I can't speak for anyone else, but my experience as a manager, talking to other managers, and being coached by my managers, is that this is the precise reason to do it. Writing someone up is the acknowledgement that the employee can't be redeemed, you're throwing in the towel on them, and you are documenting their failures going forwards so the when you let them go, no one is surprised, and it's a CYA in case they decide to talk to a lawyer. If it encourages them to go find a job before the eventual termination, even better, that way no one gets hurt (because really, one reason bad employees are kept far longer than they should be is folks don't want to hurt that person financially or emotionally, or they personally can't handle the emotional strain of letting someone go).

I agree 100% with you that *any* other use of "writing someone up" is going to backfire, and badly.

J.Ja