Well-reviewed employee is suddenly put on a PIP after asking for a raise: ‘If stepping back wasn't possible, why offer it? And if they simply want me gone, why not fire me?’

Is this a process HR initiated or some obscure managerial tactic?

Something about this story is fishy. The timing is just off. Everything was going well, and he was receiving very good feedback until he asked for a raise, and suddenly a lot of ‘anonymous negative reviews’ started coming up out of the blue.

In an ideal world, the employee could contact HR, and they would protect him or at least try to intervene in the PIP with a little extra organization, but if you ask me, I think no matter what he does, he is already cooked.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I don’t know a single example of somebody who has entered a PIP and survived. The only thing one can do in those cases, in my opinion, is to use the PIP time to search for a new job.

Obviously, asking for a raise shouldn’t be viewed as a crime, but some organisations would rather dispose of anyone with ambition and hire a person with less experience who is willing to work for less money. It is just how it is.

At any rate, my opinion is very biased and very negative. Do you think this company is really trying to assess a normal productivity issue and is willing to keep this employee?

Or are these kinds of processes always a tactic? What do companies really get from PIPs if that were the case? Because if they fire him in the end, they will still have to pay compensation, right?