Coaching vs. “Fire Fast”: Why Real Leaders Choose Growth

Coaching with Purpose. Win Big. Newsletter #10

We’ve all heard the phrase: Hire slow, fire fast. It sounds sharp. Strategic. Decisive.

But here’s the catch. When companies live by it, they often create scared employees, fractured trust, and a culture where people feel disposable.

I’ve led 450+ team members across 61 locations. I’ve seen firsthand: teams thrive not because we fired faster, but because we coached smarter.

The Cost of Firing Fast

Patrick Lencioni calls it out: firing fast can be cowardice.

Simon Sinek adds: Managers fire fast. Leaders coach, and then help people land softly.

Yes, firing provides short-term relief. But here’s what usually follows:

• High turnover costs that eat into growth.
• Morale drops as people stop taking risks.
• Trust erodes as teams feel like headcount, not people.
• Leaders avoid responsibility by skipping clarity and feedback.
• Culture shifts to fear where people focus on avoiding mistakes instead of pursuing growth.
  
  That is not accountability. Accountability is about creating clarity, setting expectations, and ensuring people understand what winning looks like. Firing without that foundation is just a shortcut.

Why Coaching Creates Real Accountability

The data is clear. Gallup shows coaching-first leadership delivers 20–25% performance gains. But here’s the bigger picture:

• Clarity – People know the exact behaviors that drive success.
• Capability – Even underperformers grow into higher-impact roles.
• Commitment – When leaders invest in people, people invest back.
• Consistency – Coaching creates repeatable systems, so growth is not left to chance.
• True Accountability – Coaching is accountability. It means reinforcing expectations, tracking behaviors, and holding people to standards with fairness and consistency.

This does not look like one big meeting or a spreadsheet. It looks like 1:1s, ride-alongs, SMART goals, and feedback loops every week and every month. That is how accountability becomes culture.

When Firing Is the Right Call

Coaching does not mean avoiding tough decisions. Some will not, or cannot, rise to the standard. The difference is this. Coaching-first leaders make sure people are given every chance to succeed before firing is even considered.

But there are clear moments where firing quickly is the right move:

• When an employee refuses to do the defined behaviors even after multiple trainings, coachings, and explanations of why they matter.
• When there are integrity issues such as dishonesty or ethical lapses.
• When they ignore clearly defined policies tied to compliance, safety, or customer trust.
  That is when leaders must move fast.

In these cases, firing is not avoidance. It is protecting the culture and the people who are doing the work the right way.

Hire Smart. Coach Hard. Fire Fair.

It is time to rethink the old mantra. Instead of “Hire Slow, Fire Fast,” the leaders I have seen win do this: 

Hire Smart. Coach Hard. Fire Fair. 

Here is what it means:

• Hire Smart – Do not just hire for resumes. Hire for behaviors. Define what great looks like before you post the role, and align your interviews to test for it.
• Coach Hard – Accountability does not happen in the annual review. It happens in the everyday: feedback loops, weekly 1:1s, role-playing, dashboards that track behaviors, not just results. Coaching hard means you care enough to lean in, even when it is uncomfortable.
• Fire Fair – When someone will not or cannot change, you have already given them clarity, tools, and time. Separation is not a surprise. It is the natural outcome of choices. Handle it with dignity, so even in leaving, people know they were valued.

Why this matters:

• Leaders who only “fire fast” create short-term compliance.
• Leaders who coach hard build long-term commitment and capability.
• Leaders who hire smart and fire fair build cultures where trust and performance reinforce each other.

This is not theory. I have seen it transform underperformers into top performers, cut attrition, and drive 62 percent year-over-year growth.

The framework is simple. The discipline is hard. But if you want a team that wins consistently, you do not get there by firing fast. You get there by leading well.

The Leadership Takeaway

Leadership is not defined by how quickly you cut people. It is defined by how well you help them grow. Because in the end: People drive process. Process drives performance. And performance drives results. In that order.

💬 What do you think? Does “hire slow, fire fast” still have a place in leadership today, or is it time to retire it for good?

---

Thanks for checking out my newsletter, Coaching with Purpose. Win Big. If you’re new here, this is where I share my playbook for building high-performing sales teams, rooted in strategy, powered by people, and executed with purpose. Each edition breaks down what it really takes to connect vision with execution and build cultures that scale results.

Let’s Connect
Visit www.ericboettner.com or follow me on LinkedIn.

Driving Sales Growth at the Intersection of People, Process, Performance | Sales Enablement & Execution Expert | Strategic Operator | Servant Leader | 20+ Years Scaling Teams, Systems & Results

I build sales engines by connecting strategy, enablement, and coaching to drive measurable growth and stronger teams. That includes delivering 62 percent year-over-year growth across a 450-person team and leading enablement programs that supported over 700 locations.

I make complex ideas practical, build coaching cultures focused on behaviors over outcomes, and design scalable enablement systems that align people, process, and performance. The result is execution with clarity, consistency, and accountability.