Most business owners would agree that one of their major goals is to have a capable and motivated employee team. But what is the best way to accomplish this? Simplistically, most people will feel motivated and will want to stay in their job if their manager:
- Pays attention to their work.
- Provides them with a job to match their skills, knowledge and experience.
- Gives them opportunities to grow and develop.
- Judges their performance objectively and provides useful feedback.
Periodic Performance Appraisals
In many companies, the annual appraisal is the only meeting during the year when an average or better worker will meet his or her boss to discuss performance. People with poor performance can and do have a regular audience with their manager; sometimes on a weekly basis. Your appraisal form is the document that is held on file as a record of how good, bad or indifferent you might have been.
Unfortunately for some employees, this may be the only time in the year that they receive acclaim and even these may be guarded comments because of the close link in everyone's mind between appraisal and pay raise. Too much praise might raise expectations of a large pay increase. Poor performers, however, frequently receive far more than their fair share of management attention throughout the year.
If paying attention to our employees is one of the greatest motivators, why do we implicitly feel that high performers need less motivation than poor performers? Of course they don't! Some more progressive companies have introduced regular coaching and mentoring sessions to supplement the appraisal system and to give all employees a regular opportunity to talk about their job, their performance against their objectives, their motivation, and their aspirations.
Coaching
Consider two different sports oriented analogies:
- The Spectator - sits in the stands eating a hot dog, throwing down a beer, and belting out criticism at the players (their staff) on the field. There is almost no connection between the spectator and the team other than they happen to be sitting in the same building.
- The Coach - works individually with players, helping them to overcome setbacks and obstacles to progress forward. They know and understand how their players respond to different types of motivation and how their family life and health impact their performance. The coach regularly works with everyone in the team, understanding the strengths and weaknesses before they are tested under pressure, recognizing both successes and challenges.
If your only feedback to your staff is in the form of an annual performance appraisal, you are acting as more of a spectator than a coach. Try one or more of these ideas and you become more of a coach. You may find that your team reacts well to the increased recognition and their work output steps up a notch:
- Hold a weekly structured (or unstructured) 1:1 meeting with every direct report
- Regularly stop by to ask questions about how work is progressing rather than waiting for the end of a project.
- Recognize project completions or important milestones, taking time to highlight the hard work that was necessary to achieve success
- Hold separate "career development" meetings annually. These should be focused on where an individual seeks to go rather than how well he/she is doing.
