Managing the Workforce

Your best project manager just resigned. She gave you a month's notice, smiled through the handover period, and left on a Friday with a cake and a card. Everyone wished her well. HR processed the paperwork. And somewhere in the finance department, nobody is tracking what her departure actually cost the company.

Here is the real number: replacing a mid-level employee costs between six and nine months of their annual salary. That is not an exaggeration — it is the sum of recruitment costs, interview time, onboarding, training, the productivity dip while the new person learns the role, and the institutional knowledge that walked out the door and is never coming back. For a senior employee, the cost can be twelve to eighteen months. These are real numbers that appear on no balance sheet and in no quarterly review.

But the financial cost is only part of the story. When one person leaves, the team absorbs the workload. Morale dips. Other people start wondering: "Should I leave too?" One departure becomes two. Two becomes a pattern. And suddenly the company that was "fine" six months ago is in a retention crisis, spending more on recruitment than on development, and wondering why the talent pipeline is empty.

The Invisible Costs Nobody Tracks

• Relationship capital. Your departing employee had relationships with clients, suppliers, and colleagues that cannot be transferred in a handover document. Those relationships leave with them.
• Institutional memory. "Why do we do it this way?" Because the person who knew has been gone six months and nobody documented the reason.
• Team dynamics. A functioning team is not a collection of individuals — it is a system. Remove one part and the system recalibrates, often poorly.
• Manager time. Every departure consumes management attention — interviews, onboarding, check-ins — that could have been spent on strategy or development.

What Retention Actually Requires

Retention is not about counter-offers. By the time someone resigns, the decision was made weeks ago. Retention happens in the months and years before — in the daily experience of working at your company. Do people feel valued? Do they see a future? Is the workload sustainable? Is their manager someone they respect? Is their pay fair? These questions sound simple. Most organisations cannot answer them honestly.

The cheapest retention strategy in the world is a good manager who checks in regularly, gives honest feedback, advocates for their team's growth, and treats people like adults. It costs nothing. And it prevents the KES 900,000 departure that nobody budgeted for.

You are a middle manager. Your director wants results. Your team wants support. HR wants compliance. Finance wants cost cuts. The strategy changes every quarter. The headcount does not. You spend your morning in leadership meetings hearing about ambitious targets and your afternoon with your team hearing about burnout and resource shortages. You are the translator between two worlds that do not speak the same language, and the translation is killing you.

Middle management is arguably the most difficult and least appreciated position in any organisation. You have responsibility without authority. You receive targets that you did not set, resources that you did not choose, and people problems that you were never trained to handle. You are judged on your team's output but given almost no say in how the team is composed, compensated, or supported. If things go well, leadership takes credit. If things go badly, it is your fault.

Why Middle Managers Burn Out Fastest

Research consistently identifies middle managers as the group with the highest burnout rates — higher than frontline employees and higher than senior executives. The reason is structural: they occupy the most emotionally demanding position. They absorb pressure from above (targets, deadlines, strategic shifts) and absorb emotion from below (frustration, anxiety, interpersonal conflict). They are expected to be strategists, therapists, administrators, and motivators simultaneously — and most of them received zero training in at least three of those roles.

What They Actually Need

• Training in people management. Most middle managers were promoted because they were good at their technical role — not because they were good at managing people. The skills are completely different. Organisations that promote without training are setting up both the manager and the team to fail.
• A voice in decision-making. If you are going to be held accountable for results, you need to have input on the plan. The middle manager who learns about a new target via email has zero ownership of that target. The one who was consulted before it was set has full ownership.
• Permission to be honest. Middle managers often feel pressured to present an optimistic front in both directions — telling leadership what they want to hear and telling the team that everything is fine. This double-deception is exhausting. Give them permission to say: "This target is unrealistic" upward and "I know this is hard" downward. Honesty is not disloyalty. It is the foundation of trust.
• Someone who manages them. Middle managers manage everyone else. Who manages them? The answer, in most organisations, is "nobody." Regular check-ins, mentorship, and someone who genuinely asks "how are you doing?" is not a luxury. It is the difference between a middle manager who thrives and one who quietly breaks.

You spent three months hiring the perfect candidate. Six rounds of interviews. A panel discussion. A reference check. A negotiation. And then, on their first day, you hand them a laptop, point them to a desk, and say "talk to Wanjiku — she will show you around." By Wednesday, they are sitting alone, unclear about their role, unsure who to ask, and wondering whether they made a mistake.

This is onboarding at most organisations: a shrug followed by a prayer. And it is one of the most costly mistakes in talent management, because the first two weeks of a new job shape how someone feels about the company for the next two years. The new hire who is welcomed, oriented, and supported in their first week is dramatically more likely to stay, perform, and engage than the one who is abandoned to figure it out alone.

What Bad Onboarding Actually Costs

Research shows that roughly 20% of employee turnover happens within the first 45 days. One in five people who leave your company leave almost immediately — not because the job was wrong, but because the experience of joining was so poor that they lost confidence in the organisation. You spent tens of thousands recruiting them. They left because nobody introduced them to the team properly.

What Good Onboarding Looks Like

Good onboarding is not expensive. It is intentional:

• Before day one. Send a welcome email. Tell them what to expect. Introduce them to a "buddy" — someone who is not their manager but can answer the small questions ("Where is the printer? Who do I talk to about leave? Is the kitchen communal?"). Make them feel expected, not tolerated.
• First day. Manager meets them personally. Introduces them to the team. Gives them a clear plan for the first week. Has lunch with them. This is not a waste of time. It is an investment in a relationship that will determine whether this person stays for five years or five months.
• First two weeks. Scheduled meetings with key colleagues. Clear expectations for the first 30, 60, and 90 days. Regular check-ins: "How are you settling in? What questions do you have? Is anything confusing?" These cost nothing and prevent the silent confusion that leads to early exits.
• First month review. Not a performance review — a temperature check. "Is this what you expected? Is there anything you need? How is the workload?" The new employee who feels heard in their first month becomes the loyal employee who stays for years.

The most important thing about onboarding is the message it sends. A thoughtful first week says: "We care about you. We planned for your arrival. You matter here." A chaotic first week says: "We are too busy for you. Figure it out." Both messages are received clearly. Both shape everything that follows.

Firing someone is one of the hardest things a manager will ever do. If it feels easy, you are doing it wrong — or you have been doing it so often that you have become numb to the reality that you are about to fundamentally alter a person's life. Their income. Their identity. Their daily routine. Their sense of self-worth. All of it changes in one conversation.

Most organisations handle terminations badly. They focus entirely on legal compliance — making sure the paperwork is correct, the notice period is met, the company is protected from lawsuits — and give almost no thought to the human being sitting across the desk. The person leaves feeling discarded, confused, and often humiliated. And then the company wonders why its Glassdoor reviews are terrible and former employees warn their networks against applying.

How Termination Usually Goes Wrong

• The surprise firing. No prior feedback, no warnings, no performance conversations — and then suddenly, "we need to let you go." The person had no idea it was coming, which means either they were not managed properly or the decision was made for reasons they were never told about.
• The public humiliation. Being walked out by security. Having your access revoked mid-day while colleagues watch. Being told to clear your desk immediately as if you are a criminal rather than a person who gave years to this company.
• The blame-shifting. "It is a restructuring." When it is clearly performance-related but nobody wants to have the honest conversation.

Doing It Right

Compassionate termination is not about keeping people who are not performing. It is about treating them with dignity on the way out:

• No surprises. If someone is underperforming, they should know it long before termination is discussed. Regular, honest feedback — "this area needs significant improvement" — gives the person a chance to correct course. If they do not, the termination is not a shock. It is a known consequence.
• Have the conversation privately and honestly. Be direct. "We have made the decision to end your employment, and here is why." Do not be cruel. Do not be vague. Be clear and human.
• Support the transition. Offer references where appropriate. Allow reasonable time to say goodbye to colleagues. If you can offer outplacement support or extended benefits, do so. These gestures cost relatively little and they communicate something important: we value people even when we are parting ways.
• Brief the remaining team honestly. The people who stay are watching how you treat the people who leave. If the departure is handled with cruelty or silence, every remaining employee draws the same conclusion: "That will be me someday." Trust evaporates. If it is handled with transparency and respect, the team understands: "This is a place that treats people fairly, even in difficult situations." Trust strengthens.

The manager says: "I need to see them in the office. How do I know they are working if I cannot see them?" Here is a better question: how do you know they are working when you can see them? Presence is not productivity. The person at their desk for nine hours scrolling LinkedIn between tasks is no more productive than the person at home who finishes their work by 3pm. The difference is that one of them looks busy, and the other actually is busy.

The remote work debate — which exploded during COVID and has not settled since — is not actually about work. It is about trust. Or more precisely, the absence of it. Managers who insist on physical presence are usually managers who manage by observation rather than by output. They equate "I can see you typing" with "you are being productive." This was always a flawed metric, but it was unquestioned because everyone was in the same building and the illusion of control was maintained.

The Real Challenges of Remote Work

This is not to say remote work is without problems. It has real challenges that need real solutions:

• Isolation. Working from home can be lonely. People miss the informal conversations, the after-work drinks, the sense of being part of something. This is a genuine issue, and organisations that go fully remote without building deliberate community will see engagement drop.
• Communication gaps. The spontaneous hallway conversation that solved a problem in five minutes now requires scheduling a call. Information flows more slowly and more formally, which can create silos.
• Boundary collapse. When your office is your living room, work never ends. Many remote workers report working more hours, not fewer — because there is no physical signal that says "the workday is over."
• Junior employee development. Learning by watching experienced colleagues — absorbing how they handle a difficult call, how they write an email, how they navigate a conflict — is harder when everyone is behind a screen.

Building a System Based on Trust

The answer is not "everyone back to the office" or "everyone stay home." The answer is building a management system based on outcomes rather than observation:

• Define what "done" looks like. If you can clearly articulate what each person is expected to deliver each week, it does not matter where they sit. If you cannot articulate it, the problem is your management, not their location.
• Check in, do not check up. A weekly one-on-one to discuss progress and blockers builds trust. A surveillance tool that tracks keystrokes destroys it.
• Create intentional connection. Monthly in-person meetings, team lunches, collaborative workshops — these are more valuable when they are deliberate and less frequent than when they are daily and taken for granted.

The company that trusts its people to work from anywhere and judges them on results will attract better talent, retain longer, and get more genuine productivity than the company that mandates physical presence and measures effort by hours observed.

Look at your actual workforce. Not the one on the organisational chart — the real one. Count the consultants, contractors, freelancers, casual workers, and "temporary" staff who have been temporary for three years. In many Kenyan organisations, this non-permanent workforce is 20-40% of the people who actually do the work. They have no health insurance. No leave. No career path. No voice. And they are essential to the business running.

The gig economy is not a trend. It is a structural feature of the modern workplace. And most organisations have not updated their thinking, their policies, or their ethics to match this reality. They treat gig workers as outside the system — people who provide labour but do not "belong" — while depending on that labour to hit every deadline and fill every gap.

The Hidden Exploitation

Let us be direct about what is happening in many cases: organisations use gig arrangements to avoid the costs and responsibilities of formal employment. Instead of hiring someone and paying their benefits, insurance, and leave, they bring the same person in on a "contract" — same desk, same hours, same work — but with none of the protections. The person is an employee in every practical sense except the one that matters: legal classification.

This arrangement saves the company money. It costs the worker security, health coverage, and dignity. And it creates a two-tier workforce where the "permanent" employees have access to development, stability, and career progression, while the "temporary" workers do the same work under worse conditions with no path forward. This is not efficiency. It is exploitation wearing a procurement hat.

What Responsible Organisations Do

• Be honest about who is actually permanent. If someone has been on rolling three-month contracts for two years, they are not temporary. Either hire them formally or acknowledge that you are benefiting from their labour without offering proportional security.
• Extend basic protections. Gig workers who work on your premises, use your tools, and follow your schedule should have access to basic health and safety protections. This is both ethical and legally prudent — labour courts look unfavourably on companies that misclassify employees as contractors.
• Include them in communications. If a contractor works alongside your team and does not receive the team newsletter, attend team meetings, or know about policy changes that affect them — you have created an invisible workforce operating in an information vacuum.
• Provide feedback and development. A contractor who receives no performance feedback for three years cannot grow. If you are going to keep them, develop them. If you are not going to keep them, tell them honestly so they can plan their careers accordingly.

The gig economy is here to stay. The question is whether your organisation will be one that uses it responsibly — with fairness, transparency, and basic human dignity — or one that uses it as a loophole to extract labour at minimum cost.

She was your best analyst. Brilliant with data. Fast, accurate, reliable. So you promoted her to team lead. Six months later, the data team is in chaos. She is stressed, micromanaging everyone, doing all the work herself because "nobody does it to my standard," and the team morale has collapsed. You took your best analyst and turned her into a terrible manager. Not because she lacks talent, but because you confused "excellent individual contributor" with "will be excellent at leading people." These are completely different skills.

This is one of the most common and most damaging mistakes in workforce management: the assumption that the best performer should become the next manager. It makes intuitive sense — they understand the work, they are respected by peers, they deliver results. But management is not a promotion from technical work. It is a career change. The skills required — emotional intelligence, delegation, conflict resolution, coaching, strategic thinking — are entirely different from the skills that made someone excel at their technical role.

Why This Keeps Happening

Two reasons. First, most organisations have only one career ladder: up. If you want more money, more status, or more influence, you must become a manager. There is no equivalent progression for people who want to remain individual contributors. The brilliant engineer who does not want to manage people has no path to growing their salary or title — so they accept the management role, do it poorly, and everyone suffers.

Second, organisations do not invest in management development. The new manager is given a title, a team, and a vague instruction to "keep things running." No training in having difficult conversations. No guidance on delegation. No framework for giving feedback. No support structure for when things go wrong. And then, when the new manager struggles, the conclusion is "she is not cut out for management" — when the real conclusion should be "we failed to prepare her for a role that requires a completely different skill set than the one she was hired for."

Building a Real Leadership Pipeline

• Create dual career tracks. Let people advance in salary and status without managing people. "Senior Individual Contributor" or "Principal Specialist" roles allow technical excellence to be rewarded without forcing everyone into management.
• Train before you promote. The time to learn management is before the person has a team, not after. Shadowing programmes, management fundamentals courses, and mentorship from experienced leaders prepare people for the reality of the role.
• Evaluate management potential separately from technical performance. The best analyst may not be the best manager. The average analyst who shows empathy, communication skills, and a natural instinct for developing others may be the better choice. Promote for the destination role, not the origin role.
• Make it okay to step back. Some people try management, discover they hate it, and feel trapped. Create a culture where stepping back from management into an individual contributor role is seen as wise self-awareness, not failure.

The best leaders are not accidental. They are identified, developed, supported, and given the tools to succeed. The organisation that treats leadership as an afterthought — promoting people and hoping for the best — will produce mediocre managers, frustrated teams, and expensive turnover. The one that invests in building leaders will build something that lasts.