Three Reasons You Should Fire the Prima Donna
Over my ten years as an executive coach, I've come across situations where one of my clients feels like they're between a rock and a hard place because they have someone on their team who produces great results but alienates everyone around them. You know the type. It's what we've come to call the prima donna. According to Wikipedia, the term comes from the world of Italian opera where the prima donna is the "first lady" - usually the leading soprano in the company with a reputation for arrogance, ego and irritability that makes them a real pain to deal with. These days the term has become gender neutral. Males can be prima donnas too. (American Idol's Simon Cowell is the first male example that comes to mind.)
The prima donna dilemma has been on my radar screen a few times in the last year. These situations usually have some common characteristics. The prima donna is talented in his domain and selectively builds relationships with a few key people who can help him accomplish what he's trying to do. Meanwhile, he treats his teammates poorly and, as he puts more and more points on the board, starts making demands of the boss that have the whiff of extortion. You probably have seen how this plays out. "If I don't get the promotion, the raise, the big account, the glamorous assignment or whatever, I'll take my services elsewhere and you'll be left high and dry." He'll usually make this move a few weeks or days before a critical meeting with a customer or in the midst of an important project where he's a player. Every time he gets what he wants it becomes fuel for a cycle of escalating demands down the road.
So, if you're a leader with a prima donna on your team who keeps playing this game, what do you do? It's simple. Bite the bullet and fire them. Here are three reasons why you should:
1. You'll get more from the rest of your team. Prima donnas are productivity and morale killers. When they're playing their game, everyone around them is miserable, resentful and spending most of their energy griping about the prima donna. Take the diva (or divo as the case may be) out of the picture and everyone else is able to get on with the real work. As a leader, you'll likely be pleasantly surprised by how much more creative the rest of your team is when they get to breathe some of the oxygen the prima donna was sucking out of the room.
2. You'll send the right message. While it feels a little strange to quote Karl Marx in a leadership blog, curing a prima donna situation is one in which the good of the many outweigh the good of the few. By getting rid of the prima donna, you send the message that the health and welfare of the team is more important than the ego needs of any one individual. Most people are motivated by being a part of something that's bigger than themselves. You can't create the conditions for that to happen when one person is demanding all of the spotlight.
3. You'll save yourself headaches in the future. If you've had a prima donna on your team, you know that once the pattern of "give me more" is established, it rarely ends. As tough as it can be to let go of someone who is getting results at a critical time, you've got to do it and look at it as an investment in the long term success of your team. The analogy I make is to removing a band aid from your arm. You know that the adhesive backing on the band aid is going to pull some hairs out of your arm when you remove it. You can just rip it off or peel it off bit by bit. Either way, it's going to hurt. You might as well rip it off and get it over with. It's the same thing with firing someone who's established a history of being a long term source of heartburn and headaches. Get it over with.
OK, all of you leaders out there, let's hear your stories on how you've handled the prima donna situations in your career. What have you learned that the rest of us can benefit from? What have I overlooked with my advice here?
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Executive coach Scott Eblin’s goal is to help you succeed at the next level of leadership. Throughout the week, he’ll offer his take on the leadership lessons in the news and his advice on your most pressing leadership questions. A former government executive, Scott is a graduate of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and is the author of The Next Level: What Insiders Know About Executive Success.
You make some valid points, but in the real world things are not always so clear cut and easily diagnosed.
Sure there are "prima donnas," but organizational and sometimes office culture is nearly everything.
I've been a blue collar trades guy (for >12 years), and after going back to school, entered into the white collar 'professional' side of the federal workforce. And I've been with four major federal organizations, including the NIH, VA, IRS and DOD.
And although it can and should be expected that some organizations can be and indeed are somewhat insular (and at time defensive). But in my view and experience, DOD, takes the cake.
On more occasions that I care to recall I've personally witnessed supposed 'managers' and 'leaders' exhibit near mindless resistance to and at times display contempt for time-proven practices and procedures and ideas that have been develioped and proven successful in organizations outside of merely DOD.
Persons like myself, who are experienced, educated, and desire to make a difference with their professional lives (and actually propose ideas that are not DOD specific), are oftentimes depicted as 'prima donna' types who do not 'fit in'with what is in fact a go-along-to-get-along culture that is present in far, far to many DOD organizations, organizations that are nearly 100% inbred.
Far too many DOD employees have spent their entire careers within DOD, and many times within one organization, one office and one cubicle. These individuals are actually intimidated by persons who are not like themselves.
So when you toss around the idea of unilaterally dismissing so-called 'prima donnas,' be careful because organizational culture, rightly or wrongly, oftentimens has a role to play in who is defined within this negative stereotype.
Michael Smith Posted Thursday, January 28, 2010 4:42 PMOne thing that makes getting rid of the prima donna harder is they often have top cover from above. Prima donnas create a perception of greatness that senior leadership sees, but at the same time they don't have to deal with the mess. So when you do try to fire them, those above you minimize the problems they cause and over emphasize the "greatness." Had one who was a thorn in my side for four years and could never get rid of him. Even with good employees leaving they were so in awe of him, they kept "giving him another chance." I eventually left for another job and my replacement had the same problem as well.
bmj Posted Thursday, January 28, 2010 10:54 PMMy "prima donna" started as a mentor to me and then my team leader. With a long career history full of histrionics and her having no friends, she befriended me and things were great between us. In spite of the warnings of others that she will turn on you when you least expect it, my "Pollyanna" personality decided she was misunderstood. My director had already threatened to fire her which resulted in a grand show of tears and histrionics, but in the end he left and she was able to use her wiles on the new director and then she stabbed me in the back repeatedly before I even knew it. Long story short, she spent the last 5 years of her career being "Peter Principled" up 3 levels and then fell from grace because there was no where else to send her up to out of the way. She was placed back down at the place where I met her and then she finally retired to avoid the humiliation. Good riddance! In the mean time, that division lost many valuable hard working people, including me because of her hateful malicious histrionic treatment of people that she may have felt threatened by. Get rid of them before they hobble the whole organization.
edumcateddemocrat Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 7:41 AMReading this article was like a flash from the past. I once managed a prima donna. While she produced the most work within the group, she also stirred the pot. She thought she could do no wrong. She used her leave as fast as she earned it and had a bad habit of taking leave every Friday. The others in the group constantly grumbled about her attitude and absence. After the lenghty process of discipline for leave abuse, I ended up furloughing her. It was the best thing I could have done. The rest of the group never missed a beat and the work continued uninterrupted. While she was on furlough, she applied for a position in another area and was hired. She was never missed by the group, productivity was up, and harmony was restored.
Been There Done That Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 7:45 AMRather than quoting Marx, you can always quote Mr. Spock from Star Trek, "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or the one."
Toni Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 8:20 AMYour advice is right on target. I especially agree with your take on Cowell, what a pompous a--! As for the workplace, fire the prima donna and send the message to your people that the work they all do is not defined by one individual, but it is a team process and no one person is greater than the sum of all their parts. This may set you back initially, but you will reap much greater benefits down the road and the rest of your team will love you for it.
Chin Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 8:43 AMI have to disagree, Scott. Firing should be the last resort. You can take the diva/divo out of the picture without firing them. Treat them (and the rest of your team) as equals and everybody benefits. Yes, the diva/divo will play the games that you mention, but as a leader one should be able to outwit them at their own game without having to fire them.
Paul Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 9:09 AMExcept when the single prima donna outproduces the rest of the entire team combined, as is sometimes the case. Variances in productivity of 20 to 1 are considered normal in IT. In the case of a five person IT development team, if the prima donna is producing 20 times what each of the four average peers are producing, it makes a lot more sense to keep the prima donna. In this instance, the surrounding coworkers are the expendable ones.
Master of Business Administration Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 10:17 AMGreat advice, but tell me,how would you charge being a "diva/divo" and where would it fit under a federal agency table of penalties?
Lawrence Stunkel Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 10:27 AMActually, you couldn't be more wrong...instead of keeping the star, you're aiming for a mediocre average...which explains why government is a bloated dinosaur, America is rotting from lack of productivity and the rest of the world is leaving us in their dust. You must be mediocre yourself. Stupid advice.
DSWood Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 10:46 AMI'll point out that, in the movie "Patton," General Patton refers to himself as a prima donna. I think that's true to the historical record...and the advantages of firing him, or not, are evident there as well. Personally, I don't think Patton was a person I would like/admire/be happy to follow...but I am glad he was on our side.
Michaël Trout Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 10:53 AMScott -- how long have you been practicing leadership coaching? Firing prema donnas may have merit in some cases particularily in the private sector, but the situation is a little different in the government. You should know that in many govenment agencies the people who are carrying the lion's share of the work may be more than a little like prima donnas. If you think about it, isn't that the people that George Bush wanted to reward with the ill concieved NSPS? I've had prima donnas work for me, in fact I may even be one. All I had to do was let them know that I was the leader and that any prima donna stuff they'd throw at me would be dealt with as a beharioral matter where adverse action can be swift and decisive (admonishment, suspension without pay, firing) as opposed to a performance issue where you have to put them on a performance improvement plan that will consume much time. When prima donnas feel they can't be touched is when you have leadership challenges so make sure they know that you can reach out and touch them personally. You already said they were good workers and top producers so isn't firing really just not wanting to exercise leadership?
Truth and Justice Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 12:30 PMNip it in the bud before you have a problem. In the beginning it starts out as a bluff, call them on it. Most people want to be gainfully employed. A prima donna is much like a teenager. They test their limits and will rock the boat if you let them. Set the rules and stick to them, if they bite off their nose to spite their face then they do it themselves without the backlash of actually having to fire them.
AMS Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 12:38 PMI agree!
Performance = Results + Behaviors
This equation is the same reason you fire the most likeable person who can't get the job done as well.
Supervisor Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 2:23 PMThis is a blog used by government executives. Your definition of prima donna shows that the person in question is not a poor performer. Poor performers are hard enough to fire, great performers who are jerks would be virtually impossible to fire. The best you can do is convince them that it's in their own best interest to take their excellent performance elsewhere, since you can't or won't give them what they feel they're due.
sohara28 Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 2:38 PMI found this odd to be in GovExec! As a previous government manager, I am aware how much work goes into firing a civil servant - these aren't at-will employees! I'm not sure that being a prima donna is going to cut it at an MSPB hearing! If your prima donna team member does their work, gets results, and meets deadlines - the best thing to do as a leader is assign them work which can be done alone. They'll either knuckle down and do it, ask to get back on the team (where then you can make some demands of your own) or leave so that they can make someone else's life difficult.
Jen Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 6:19 PMIn a long management career, I've learned you can fire someone who doesn't perform, you can fire someone who abuses leave, you can can fire someone who steals. You can't fire some one who is a pain in the neck or "difficult". There is no sustainable way to fire someone who doesn't play well with others.
Gary Posted Friday, January 29, 2010 6:39 PMSeveral years ago I took a class on how to build effective teams. The instructor mentioned that he had just written a well-regarded book on effective team building and had sent a copy to his dad, a retired foundry foreman. The instructor told us that when he had asked his dad what he thought of the book, his father, being a dad, made some vague polite remarks which prompted his son to ask, “Did you read it?” After a bit more probing, the father finally said what was on his mind. “I disagree with the central point of your book, You say you form teams around irreplaceable people. If I had an irreplaceable person, I’d fire him tomorrow.”
The instructor used this to point out the difference between old-style “cog in the machine” organization and modern-style knowledge worker management. For dogs’ years I agreed with the instructor that his dad was a relic from a bygone age.
I think it was Mark Twain who said that when he was a young teenager he thought his dad was the dumbest man alive but years later he was surprised at how much the old guy had learned. I find myself in that position today and maybe the guy who wrote the book on effective team building does too.
A lot of pay-for-performance consultants say that it is only by rewarding and cosseting high-performers that they will stay around longer. Adopting a such a system probably does keep them around a while longer.
Dan Pink in his new book “Drive” about human motivation suggests that people can be put into one of two categories. Some people are extrinsically-driven and some are intrinsically-motivated. Those who are extrinsically-driven achieve a lot. But there is a black hole at the center of their personalities that no award you can present them and no amount of money you can ever give them will ever long satisfy. They will be unhappy all their lives no matter how much they achieve and make everyone around them miserable into the bargain.
Steve Kerr who worked as Jack Welch’s Chief Learning Officer at GE for several years once wrote that, while at GE, some people during a training exercise cam up with a radical definition of teamwork, “Not allowing other to fail”. I don’t think that would work for prima donnas. It’s always about them, never about the team.
It’s ironic that your posting on prima donnas appeared the same day as Alyssa Rosenberg’s piece on “Personnel Change” in Pay + Benefits Watch” . A comment to the article said:
“During a three year freeze on non-security discretionary spending, you think there's a snowball's chance in hell of any serious governmentwide personnel reforms? Personnel reform is dead. The unions killled NSPS and, with this spending freeze, we'll all be stuck with the GS scale continuing to reward poor performers and drive top-performers out of government for at least the remainder of the Obama Administration.
I'm two years into what I thought would be a lifetime career in government. Instead, I can't wait for the economy to turn around so I can go work somewhere where what I earn is tied to how well I do my job.”
So what do you think? High-performing employee? Or someone you should drop-kick out the door?
Doug Coleman Posted Saturday, January 30, 2010 8:54 AMI worked for a manager that actually got her boss transfered using her political friends to assist then got her boss's job. She later set up such a dictatorship that we had as many union complaints with our 40 person shop as the rest of the district combined 1200 people but because of her connections, she just got further pomoted but eventhough she was in another region, she still held her thumb on our shop and wouldn't let anyone be promoted or get good job performance reviews unless she approved them. We tried to warn the top brass but they wouldn't listen. Lots left because of her and her spy's, who couldn't do the work, got promoted. Now the shop is disbanded because of politics. We went from being one of the best in the region to gone.
lll Posted Monday, February 1, 2010 11:22 AMWhile firing may be impossible in many circumstances, the leader must make it clear that this type of behavior is over or else the person is going to be counting Post-It notes until they find another job. That, for a prima donna, is worse than being fired because the stage show is over. (If the prima donna is being protected by their higher-up sponsors then as a manager you are toast anyway, you aren't part of the inner circle while your subordinates are; you might as well sharpen up your resume and start looking).
I once pointed out to my boss, who was very troubled by one such prima donna, that if the person refused to take direction then they needed to be got rid of. My boss worried that the organization could not afford to lose traction on the things the prima donna was working on.
My response was:
(1) the prima donna was rfusing to work on it anyway
(2) this manager controlled several of our best people, and a large number of pretty good contract staff. If all those resources were standing around idle every day waiting to be told what to do, then we should have fired the manager just for that. If not then he wasn't irreplaceable.
My boss decided to take the weaker route, and in fact gave the prima donna a promotion on condition they would start to comply more (thereby rewarding past refusal to comply, losing all leverage with that person and encouraging everyone else to do the same thing). Eventually my boss had to "pursue other interests" because the thing he was brought in to do, and was telling the prima donna to do, never got off the ground.
Doug Brown Posted Monday, February 1, 2010 9:12 PMI am late to this conversation but find it interesting based on the premise that the prima donna is the star player (top performer) on a team of marginal performers, and firing the prima donna allows the marginal performers to be comfortable with their mediocre existance. All prima donnas serve a purpose, whether it is in the government, or in private industry. If you have an individual that is that much better than the individuals around him/her performace wise, then you need to bring the performance of the team up a the level of the top performer. Or have the average performers accept their roles in support of the top performer. The best analogy is with sports teams. Every teams seems to have a prima donna. But the teams that usually fair the best are the ones where the average performers accept that they are average performers and let the prima donnas do what they do. The great teams are the ones where the prima donnas are transformed into the leaders of the average performers, making the average performer better in their supporting role. In these top organizations, management takes a back seat and navigate a winning organization. It is only when management wants to be a bigger prima donna, than the prima donna, that it becomes necessary to fire the prima donna. A cohesive team of average performers still equates to an average performing team. This certainly is not the new mindset of business.
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