Managing Your Employees Performance

When I ask my clients if they have an employee performance management system in place, many of them scratch their heads, while others say with some uncertainty, "well we have a performance appraisal system, does that qualify?" I say that if your performance appraisal system helps your employees improve their performance, appraisal period after appraisal period, and help them meet their performance target, then you must be doing something right. That is because an effective performance management system does the same.

The truth is, in many companies, the performance appraisal system has become a cumbersome ritual that people want to do only because the result is often tied up with annual or periodical salary increase. In many cases, performance appraisal fail to bring about the kind of return expected (as you might already know, performance appraisal require considerable amount of investment depending on the system you’ll use or purchase) what’s worse is that a not so properly done performance appraisal can be a serious cost of frustration and demoralization. How many times have we encountered employees complaining about how unfair their superiors are in appraising their performance? When do we most see the issue of favoritism surface among employees? If you say after every performance appraisal, you got it. The reason is this thing about what’s fair is usually quite hazy. Both superiors and subordinates are not clear about what their performance targets are. What’s more disturbing is that they are not even clear about how they are supposed to work together to meet their performance target. (Assuming that the superiors performance is tied up with the performance of their staff which should be the case.)

Performance Appraisal, just like any other endeavors invested in by the company should have reasonable returns whether tangible or intangible, if there isn’t, then it’ll be an exercise in futility. The only way for it to work is to make it an integral part of a performance management scheme that enable the superiors and subordinates to set performance targets, monitor performance on a regular basis, (not only during performance appraisal) identify performance gaps as early as possible, carry out corrective efforts, appraise performance based on agreed upon parameters, discuss performance appraisal result and set the next target. Not to forget, a meaningful rewards and recognition scheme to keep employees excited about displaying exemplary performance.

Implementing an employee performance management scheme is easier said than done. In the few times that I implemented one, I encountered considerable hesitation if not outright refusal from those who will actually do it. The reason, they are even more cumbersome than the annual or semi-annual performance appraisal that they have totally accepted in their system. Many managers and supervisors are so busy with putting out day-to-day fire that they don’t have room left for something like this (even if they say there’s logic in doing it). What many do not realize is that the reason there’s too many fire to put out is because there’s failure to be proactive. Employees are not clear about what’s expected of them, what particular skill they should work on improving, what kind of decisions they are expected or allowed to make, the kind of issues that a proactive performance management system is supposed to address. It is therefore very important to win organizational buy-in to the idea. It is also important that the ones to manage the employees’ performance are properly equipped and primed to carry out the task.

In a nutshell, a sound performance management system should have the following components:

1. Planning Employee performance – Setting a mutually acceptable performance standard (Key Result Areas, Key Performance Indicators, Quality and Productivity standards and the likes) and drawing a clear road map to achieving it.
2. Monitoring Performance – establishing means to monitor performance on a real time basis (or anything close to it) and matching it with what is expected to determine performance gaps and needs for improvement
3. Developing the employees’ capability to perform – The kind of interventions range from coaching and counseling by the direct superior to formal classroom or field training. It’s any deliberate effort to help the employees improve to achieve their performance targets.
4. Appraising Performance – There’s a whole gamut of approaches to performance appraisal but what really matters most is that there should be a way to appraise their inputs (before the fact or leading indicators) and outputs (after the fact or lagging indicators) and that these things are properly analyzed and adjusted so that there’s correlation between both. One other thing. When we have our gem appraised, the appraiser tells us how much it’s worth and why. This should always be the case in appraising performance. Failure to discuss appraisal results with your staff will not help them become aware of their current worth and how they can improve themselves to achieve higher worth, so why bother?
5. Rewarding and Recognizing Good Performance –Companies can be very creative in giving rewards and recognition. There is really no hard and fast rule on what kind should be given. What matters is the basis for which they are given. Setting correct performance standards should enable you to identify exemplary performance and reward them appropriately. It should also prevent you from rewarding poor performance, which sadly, happens too often. Just imagine what rewarding poor performance does to employees and the organization.

The bottom line is, Performance Management is not just about keeping score of employees performance which if you ask me is not worth anything without the other components. Performance management is about helping people succeed and in the process helping the organization succeed, for what is an organization but a group of people working together to achieve a common goal.

Home