Ted Lasso just gave me the best reframe of a PIP I've ever heard, and I didn't even see it coming.
Episode 5 of this season is basically a masterclass in embarrassment and shame, and how differently they can be used. Alice tells the team at halftime of the FA Cup game versus Chelsea that they should be embarrassed. Ted corrects it immediately: you shouldn't be embarrassed to TRY. Score a goal. Then score another one. That's it. That's the whole reframe. It becomes more painful to sit frozen in embarrassment than to just go for it.
And what happens next? Ted suspends Alice for a game. Not to punish her. Because he's seen this pattern before, with Nate, and he's not making the same mistake twice. Last time, everyone just quietly worried and did nothing, and Nate went full dark side. This time Ted acts. He names it. He gives her the consequence AND the framework to get better.
That's a PIP. I mean it.
I coach managers who are terrified to put someone on a PIP because they think it's just paperwork on the way to a firing. But a real PIP, the kind I actually believe in, says: here's the framework for success, here's how I'll help you get there, and if it doesn't work, that's on you. This is NOT me walking you out the door on autopilot. The intent has to be growth, not a paper trail.
Alice is on her own version of that right now. Whether she takes her ball and goes home or sits in the discomfort and asks herself why she's really there and what she really wants, that's the growth edge. And I am SO here for watching her figure it out.
Anyone else managing a real-life "Alice" moment right now, where someone needs a big, uncomfortable wake-up call before they can actually grow? Tell me about it.