When organisations look to improve performance management they typically look at the process, redesign the paperwork and possibly reinvent competencies or role profiles rather than address the real challenge which is about getting managers and leaders to do it well.
Performance management training or development tends to focus on handling difficult conversations and managing underperformance. But managing performance is much more than this. It requires an understanding of what affects performance at work. Providing clarity about job purpose and objectives and how this supports the business is a key part of performance management along with the skill of being able to assess performance and identify the causes of underperformance.
Giving feedback and coaching are obviously key skills which can be developed over time once the basic understanding and awareness has been grasped.
Our approach is to work over time with leaders to ensure that they understand how to set performance standards as well as developing the skills to assess and develop individuals. The next stage is to provide development in coaching and mentoring skills so they can support indidiual and team development. Over 12-18 months leaders gradually acquire the skills and understanding, taking time to apply what they learn. Highly practical workshops provide plenty of opportunity to try out new approaches and receive feedback.
Outcomes include higher employee engagement, increased overall performance and more accurate performance data that can be used for recruitment, talent management and development needs analysis.
Please get in touch if you are interested in finding out more.
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We do lots of things on the Influencing Skills programme to provide people with as much practice as possible and they receive feedback about their style and the impact that they have on others. We use professional actors so participants explore real situations that they have either faced in the past or need to face in the future. What struck me this week is the complexity of the whole topic of influencing and the range of situations that participants brought to the workshop.
By focusing on behaviour we help people think about how they are using their voice, body language and the words they use but there is much more to influencing than this. The work with actors allows us to explore all these angles of influencing as well as the basics.
Things like being really clear about your objectives is vital as well as having clear evidence or factual information that supports your views and allows the conversation to be based on reality rather than abstract ideas.
We sometimes enter into dialogue with people with assumptions about how it will go and this can affect our approach. We give up before we have even begun and whilst this may not come across in what we say it will come across in how we sound and look. Our views about ourselves and others comes out in the language we use - patronising when we feel someone needs “looking after”, tentative when we feel overpowered. Emotive or personal language can ignite strong feelings in others that then get in the way of problem solving. This is especially true when handling conflict or performance related problems.
Influencing a situation sometimes involves challenging the boss which for many people at the moment feels difficult- we might be reluctant to do this if we feel our jobs are at risk. Weighing up the costs and benefits of raising an issue or not can be a useful and objective approach to assess this. Explaining your thought process at the start of a conversation and even your fears and how you feel about something can signal to the other person the importance of what you are raising which underlines why they need to listen.
Finally, in my experience of working with groups, the most common mistake that people make is to think that influencing is about selling and telling not asking and listening. People will accept an idea if it fits with their goals and helps them - they won’t if you simply tell them. The old cliche of putting yourself in the other person’s shoes is so key when influencing. What’s in it for them? How much can they do? and how do they like to hear information are all questions to ask yourself and them.
For more information about work we do please link to personal skills training, case studies and role plays.
]]>Probably one of the most difficult balances an employer has to consider is the extent to which the graduate is there to deliver work for their manager, whilst the manager is there to help the graduate develop. Of course both are true, and they can often be the same thing, but it is a balance that requires skill and attention.
This is further complicated by the need for a line manager to see the graduate develop in a specific role, whilst in many businesses a “rounded graduate” is the ultimate goal of the development programme.
I’ve just come back from delivering a 2-day programme for supporting managers in getting the most from the graduates they manage. By adding this dimension to the graduate development programme, we can support graduates with more sustainable and context specific learning.
Perhaps equally important, we can help managers become much more engaged in the graduate development programme, better equipped to support it, and encouraged by the value the business places in their role.
As well as exploring the specific perspectives of the managers on the programme and getting them to work on these together, we use the GROW model to explore the coaching process.
We also look at behaviour - the application of theory - using 1:1 work with actors on what we call real-play, so managers can experiment with discussing difficult performance issues with real people, gaining valuable personal feedback.
We’ll be meeting the managers again in a few weeks, on the follow up day …
]]>You can also take part in our graduate survey for a chance to win a champagne box set! Every entry gets a comprehensive set of the survey results.
See you there!
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It’s well worth a read and is a free download from http://www.cipd.co.uk/subjects/lrnanddev/general/_Learning_and_development_summary.htm.
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