Performance Management: Grow or Exit? | July 2026

Performance and conduct issues occur across your workforce every day. They range from minor gaps or inconveniences through to major breaches. The handling of them varies greatly based upon the severity, frequency and impact of them. You also need to consider the context. Is this an otherwise valuable member of your team who has some "bad habits" you'd like refined? Or, is this someone in your organisation who is impacting the workforce, client outcomes or putting you otherwise at risk?

In this practical session, Corinne West and Laura Cowling walk you through how to navigate the full performance and conduct journey with confidence, from the decision to have a conversation and act at all, to holding that difficult conversation, to a fair and well documented outcome. You will learn how to decide when to invest in growing an employee and when a respectful exit is the right call, and how to get there fairly either way.

What we will cover:

• Employment relations fundamentals: the rights, obligations and principles that underpin every performance and conduct decision

• Difficult conversations: how to raise concerns early, clearly and without escalating the situation

• Performance frameworks: setting expectations, managing underperformance and building a defensible paper trail

• Investigations and fairness: running a fair process and applying procedural fairness correctly

• Disciplinary actions: warnings, outcomes and knowing when and how to act

• Escalation protocols: when to escalate, plus the recent casual employment changes and how they influence things
  

The session finishes with an open Q&A. Bring your curly people challenges and get them answered live.