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Develop & Maintain High Performance Employees
Bob Ryan, About Purpose, Inc. ©2003
Many of my clients – who are normally fearless entrepreneurs, captains of industry, charismatic leaders, and strong, decisive employers – turn into jelly when it comes time to deal with employee performance issues. For most, it seems that dealing with conflict, poor performance, or even positive feedback is a daunting task.
They can wrestle with complex operational or financial issues without missing a beat, but confront them with an employee who is habitually late and they deny or avoid the problem. If you are one of those people, help is at your fingertips – literally. Right here in this article I give you four simple steps to develop and maintain high performance employees. Here’s a simple mnemonic for learning the steps:
Write, Check, Record, Reward
Write, Check, Record, Reward for all employees (your stars and your “problem employees”).
Write, Check, Record, Reward in all situations (negative and positive).
Write, Check, Record, Reward and you will be well on your way to building a strong, high performance workplace.
Write: The two keys to any employee performance system are written performance standards and developmental goals. I repeat: “written.” Neither you nor your employees can possibly keep in mind all that is expected in doing a good job. First, think through and write performance standards. Performance standards define the floor – the minimum expectations of anyone working in a particular job. They ought to include the basics of employee behavior, work habits, workplace rules, corporate culture, and minimum performance requirements for each job task. Next, define the goals to which you would have the employee strive. These are targets designed to challenge the employee to improve beyond the minimum expected. Developmental goals work best if they are individualized to each employee and created jointly with the employee.
By the way, another great reason for the Write step is that when all positions are defined, you have a good check on whether your staffing truly supports your mission and where there are holes or overlaps.
Check: Once these written standards and goals are in place, monitor the employee’s success with them. There are many ways of monitoring. The best are methods that enable the employee to self-monitor, but don’t neglect this step. Those of you who think you should be able to tell someone something once and then expect it will be done and done right are deceiving yourselves. Check often. Use oral or written reports, checklists, meetings, supervisors, MBWA (Management by Walking Around) or whatever gets the job done effectively. This Check stage is not the annual or semiannual performance review. I’ve written about that elsewhere. This is a regular, ongoing monitoring.
| Improving your skills: Two phrases to remember in this step: job-related and behaviorally measurable. All observations should be tied to their effect on the job. So, it doesn’t matter if you just don’t like the way Tim smacks his lips. What matters is the effect on the job – if any. Secondly, your feedback should be around observable, objective behaviors, not your feelings about them or your guess as to what they mean. If someone raises his voice, say, “You raised your voice.” Don’t say, “You were rude.” Describe the behavior. |
Record: This step involves interacting verbally and in writing – that is, going on record regarding the employee’s performance. This is the step that most often gets skipped by employers. When the employee is performing well, the employer tends to leave well enough alone and to focus elsewhere. When the employee is performing poorly, the employer often puts off interacting, hoping the problems will just go away. So how do you get over this tendency and get really good at “recording?” To borrow from Nike, “Just do it.”
The positives: Ideally, you want to be able to “catch your employee doing things right” and compliment on the specifics. Don’t just pass along a general, “Good job, Mary.” Rather, identify the exact behavior, such as, “These reports are very well constructed and easy to use. I was able to make a clear decision on our purchasing. Thank you.” Enter a note of the conversation in the employee’s personnel file. A good way to do this is to immediately jot a note in your PDA or on a pocket-sized notebook with the employee’s name, date and the specific observation. You can transfer the note or even tape it into the file.
The negatives: This kind of feedback is equally important to identify behaviors that are wrong. Do not procrastinate! As soon as a negative behavior comes to your attention, go directly to the employee and deal with it the same way you did with the positive. Make a direct, specific comment such as, “You didn’t put the shop tools away last night. As a result the janitor wasn’t able to do his job and the shop floor is still littered with shavings today. In the future, put all tools away before you leave.” Tell the employee you are making a note of this conversation so that both of you will remember it. Then write it down and enter into the employee’s personnel file.
Please note the three elements of good feedback. It is job-related, behaviorally specific, and it identifies the result of the behavior. In the case of negative feedback, it also specifies the desired behavior.
Reward: Always follow up a performance interaction with clear consequences for actions – positive and negative. Follow your personnel policies here, but normally, the natural consequence for a small positive or a first-time negative is simply your feedback and a note in the file. Beyond that, on the positive side, you may have identified specific rewards for reaching certain goals in the development plan, such as a bonus for a certain level of sales, or a share in the savings from an employee’s cost-cutting initiative. On the negative side, you will follow your disciplinary procedures such as a formal, written warning for the second offense, a dock in pay or a suspension or even discharge for a third offense.
Developing and maintaining high performance in your employees should not be a chore. Practice these steps and it will become a natural and mutually beneficial part of your daily routine. You will create an environment in which you know and value your employees. They, in turn will appreciate honest, direct communication about their performance, as well as an atmosphere that rewards good performance and holds other accountable for shoddy work and poor habits.