Leadership is not magnetic personality – that can just as well be a glib tongue. It is not ‘making friends and influencing people’ – that is flattery. Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to high sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations – Peter Drucker
Forward-thinking businesses need to be on the ball with regards to feedback. Managers need to know how and when to deliver feedback to their employees and likewise, they need to understand the importance of soliciting feedback. Good performance management should be viewed as an everyday management task and not seen as some kind of bi-annual add on to the day job exercise or worse, a ‘going through the motions annual tick-box event’.
Performance management is a two-way street. Hence, it’s important to take a holistic view of its management. Here are the top five tips to effectively manage performance at work.
1. Ensure that your employees understand the organisation’s goals, the objectives, and the end results they need to achieve. Clear communication of these essential points would motivate them to enhance both their and the organisation’s performance.
2. Whether you’re communicating the targets, giving feedback, or having a difficult conversation with the team members keep the conversation positive. Remember that conversation is a two-way process: involve your team members, provide clarity, show empathy, trust, and respect; be constructive in your approach and agree on the next steps to be taken.
3. For a high-performing team you need to build trust and rapport among the team members; motivate them to solve problems together, air their opinion freely, and arrive together at decisions faster.
4. Resolve underperformance by having the difficult conversation at the earliest, make your expectations clear including what exactly is expected from the employee, draw up a roadmap to improvement, provide constructive feedback, provide the necessary tools for success, and finally monitor progress and extend help.
5. Remember that performance management is a continuous process of planning, training, coaching, and reviewing your employee’s performance. Once a year appraisal does not help to achieve goals.
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