I think that in about 6 years at the King's Table, I fired maybe 2 people. But I had them all well documented and written up, and no one ever collected Unemployment Insurance just because they were dismissed, specially when they had cause. One of them was abusing the priviledge and it was the 3rd time I saw him playing around with a knife!
 
All 3 of these incidents documented.
 
In any meeting we had, and I tried to do this once every 2 months to ensure folks knew what was going on, they knew the procedures and there was no further issue. They knew about the Health Inspector and why it was important to realize the floor is not a trash can and so forth.
 
It wasn't perfect, but you have to protect yourself, and the number of customers I had, was not conducive to me being on training mode every day ... simply could not afford it. But a cook not listening, and goofing off is not acceptable in my book! Certainly not with a knife in your hands!
 
It takes a lot of the emotion out of it! But yeah, I never hired people just so I could fired them and my employee turnover in those years was like 12% only! Lowest in the company!

These days I work alone -  thankfully -  but when I ran a sign company (1988-2004), I had up to 15 staff to deal with. Without a doubt, they were far and away the biggest cause of stress. I put it down to the chemicals they were breathing in on a daily basis.. (Bapu will be getting used to those screenprint inks now..)
 
Making someone redundant on their birthday was a stand-out. Having another threaten me with a knife was also interesting.

Years ago, I worked with an HR person who took delight in firing people. It was the high point of her day. She would tell stories about all of the people she got to fire while giggling and laughing at their reactions.
 
She reminded me of the guy working at the stockyards who breaks the hog's noses to prevent them from fighting.
 
Not everyone should find personal fulfillment in their job.

I've had to fire people and didn't care for it. Sharke I think the fact that this bothers you only points to your compassion as a human being. So I say +1 to you for caring and then another +1 for finally doing what needed to be done.
 
I hope when you find the replacement that they work out for you, not only in their attitude (i.e. they should be saying: "how can I help?") but in their abilities to do the job. And I hope that your current regret goes away soon.
 
Regards,

Employment termination was a large part of my job during my last years in the corporate world. I've fired well over 300 people. I didn't enjoy a single one, but it's just business. During my management years, it was a little more difficult as I had hired them in the first place. But again, it's just business. Everyone I've ever hired was told exactly what was expected of them, and what would not be allowed, including what would be cause for immediate termination. There was never any doubt from either party what those were going in. Makes the termination much easier. It takes the emotion out of it.
 
Randy

I run a business and for the better part of that 22+ years have run it solo. At times it's really a pain since I have to do it all, but in the long run, no headaches from employees.
 
However.... on one big job, the customer insisted that I hire at least a helper to expedite the job and finish quicker. I estimated it was a 12 month job.
 
So, according to their wishes, I hired a fellow to help. He was a hard worker and learned the job well enough that he would get the things he needed and go do the job without me standing there to babysit him all day. He was easy to get along with, His down side was that when he got enough money to last him a few months, he'd take off and quit. He lived in his grandmother's house and it was paid for.... no bills other than phone and electricity. And he roomed with his brother.  So he up and quit one day about 3/4 the way through the job.
 
I hired another guy a few days later. This guy was the opposite. Supposed to have experience in all things electrical. So I put him running 40 feet of conduit across a ceiling. I bent the first piece and connected it.... he had to run 2 straight pieces and bend the last one into a box that he would mount on the wall.... maybe a 20 minute job if you took your time. He assured me he could handle it so I left to do something else. The day before it took him all day.... 8 hours to pull 4 cables 200 feet across a lobby and through 2 existing firewall access points. So I figured I'd let him go and see how long THIS little job would take.... it was 8am.  At 10:30, I hadn't seen him. So I walked by and peeked through the window in the door. He had one piece of pipe up and was standing there looking at the ceiling as if the next piece was just going to install itself.  I went back to what I was doing....
 
At 12 noon, still no helper.... I walked to the kitchen and he had installed the second straight piece of conduit, but it was hanging from the coupling. There was a bunch of pipe on the floor he had tried to bend and screwed up. I asked him what was the problem..... he said...Man, this is hard.  I said , no... it's not. You should have been done this by 8:30. I picked up the piece of pipe on the floor, held it in place and cut it to length, added a coupling, a short stub and installed the box.

I told him to go and set down in the lunchroom but not to bother the folks who worked there. Just stay out of my hair and out of trouble. I ended up putting him sweeping up behind me. Everything he did I had to redo and the kind of work we did, wasn't the kind of things you wanted to have to fix..... we drilled holes in doors and if you're off 1/4" you have a mess to try to fix it right....
 
Anyway...I had to fire the guy. As it turned out, in this business, you need a state security check to work in this business and he neglected to disclose an arrest. The state told me I had to fire him anyway. Then, he demanded his paycheck on the spot. I also had a letter from social services demanding that I withhold back child support. I told him I'd pay him next week after I got all the mes sorted out. He threatened to call the police, and I told him to help himself. He bugged me all weekend long. I finally paid him mid week and ended that mess.
 
You have my sympathy..... I understand totally. I didn't want to fire the guy either but I was given no choice.... between the state, and his lack of work ethic or skill level.... he lied to me telling me he had experience..... he had to go.
 
 

There have been a few times when I fired someone while angry. It was always rougher, and left me with no sense of satisfaction. I was talking with another manager once in a hotel bar, and the subject of terminating employees came up. He had a pretty funny story about getting fired himself when he was younger. He'd gotten fired from a job while he was in college and in hindsight he knew he deserved it. At the time he didn't see it coming and reacted to the news by saying "I can't believe I've lost my job". His former employer looked him in the eye and said "Oh, you haven't lost it, it's still right here, it's just that someone else will be doing it tomorrow".
 
Randy

Thanks for all the input guys, it's reminded me that I'm not the only one who has to deal with this crap. 

Last guy I fired was making my life hell.  I was working so hard covering his ass all the time.
 
Cleaning up his messes and getting side bar calls from everyone telling me that he is hurting out business.
 
Still not easy, I too felt like ****.
 
But two months later, much better.
 
JR
 

Shorter story:with a real kick in the butt moment.
 
Before I started my business I was a shift supervisor in a factory.  There were a few folks who were always screwing up and costing the company money. I wanted to fire one guy in particular since he would come to work reeking of alcohol and obviously a safety hazard not only to himself (we had some dangerous machines) but also, to those around him.
 
I was told that to fire someone, I had to document, document, document and have another staff person witness the incident and get them to document as well. The guy eventually was terminated due to missed days of work not due to staff writing him up. But that took quite some time to do because the company gave him a lot of chances.
 
Me... on the other hand..... out of the blue.... I was doing a good job as supervisor, had learned the job well, had zero complaints filed against me.....so when staff evaluation came around I was actually feeling good about the meeting and as I walked in the door.... I was planning to ask for a raise. The VP said, come in Herb, close the door and have a seat. I said How are you today?..... he said, Herb, I'm going to get right to the point.... you are fired. 30 minutes later I was in my car, headed home, having been escorted out of the facility by the dept head.
 
That's when I started my own  business a few weeks later.