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Christian leaders and how to fire a Christian employee.

This weeks ramblings.


I was asked this week if it was OK for Christian employers to fire other Christian staff.  Firstly let me state that it is always important to follow the laws of the country that you live in, but the question should be; Do I as an employer have the right to fire other staff Christian or not. The short answer is YES! Let me give you two examples I have come across;
Case Study 1;
The CEO of medium sized Christian organisation dealing in books and other Christian Literature had a problem with one of their staff. The person concerned, let’s call him Pete, seemed to push everybody’s buttons. Pete had been with the company 2 years, his first six months were just great but after that everything went downhill. He always complained, he bad mouthed his managers. At company social gatherings, when sport was played, he never played with any great sportsmanship; it seemed that every decision was wrong or somebody had a beef with him. But, Pete went to the same church as a number of the staff including the CEO.
I am not going to go into the background, there is a lot more to this story and will take too long to go into, but the CEO dealt with it this way.
Firstly he talked to their Pastor, just to make sure there were no under laying issues, there weren’t any. He then called Pete in for a chat, expressed his concerns and talked about building relationship with people. He made it very clear that Pete’s personal skills had to improve as should his attitude towards others. His attitude towards the company had to change. The CEO said the situation would be reviewed in three months. Things changed, for about a week, after that it was back to normal. At the end of the first month the CEO wrote a letter to Pete as a final warning. A week later the CEO fired Pete.
Case Study 2;
A very large Christian Organisation in the Christian academic sector. This time the CEO laid out to staff, how he would deal with people within the organisation. If a person didn’t fit in a department they would move them, if that didn’t work, they would make the effort to retrain that person in another area. If that didn’t work then they would help in any way they could to get the person a new job, but would not let them go until that person had a job because to make a person unemployed was wrong and unchristian.
Let me say that in the five years I worked with (never for) this organisation, I never once saw the above policy implemented. If a person did not fit they were given immediate notice, others were fired on the spot. In fact there was ruthless personnel management in operation. Two years later there was a staff reshuffle, all staff were told to reapply for their own jobs. This resulted in people being made to leave the organisation or just not bother reapplying. While the academic standards were always high and continued to be high throughout this period, the organisation got a reputation for not dealing well with staff.
What did I learn? As a boss be secure in your position. Be consistent and always do what you say you will do. If needed seek wisdom from others. Unlike secular organisations build relationship you are Christians, act and be Christian. Don’t be afraid of making a decision.


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