Creating an Effective Performance Management Program
Having an effective performance management program is essential to a well-run office. In this guide you will learn the four steps of a management program: establish standards and expectations, train, coach, and provide effective performance reviews.
Step One: Establish Standards and Expectations
Many employees want to be good workers and succeed and move forward in their jobs, but they can’t because they simply don’t have enough information about what they’re supposed to be doing in order to perform at exceptional levels. Clearly stated job performance standards and expectations can remove that obstacle to success when employees truly understand them.
Give Them Goals That Make Sense
Goals are great when properly established and administered. To be effective and useful, a goal must be clear, understandable, and measurable. There has to be a method of tracking progress toward the goal. You can tell an employee that she is to provide outstanding service to customers, but what does that mean? Until you tell her that outstanding service means greeting each customer who enters the store; asking how she can be of service; offering to hold items as the customer continues to shop; calling the customer by name, when possible; and thanking the customer, whether or not she buys something; your employee can’t be expected to know what providing outstanding service looks like.
To be able to meet standards and expectations, employees must first fully understand what they are. As a manager, you need to be an excellent communicator and make sure that you and your team members are on the same page.
Step Two: Provide Training
Training is vitally important and shouldn’t be limited to just new employees. Job training must be ongoing and should be available to every employee. Even experienced, successful employees require training when they take on new responsibilities or move to another job. New, inexperienced employees need even more training.
Not Everyone Learns the Same Way
A manager should never assume that a one-size-fits-all training program will work for all employees. Some people learn better when paired with other employees, while others do best with an online training program. Job shadowing—where an employee new to a company or position shadows an experienced employee to learn about the job he’ll be performing—works for some employees, but other people are uncomfortable in that situation.
If you’ve ever tried to learn something from a hurried and impatient teacher, you know that it can be a daunting and unproductive experience. Whether you’re providing actual training for employees or just deciding what training is appropriate and setting it up, you’ll find that employees respond much better to patient and realistic goals than to unrealistic ones. Sure, you need to lead, set boundaries, and establish expectations, but if your expectations are completely unrealistic or you insist on pushing someone ahead faster than he’s able to go, employee performance will be negatively affected.
Step Three: Coaching Your Employees
Coaching—the act of providing feedback—is anything you do or say that develops, reinforces, or improves the on-the-job performance of an employee. It’s an integral part of the performance management cycle.
Coaching cannot be a once-in-a-while effort or be provided only once a year during a performance review; it needs to be practiced on a predictable and ongoing basis. Managers sometimes avoid coaching because they don’t want to appear overly critical or look like they’re checking up on employees. A worker who doesn’t get any feedback, however, will assume that everything is going well, even if it isn’t. An employee who is alerted to performance problems through coaching has the opportunity to work to improve performance.
Coaching Moments
Managers sometimes assume an “if it’s not broken, don’t fix it” approach to coaching. Certainly performance problems should be addressed promptly and in an ongoing manner. However, coaching should not be limited to cases of performance problems. Key coaching moments—opportunities to offer feedback and help—arise in four different situations:
- When an associate meets your expectations
- When an associate exceeds your expectations
- When there is a gap in performance
- During the performance review meeting
Coaching in all of these situations keeps you in tune with your team and establishes you as a partner, not just a supervisor. This builds trust, which is essential in helping your employees boost their performance.
Step Four: Provide Feedback
Employees who fully understand performance expectations and standards, and have been properly trained and coached throughout the year, won’t be in for a lot of surprises during performance reviews. They’ll already know whether they’ve met or exceeded expectations, and if there’s been a performance gap—a difference between the expected level of performance and the actual level of performance—you and they will have already addressed it.
Your role is to look at the overall cycle and address all of its parts. You review job performance standards and expectations, and discuss whether any changes are necessary. You determine whether additional training is called for and use your coaching notes to review conversations and actions regarding job performance that occurred before the review.
The review simply serves as an opportunity for the two of you to engage in an in-depth discussion, which serves to maintain positive performance. It also is an opportunity to enhance a positive working relationship with a particular employee and to start off the next performance management cycle on a high note.
Keep It Positive, Fair, and Factual
It’s important to be prepared when you go into a performance review and to make sure you’re comfortable with the key points to be discussed. The review should focus both on positive aspects of performance and on any areas in which improvement may be necessary. Make sure you have coaching notes to support whatever conversation is necessary, and resolve to maintain a positive and upbeat attitude throughout the review.
Performance reviews are generally the arena for discussing pay increase or bonus recommendations. Because of this (and other reasons), they can potentially become emotionally charged. Whatever you do, do not allow the discussion to become personal. Stick to the facts, be as fair as you can, and document all discussion by making notes during the meeting and drafting them into a memo following the review. Documentation is extremely important so that you will remember what occurred and a record of the meeting will be available in the event that anyone else needs to see it.
Involve the Employee
A performance review is a great opportunity to foster personal development in employees. Ask about employees’ career plans and how they hope to advance within the organization. Discuss whether they’re interested in receiving more training or in learning about another aspect of the job. Employees who know that their supervisors are genuinely interested in them and want them to succeed respond positively, take more ownership of their jobs, and become more productive and higher-performing employees. Encourage her to share any concerns or questions that she has, and, if you don’t have answers at the moment, make notes to follow up, and make sure to follow through.
Together, these four steps form a performance management cycle. The cycle is a closed-loop system in which the parts fit together, with each one dependent on the others. If you take away any one of the steps, the cycle falls apart; but with all four steps in place you will have the structure for an effective performance management program. Good luck!
From The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Boosting Employee Performance by Marc Dorio and Susan Shelly
