The Ultimate Performance Improvement Plan (PIP) Guide
The easiest way to stress out a tech worker is to bring up a PIP -- a Performance Improvement Plan.
A PIP is a formal document informing an employee about recurring performance issues. The performance improvement plan (PIP) indicates that the employee is not meeting expectations for their job, and without an improvement, they'll be let go.
Given how high the stakes are, it's essential that you create an airtight gameplan to get the best outcome for yourself.
This course shares everything you need to know about a PIP, presented in a structured way with easy-to-revisit sections. This course is broken down into 4 phases of a PIP lifecycle:
Before the PIP
- Surviving (and thriving) in a company that has a PIP culture.
- A systematic approach to prevent bad surprises when it comes to performance evaluation and feedback.
- How to identify if you're in the PIP danger zone, and what you can do about it.
Receiving a PIP
- Actionable advice if you've officially been put on a PIP. What to do and what not to do.
- The PIP Evaluation Framework to determine if you're setup to fail, or you have a fighting chance to succeed.
- Checklist of what you should negotiate (or at least ask about) in your severance package, and what to check before you walk out the door.
Case studies
Real stories of people who went through a PIP, including their context, what they ended up doing, and what advice they would share. Four case studies from Individual Contributors (ICs) who received PIPs and two case studies of managers who have put employees on PIPs.
Finding career success after a PIP
- How to prevent the negative impacts of a PIP from extending beyond the initial job.
- The right mindset to adopt for future jobs, and how to talk about your experience in the right way.
- Advice to avoid shooting yourself in the foot for future interviews.
Rahul is the cofounder of Taro, designed to accelerate career growth for engineers. From 2017 - 2022, he was an Engineering Manager and Tech Lead at Meta. Before that, he was an Android Engineer at Pinterest.
Throughout his career, Rahul worked at companies with varying PIP cultures, and he's worked directly with engineers who received a PIP. In addition, Rahul has interviewed dozens of engineers and managers to learn how the overall tech industry uses and perceives a PIP. (See his YouTube video on the topic.)
Rahul graduated from Stanford University and lives in the Bay Area.
Connect with Rahul:
The course on handling a PIP was a life-saver. Thank you it was the best subscription of my life. By setting objective goals and over-documenting stuff, I could show progress to the leadership team.
These were the best dollars I have spent recently. Thanks again.
Thank you so much for making this! I have been going through onboarding at Meta and I am terrified of not doing well and the dreaded PIP! This gave me some great actionable advice to stay ahead of it that I think anyone, even people that don't think they're in any danger of a PIP, could benefit from. I'm not surprised that your example case studies were surprised because I think that's a lot of times how things get to that point, the breakdown of communication leading to the two parties not being on the same page about expectations. Your advice on how to use 1:1s to ensure that doesn't happen is invaluable and something I'm going to put into practice this week (along with other 1:1 advice you've given in other videos about setting expectations for ramp ups and promotions). This is an awesome third party resource to get direct communication that may not occur in a work environment, I appreciate the course!
I've coached several engineers who received a PIP, and this has become my go-to resource for advising them on the next steps.
Very clear and empathetic advice for dealing with a stressful period.
