【职场点睛】我能解雇女职员吗？
THE PROBLEM 问题
I head a small financial services company. We do not employ many women and would like to employ more. However, one of our female analysts is poor at her job and unpopular. If I fire her, I'm concerned she is the type to sue on discrimination grounds - even though she doesn't have a case. Also, firing her might make it look as if this is a bad place for women to work. Any ideas?
Chairman, male, 58
我掌管着一家小型金融服务公司。我们公司的女性员工并不多，也愿意雇用更多女职员。然而，我们有一位女性分析师，工作表现很差，又不招人喜欢。如果我解雇她，我担心她会以性别歧视为由提出诉讼--虽然根本没有这回事。同时，如果把她解雇，可能会使我们公司看起来很不适合女性工作。您有何高见？
董事长，男性，58岁
This woman is both feeble and unpleasant. If she were just the first, then you might consider keeping her. All but the smallest companies can tolerate a dog or two. But as she is also unpopular, there is nothing for it: she must go.
这个女人工作又差，又令人讨厌。如果她只占第一条，那你或许可以考虑留着她。除了最小的公司以外，几乎所有公司都能容忍一两个没用的人。但是，如果她同时还令人讨厌，那就没有什么好说的了：她必须走。
However, you are right to be worried about the vindictive legal action she could take, and also right that her sex makes a big difference. If she were a man, you would simply risk being sued for unfair dismissal - and those cases do not make the headlines and the payouts they command are small.
不过，你是对的，她的确可能采取报复性法律手段，而她的性别问题也的确关系重大。如果她是一个男人，你顶多会遭遇"不公平解雇"的指控--这种案子不会成为重大新闻，而且他们索要的补偿也很少。
In any event, protecting yourself against such a case is relatively easy. You can't fire anyone out of the blue for poor performance but, as long as you issue warnings and give the person a chance to get better, you can fire them after a few months when they don't.
无论如何，防止自己摊上这种官司相对比较容易。你不能因为某位员工表现差劲就突然宣布解雇，但是，只要你提出了警告，给这位员工一个改进的机会，如果几个月之后还没有改进，你就可以解雇了。
The woman thing makes it much more risky. All she needs is to show that there might be a case for discrimination and you could find the onus of proof is on you. You would then have to show that you had not discriminated - which is almost impossible to do.
女性问题使这种做法的风险大了很多。她所要做的，就是表明你的行动可能存在歧视，而你则会发现，所有取证的责任都在你身上。于是，你就不得不表明你没有歧视过她--要做到这点，几乎不可能。
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