When it comes to employee performance management, a good leader will understand the value of early intervention. Soon after a performance issue is first identified they will have a candid conversation with their employee to resolve the issue.
By acting quickly the leader will ensure issues do not persist or escalate.
Management Tip: Performance standards are often set by “silence” or through a lack of action on the part of the manager to enforce the written performance standard.
A manager who is willing to initiate a candid conversation on a relatively minor issue is more likely to retain the respect of their people. Your people are unlikely to respect you if you let a minor issue slide only deal with it as part of a package of performance issues later on.
What is the aim of a Performance Discussion?
The aim of a performance discussion is to correct an employee’s behavior or to get an employee to do what they are paid to do to the standard that is required or that you expect.
An employee is more likely to be actively involved in changing their performance or behavior if they themselves are included in the process of developing solutions to the performance issue.
At the end of the performance discussion
You will have reinforced your performance expectations
There should be an agreed set of actions to correct the performance issue
The employee should be left feeling positive about their future.
(Note acts of gross misconduct are treaded differently)
What is Poor Performance?
Poor performance is simply when an employee does not meet one or more of your clearly stated objectives.
You will find that poor performance can be grouped under two headings, as follows
Behaviour, the employee exhibits an undesirable behavior
Examples of undesirable behavior
Turning up late to work
Taking excessive breaks
Being abusive
Performance, the employee does not meet the minimum quality or productivity expectation
Not meeting minimum productivity
Producing poor quality outputs
Not meeting customer service standards
You will note that attitude is not mentioned as an example of poor employee performance.
Management Tip: An employee is not a poor performer if they do not meet all of your expectations, if they are meeting or exceeding most and falling short on a few then they are a good performer with a few development needs.
Drivers of Poor Employee Performance
Drivers
of Poor Employee Performance
Skill
or Knowledge Gap
Where
and employee does not know
What to do, (expectations are not clear)
How to do it, or
When to do it
Leadership
Gap
Lack of or
inconsistent feedback
Lack of incentive for performing as required, (Reward
and
Recognition)
It was once said that a problem well defined is a problem half solved and that is also true with poor employee performance. Your leadership skills will shine if you can master the art of defining the performance issue.
All too often in management training there is not enough time spent on ensuring the participants master his step.
Here we go! An employee performance problem is identified when the employee
Does not meet an agreed standard of performance, or
Behaves in a way that is inconsistent with company values or code of conduct
When managing poor performance a good leader will
Focus on the problem not the employee
Ensure consistency within their team (all people who behave the same are dealt with the same)
Use specific examples
Remain open minded on the “employees reasons” for their actions/performance
Summary
Good leaders earn respect from their employees by acting early to resolve performance issues. They are aware that they themselves might be the cause of the performance issue and will investigate all options.
Read more on identifying performance issues using our 6 step process a simple but powerful technique that is guaranteed to help you to take the next step.
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