How to Handle Layoffs, Firings and Exits from your Small Business – Small Business Show 144

The Small business show, episode 144 for Wednesday, November 8, 2017. Greetings, folks, and welcome to the Small Business show here at businessshow Co. The show by, for and about small business owners. Sponsors for this episode include Storyblocks, where@storyblocks.com SBS you get a special deal. All three of their services, images, video and audio for one price. We'll talk more about that here in a minute. Here in Durham, New Hampshire, I'm Dave Hamilton.

And in Lafayette, California, I'm Shannon Jean. How are you, man?

I'm good, man. How are you?

Good, good, good. That flowed pretty good with. Yeah.

The new thing. That's right.

Happy to have them. Happy to have him here.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Cool. Yeah. As we talked about in the last episode.

As we talked about. That's right. The cat's out of the bag now. Yeah, yeah.

If you missed that one, go back and listen. And we talked about sponsorship and podcasts and business, you know, podcast business in general. So.

Yeah, yeah, it's good stuff. It's crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it is.

It is. So today we're talking about. I said it's one of my least favorite things to do. And probably all small business owners, I would imagine, feel this way. It's. It's letting people go one way or another. Either, you know, you. You mentioned, you know, downsizing or changing, you know, changes in your business that require you to lay off people. Whether it's, you know, a certain business channel that's changing, that you don't need folks anymore, or if you as well, just letting people go in general because their performance or lack of. Their lack thereof. Yeah, that kind of stuff. And, you know, I always make the comment, you know, it's just not like a big business where you can just call HR and say, oh, you know, let, you know, X number of people go lay 5% off of, you know, staff or, you know, employee number, whatever needs to go. You have to really sit down and you have to do it first and foremost. Usually even when you're. When your managers or your, you know, your supervisors do it. As a small business owner, I think you need to be there.

It comes back to you.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You have to be in there because it's probably coming down from you anyway and it's miserable. But it's also like, sometimes like a festering wound that you finally get cut off and then you're so happy, like, oh, it's so much better now.

It's true. No, I always feel horrible after I've let someone go. And I almost always feel relief after I've let someone go. Had to do it. So I guess we'll do this perhaps slightly in reverse. We'll talk about the different ways of doing it in a minute. But just in a general sense, that feeling of relief always tells me you did the right thing, as difficult as that was, because that's the key. You're doing this for your business, either because you don't have the money for this person, or they're the wrong fit culturally or skill wise. I mean, there can be a million reasons and we'll get to those. But, but yeah, there's that, that, that feeling of relief. Yeah, yeah, I hate it.

I do, too.

Yeah, I do too.

But, but like I said, you often feel better after it's done. And, but I, I always would remind, you know, my supervisors and managers, I said, you know, when we have to let somebody go, it's just as much or more so a failure on our part. And, and, and I'll explain what I mean by that.

You're totally right.

Yeah. Because either A, we didn't hire the right person, B, we haven't kind of given them what they need to succeed, or, you know, and yes, there's that third thing where somebody's just a complete flake or whatever. But again, it comes back to, well, maybe we should, you know, we shouldn't hire that person.

Yeah.

And, and, you know, we didn't do enough due diligence or whatever. And I think that's an important thing to understand is it is a failure so that you take it serious and you use it to be introspective about what we as managers could have done differently to avoid this in the future because it's such a miserable process for everybody and it can be destructive to your staff and your culture and the performance of your other people.

Right.

And both sides. One, if somebody, you know, they see someone slacking off and not doing their work, but nothing happens, that sends the wrong message. That sends the wrong message. Or if you're very flippant about, you know, letting people go, you know, willy nilly, that also sends the wrong message. Right.

I never, I get friendly with my employees, more so with some than others, just because people are different. But I have made it a rule that I never, ever, ever, no matter how friendly I am with someone, never joke about letting them go or firing them or anything like that.

No way.

And I broke that rule. It wasn't that long ago, maybe a month and a half ago. It was a Guy who. He works for me. He's actually the one that put together the deal for the sponsorship that we're doing in this episode. Yep. He and I have played in bands together. In fact, he hired me in one of his bands. That's how we met. So it's always been sort of a business relationship, but, you know, we've spent a lot of time together on stage and off, and so we're very comfortable with each other. Very, very comfortable. And I just made the joke about, you know, something about, oh, well, you know, you'll find that it'll be written in the corner of your pink slip or something like that. And he laughed. He completely took it exactly as it was intended. And I stopped and I said, I'm sorry.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, And. And he said, what do you mean? I'm like, no, I. Like, I, I, I. That's a rule of mine. I shouldn't do it. He's like, no, I get it. And. And he has actually a small business of. Of his own. In addition to the band. He's got a T shirt company and stuff that he, Like a. A teamwear company and all this stuff. And. And he's like, no, I get it. I. And I appreciate you saying that. He's like, if he hadn't said anything, I don't think it ever would have, you know, even come back to my mind. He's like, but I'm glad you said it.

Just. Yeah, it is good.

Yeah. Yeah. You just have to. I don't know, you have to be aware.

It's a. You're in a different position now, and you have to. You cannot take it lightly. The fact that you're, in many ways, I mean, you're really. I was just talking to a guy the other night who's a dentist, and he was. We were talking about people at Staff that stays up for a long time and this kind of thing. And I made the comment. I said, well, you know, they. The thing is, as a business owner, you're really a steward of your employees as well.

Yes.

You know, you are. You're there to help them succeed and in their lives. And, you know, and I think getting connected is really important. I always say, you know, you can be friendly, but you cannot be friends. Right. Yeah. And I. And I think it's an important distinction because they will never think of you as just a friend or whatever, as long as you're signing a page.

They can't. It's impossible. Right?

Yes.

Right.

That's right. So those little flippant comments like you say that really? Especially in that case where it's like, oh, this is so, you know, kind of casual.

Yeah.

So casual. But you, you cannot underscore how important they. That he could have gone back and thought about that.

Yes, he could have. He could have been up until five in the morning the next totally freaked out about it. Yep.

And it's one thing I. Things that. One thing I've learned over the years is the way you as a business owner look at things and is quite often completely different than it is taken by your employees.

So that's true.

I mean, things that you're like, oh, this is going to be great. I'm going to give them all this freedom or I'm going to do this.

It scares the crap out of them.

Scare the heck out of them. And be taken completely the wrong way. And I've often had that experience where I've just been shocked. Right. It's like, wow, I meant this to be real positive and look how it's gotten turned around as this big negative thing. So that can definitely happen when you're talking about those things.

Yeah. Yeah. You just need to. You just need to. You know, you can't. I know that no matter how much I obsess over pretty much everything because it's just kind of who I am, there's no way that I can put myself truly in the head of my employees and. And understand how anything is going to be received. And so that's right. You know, I have to, I have to come at it from all angles. And I don't. I mean, I fail on that all the time. It's hard. Yeah. But just, you know, being mindful of the fact that you're going to fail. Yeah, there you go.

So. So letting people go. I mean, I take it there's kind of two different, you know, one is there's a performance issue that you haven't been able to correct or guide that person. And let's focus on that for a minute.

Well, I was going to say let's identify both of them. Then we're going to talk about our sponsor for the day and then we'll talk about each one.

Perfect. Yeah. So, you know, one, it's a lack of performance, and then two is there's something going on where you just don't need those person services anymore.

That's correct. Yes.

Those kind of two things I would. Categories.

Yeah. You're firing them or laying them off.

Yeah.

And these are broad categories. And, and, you know, certainly there's a Lot of blurred lines between them. Yes, sir. But that's in, in terms of how we'll talk about it here today. It's cool. It's. You're firing people, you're laying them off.

You got it.

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We'll chat about that. There you go. Perfect.

Cool. All right, so back to the. Yeah, the two different types of firing, letting people go.

Start. Let's start with layoffs.

Yeah.

You know, I've had to do this. Me too. Thankfully not recently, but it doesn't mean that I won't have to do it soon. Right. And again, there's me. You know, we have an audience of small business owners here. I know sometimes my employees listen. So, you know, take this with the grain that I am talking to an audience of small business owners. Yes. Yep. That's more me knocking on wood, hoping that I don't have to, and certainly not plans. But a few years ago at Mac observer, there had been kind of some significant changes to the industry. And we were at the point where we weren't like up against the wall yet, cash flow wise, but I could see it coming if we were burning at the rate that we were burning and earning at the rate that we were earning. And so it was like, okay, you know, we have to change things a little bit here. And that meant changing the pay structure for a lot of our freelancers, but also, you know, kind of not having as many full time people as we had and just sort of tweaking things around. And it was like, you know, I hemmed and hawed about it. I went back and forth through all the things that we could do and obviously talked about it with Brian, who's my partner there, he's our chief editor. And we came up with it. And the one thing that we knew early on in the process of kind of evaluating this was we can only do this once. Like, we can't.

Yeah, that's a good point.

We can't do it and then three months later do the rest of it, you know, like, you can't delude yourself into thinking, ah, if we just like, maybe slow it, but don't quite turn it around. Yeah, well, it'll be great, you know, we'll be fine.

No, that's easy to do because.

Yeah.

You know, as optimistic and kind of create your own reality, Small business owners, you are always thinking things are going to get better, right? Yes. And certainly speaking in my own experience. And you're like, okay, if we cut here, you know, and keep our level at this, we should be okay.

Should be okay.

Yeah, should be okay. But if, if you think that it's going to be a longer trough that you're going to be into, so to speak, you're right. You do need to really bite the bullet and get it all done. Because the thing that's different about layoffs versus firing a particular person is I think the layoffs rumble through your organization much more powerful.

Well, that's exactly it.

Where people start to think, oh, am I next? What's going on? Is the business going to make it? You know, and what you don't want is. You don't want a mass exodus of people.

No. If you're going to. If you're going to lay off, whatever percentage, it doesn't matter if you're going to lay off, let's say, 20, 30% of your staff, something, you know, not insignificant at all, you really like. You've chosen and hand picked who's going to go and who's going to stay, but you don't really get to pick who's going to stay. You only get to pick who's going to go, and then it's free will whether the rest of those people stay short term or long term.

Yeah. So if you are letting people go, you should look at that and say, okay, what happens then? If the remaining, you know, or some. Or this particular person, I mean, if there are key individuals in your organization, you really need to. They need to be on board with what's going on. Yes. And you need to get them into the discussion and either beforehand, like, certainly your department heads or supervisors, managers, they need to be involved in this and so that they can give you feedback. It may be like, oh, hey, I really need to keep. I want to keep these people.

Yep.

This guy, you know, this person, you know. Yeah, we could let go, but you don't want to surprise them to where, you know, they're not feeling secure. And then all of a sudden they decide to take another opportunity. And then you really trouble because you're shorthanded and you've lost some of your quality. Quality folks.

Yeah, you're already shorthanded. I mean, you've just cut. Yeah. Yeah. So we made sure when we did it that not only were we confident, truly confident, not deluding ourselves, no optimism. It was like, okay, here's the numbers. Here's what our outflows will be after we do this. We are not just cash flow neutral at that point. We are cash flow positive. Like, we're excited about having extra money in the budget now. You know, I know that the people we let go would not share that excitement. There's just no way. Right. And so you kind of have to reconcile the fact that you're Going to feel things differently than the people you've let go, and yet you're still going to feel for them. At least I would.

Yeah, of course. Of course.

So. And then once we did it, we got the staff together and we had a conversation where it was like, hey, look, we're really excited. And I think, you know, people know you. The people that work for, you know, you at some level. And my hope is, and based on the fact that none of them left then or even since then, they believed us. And also, we haven't done it again.

Yeah, right.

It was. Not only did we communicate that we believed it, we. We, you know, we committed to that. And. And the proof's in the pudding, and obviously it worked out, so. Yeah.

Yeah. And I think that your point about meeting with everyone after is really important. Whenever there's a time. Well, when something like this happens, it's not a time for closed doors. No, you need to be out and about. You need, you know, open and transparent. You need to be, you know, hey, if you want to come and talk to me about what has happened, please do. It really needs to be transparent, and it'll. It'll add, you know, a lot of authenticity to it, if you are.

Authenticity.

Yeah, yeah. And. And you just have to open yourself up and be ready to. To discuss when, you know, hopefully you've had some pre. Discussions with, you know, your key players, and they're helping to kind of soften the blow as well. But, you know, what I found in, you know, my wife Renee would always tell me this. You know, hey, they know what's going on already.

Yes.

They. They see it.

Right.

And I. I would be, you know, I always. Oh, yeah, you know, I don't want to. I mean, I don't want to let anybody go. Right. I would. I would always rather pay them than pay me. You know, I'm just like, no, we got to keep these people going. And. But sure enough, that would always happen. Is sick. Oh, yeah, we. You know, the people have stayed well, we saw, you know, weren't as busy or whatever, you know, so they're. They're aware of it. It's just the way you handle it. It's an opportunity to build respect or to destroy it.

Yep.

So go, you know, try to do the right thing.

So before we jump to firing, I want to ask you a question, because I know I've done this, and I can only imagine you have, too. How long will you. So I'm not going to ask it as a yes or no question. I'M going to assume the answer is yes, of course. Of course. How long will you go not taking a paycheck before you make other changes like layoffs to your biz, to. To your business? How do, how do you gauge that? And I realize it's sort of different for every scenario.

Oh, well, yeah, I think it depends on. To answer your question directly, I, I've done it in certain cases for about a year.

Okay.

And.

Yeah. Okay.

Because I felt strongly that, okay, this is what the business needs to make it through this rough patch.

Yep.

And, and I also. But I believe it's influenced by how much the business has rewarded you in the past.

Totally.

You may not have the, the, the luxury of saying, I'm not going to do this for a year. You know, I'm not going to not take it.

Right.

But, you know, I think that if you do it and then you don't see that improvement, well, then it's kind of futile. Feudal, right?

Oh, yeah. You've just, You've. You've given your money to someone else, correct?

In retrospect, yes. That's right. You really. And I, I have absolutely. Somebody that's done this where I have kind of put off the inevitable by taking sacrifice myself when I really shouldn't have. And I should have just, you know, stood up and said, you know what? We just have to do it. If, if, if this particular company is going to survive, we. We've got to make these changes.

Y.

So I'm not sure that that is my answer and it's truth, but I don't know that it was the right thing to do.

I'm with you.

But I did it.

I've done it, too. And you know, in retrospect, there, there have been. There haven't been that many occasions where I've done it, but there have been enough where it's. It's been a varied outcome. That's right. Sometimes it's like, yep, I did it and it worked, and, oh, yeah, great. And I was able to keep everybody. And now I have a, you know, a trained staff instead of new people. And I feel like that was the right thing and it worked out. And I've done it where, you know, you sacrifice for whatever, a few months or whatever it is, and then you realize, yeah, why did I give that person my money? And it's your choice. Like, I never blame the, the employee. You can't. They don't know or they don't.

They're not in charge.

Their choice.

And if you do it, I think you have to be careful about how you. If you tell them, oh, yeah, it's really delicate, you know, so you can certainly use that in a conversation of, hey, you know what? We're gonna have to let a few people go. This is that. I mean, it all depends.

You can say, and I haven't been taking a check for X months, but.

I don't think you can say it if you're driving a new Porsche.

Nope.

And I don't think you. I mean, you know, there's just nuances to it.

Yeah.

Just remember, like I said earlier, they're going to take it different than you think, than. Than you are internalizing it. Of course, you know, they're going to be like, well, you know, you've taken so much money before. I mean, there's just so many different ways. So be careful how you use it. Information.

Yeah. You're not going to po Approach is. Is rarely going to play well, even if it's what you believe. That's a very good point. That's right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It doesn't work.

Yeah. You can't do that. You just don't like you. Don't you. You cash that card in when you open the business.

Yeah.

You don't get to say poor me.

That's not it. And the other thing, I think what it is done over the years for me is it's really reinforced the concept of the revenue stack which we've been talking about here. Because if you have revenue coming in from other business ventures or other investments, you have maybe a little bit easier time saying, you know what? This company's doing really well, this one needs a band aid. I'm not going to take anything from this for three months or I'm going to reinvest it in this. The other aspect of it, not to focus too long on it, but you should talk to your accountant because it may be better to draw the paycheck and loan it back to the company.

That's true.

Yeah. So there's a number of tax implications in that. So you should talk to your accountant. But especially down the road, let's say you never get an opportunity to get that back. Well, you can pay yourself interest on that money. Right. Which is taxed at a much lower rate as well. When you. If, let's say someone comes along and wants to buy your company someday, well, that loan is on the books and you can then negotiate. Okay. Well, this is the sale price and everything, but, you know, this is some money we've loaned to the company. I want to get back that. And then finally, if you're ever dealing with a partnership or an llc, there's something called basis. And basis is a very important thing to learn about, especially as a new business owner. Because if you don't have basis for your investment in the business, like if someone comes in and you're using sweat equity and someone else comes in and puts $100,000 in your company, well, they've got basis, but you don't. So you're very limited on the tax benefits and write offs and all kinds of other stuff that you can do if you don't have basis. So if you loan that money back to the company on the books and the company uses that cash, you're building up your account, your basis. And it's really important. And we'll put a link in the show notes about basis. And it's something that drove me crazy when I first started these various companies. And I was like, what are you talking about? I don't qualify for this. But it's, you know, I'm not an accounting guy. But it's an important thing to understand so that loaning that back can help you out if you're low. Low on your basis. Yeah. So.

Yep.

So the second part is when you have to fire somebody, right?

Yep.

Which is equally miserable, but may not have, may actually be taken very positively by the rest of your, your staff.

Yeah, well, it depends on why you're firing them.

Yes.

Right. But if, you know, if someone is awful, an awful person to be around, and you can, and you don't wait too long to fire them, then it can play very well for you. But if, you know, if you hung onto them for too long, then the staff could be like, well, yeah, thanks for getting rid of them. But what took you so long? Like, that's right. It can shake their confidence in you too.

Yeah, yeah, it can. And what, you know, I would answer that question if, if they, if no one had brought it to your attention.

Yes.

I think the answer is, hey, you know, when this kind of thing happens, you, if you're seeing these things, please come in and tell me so we can then address it sooner. Yep. But if they do that and you don't react well, you know, that, that's a, that's an issue that's on you.

Yeah.

And I've had it. You know, the trouble is sometimes you have to fire people for reasons that are not, you know, like I had a guy that never could transition from, you know, working on electronics to then working on microelectronics. Right.

Okay.

The transition from, I mean, you know, we were in the service.

As your business evolves.

Yeah, that Azure business evolves. Servers, monitors, printers. This guy was awesome. But as we transitioned into laptops, it was a little tougher for him. And then when we made the transition from tablets into mobile, boy, he just couldn't do it. And, and I, you know, it was tough because I. If you couldn't do the work and that was. That was the business.

Right.

You know, and so we kind of had to. We eased him out, if you will. I said, look, anytime, as if we have this work, you're the guy. You know, you're the guy. But as that work disappears, if, if you can't do it, then what do I do? And he, you know, and he knew it. So you have to let somebody go like that. That's tough. Versus, you know, I had a guy that got in a fistfight right in the middle of a tech lab, you know, and I had to let his ass go the next day.

Yeah.

Right away, you know, so. And if you don't respond correctly to an. A big issue like that, or if, if you have any kind of harassment issues, man, you really set. You can set yourself up. Not only respect and this, but legally, you know, you're on the. Really have to be careful, man, of how you do it. So you want to have some HR advice. And, and if you're small and you don't have an HR department, there's all kinds of third parties that you can contract with that will effectively be your HR department. And, and Google, you know, outsourcing hr, there's some. You can get some good support. So, you know, hey, I'm in the right. I'm going to fire this person, and I'm doing it legally. Yeah, that's really important because that's.

That's the hardest part. I mean, it's true of layoffs, too. Like.

Yeah, certain ways you have to do.

It, you've got to. You've got to do it the right way. But with firing, yeah, it gets difficult. And I've had issues in the past where, you know, we pay our sales reps on commission, and there's a real question about what constitutes the earning of that commission if you're not clear about it. Right. Because you could have somebody that, you know, let's say they. They sell a deal that's worth, you know, 12 months worth of a deal.

Yes.

You fire them three months in. So there's nine months of this deal is still going to happen. And Those checks aren't going to come in until after each of those nine months, let's just say. Right. You know.

That's right.

So now you've let this person go, you fired, whatever it is, they are no longer under your employ. Do they have a claim to that commission? That's a good question and it is a good question. If it is truly a sales commission and nothing more, then yeah, I mean, it seems like they might. Right.

I guess it depends on their employment agreement, if you will. If you spell it out up front.

Yeah. And I never used to. Right. But we always talk about it here. I always say, look, you know, I don't pay a commission for sales. I pay a commission for maintaining that contract.

Yeah, that's right.

Because that's actually what's happening. Like, you know, those remaining nine months, somebody needs to work that contract. Otherwise relationship.

Manage it. Yes.

Otherwise we're going to be in default on that. So if you're not here, and I get that, it might be my fault you're not here. Right. But you're not here. Someone has to do that. That work. You didn't do that work. So therefore you can't get paid for it. But it has to be a very clear thing and it's better if everybody truly understands it as opposed to kind of understands it and then tries to collect anyway, because that can get messy for everybody. That's right, yeah.

So I have a question for you. Are, do you, in the case of laying people off or firing people, do you believe in doing an exit interview and getting their feedback and that kind of thing?

You know, I like the idea of an exit interview. I really do, but I'm not convinced they are valuable when you are the one choosing to let someone go. Now, I've had people.

That's correct.

Choose to quit and move on or whatever. And in those cases, I definitely like to get the exit interview.

Yeah. Their attitude is different. Right. They're coming from a different space. Yeah.

They feel. I mean, regardless of what reality is, it doesn't matter. Their perception is they are in control of this situation. I mean, they're the ones that chose to leave. So that exit interview has them in a position of perceived power and also nothing to lose. Right. Yeah.

I think they're in a position to be a little more honest. That's right. They're not angry or disappointed or hoping.

To get their job back.

Ah, that's a good take. That's. That's interesting. Yeah, that's a good take on.

Right.

So you let him Go, yeah, yeah.

Like I gotta let you go. And especially if it's like a layoff or something where I gotta hate to do this, you know, and you gotta keep like those kind of comments out of it because they hate it more than you. You know what I mean?

You can't make it personal at all.

No.

No way. No, no, no. You just have to go, you know what? I'm. You know, you can. And I don't think you can apologize. That's hard.

It's hard. I have apologized because I don't know not to.

I have too. You know, it's like, look, I hate to do it, but I always do say to your point, it's like, you know what?

It.

Things turn around and this thing. We'd love to have you back, you know, keep in touch. And we've done it. I mean, we have absolutely done it where we've asked somebody to come back and they've been very happy to come back.

Sure.

Yeah.

But that's the thing where you're not gonna. That exit interview. I don't know it like maybe three months later. And I have. I've run into people that I've, you know, because my industry is a lot of, like any industry. Right. You know, you know, you can let somebody go, but it doesn't mean you're never going to see them again. And I run into somebody three or six months later and we wind up having a beer and they've moved on to something else. They're not worried where their rent check's going to come from or anything like that. And then you can have kind of an honest conversation, but you have to be a willing participant in that conversation. Do you really want to hear what they have to say? You know, and maybe. Maybe you don't like there. We've talked about how sometimes that optimism is a good thing and, you know, you just kind of want to keep trucking. So I don't know. It depends. It depends on the person.

It does. It does. Yeah. I mean, I'm not a big believer in just because I don't think you get accurate information.

You have to parse it. Yeah.

Yeah, you do have to kind of parse it, but it's tough. I think as a small business owner, it's definitely one of the worst things to do, but. But it's something that is critically important that you do and that you handle in a respectful manner and you don't wait too long.

And the key is don't wait too long. I still don't know the Answer to, like, how do I know when.

No, it's. You don't. Yeah. I think it's very challenging, and I've actually had to let people go at one of my companies, and I felt like. I felt. I've literally. I still feel. I was like, wow, I've just let the heart and soul of this business go.

Yep.

And, man, it hurts. It's tough. And, you know, but again, it turned out to be, you know, what it was the heart and soul of the business as it used to be.

Correct.

But that it needed to evolve to be something different. And. And. And I think what happens is we all get comfortable.

Well, that's it.

Especially with the people around you and how things work. And then you're like, oh, man, you know, I got to do this. And it's just. I mean. And I've had, you know, you're sitting there and people. The tears come into their eyes, and you're thinking, oh, man, this is just rotten. But it's one of the, you know, not. You can't put too fine a point on it. How it just takes time, and you got to get some experience under your belt. The last thing I'll leave you with is don't ever do it by yourself. Always have someone in the room with you when you do it, because you don't want to get into a he said, he said, or, you know, he said, she said, any of that thing. You want to have something. Someone else that can sit there and say, oh, I was there. I witnessed the way they did this. Here's the thing. Right.

Yeah.

And especially if you're firing someone, that it's volatile. You definitely need to have somebody there. And if you're a sole proprietor with only one employee, have your bookkeeper, accountant, lawyer, whoever one of your advisors is, have them come sit with you or something, because you definitely want to have some backup. Backup support.

Huh. I never thought about that. I. I've always done it. I'm trying to think. Oh, I've. I've. With the computer nerds business. I. I fired people to their face because we saw each other. We all worked out of the same office. But with. With Backbeat, actually. Well, with Backbeat, there was one person I let go in person. But generally it's with both Backbeat and tmo because we're, you know, virtual companies that it's on the phone. But, yeah, what I never thought to do. And you got to check with the laws in your state, all this is to record that conversation recorded.

Or have somebody sit in on the call with you.

Yeah.

You just. You. You have to protect yourself.

That's good advice.

Huh? You want to have. And also, you. You'll feel a little more confident. You know, typically you've discussed it with this person, right? Oh, you know, as well, you know, this person may have said, oh, you know what, what, you can't say that. Or oh, I would say it this way. So it kind of gives you a chance to run things by whoever your.

Advisor is going to role play it is. Or whatever.

Yeah, yeah. So. And then you get there on the line with you, and I'm not sure, again, legality, whether you need to tell that person that some. Someone else is on the phone, especially if you're not recording it. I don't know what that is. You need to check.

Yeah, you gotta check. Yeah, exactly.

But when you do it in person, for sure, man, you. You gotta bring them into your office or the conference room and you got to have somebody in there with you. Yeah, for sure.

That's really smart. Yep.

Yep. So.

Yeah. Yeah.

Well, it's good. I normally feel totally excited at the end, but I'm like, oh, my gosh, it's draining.

Yeah. This felt like therapy.

Yeah. But I think it makes you a better business owner if you feel that empathy for. For people. And hopefully we've helped you out and, you know, come up and talk, share your story and your tips in.

Yeah, we can't do this one alone, folks. You gotta chime in on this one.

Yeah. Yeah. We need to hear you at. Up in the Facebook support group. Just go to BusinessShow Co Facebook or send your stories to feedbackusinessshow co or your questions or tell us what we did wrong. Any of those things. We want to hear from you.

Yeah, we just need to. We need. We need the support group now. That's right. Our great big thanks to Storyblocks. We're@storyblocks.com SBS you get that triple bundle deal. Check it out. See you next week. Keep living that charm life.