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Let’s sort out poor performance, Part 3: The Alternative

In the last two weeks, we have been looking at managing poor performance:

  1. The infrastructure you will need
  2. The techniques to turn poor performance around

This week, we are going to look at what to do if you cannot turn the poor performance around.

Poor Performance

First, however, I should say two things

  1. In many regions of the world, you will have laws which mean you need to do this properly, to avoid unwanted complications and problems.  I am not a lawyer and know the laws in precisely none of the legal jurisdictions of the world.
  2. The above does not absolve you of the responsibility to deal properly with poor performance and neither, if you take proper advice and act with care, need it stop you.

Consequently, the following is nothing more than some generic thoughts, which you need to test against local law and your organisation’s policies and procedures.

The Supremacy of Evidence

Rule 1: you can’t act effectively without evidence.  No manager can be effective unless you are constantly aware of your team members’ performance – and that means reviewing evidence of what they are doing and how it compares with the requirements of their roles.  Take into account also any external factors that are affecting their work.

Documentation and Record Keeping

You also need to keep records and document what happens.  Most procedures and, I am sure, most legal systems will require documentary records to provide solid evidence that can back up your judgements and so justify your decisions.  Some systems will require copious data gathering and recording, so be structured and methodical.  Also ensure that your records are kept under lock and key or in strong-password protected files.

Openness and Choice

Be open with the poor performer about what you are observing and the implications it has for their future.  Be clear about the choices they have and the implications of each choice for them.  You cannot make me perform to a specific standard, but you must let me know the implications of my choice not to.

Care and Compassion

Finally, you may want rid of me – for all the right reasons – but that is not a good reason to abandon all compassion for me as a human being and, more important organisationally – to disregard any duty of care that you have towards me during the process, while I am still employed.

Some Management Pocketbooks you might enjoy

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Let’s sort out poor performance, Part 2: Turnaround

Last week, we introduced the three components of managing poor performance and dealt with the first one:

  1. The infrastructure you will need
  2. The techniques to turn poor performance around
  3. What to do if you cannot turn the poor performance around

This week, it’s the turn of techniques to turn poor performance around.

Poor Performance

Performance Turnaround Toolbox

The toolbox analogy that Pam Jones describes in The Performance Management Pocketbook is a good one and some of the tools she details in her book are particularly relevant here: feedback, coaching and motivating, in particular.

Let’s list some of the tools in your performance turnaround toolbox.

Feedback

First and foremost, we need to provide open, honest, clear, and factual feedback to the under-performer, about the nature and level of their performance.  Do it early and the problem will be smaller.  Often an early intervention here can bring about swift changes or a genuine request for help, alerting you to causal conditions that you may be able to help with, or at least take account of.

Coaching

For my money, coaching is one of the most powerful ways to support poor performers – as it is to support average, good and excellent performers.  If you don’t have the skills, there are lots of sources of help – not least, the Coaching Pocketbook.  On a recent training course about Performance Coaching, the feedback I had was that this is, itself, a very powerful tool set for managers at all levels.

Goal-setting

Clearly a part of any coaching process, whether you coach or not, you must agree performance goals with the under-performer that are attainable and acceptable to the organisation.  I recommend tiered goals, incrementing in performance level month-by-month, until basic performance standards are achieved.  Why stop there?  If the process works, continue it until the performer reaches their maximum performance capacity.

Resource review

Look at the resources available to the under-performer in their workplace and ensure that they represent all that the performer needs, to succeed.  If not, take rapid remedial action.

Support

What support can you, other managers, and the performer’s colleagues offer them, to help them to tackle their poor performance?

Training/Re-training

Evaluate whether the poor performer needs further training or re-training to address their performance issues.  But do not accept a training course as a panacea: you must place it in the context of goals, support and a regular performance evaluation process, to help them to embed their learning into new practices.

Incentives

You may want to consider incentives – or even their flip-side, penalties.  You should not need to and, if you do, ensure that these will fall wholly within your organisation’s policies.

Job re-structuring

One option is always to re-structure the under-performer’s job either temporarily or permanently, to allow them to perform more effectively.

Re-deployment

Even more radical is the possibility of re-deploying the poor performer into a new role that they can thrive at.  Be careful though: don’t use this as a means to off-load trouble on other managers.  Also be aware that you cannot lawfully change someone’s contract without their consent in most jurisdictions (all?), so only do this after careful consultation with your HR experts and maybe even an HR lawyer.

Options Review

As a last resort, you need to work towards reviewing your poor performer’s wider options with them.  This is, of course, a euphemistic way of alluding to next week’s post about what to do if you cannot create a turnaround.

Management Pocketbooks you might enjoy

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Dr Stephen R Covey

Stephen CoveyIf you were expecting Part 2 of
Let’s Sort out Poor Performance,

we have deferred it for a week,
to make space for this tribute to
Stephen Covey.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Books that change the way people think

When business authors (like me) start writing a new book, we allow ourselves to fantasize for a while that it will be the next book to transform the way hundreds of thousands of people think about this concept or that.  We have in mind the achievements of books like “Who Moved my Cheese”, “Fish!”, “The One Minute Manager” and, of course, “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People”. Continue reading Dr Stephen R Covey

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Let’s sort out poor performance, Part 1: Infrastructure

Happily, few organisations retain the ‘forced ranking’ system that classifies a fixed proportion of the staff as poor performers at the end of each year and then, as Jack Welch advocated at General Electric, manages them out of the business – or just fires them  A business I once worked for did this and it was as brutal as it was stupid.

Poor Performance

This isn’t to make a naive suggestion that there are no poor performers, nor that we should tolerate poor performance.  We need to identify and handle under-performance at the first sign.  Of course, prevention is better than cure, as we looked at what the positive tools are for performance management a while ago (What is Performance Management?) and also at the reasons for poor performance (The root of the issue).

But what can you do to deal with the poor performance you discover?  In a series of three blogs, we will examine:

  1. The infrastructure you will need
  2. The techniques to turn poor performance around
  3. What to do if you cannot turn the poor performance around

The Infrastructure for dealing with poor performance

A good organisation – and a strong management team – will recognise the reality of poor performance and proactively develop the elements it needs to engage positively with poor performers and manage their performance to turn it around.  Here is my checklist of the assets your organisation will need.

A performance management policy
… so that everyone knows the answer to ‘what next?’

Up to date and clear job descriptions
… to measure performance against

Robust performance monitoring processes
… so that managers have early indications of under-performance and a strong evidence base that allow them to identify and tackle issues early and firmly

A recruitment process (and all that involves)
… to maximise your chances of recruiting the right people and minimising your need for managing poor performance

Training in performance management
… because tools, techniques, policies and procedures are no good unless managers know how to use them

Coaching skills among line managers
… because coaching is one of the best tools for dealing with poor performance

Support mechanisms
… for the managers conducting performance management, who are likely to find it mentally and emotionally challenging and stressful

A disciplinary policy
… in case performance management does not succeed

Management Pocketbooks you might enjoy

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Building Rapport with FROGS

What is Rapport?

Rapport is a harmonious relationship in which two people communicate easily and effectively.  Rapport-building is a valuable skill for anyone who wants to communicate better and influence people.

Familiar Techniques

There are many things that you can do to strengthen rapport during a conversation, and most of them reflect the things that will happen naturally anyway.  Postural matching and echoing the rhythms of speech with nods and small movements can be both subtle and powerful, for example.  These are often the focus of rapport-building training.

Other, easier techniques are often over-looked or down-played, like repeating back key words and phrases, agreeing with what you hear, and showing your approval for what is being said: human beings love to be affirmed and approved of!

Back to Basics

But one of the simplest and best ways to get rapport quickly is to establish or reinforce a common interest or experience with someone.  This simple conversational gambit is what we often do naturally when we meet a new person for the first time: we ask simple questions hoping to find something we have in common:

‘Ah, you come from Rotherham.  I know Rotherham.’

‘Oh, you worked for ABC Inc – I have done business with them.’

‘Really, you’re a fan of Sumo? Me too.’

Common ground is the easiest basis for rapport.

FROGS

I was working with a group recently, which included several people with a sales background, who introduced me to a simple tool for remembering how to develop this aspect of rapport: FROGS.

Red-eyed Tree Frogs - Brian Gratwicke

Photo by Brian Gratwicke
Click on photo for original

FROGS reminds us of five sources of rapport with someone – and therefore five subjects of conversation we can use to start a meeting up and thereby build rapport.

Friends
Who do we know in common?  Ask after shared friends.  Take an interest in their friends.  LinkedIn gives you a possible route to researching this.

Relationships
You could interpret this as family, if you know them well enough, or as business relationships otherwise.

Organisations
Current or past organisations with which they are connected – in both formal and informal contexts.  Think about employers, professional or trade organisations.  Political and religious organisations need to be handled with care.

Geography
Place is an important anchor for many of us, so when we share connections to towns, villages or countries, it can create a strong bond.  Often there are allegiances and experiences that go with this, which can also strengthen rapport.

Social
… or, for some people, just Sport.  But it is far better to think as widely as possible about social connections, into voluntary groups and other interests.  These are often the things people actively choose to do, so they are bound to be important to them.  Asking about them and taking an interest is therefore a strong signal of liking and respect.

Some Management Pocketbooks you might like

More on rapport and good communication in:

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A Model of Integrity

I am not sure why, but something made me think of ‘integrity’ when I was pondering what to write about this week.  I wondered if anyone had created a useful model of integrity which could be used as a basis for discussing the topic. I found relatively few in my researches – although a lot of very interesting and thoughtful discussions that could be used readily to create a model.

The Yacht Model

One model that appeared a couple of times in my searches is presented by at least two different businesses with stunningly similar text.  The business may be linked or there may be some borrowing going on, but for me the challenge is to properly credit the model: it may belong to Integrity and Values .com, to Dynamic Creation, or to someone else.  I welcome clarifying comments and claims, below.

Whoever owns it, it is a nice and simple model that captures a lot of what I understand by integrity.  It is re-presented in Pocketblog format below.  While the basic metaphor of a boat is the same, some of the details have been changed to create a different but related model.

Integrity Model

In this model – and I do like the metaphor – integrity is represented by the mast. It ties everything together and allows the boat to function consistently and as a whole.  When the mast is warped, weak or broken, that is no longer the case.

I am no sailor, so I don’t know how well the metaphor works technically, but I do feel indebted to Integrity and Values .com or whoever developed the metaphor for a nice way of representing integrity.

Keeping Promises

I was also struck by an exchange in one of my favourite TV shows, The West Wing, in which one character (it was Josh, if you are also a fan) noted that the problem is not when we fail to keep a promise.  It is when we make a promise that we are not completely sure we will be able to keep.  At the end of the episode, he is asked about something he has said: ‘is that a promise?’ says another character.

‘No’ Josh says. ‘But we’re going to do the best we can.’

That seems fair enough.  If we go on to do just that, and work hard to do the best we can, then that is integrity.

Integrity is when your beliefs, your words, and your actions are all in alignment.

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The New Manager’s Guide to Interviewing Part 3: Polishing Your Process

One of the most daunting tasks for a new manager is conducting their first job interviews. The stakes are high: get it wrong, and you may be stuck with a capable – but not that capable – colleague for years. Get it right, on the other hand, and you have not just added a huge asset to your organisation, but you will probably make your own life easier.

So what can you do to improve your chances of securing the right candidate?

This is the final of three articles that Management Pocketblog will offer you:

  1. Preparing the Ground
    Increase your chances of success well before the interview
  2. Getting it Right
    Hints and advice for conducting and effective interviews
  3. Polishing your Process
    Tips and tricks of the trade

Polishing Your Process

As in all matters, details are important.  So let’s look at a few of them.

Checking Facts

Sadly, exaggerating, reinterpreting, and outright lying about qualifications and experience are facts of the recruitment process.  So don’t get caught by them.  If qualifications matter, make it a condition that candidates bring original copies for you to inspect.  Ask questions about experience and listen carefully to be sure the answers are plausible and internally consistent.  Always take up references before finalising an appointment.  Where possible, speak to the referee as well as getting a written statement.  It’s easier to hear hesitancy and reservation in the voice than detect it in writing.  And some people are fearful that an honest reference could get them into trouble, so a written reference can miss out important concerns.

Horns and Halos

Warning: this advice may be impossible to follow, but that doesn’t mean you should not make every effort.

First impressions are powerful – whether from the application documents or the minute they walk in the room.  If your first impression is positive (a neat application document, the same set of A levels as you, an upbringing in the same town as your best employee, the right colour shirt or blouse…) you will be constantly noticing evidence of their capability and mossing all but the boldest evidence of weak points.  This is called the Halo Effect.

If your first impression is negative (a scruffy application document, a mis-placed apostrophe, an upbringing in the town you hated when you visited, the wrong colour tie or scarf…) you will be constantly spotting more and more evidence to justify that initial assessment.  You will also miss all but the strongest evidence of real talent.  This is sometimes called the ‘Horns Effect’.

Horns & Halo

These cognitive biases – so well documented in Daniel Kahnemann’s wonderful ‘Thinking, Fast and Slow’ – can lead to poor judgement.  Simply being aware of them can help but it is not enough.  You must strive to look for evidence that counters your first impression and keep focused on seeking the objective data you planned in your preparation for the interview.

Mini Me

It’s natural.  You want rapport with your staff, and you most easily build rapport with people like you.  So it is an easy trap to fall into, to hire someone just like you.  You’re good at your job, aren’t you?  So it stands to reason, surely, that someone just like you will also be good at their job.

No, it doesn’t.  And more to the point, someone not like you could be equally good – or better.  Diversity is what brings real strength to a team, so make every attempt to see the strengths of candidates who are different to your current team, to counter your inevitable bias to recruiting more of the same.

Cod-Psy

Psychology is everywhere, and we all learn bits and pieces along the way.  But if you are not an expert, leave your amateur analysis to the social settings of the pub, cafe and dinner table.  Not only will it not help with your recruitment, it may well get you into all sorts of trouble.

Data Protection

Data protection can also get you into trouble – as can Freedom of Information if you are in the public sector.  SO be very careful to record your notes of interviews accurately and without any inappropriate comments or doodles.  Ask yourself, how would I feel if this were on the front page of tomorrow’s newspaper?  If the answer is anything other than ‘I’d be happy – I could back up anything there with real evidence I gathered at the interview’ then think again.

What Else?

One of the most valuable questions for anyone whose task it is to learn from another person.  You cannot possibly ask all the important questions every time.  So a good question to end with is:

‘What else would you like to tell us, before we finish this interview?’

or

’What question would you like us to have asked you
– and how would you answer it?’

Management Pocketbooks you may enjoy

The Interviewer's Pocketbook

The Interviewer’s Pocketbook

The Managing Recruitment Pocketbook

Or, if you are expecting to be on the other side of the table…

The Succeeding at Interviews Pocketbook

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The New Manager’s Guide to Interviewing Part 2: Getting it Right

One of the most daunting tasks for a new manager is conducting their first job interviews. The stakes are high: get it wrong, and you may be stuck with a capable – but not that capable – colleague for years. Get it right, on the other hand, and you have not just added a huge asset to your organisation, but you will probably make your own life easier.

So what can you do to improve your chances of securing the right candidate?

This is the second of three articles that Management Pocketblog will offer you:

  1. Preparing the Ground
    Increase your chances of success well before the interview
  2. Getting it Right
    Hints and advice for conducting and effective interviews
  3. Polishing your Process
    Tips and tricks of the trade

Getting It Right

If you have prepared well, the interview is set to go well, but a few details are worth attending to:

  • You need a suitable place – a quiet and pleasant room, which is big enough for comfort but not so big that it overwhelms (unless that is the image you want to convey – because you work for a global merchant bank, for example)
  • You need long enough time slots to allow you to really gather the evidence, but not so long as to bore yourself and the candidate with the interview. Half an hour to an hour is about right – and it is your responsibility to keep the interview to time
  • Allow plenty of time between interviews to write up notes, refresh yourself and prepare for the next – 15 minutes at least.

Great Questions vs Great Questioning

In the preparation stage, you will have developed the questions you want to ask your candidates, but how you ask them is equally important.  This is where you can customise your approach to the details of what you learn about individuals.

Use the funnel process: start with an open question to give the candidate the opportunity to put their point of view in their own way, emphasising what they choose to, and then use probing follow-up questions to investigate details and evidence for the parts that are most relevant to you.  Only used closed, ‘yes/no’ questions to confirm specifics where you want to be absolutely certain you have a fact right.  Then, go back to another open question and repeat.

Avoid the temptation to grill your candidates, to try to catch them out, or to use trick questions .  Good questions focus on things like:

  • relevant experience, qualifications and expertise
  • problem solving skills
  • decision choices under realistic scenarios

The All-important Social Skills

Most jobs have an interpersonal component that makes social skills essential.  The early and closing stages of your interview are good for examining these, but be aware that interview nerves can mask some of the skills of even the best candidates.  Ask your receptionist or other colleagues who interact with the candidates to tell you how the candidates treat them.  Good candidates will treat receptionists with respect: poor ones will treat them as unimportant or worse.

Avoid the temptation to try and read body language cues.  You are probably not as good at it as you think, unless you are properly trained.  On the other hand, use all of your senses (except, perhaps, touch!) to get a feel for the candidate’s demeanour.

Responding to Answers

You job is to assess candidates objectively, but not to be judgemental about their answers.  Unless they step far out of line and exhibit the kind of behaviour that might elicit disciplinary action in a staff member, keep your reactions to their performance measured.  Stay interested in what you are hearing but don’t get caught up in supporting or decrying what they say.

If, however, they don’t say much, make it clear that you are not getting the answers or the detail you need to make a fair assessment. If they still remain evasive or vague, that is valuable information that the topic is a weak spot for them.  But they may simply be misjudging your question or setting the scene.  Say things like:

  • ‘Could you give us an example of that, please?’
  • ‘Here is an example… What would you do in these circumstances?’
  • ‘In that example, can you give me more detail about what happened?’

Who is Interviewing Whom?

Yes, it is a ‘buyers’ market’, with far more candidates than jobs, at the moment.  But don’t let that fool you into complacency.  There are probably still fewer first class candidates for many jobs than there are jobs, and you want the best, right?  So make sure you give your candidates a chance to learn about you and your organisation too.  Be on your best behaviour and conduct the interview to impress.  That way, when you know who it is you really want to have working with you, your job offer is likely to be accepted.

Next Time…

… we’ll be looking at a few extra tips and tricks, to sharpen up your performance.

Management Pocketbooks you may enjoy

The Interviewer's Pocketbook

The Interviewer’s Pocketbook

The Managing Recruitment Pocketbook

Or, if you are expecting to be on the other side of the table…

The Succeeding at Interviews Pocketbook

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The New Manager’s Guide to Interviewing Part 1: Preparing the Ground

One of the most daunting tasks for a new manager is conducting their first job interviews.  The stakes are high: get it wrong, and you may be stuck with a capable – but not that capable – colleague for years.  Get it right, on the other hand, and you have not just added a huge asset to your organisation, but you will probably make your own life easier.

So what can you do to improve your chances of securing the right candidate?

In a series of three articles, Management Pocketblog will offer you:

  1. Preparing the Ground
    Increase your chances of success well before the interview
  2. Getting it Right
    Hints and advice for conducting and effective interviews
  3. Polishing your Process
    Tips and tricks of the trade

Preparing the Ground

Your interview can only be successful if you get the right candidates in front of you, so your process needs to start right back at the beginning – thinking clearly about the role you need to fill.  Avoid the lazy option of re-issuing an existing job description and start afresh.

The Job Requirements

Look at your requirements in terms of the job, your organisation’s short and medium term plans, the team of people that is there, and what you believe it will take to do the work to the highest standards.  This is time consuming and will doubtless require consultation and negotiation.  But if you get it wrong, two risks emerge; either:

  1. You get someone who fits the job description (JD) perfectly, but it is the wrong JD, so you have the wrong person.
  2. You get the right person despite the poor JD, and then other candidates can legitimately claim that the interview process was unfair, in not selecting against the published JD.

Handling the Advertising and Admin

How you advertise the vacancy and handle enquiries will tell candidates a lot about your organisation.  The impression that they form may be fair or false, but it will influence everything from how candidates present themselves to you at interview to whether they accept a job you offer.  So, if you get that wrong, a good candidate may mis-judge you and perform poorly or may succeed at interview, only to turn you down.

How many times have you phoned a business up and had to wait for a grumpy person to take your call and then lose you in the system?  Would you want to work for that company?  No?  Neither will the best candidates.

Do your Reading

When applications and CVs come in, take the sifting process seriously.  Evidence-based sorting and shortlisting is not just fairer than impression-based selection: it gives better results.  So before any responses come back, devise a set of criteria to rate or rank all applications.  Do so on the basis of the factors that matter most to this role, and choose a small number of factors.  Keep the process simple and then evaluate each application scrupulously against these criteria.

Ideally, have two people do it independently and average the scores.  Before doing that, examine any applications where the two give substantially different scores.  Work together to examine the evidence in the application and decide which of you mis-read the application.

Prepare for the Interview 1

Create an interview process that focuses on the most relevant skills, experience and characteristics for the job.  Avoid clever tricks (more in the next blog) and questions designed to catch the candidate out.  Instead, presume that each candidate is ideal for the job and design a process that allows each to show how she or he fits perfectly and what extra qualities they bring.  Some will fail to give you the evidence that convinces you, and you will exclude them.  This approach is better than risking catching out a perfect candidate with a clever trick, while the so-so candidate sails through by playing it safe.

Prepare for the Interview 2

In the perfect world, all applications would be rendered into uniform, relevant data only briefs before interviewers read them ahead of the interview.  This means that, in preparing,you only see the relevant information and are not distracted by irrelevancies (for example, gender, age, and sometimes layout and handwriting).

Whether you have the resources to do this or not, read the information that you have carefully and highlight the most salient details, which you wish to explore in the interview.  Highlight those sections and note your questions.  Avoid putting smart remarks like ‘obviously a lie’ on them, as these papers may be disclosable under the Data Protection Act and so open you up to tribunal or worse.

If you do suspect a problem, use phrases like ‘explore in detail’  instead.  You need to know each application and CV thoroughly before the candidate walks through the door.

Next Time…

… we’ll be looking at the interview itself.

Management Pocketbooks you may enjoy

The Interviewer's Pocketbook

The Interviewer’s Pocketbook

The Managing Recruitment Pocketbook

Or, if you are expecting to be on the other side of the table…

The Succeeding at Interviews Pocketbook

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Reward Failure

Yup, you heard me.

Nice Try

But why?

Well, first, we need to define terms:

Reward: celebrate, congratulate, give praise.

Failure: making the effort and not succeeding.

You get what you reward, right?

Dead right.  So, if you only reward success, people will succeed more, yes?  Of course yes.  But to achieve that, what behaviours will you get?

Protective, cautious behaviours that are calculated to minimise the risk of failure of course.

So what will change?  Very little – too much risk.  In fact, all you will get is ‘safe’.

But what if you reward failure?

Well, if you just reward failure, that would be silly.

But if you reward the effort,

… and if you include in your evaluation of effort the good judgement that leads to well calculated risks

… and if you assess ‘well calculated’ against the evidence available at the start, and eschew ‘hindsight bias’

Then maybe your team will realise that success is not easy, but that striving for real, hard-fought, worthwhile success is something you value – and so should they.

Reward good judgement and effort – not success, which may, after all, have little to do with either, and everything to do with luck.

Don’t reward luck.

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