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Motivate, Manage & Reward Performance

>Motivating employees / Managing performance / Rewarding performance

Managing performance

You can manage each employee’s progress with formal appraisals of their performance and by organising informal activities such as ongoing training and skill development. Managers and employees should work together to identify ways to improve performance.

Flowchart

Essential Human Resource Management process flowchart The flowchart provides logical steps to follow to managing performance.

Managing employees’ performance should include:

• informing employees what the business goals are
• deciding what you want to measure (the goals)
• choosing an effective way to measure it – consider
  • output over a certain time period to measure productivity
  • a time log to measure customer response
  • sales volume and profit
• setting up regular performance appraisal appointments to discuss each employee’s progress
• providing feedback to individuals and teams.

Successful performance management requires you to commit to the process, follow-up on issues that arise, give praise and identify areas that need improvement.

Factsheet

Formal methods of performance management factsheet This fact sheet includes a summary of formal methods of performance management, so you can decide for yourself if one or more might work well to monitor performance in your business.

Performance appraisal

A performance appraisal, or performance review, is a formal discussion to assess progress made towards set goals or other performance standards. These are often conducted on an annual or twice-yearly basis.

Here are some tips to help with performance appraisals.

• The formal appraisal should be supported by ongoing informal feedback processes.
• Prepare an action plan that lists what is to be done, by whom, and when. An action plan is included in the job performance appraisal template and provides a record for both managers and employees to quickly identify what has been done and what remains to be achieved.
• If your performance targets are not being met or you are not seeing the results you expected, you may need to review what is being done and question whether you are measuring the right things or rewarding the right behaviour.
• Be open and clear about why you want to introduce performance appraisals and seek employees’ input.

Template

Job performance appraisal template Use this template to help with carrying out a performance appraisal. You can change it so it matches the headings in your employee’s job description.

Under-performance

• Discussing under-performance can be unpleasant. However, if the unsatisfactory performance is to be remedied good discussion is crucial.
• Here are some tips to help with managing under-performance.
• Act promptly and arrange a private meeting to discuss the problem with the employee.
• Give the employee an opportunity to explain reasons for the behaviour. Problematic personal circumstances can be dealt by someone with appropriate skills or through an Employee Assistance Program.
• Tell the employee what is unsatisfactory and ensure that they understand the difference between what they are doing and what you want done.
• Agree on how the unsatisfactory performance will be resolved.
• Make a time for review to ensure that both parties are happy with the outcome.
• Always follow-up and give positive feedback when the employee is working as you wish.
• If the employee’s performance remains unsatisfactory you need to consider what action will be taken and to inform the employee of these possible consequences.

Conflict and disputes

Conflict and disputes may arise from changes in the workplace, personal or cultural differences (for further information see: Section 5. Retain and Support A Diverse Workforce), insufficient resources, stress, ineffective communication or inconsistent instructions, among other things.

There are two main types of workplace-related conflict:

• Functional conflict is considered to be innovative and creative, encourages performance and helps to collectively achieve goals.

• Dysfunctional conflict hinders the achievement of your business’s goals by affecting productivity.

Here are some tips to help resolve conflicts.

• use arbitration as a last resort.

• listen to both sides of the argument

• try to have the conflicting parties mutually agree on some point

• stick to the facts

• assume the role of mediator

• sort out the easy issues first

• get both parties to recognise the value of the workplace relationship

• don’t settle on the first solution – it may not be the most appropriate

Managing people out of the business

Employers have particular legal obligations to satisfy when they dismiss an employee. These obligations may vary from case to case so it is wise to get advice before you make someone redundant or terminate their employment.

Exit interviews

An exit interview with a departing employee is one way of capturing information that ordinarily may not be available to you. Find out the reason(s) that someone is leaving so you can make changes in the workplace, if necessary, so that others don’t leave for the same reasons.

Template

Employee exit checklist This template provides examples of things you can do when an employee leaves your business. You can adjust this document to suit your own needs.

Here are some tips to help manage your interviews with employees who are leaving.

• The exit interview should be undertaken like any other interview – keep it formal and take notes.

• Questions should be presented as a means of extracting information that may be useful to the organisation.

• Ask questions that allow employees to give as much information as they wish.

• If they’re going to another employer, ask what attracted them to the new position. This may give you an idea of what benefits/rewards other businesses are offering and may help you to retain other employees.

The exit process should also be managed from a security point of view.

• Consider what needs to be returned or terminated (e.g. uniforms, keys and email accounts). Handle these requests sensitively – you don’t want it to seem as though you distrust the person.

• Working out a period of notice is often required. However, where employees have access to commercial-in-confidence information or material, you may need to consider forgoing the notice period. This is especially relevant if the individual is moving on to another business that may be a competitor.

• There are rules covering the circumstances in which employees may leave without serving their period of notice. Check the relevant agreement and seek advice.

>Motivating employees / Managing performance / Rewarding performance