The last 18+ months have introduced disruption, uncertainty, and ambiguity to all aspects of our lives—especially the ability to perform well at work. Of the more than 1,800 US workers surveyed, 57 percent say their mental health has deteriorated since the pandemic’s onset, with 50 percent blaming workload pressures, and only 37 percent listing fear of COVID-19 as a reason for mental distress.
The silver lining is that managers see pandemic-related disruptions as opportunities to reinvent how they engage with employees about performance, to promote and encourage more engaging and meaningful conversations, and to emphasize the focus on employee growth and development. At a recent performance management conference, for example, 58 percent of HR leaders reported that working from home forced managers to conduct more frequent conversations with employees about performance.
This is the time to take what we have learned as business and HR leaders and truly reexamine performance management practices, embracing a more employee-centric approach. Organizational leaders can use these five recommendations to take this next step:
- Clarify and communicate the purpose and key outcomes of a performance management process. Once merely focused on standardizing levels of achievement, pay, and promotion decisions, performance management practices have evolved into flexible systems that drive learning and growth. Performance ratings may create structure, but they do not improve performance in and of themselves.Instead, employees seek continuous feedback, actionable opportunities for development, and meaningful rewards and recognition. Clarifying the purpose of a performance management process and expected outcomes will have a positive impact on performance and productivity.
- Address real and perceived concerns of fairness, equity, and bias. Being aware of bias—and taking action to mitigate it—is essential for a fair and equitable performance evaluation process. Not only are employees unlikely to invest time and energy in a process that they perceive as biased, but they will question decisions made based on it. Leaders must create transparency into both the evaluation process and how its outcomes are used to make decisions about pay, rewards, promotions, or work assignments. Additionally, managers must understand their own intentional or unconscious biases and take steps to eliminate any influence these have on evaluations and talent decisions.
- Create an environment where performance feedback is relevant, timely, meaningful, and easily received from multiple sources. The current environment’s unpredictability underscores the need for adaptability, flexibility, and resilience. Employees who must make necessary adjustments or acquire new skills to perform their job and meet changing business demands need timely, valuable, actionable, and trusted performance feedback from peers, managers, and customers. Such information and insights allow employees to deliver their best performance. Leaders must evaluate their work environments and culture to ensure they encourage and support ongoing and impactful coaching and feedback.
- Empower and educate managers to play pivotal roles in the effectiveness of the performance management and development process. Managers’ ability to provide meaningful feedback and to guide individual and team performance continues to be a determining factor in the success of the performance management process. Organizations can encourage coaching and development conversations by managers and peers, where all employees receive authentic, evidence-based, and actionable feedback. Organizational leaders are taking several innovative steps, including providing managers with tools to lead through uncertainty, identifying alternative recognition strategies, revising or revisiting goals, and maintaining fairness while reevaluating plans. Companies including American Express, AT&T, Cisco, and Microsoft have invested in management-development initiatives that highlight and model effective feedback and support communications. Managers will need these new skills as they learn to communicate developmental feedback in novel ways.
- Listen to employees to understand their expectations for feedback, development, and growth. Understanding employees’ expectations about performance evaluation, feedback, and linkages to compensation will help to create a more employee-centric process. This input is more critical given that managers may have less direct contact with their employees, the work environment is increasingly ambiguous and unpredictable, and reports of burnout are growing. As an example, ADP, an HR software and service provider, has implemented weekly check-ins between associates and their managers. These check-ins drive engagement, facilitate communication, and positively influence ongoing associate performance and development. Organizations that recognize employees’ needs and expectations and respond quickly are more likely to improve performance, engagement, and retention.
Looking Ahead for Performance Management
Performance management practices will continue to move beyond their transactional aspects and represent an employee-centric approach to development and feedback. All leaders play a critical role in this ongoing transformation by displaying empathy, resilience, and a capacity to adapt during challenging times. As organizations adjust to recent events, they must continue to listen to their employees, adapting their performance management practices to their workforce’s needs. Performance management, evaluation, and development will continue to be a critical and organic process; its evolution can create a culture focused on growth, resilience, and productivity for the future.
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