Employee Performance reviews are a very important but often overlooked part of your Employee Management process.
Performance Reviews provide tools for the clarification of expectations and priorities, and for monitoring performance. The Performance Review is designed to give ownership for performance and development to individuals, while at the same time recognizing the important role of management in providing leadership, ongoing constructive feedback, guidance and support. The process draws attention to the contributions made, past and present, by every individual in achieving company objectives.
Reviews must be based upon performance standards, goals and objectives identified in employees’ respective job descriptions. It is very important that your employees are aware of any criteria that will be used to rate their performance, for example sales targets or projects completed.
Performance reviews assist in the identification of strengths and weaknesses in organizational abilities and capacities that will aid in the development of effective training, employee placements and productivity forecasts.
The process should be designed to facilitate two-way communication between employees and management regarding performance and personal development. Both managers and employees should be encouraged to engage in open and honest dialogue both at the review meetings and all year round. There should be no surprises at the performance review meeting.
All employees and management staff should participate in performance reviews at regular intervals within the fiscal year, not just once per year. Ongoing, informal coaching and feedback should be encouraged. Regular Performance Reviews help keep employees on the right track with direction and goals that will lead to their continuous improvement and provide career advancement opportunities.
At the end of the meeting, employees and managers should set objectives for future activity which allows individual, team and/or departmental objectives to be aligned closely to the strategic and operational plans.
The performance review process must be designed to be user-friendly. There should be guidance notes to support managers with the process and training should be made available to those who will be doing the reviews to prevent unintentional bias. This will help ensure that the process is non-discriminatory, transparent and consistently applied, but most importantly that all development activity is aligned with the strategic business objectives.
Please contact me for help implementing your Employee Performance Review process.
