Everyday Performance Development

Performance management is changing.

Many organisations are moving from backward looking, disengaging annual appraisals to an ‘Everyday’ Performance Development approach where employees benefit from forward looking, regular performance and development conversations. In this article, we give you a tips for implementing an Everyday Performance Development culture.

Tip #1 – Explain the benefits

Everyday performance development enables everyone to contribute to the overall success of the business via SMART goals linked to business priorities and regular check-in conversations.

Team members feel more connected to the overall business, receive regular, timely feedback, get more one-to-one time with their manager and develop their skills and build on their strengths.

Managers delegate more and benefit from higher performing team members. In the moment feedback increases performance by between 12% and 39% (Gallup).

The business benefits from more engaged and more productive employees. Employees who have a monthly check-in are 3 times more engaged and 21% more productive. Organisations adopting this approach have up to 30% less voluntary leavers. (Gallup)

Tip #2 – Involve your senior stakeholders

For everyday performance development to be truly effective, it can’t be seen as an HR initiative. It needs to become a business process and be seen as such. The best way to achieve this is to involve your senior stakeholders early.

Meet with them face to face to discuss the benefits from adopting continuous performance and development. (See Tip #1)

Ask them to role model the key behaviours (having regular check-ins with team members, giving regular feedback, and setting SMART performance and development goals).

Get your senior stakeholders to assist in the communication of the approach. Ask your CEO to officially ‘launch’ the new approach via a ‘town hall’ meeting, video or via an email to all employees. When carrying out your briefing sessions involve senior managers who you know already embrace the principles. Involve them by asking them to run sessions, speaking about the benefits they have personally gained by adopting continuous performance development principles and sharing their practical tips.

Tip #3 – Build a Communications Plan

Adopting everyday performance development usually requires a shift in your culture.

To embed any change at work successfully, you need to communicate the key messages a number of times. In fact, research into change management has found that a message needs to be communicated SEVEN TIMES in a number of different ways in order for it to be internalised by recipients.

Additionally, you will need to remind employees to do the things you want to do (have regular check-ins, give and request feedback frequently), until they become habits. It can take up to a year for these things to become habits, hence the need for a communication plan for the first 12 months.

Make a list of the key messages you want to reinforce, and plan to communicate them using a variety of channels. Different people respond better to different communication methods – some people prefer reading, some video, whilst others value discussion. 

Tip # 4 – Outline the key ingredients

Everyday performance development is about enabling people to achieve their full potential at work, developing their skills and knowledge, further their career and ultimately helping the organisation to achieve its goals.

It’s different as it’s part of the everyday job (not a once-a-year activity) and it is the shared responsibility of every team member and manager. Team members take ownership of managing their own performance and development, supported by their manager.

Team members work together with their manager to:

·       Set SMART performance goals, aligned to the organisations goals, which are regularly reviewed and updated

·       Agree one or two personal development goals

·       Hold regular check-in meetings

·       Request and receive frequent feedback

·       Take action following the performance and development conversations

When team members take accountability for driving the above they feel more motivated and get more enjoyment from work.

Tip #5 – Get going with monthly check-in conversations

There can be a temptation to want the train managers thoroughly before launching a new performance development approach. Training of managers is time consuming and costly. Instead make the decision to get going and build the skills of managers along the way.

Get the process started by asking managers and team members to book monthly check-in meetings in the diary. The check-in meeting is an ongoing conversation about performance and development. It enables issues to be nipped in the bud and helps build relationships based on trust. The check-in should include the following:

·       An informal catch-up e.g. how is life outside of work?

·       Discussion of key achievements in last month and any areas the employee is concerned about.

·       Sharing feedback, praise and recognition.

·       Review and update of development plan.

·       Agreement on key areas of focus for the next month and any actions arising from the meeting.

Good quality, regular one to ones lead to better engagement, increased productivity and reduced turnover. The quality of these discussions can be improved over time. The most important thing is to the conversations started. 

Tip #6 – Increase motivation by setting SMART goals

Performance goals are the most important things individuals need to achieve in the forthcoming period. We suggest that goals are written and ‘owned’ by the team member. But how do you put your employees in control, while making sure they’re still doing what you need them to do? The answer is to help them set SMART goals.

SMART goal setting lets you give your employees a degree of flexibility and control, while making sure they are working towards a specific end result.

• Specific. Making goals specific ensures that intentions are aimed in the right direction.
• Measurable. Making goals measurable lets you keep track of progress.
• Agreed. Making sure goals are agreed in advance ensures both you and your employee are on the same page.
• Realistic. Making goals realistic will help employees feel more driven to complete them – they don’t feel “impossible”.
• Time scaled. Giving goals a time scale adds pace and rhythm to the workload, and helps you plan around the end result.

If you use SMART in goal setting, employees will feel more like they are making a relevant impact on your organisation’s success. And because of the nature of SMART goals, they will feel more in control of their actions, accountable for achieving the agreed results, and more motivated to succeed.

Tip #7– Encourage everyone to ask for and offer feedback

Research has found that giving frequent, informal and accurate feedback can increase performance by a massive 39%. Yet most people don’t receive anyway near enough feedback and a lot of feedback tends to focus on negatives. For optimum performance and motivation individuals should receive feedback at least every 2 weeks and the ratio of positive to constructive feedback should be 3:1.

Use the BOOST model as a prompt. Keep feedback:

·       Balanced: - content should reflect strengths and development opportunities

·       Owned - feedback should reflect your observations, interpretations and impact – not those of other people

·       Objective: remove the subjectivity, distinguish the factual data from your interpretation

·       Specific: describe what you observed, “I saw”, “You said”, “I noticed”, “You didn’t do” etc.

·       Timely: give as soon as possible after the event – impact diminishes with time

Get into the feedback routine by ‘catching people doing something good’ or asking for feedback on what you do well. Giving and receiving praise helps build motivation and trust. Once trust has been established, we feel more comfortable giving (and are more open to receiving) constructive feedback.

Tip #8 – Focus on leveraging strengths as well as addressing development areas

Ensure your check-in meetings have a strong development focus by discussing what employees have learnt from experiences and identifying further development opportunities.

Discover what is unique about each person in your team and turn their specific talents into performance. Research has revealed that more opportunities for growth (and improved performance) comes from understanding strengths and building on them, rather than just focusing on weaknesses.

When people play to their strengths, they become engaged, energised and are more productive. Realising strengths can be the smallest thing that is likely to make the biggest difference to business performance. Challenge each person to excel in his/her own way and find ways to develop and grow each person. As for weaknesses, don’t ignore them, just concentrate on making them good enough.

Tip #9 –Adopt ‘Coach-like’ Behaviours – Part One

‘Coach-like’ behaviours are behaviours that support people to achieve and succeed without doing it for them or telling them what to do. They are the behaviours that encourage team members to take responsibility for their own goals, actions, learning and well-being.

What are the behaviours you should focus on developing?

This tip is a big one, so we’ve split it into two parts.

Build your self-awareness by seeking feedback and using psychometric tools. You cannot motivate others until you truly understand what motivates you. Ask others “how would you describe me when I’m at my best/not at my best?”

Use this knowledge to Understand your impact. A basic law of human interaction is that YOU impact on everyone you ever meet. Become more aware of your impact and dial up the positive impact and reduce the negative impact.

Be fully present when having a check-in meeting. This means giving the other person 100% of our attention. It takes lots of practice but is worth persevering with as presence builds trust.

Tip #10 - Adopt ‘Coach-like’ Behaviours – Part Two

Continuing last week’s theme, ‘coach-like’ behaviours encourage team members to take responsibility for their own goals, actions, learning and well-being.

To be more ‘coach-like’:

Ask open questions to really understand the perspectives of your team members e.g. ‘What do you think?’. Help your team members to solve their own problems by asking open questions before giving advice.

Practice empathetic listening. Listening for and exploring feelings by paying attention to tone and body language, as well as the words expressed. Empathetic listening helps build trust and strengthens relationships.

Believe in all the individuals in your team. Be an avid supporter of the members of your team. Believe that they are capable even though sometimes they may need help. Trust their innate creativity – we all have this quality so instead of telling them what to do, help them to discover answers for themselves. Know that your team members all have a combination of knowledge, experience, skill and intuition that can be used to solve the challenges they face.

Tip #11 – Find your champions and build momentum

With any change initiative, some people will embrace the change quicker than others. Therefore, it is important to find out who those people are as early as possible and use them to champion the cause during those critical first 12 months. Sharing their successes within the organisation will help you to build momentum and gain acceptance from other, more cynical employees.

Use your performance management software, your employee engagement survey results or ask your senior leaders and HRBPs to identify the managers who are having regular check-ins with their team members, setting quality performance and development goals and giving really good feedback. Then interview these people and find out:

·       The benefits they have gained from adopting this approach

·       How they have overcome common concerns

·       Tips they have for others

·       Suggestions for improvement

Include the outcome of these interviews in your communications and get these champions involve in future training sessions.