Etydhv

I have a report who is simply no good. He is able to turn the easiest task into a huge disaster. He's simply not a person for this job.

But that's not the topic I would like to discuss here.

I try to limit my feedback for him to our 1:1 conversations, but given that he often presents his - completely false - solutions to me and other people at the same time and the fact that we work in an open space and it's difficult to book a room for every negative feedback, it's sometimes difficult for me not to express with the tone of my voice that I'm irritated. I'm doing my best, but I know it can be heard by other people (his colleagues) at times and it makes me ashamed of myself.

I'm always constructive, never offensive of course. But still, it's negative feedback (my pointing to his mistakes and asking for corrections).

How should I manage that?

Try starting here:

given that he often presents his - completely false - solutions to me and other people at the same time

Limit number of presentations. Have an agreement that you will always approve this person's presentations, before they are released in public. Suggest that to your and person's managers as well. This will allow you

• to give initial guidance instead of negative feedback post-factum
  


• see exactly when things go wrong


• cancel presentations that are not ready and will waste everybody's time

This will also move your interactions from "negative feedback" to "working together" type of work. I would expect that you will not spend much more time with report than you do now.

Basiucally, I would advise you to temporally re-organize your interactions. Instead of "after", you will be ahead of bad performance, possibly correcting it.

Since you say:

He's simply not a person for this job.

I would suggest, you convey any negative feedback to him via email. This way you have his issues documented. If he replies to your emails further explaining his terrible ideas, all the better.

Then after sufficient time, you can submit this info to the hire ups to get placed on a "Performance Improvement Plan" to correct his issues, or in an extreme event, separate him from the company.

If your intent is to shield this employee from your negative feedback then you need to work to reduce the amount of opportunities he gives you for doing so.

You can start by eliminating the conversations in the open space. The next time he approaches you in open space, kindly ask him to gather his thoughts/solutions/etc and send them to you in an email. This helps avoid any public negative feedback from yourself.

You should still take the time to respond to his email and point out what is incorrect and try to explain why it is incorrect.

If ultimately you feel that this person is not right for the job you should take whatever action is available to you ( being that they report to you ) to remove him from his current role.

How to give very negative feedback gracefully?

Short answer: Just don't.

I have a report who is simply no good. He is able to turn the easiest task into a huge disaster. He's simply not a person for this job.

This sounds like you have already given up hope.
If you really think your report is simply no good, you should not have him in your team. You should tell your manager, that you cannot work with that person and that you don't think this person will improve, working in your team.

You might be stuck with him for a while so, and try to get the best performance possible out of him. Even then there is no point in giving him "very negative feedback".
Focus on the biggest improvement points and give concrete guidance on how to improve.