just case studies. They were real workplace dilemmas we’ve faced. You may have a tough personnel decision sitting on your desk right now. That produces a lot of stress and anxiety. You may feel like you’re forced to choose between your integrity and the future of your business. 

But you don’t have to. We believe you can run a highly successful business and sleep well at night. And we’ll give you the insight and confidence you need to confront bad behavior in the workplace, even when it’s costly or inconvenient.

Following the steps we’ll give you today, you can keep both your financial performance and your integrity intact. You’ll gain the respect of your top performers and your entire team.

Here’s a Look Inside Today’s Show

  • Michael shares his worst experience dealing with a bad-behaving top-performer. [3:53]
  • Learn the real driver of performance. (Hint: it’s not superstar employees.) [5:45]
  • The one thing that provides the clarity you need to confront poor behavior. [7:54]
  • Megan shares an experience of confronting lack of integrity in the workplace. [8:33]
  • Michael shares a time when he “bet his job” on confronting a high performer. [9:42]
  • What to do when your boss doesn’t support you in confronting aberrant behavior [19:23]
  • Tips for conducting a workplace confrontation [20:56]
  • What to do when the behavior is bad—but doesn’t warrant termination. [23:00]
  • What behaviors you can coach which you can’t. [25:05] 
  • The often-overlooked last step in terminating an employee [28:41] 

Is there a confrontation looming in your business? Be thoughtful, be wise, and be confident. You can handle this!

Share the Love

Shout-out to “74Cody,” who left this iTunes review of last week’s episode on avoiding the drift: “This episode really brought home for me the need to take a step back, evaluate where I am, and ask the question—Where do I want to go? Such good insight and personal connection. Thank you!”

And thank you, Cody. Glad the show is making a difference for you.

You can leave your own review on iTunes. Good, bad, or indifferent, we really want to know what you think. Why not do that today?

And if you’re loving this podcast, be sure to subscribe. You’ll never miss an episode, include occasional bonus content that’s just for our Lead to Win audience. Just tap subscribe on your device right now, or click here for more help.

Resources from This Episode