Sounds like you handled it as well as possible. I remember one time had to let someone go that I'd recruited away from another pretty decent job - that was one

Sounds like you handled it as well as possible. I remember one time had to let someone go that I'd recruited away from another pretty decent job - that was one of the most gut-wrenching things I've had to do in business. I actually kept him on and let it drag out three months without him producing anything because I couldn't get up the nerve to face the fact I'd made a mistake. Not just a mistake, but a mistake that would screw someone else's life up that I respected and liked. It all worked out well - he's becoming a doctor at one of the top English schools now, so I wish I'd done it earlier so he could have gotten on with his life, and I'd have had a lot less stress and my business would have done better. Wavering on it made him dead man walking for three months, and cost me personally $10,000+, more if you count opportunity cost, much more if you count stress. So I gotta say you handled that the best possible way, even though that situation is always hard and always sucks. Someone who hasn't managed people probably can't understand how hard it is to let someone go and do it decently. Sounds like you did right by her in the best way for that situation.