I manage the CEO’s horrible nephew

A reader writes:

I’m managing a difficult employee, “Felix.” Felix has been at my company for five years now. He also happens to be the CEO’s nephew.

His performance was never good, but it’s gotten steadily worse. His work frequently has mistakes, he is unreachable for large stretches of the day, and he pushes back on any feedback I give him. At one point, he yelled in my face when I pointed out a repeated problem with his work, saying that he “didn’t respect” my feedback.

I’ve documented these issues extensively. I’ve talked to HR repeatedly about putting him on a PIP or even terminating him outright. They say that Felix is unhappy and actively job-searching and that they will work with him to set an end date. Things came to a head at the end of last year, during Felix’s performance review. I gave him poor marks on attitude, work quality, and communication, and he once again yelled at me and told me that my review was unfair and said that the whole team thought I was a jerk. With my HR rep on the call. Who again told me that he was probably going to leave soon on his own.

What should I do now? Should I keep pushing to fire him? I’ve been trying to make it work, but I’m at the end of my rope.

I answer this question — and two others — over at Inc. today, where I’m revisiting letters that have been buried in the archives here from years ago (and sometimes updating/expanding my answers to them). You can read it here.

Other questions I’m answering there today include:

• How can I make sure my team doesn’t organize a gift for me?
• Hiring a friend’s employee

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