Addressing Recurring Performance Issues as a Manager.

David Buirs - Leadership Coach & Management Trainer

Why won’t he just do it?

David Buirs is a leadership coach in Amsterdam for new managers with 0 to 4 years of experience. This article explains how to address recurring performance issues by first examining your own role before drawing conclusions about the employee. It covers the Golem effect, the right questions to ask as a manager, and when a Performance Improvement Plan is a fair and honest step.

There is someone on your team who has not been delivering for a while.

You have talked about it. Maybe twice. Things improve briefly, then slide back. The same mistakes. The same patterns. The same conversation on repeat.

At some point, the thought arrives: why won’t he just do it?

That feeling is understandable. And it is also exactly the moment things can go wrong.

The Golem effect: how your frustration makes the problem worse

In psychology, the Pygmalion effect describes how high expectations improve performance. Researchers Rosenthal and Jacobson demonstrated this in 1968. Teachers who believed certain students were high-potential saw those students genuinely improve, with no objective difference between them and their peers.

The Golem effect is the opposite. Low expectations lead to lower performance. Not because the person lacks motivation. But because your attitude shapes their behavior.

You ask fewer questions. You explain less. You check in with a slight impatience. You give more critical feedback and less encouragement. Without realizing it, you are sending a signal: I no longer believe you can do this.

And the other person feels it. People are finely tuned to how others perceive them.

The result: the employee pulls back. Takes less initiative. Makes more mistakes. And you see that as confirmation that you were right all along.

Frustration reinforces itself. A performance problem grows while you believe you are addressing it.

The question most managers skip

Before you ask anything of the employee, there is a different question to answer first.

What role have I played in this?

That is not self-blame. It is the most practical question you can ask. Because if you have contributed to the problem and do not address that, nothing changes.

Work through it honestly:

Have I clearly explained what I expect? Not in broad strokes, but concretely. What does success look like? When is something good enough?

Has this person received the right training and resources to actually do this job? Or am I assuming they already know?

Have I given regular, constructive feedback? Or do I only speak up when something goes wrong?

Have I asked how they see their own work? Do they even know I consider this a problem?

Have I asked what they think the reason is? They might see something you do not.

This is not doubt. It is just good management. You cannot change anything in someone else while there are still variables on your side you have not examined.

Curiosity as a tool

The trap of frustration is that you start explaining. You already have a theory. He does not care enough. She is not motivated. He is not cut out for this.

Curiosity asks something different. What is going on for this person? What makes this difficult? What do they need that they currently do not have?

That conversation is uncomfortable to start, especially when frustration has been building for weeks. It feels like walking in the wrong direction.

But it is exactly the conversation that matters. Not to let someone off the hook. But to understand what is actually happening.

Sometimes something personal is going on. Sometimes there is ambiguity you have allowed to persist. Sometimes the person has felt like they are failing for months and does not know how to say it.

And sometimes you discover that the intention is there, but the skill is not. That is very different from unwillingness. And it calls for a completely different response.

When curiosity is not enough

Say you have done all of this. You have clarified expectations. You have offered training. You have had the conversations. You have asked what they need.

And nothing changes.

Then there is an honest question you have to ask: does this person meet the minimum standard for this role?

That is not an attack. It is a professional reality. Every role has a floor. Below that floor, the team does not function, colleagues carry extra weight, and results are missed.

If someone is consistently below that floor, and you have genuinely tried, there is a next step.

The Performance Improvement Plan: a last resort, not a first reaction

A Performance Improvement Plan, or PIP, is a formal process. You document in writing what the expectations are, what the current situation is, and which specific goals need to be reached within a set timeframe. Usually three to six months.

The plan also describes what support you will provide. And what happens if the goals are not met.

A PIP is not a punishment and it is not a goodbye. It is a clearly structured opportunity. With agreed milestones, support, and consequences.

But it only works if the process is honest. If the expectations are realistic. If the support you commit to is real. And if you are using it to give someone a genuine chance, not to build a paper trail for dismissal.

Use a PIP only after months of conversations, feedback, and concrete attempts to improve the situation. Not as a first response to a problem you have not yet fully understood.

Addressing recurring performance issues as a manager starts with yourself. Not because you are always at fault, but because you are the only variable you can directly change.

That takes honesty. And sometimes a conversation you have been putting off.

If you want to work on how you handle situations like this, you can read more about business coaching for leaders or explore what a structured leadership track for your organization could look like. Interested or curious? Let’s chat. Plan your free introduction here. Zero obligation.

How to Have Hard Conversations as a Manager

David Buirs | Leadership & Executive Coach

How to Have Hard Conversations as a Manager

David Buirs is an ICF-certified leadership coach based in Amsterdam, specialising in managers with 0 to 4 years of experience. This article explains why new managers avoid difficult conversations and what actually helps them stop. It draws on CoActive coaching principles and over 10 years of practical leadership experience.

She described herself as “the caring type.” And she meant it.

Her team liked her. She was warm, approachable, the kind of manager people felt comfortable talking to.

But she had not had a real difficult conversation in almost two years.

Every time something needed to be said, she found a softer version. Or she waited. Or she told herself it was not that serious. Her team picked up on it. Some started pushing boundaries. Others quietly stopped coming to her for feedback, because they knew she would just be nice.

She was not avoiding those conversations because she was lazy. She was protecting a story about herself. “I am the empathetic one. That is who I am.”

The story you protect

Most managers have a version of this. It shows up in one of two ways.

You protect the “I am direct and clear” story. Which sometimes means avoiding warmth.

Or you protect the “I am the caring one” story. Which sometimes means avoiding honesty.

Both feel like a strength. And they are, up to a point. The problem is when the story starts making decisions for you.

You know that conversation needs to happen. But you also know it might make you look less empathetic. So you wait. Or you soften it until it says almost nothing.

Leaving something unsaid is also a choice. And it has consequences.

Why the frameworks do not do the work

There is no shortage of good models for how to have hard conversations as a manager.

Radical Candor. Non-Violent Communication. Psychological Safety. They are all built on the same idea: clarity and care are not opposites. You can be honest because you care about someone, not despite it.

Most managers who struggle with difficult conversations already know this. They have read the books. They have taken the training.

Knowing the model does not change much on its own. The real shift happens when you start seeing yourself as someone who can actually do both.

That is where most training stops short. It teaches the technique. It skips the identity part. For organisations that want to address this at scale, a leadership program built around real behaviour change tends to land very differently than a one-day workshop.

How to have hard conversations as a manager: start with who you are

The conversation does not start in the meeting room. It starts in how you see yourself.

If you are more on the empathetic side, that feedback you have been postponing is not a threat to who you are. It is an expression of it. You say something because you want this person to grow, to succeed, to not be blindsided six months from now.

If you are more on the direct side, naming a problem is something you already do well. The upgrade is in how you do it. You speak like you are talking to someone you genuinely want the best for.

In the leadership guidance I do with new managers, this is one of the most consistent patterns we work through together. Not “how do I say this.” But “who do I want to be when I say this.”

Once that shifts, the actual conversation tends to get much easier.

A practical place to start

Think of one conversation you have been putting off. There is probably one.

Before you plan what to say, ask yourself one question: what story about myself am I protecting by not having it?

That question alone tends to open something up.

Curious whether this is the right fit? Plan your free introduction here. Zero obligation.

How to Influence Without Authority as an Early-Career Manager

David Buirs | Leadership Coach & Management Trainer

Influence Without Authority: What Most New Managers Get Wrong

David Buirs is a leadership coach based in Amsterdam who works with new and early-career managers. This article explains why influence at work functions like a currency that must be built before it can be spent, drawing on research by Adam Grant on reciprocity and giving at work. Readers learn how to build credibility, frame requests effectively, and create real organizational impact without relying on positional authority.

You send the message. You follow up. You get a polite non-answer.

Your title is real. Your influence is not there yet. And those are two very different things.

This is the gap nobody prepares you for when you step into a leadership role. The people around you, your team, other departments, senior stakeholders, none of them owe you cooperation. Not yet. You have to earn the right to move them.

That sounds harsh. It is also just how trust works between humans.

Influence is a currency

Think of it that way. Not as a switch you flip when you get promoted. As a bank account.

You can only spend what you have already deposited. When you walk into a new role, your balance is close to zero.

Most new managers don't realize this. They assume the title carries weight. So they start making requests before they've built anything. They ask Marketing to reprioritize. They tell Engineering what needs to happen by Friday. They give feedback their team didn't ask for and isn't ready to hear.

Then they wonder why nothing moves.

Organizational psychologist Adam Grant spent years studying how people build influence at work. His research found something counterintuitive. The most generous people in an organization tend to accumulate the most influence over time. Not because generosity is a tactic. Because people remember who made their work easier. You can read more about the underlying research in Grant's work on givers, takers, and how influence actually spreads through organizations.

The managers who try to extract cooperation before building trust get compliance at best. They get teams that do the minimum. They get departments that route around them.

The deposits come first

Before you think about asking for anything, think about what you're putting in.

Make other people look good. Give credit publicly when your team delivers. Loop in someone's manager when a cross-team project goes well. Offer to take the first draft off someone's plate. These are small moves. Over months, they build a reputation that precedes you.

Build relationships before you need them. This sounds obvious. Most managers skip it anyway. They're too busy. They'll connect later. Then they show up when they need something, and they're a stranger making a demand.

If you invest in relationships when nothing is at stake, you stop being a stranger. That changes everything when something is at stake.

This applies to your own team too. If the only time you talk to someone is in a one-on-one or when you need something, they feel it. You become transactional. People do the minimum for transactional managers.

How to make requests that actually land

Once you've built something, you can start spending it. But even then, how you ask matters.

Everyone around you is listening to the same internal station: What's In It For Me. When you make a request, they're not thinking about your deadline. They're thinking about their own priorities, their manager, their reputation.

So frame your ask around them.

To a team member: not "I need you to finish this by Friday." Try: "Delivering this on time will get you visibility with leadership."

To another department: not "Can you prioritize our request?" Try: "This feature is what enterprise customers keep mentioning. Moving it up puts your team in a strong position for the Q3 review."

You're not manipulating anyone. You're doing the work of connecting your need to their reality. Most people skip that step.

Ask questions you actually want answered

There's a difference between asking a question and genuinely wanting the answer.

When you ask "what would it take to get this done this week?" and you actually listen, something changes. You learn about constraints you didn't know existed. You find room for compromise. The other person starts to feel like a collaborator, not an obstacle.

Even with your own team, questions tend to get more commitment than instructions. "How do you think we should approach this?" creates ownership. "Here's what we're doing" creates compliance, if you're lucky.

To other departments: not "We need this by Friday." Try: "Friday is our ideal timeline. What's realistic on your end?"

Questions get you information. And they make people feel heard. Both matter more than most managers expect.

Connect it to something bigger than your deadline

People tune out when you talk about your project's timeline. They pay attention when you connect it to what actually matters.

To your team: not "we need to hit this deadline." Try: "Leadership is watching this project. Delivering well shows we can execute under pressure."

To other departments: not "we need this next quarter." Try: "The company is pushing into enterprise. This feature keeps coming up in those conversations."

People want to work on things that matter. Showing them why your thing matters is not spin. It is leadership.

This feels slow. That's the point.

Building influence the right way takes months. That can feel frustrating when you're already underwater.

But the alternative is faster and it doesn't work. Managers who lean on positional authority before they've built trust get teams that do the minimum and departments that work around them.

The managers who figure this out get things done across the whole organization. Long after anyone has stopped counting who owes whom what.

This is one of the first things we look at together in business coaching for leaders. At a more senior level, in executive coaching, the same dynamics apply. The stakes are just higher and the political landscape is more complex.

For organizations that want to build this capability across an entire management layer, a structured leadership track is often a more scalable way to get there.

Where to start

Pick one person you need something from this month. Before you ask, figure out what they actually care about. Frame your request around that. Connect it to something the company is working toward. Then ask a real question and listen to the answer.

That's it. Start there.

Curious what this looks like for your specific situation? Plan a free introduction here. Zero obligation.

Kindness or Pleasing?

You helped, smiled, nodded… and walked away annoyed.
We’ve all done it.

When we please, we’re often hoping for something in return. Approval, respect, appreciation.
But when that return doesn’t come, we’re left feeling used, bitter, or just plain tired.

That’s because pleasing isn’t kindness.
It’s a quiet transaction, disguised as niceness.
And when it fails, the emotional cost is yours alone.

Kindness, by contrast, is clean. It gives without expectation, and feels lighter, not heavier.

In leadership, the difference isn’t academic.
One builds trust. The other erodes it silently.

Have you caught yourself doing the second, when you meant the first?

How to Up-Manage Well

Not all rising leaders are the loudest or most experienced ones.

Some are just quietly doing something most people overlook:

They think like owners—and that includes how they manage up.

It’s not just about leading your team.
It’s about supporting your manager too:
→ Keeping them informed
→ Flagging issues early
→ Helping them avoid surprises

Because when you practice up-management well,
you earn freedom.
You stop getting micromanaged.
You get pulled into real decisions.
You start getting seen differently—like someone who gets the bigger picture.

A few ways to start:
✅ Keep a shared doc with live updates—they’ll never have to chase
✅ Ask: “What could I do this week to make your job easier?”
✅ Offer a possible fix with every issue—even a rough one is better than none