How do you manage staff performance?

Managing the performance of workers plays a key part in achieving the objectives of the firm, maintaining the motivation of employees, and being able to take the required actions to assist employees when they are having difficulty. Treating all of your employees equitably and bringing out the finest performance they are capable of is possible when you use data from business intelligence to assess objectives and present new prospects. This method is both transparent and effective.

When seen from the perspective of the corporation, performance management is an important tool for ensuring that business strategy and objectives are met. It makes it possible for managers and executives to concentrate on certain aspects in order to achieve goals. Without performance management, the organization would have no idea how well it was doing and would be unable to change either the goals it set for itself or the strategy it used to achieve those goals.

When seen from the perspective of employees, performance management is of similar significance. It enables managers to single out those employees who do exceptionally well and recognize them for their efforts. Employees are encouraged to work to the absolute best of their abilities as a result of this incentive.

A successful approach to performance management involves attending to the requirements of both the tasks and the people being managed. Needs for the task are those that deal with organization and strategy in a practical setting. The demands of your people are directly related to the growth and motivation of your team.

It is often accepted that an effective performance management framework should be ongoing. Creating a repeating process requires that each phase provide input for the subsequent stage, as well as the final step providing input for the initial step. In order to be of assistance to you, the procedures have been broken down into five parts, each of which consists of a task component and a people component.

1. Set objectives + Recruit right

It is essential that the objectives you establish for your business be in line with its values and take into account the capabilities of its workforce while doing so. We recommend that you examine the historical performance of your division, pinpoint areas in which it may be improved, and make an effort to quantify the increase in performance that you would want to accomplish. At Phocas, we are firm believers in the notion of utilizing SMART objectives, which are goals that are precise, measurable, attainable, relevant, and have a time limit attached to them. These objectives are very readily translatable into key performance indicators (KPIs), which makes them fantastic for efficient performance management.

While it is incredibly essential to make sure that you establish the correct objectives for your team, you need also make sure that you have the right individuals working on your team. Be sure you assign the appropriate responsibilities to the appropriate personnel. In this regard, we suggest that you take a look at their previous performance (which can be easily done in Phocas), and talk to your employees to find out the source of their motivation – you might be surprised, especially considering how difficult it is to find talented people and how people have experienced greater flexibility in where they work.

2. Set a framework + Provide support

It is essential to have an open discussion in order to successfully build a hybrid work environment in which workers are able to feel at ease. But as a manager, you can't always be responding to people's inquiries and emails when you should be focusing on other things. In the event that it is required, you should define a communication system in which younger workers first seek counsel from more senior employees before coming to you, and you should offer the appropriate collaboration tools in order to create these connections.

When you do this, you should also make sure that there is sufficient support for both young and senior members of your team so that they may feel comfortable in their responsibilities and that they get sufficient help and training. Acknowledge their prior experiences and abilities, then build on this foundation by providing pertinent learning materials, in addition to your own advise and direction.

3. Share your strategy with others and encourage and push them

After you have established a framework, it is important to convey your strategy for moving forward. Ensure that each employee has a crystal clear understanding of the expectations placed on them. It is possible that developing KPIs for graduate workers will prove to be beneficial. This, in turn, makes the progress you make in reviewing simpler. When talking with the rest of your team, be sure to utilize language that is easy to understand. To further demonstrate what you are saying, use statistics and visual representations. Business intelligence software gives you the ability to communicate reports or key performance indicator (KPI) progress with staff in a format that is simple enough for non-technical people to comprehend.

At this point, you should make sure to offer your personnel with ongoing coaching and push them. Take into account the input they've provided, pay attention to any issues they may have, and provide help where it's needed. As a manager, it is your duty to assist the employees under your supervision in developing their skills. You should always be aware of the many ways in which the members of your team learn best; for example, do they perform better when given verbal or written instructions? Do they want you to be hands-on or hands-off most of the time? Make sure that you modify your coaching approach based on the specific person.

4. Monitor & assess + make joint choices

You should keep track of and assess how well you are doing in comparison to the planned development, but you shouldn't spend hours on the end generating reports. When reports are compiled over the course of many days or even several weeks, by the time they are put to use, they are often irrelevant to the situation at hand. Using software such as Phocas, you are able to keep track of the progress being made in real-time, which eliminates the need to create a new report each time. Even better, you are able to aggregate pertinent data from several sources to get a holistic snapshot of what is occurring throughout the company or in your particular department. Because Phocas can be accessible on any device, this means that you do not need to sit down with each person in your office in order to show them their accomplishments and prospects. Instead, you may do this off-site or as you go along. (If you want to know how it works, watch this video that's just three minutes long.)

Once you have a sense of how well you, your team, and each individual member is performing, you can include them in the process of decision-making. This gives the individual a feeling of ownership over the goals, which may be a tremendous source of inspiration for them. Ask your staff members if they would want to have any feedback on your plan, how they feel they can improve, or how they believe objectives should be altered, and take their responses into account. If you want to find future leaders who are motivated by more than just their inputs or their job role, one way to find them is to invite your team to contribute to a strategy that applies to the whole team and see what they come up with. Not everyone will want to participate in activities that are outside the scope of their job.

5. Demand accountability in addition to empowering, engaging, and listening

You will be able to keep your team responsible if you continue to monitor and assess their performance in accordance with the step before this one. If specific individuals consistently perform below expectations, this should serve as a signal that you need to take corrective action. Talk to the employee, show them the statistics that shows they are not performing up to par, and then ask them what they think they need to do to improve their performance. They may not completely appreciate the value of a product that you are producing or distributing, or they may be able to learn new tricks from workers who are doing well. Either way, they may benefit from learning new tricks from employees who are doing well. It is possible that the employee is not solely to blame; if your team as a whole is experiencing the same problems, you may need to modify a business procedure. For example, you could provide improved product training for newly hired employees or refresher training for employees with more experience.

In conclusion, it is essential to provide workers with the authority and the opportunity to participate in decision-making processes, as well as to solicit and consider their input. Providing workers with the knowledge they need to make choices like these is a wonderful method for accomplishing this goal. By using business intelligence, you are able to provide your staff a unified perspective of the truth that is presented in a way that is simple to grasp. Phocas makes it possible for you and your team to see trends quickly, enabling you to respond to them in a timely manner and capitalize on opportunities before they go.

Putting these performance management ideas into practice may be quite useful, not just for your team but also for the organization as a whole. There is a good chance that others will see you as a more capable leader, that your team will have a higher level of motivation, and that the organization as a whole will have improved results.