A PIP Is a Receipt for Feedback You Never Gave

A lot of my friends in HR are going to hate this… PIPs are largely useless. If you're about to put someone on a performance improvement plan, the conversation is already over and the manager's mind is already made up.

So why doesn't the manager just part ways with the person at that point? Because the PIP is a CYA, built for companies operating under the assumption that the manager hasn't done enough of their fundamental job along the way. Feedback, coaching, documentation. And that assumption exists for a reason, since plenty of managers genuinely haven't. Then it becomes a self-fulfilling thing. As long as the safety net is there, nobody has any real incentive to get better at delivering feedback in the moment, coaching while it still matters, or writing the one-on-one recap that builds the record over time.

The downstream effects are worse than the paperwork. It signals that underperformance earns multiple formal chances, and the high performers you most want to keep are watching that happen while wondering why they're held to a different bar. Resentment follows, and it doesn't stay contained to one team. Good management looks pretty unglamorous by comparison. Regular one-on-ones that are actually about something. Direct feedback delivered when the thing happens, not a quarter later. Expectations stated clearly and repeated often enough that the bar is never a mystery to anyone. Do that consistently and you eventually reach the honest version of the conversation, where you say that despite ongoing effort this isn't working out and it's time to part ways… and nobody in the room is surprised, and no additional documentation is required, because the work already happened over months. That's what actual management is. Everything else is documentation theater.

0:00 Why PIPs are largely useless

0:18 PIPs as CYA for poor management

0:38 The self-fulfilling prophecy problem

0:54 Toxic downstream effects on culture

1:16 What good management actually looks like

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