Key Solutions to Turning Around Underperforming Teams Part 2

NOTE the special offer by the National Leased Housing Association (NLHA) at the end of the article!

In the last newsletter, I mentioned fact-based decision-making when you are working to improve the performance of an underperforming staff member.?

What if you could look forward to the performance meeting with that staff member rather than dread it because it was based on facts? Why? Because the facts are available to the employee every day!

Could you gather the facts by monitoring the KPIs you established for the position? Your KPIs should be tied to individual performance standards and set the measurement necessary to analyze and evaluate results.

It doesn’t matter what item you are measuring. The practical application is the same. As an example, you might set a performance standard for a housing specialist like this:

Timeliness of Reexaminations: Complete reexaminations within the specified timeframe, ensuring that at least 98% of all reexaminations are conducted and finalized before the recertification effective date.

Your key performance indicator for this performance standard could be:

On-time Completion Rate: Percentage of reexaminations completed before the deadline.

You will monitor the KPI based on whether the reexamination was done “timely” according to your standard. Therefore, if a Housing Specialist had 40 reexaminations due for a May effective date, the KPI would measure how many reexaminations were completed by May 1. You would divide the number achieved by the number due to complete your percentage.

If the Housing Specialist completed 30 of the 40 due reexaminations, their percentage would be 75%. Therefore, you know they are underperforming on this indicator. And this is a fact-based decision.

You can view this in a chart like this:

Could you gather the facts by monitoring the KPIs you established for the position? Your KPIs should be tied to individual performance standards and set the measurement necessary to analyze and evaluate results.

You may want your Timeliness of Reexaminations indicator to measure other factors such as:

Average Processing Time: Average time taken from initiation to completion of a reexamination.

Deadline Miss Rate: Track the percentage of incomplete reexaminations within milestone timeframes.

Workflow Efficiency: Measure improvements in process times over each quarter.

Each of those would be measured individually.

For the measurement of on-time reexaminations, you could monitor this on an Excel spreadsheet for each person with the Months of the Year across the top and under that the number of reexaminations to be performed for that month vs. the number of reexaminations completed that month.

You can create a chart by team, department, or however you want the information displayed. You can use the same chart type for other indicators, such as accuracy.

You could use these headings on a spreadsheet to track accuracy:

Date

Error Rate (%)

Correction Turnaround Time (hours)

Audit Results (%)

Peer Review Feedback (Average Score)

Quality Assurance Checks Compliance (%)

You could add a column for the number of files reviewed.

As you can see, the first step in addressing underperformance is to document the basis for the decision that the person is underperforming. As a supervisor, you must create and discuss the performance standards and key performance indicators with the employee to document and verify whether the performance standard has been met.

By using the data—the facts—of what is expected vs. what was completed and having that data available to the employee on a dashboard or a spreadsheet, there are no surprises, no withheld, "secret," or unexplained information, no subjectivity, just facts.

Having that data available lets you focus on solutions rather than the problem.

THE EFFECT OF EMPLOYEE UNDERPERFORMANCE ON A TEAM

Underperformance in a team can lead to several adverse effects, impacting both team dynamics and the broader organizational goals. Here are some of the typical effects:

1.????? Lower Morale: When team members notice underperformance among colleagues, it can lead to frustration and dissatisfaction, reducing motivation. High-performing members may feel their contributions are undervalued or unrecognized.

2.????? Increased Workload: Underperforming team members often need others to pick up the slack, resulting in an uneven distribution of work. This increased burden can cause stress, burnout, and resentment.

3.????? Reduced Productivity: As more time is spent addressing issues related to underperformance, the team's overall productivity drops. Inefficiencies can lead to missed goals and deadlines.

4.????? Communication Issues: Lack of trust and collaboration can arise, as team members may feel uncomfortable confronting underperformance or may resort to gossip. This can erode open communication and teamwork.

5.????? Negative Reputation: The team's overall reputation may suffer if stakeholders notice the decline in quality or output, reducing confidence in the team's ability to deliver results.

6.????? Missed Opportunities: When a team underperforms, it often struggles to take advantage of new opportunities due to inefficiencies and lack of focus.

7.????? Increased Turnover: High-performing team members may leave the organization if they perceive that underperformance is tolerated or not addressed, leading to a loss of valuable skills and knowledge.

The supervisor's role is to manage performance. When performance is allowed to slide, poor performance can become the norm. The effect can be to lose your high performers (Why stay? We are all treated the same, no matter how good or bad our performance is.") If your high performers leave, you will be left with all poor performers. That would not be fun!

Manage performance; don't ignore it. Your job as a supervisor is to get things done through people, and you need your high performers.

NLHA MAKES IT EASY! Want to make managing performance easier? Sign up for the “Basics of Enhancing Performance Using ChatGPT” webinar, sponsored by the National Leased Housing Association. Three days in June are available - choose one. Only $45 for three hours! If you have never used ChatGPT, you will create documents you can immediately use to manage employee performance at housing authorities and private property management companies! If you are already a GPT user, you will explore new ideas for using it for performance management! Feel free to have ChatGPT on your computer during the session, explore with me, or watch it happen! No experience is required! Only $45 for the 3 hours! Register at this link: https://nanmckayconnects.com/enhancing-performance

Register for the National Leased Housing Conference in Washington, DC, on June 25-27, with HUD staff presenting on HOTMA at https://hudnlha.com/seminars-and-meetings/calender-of-events/ . Nan will speak on Onboarding Success at the NLHA conference.

The NMA HOTMA Summits are a must for survival! To register here: https://nanmckay.com/hotma . And if you haven't attended NMA's HOTMA Action Plan Session on the plan for organizational success, register here: https://nanmckay.com/hotma#action-plan . I attended today, and it was fabulous!