When Performance is no more managed!
No, I am not from HR but too many thoughts triggered this article. Papers on organizations getting rid of bell curve, own good or worse experiences, thoughts of a ground breaking way to motivate people, discussions on similar topics. Anyway, I am sure we will all relate to it somehow.
Simply put, one of the most important aspects of a successful organization is "The way you treat your employees!" because this is how they feel aligned to your objectives, this is the way you retain them, this the way you take them along in your successes and failures. Looking at how organizations are growing in this fast paced environment, it is just about the right time to think of Performance management.
"Everyone thinks they are doing right with annual, time consuming, frustrating process"
Through this article, I intend to provide enough triggers for you to ponder on and make changes in your organizations. The solution would revolve 4 major themes:
- Get rid of " The Annual" process:I have no idea how would companies survive in this generation if they plan for 3- 5 years only,when the business dynamics are changing every minute, innovating, going digital, going to different geographies, getting new consumers. E-commerce companies plan every trimester and it makes sense. It means if the business planning is happening every trimester, then it really does not make sense that you measure your people annually. Whether it is project based or business planning based, performance needs to be managed immediately, not when managers forget how the team performed at the start of the year.
- Measure what matters the most:Can't stress on this enough and this point is the most lightly taken in organizations. Measuring a consulting fresher on writing white papers is wrong from so many angles. Measure on 3-5 things which are most important to the company, be it Customer Satisfaction or Innovation, team performance. Make it relevant, align it with your business objectives and COMMUNICATE it across. A spreadsheet with 25 KPIs is only adding to disaster.
- No more Ratings: Debatable! I hear lot many companies getting rid of it, Deloitte, Adobe. It takes hell lot of time and it is costly! To me, only the mature companies would be able to carry it and their employees would really mean a great deal to them. To measure people only on closed ended questions like " I can promote this person today", requires guts and maturity at all levels. Answers would be required to questions like - what about compensation hike , what about variable pay, what about the actual sales figures. But I am sure you will figure it out in some time.
- Real time conversations:Once a year conversation on team's strengths, aspirations, goals is just laugh worthy. We know how they go. Need of the hour is regular check-ins, knowing what your people aspire to do, you never know how a single person's strength can take you heights. Make use of apps, make use of performance tools, "like and share" their live professional updates.
I will conclude by reiterating that above is the way forward but now it depends on how do you see your employees, how important their strengths are to you and how badly do you want to retain them.
Go ahead , get rid of good old bell curve and show your people that you don't want to let them go!
It's an old article but still so relevant. Unfortunately the situation hasn't changed a bit. But kudos to you for the awesome write-up
Nice views Megha. The day every organization starts thinking employees as a person, respect & understand that their life is more than just being an employee number '1234', i think that's when the change will kick in and i am sure organizations that are excelling today believe and follow this religiously.
There is a significant difference between performance management, performance development, and personal development process. Organisations are tending to apply the one-model fits all due to lack of thorough understanding of these. Line Managers see it as once a year process, while employees see it as "get it over and done" and bonus/increases are dependent on it. Any matured line management staff that are good leaders will never involve their employees for a once-or-twice year discussions. These happen for meeting certain legalities in context (say for example, as per demands laid by Labour Relations Act etc) but factually, these discussions should happen as regular as possible. Bell Curve - Another highly debatable subject. The application makes sense, but with the limitations that exist, people who do not perform get away with a lot; people who perform more than required will get less out of it; This leads to demotivated performing staff. My bet is on the organisational culture, people development as a constant focus wherein line management has to focus on continual development of staff and keeping them motivated (not financially, but through right developmental needs). This will lead to a sustainable successful organisation. Bringing such change into any organisation is easy, just that the leadership and communication around this change should be effective and efficiently managed, so the benefits from implementation can be seen, realized and celebrated as they start happening.