Reviews Don’t Work, Here’s a Tool for Performance Management

Professionals expect clarity in performance appraisals and promotions. Make sure the expectations are set clearly from the very first day and give frequent feedback along the way. We’ve adopted the Dale Carnegie Key Result Areas (KRAs) approach to talent management. We use the following questions:

  • What is the purpose of my job? This answer should be extremely simple, such as “selling our services.”
  • What do I need to do to make it happen? For someone in sales, the answer might be “call 100 potential clients every day.”
  • What tools do I need to be successful? For a salesperson, training in phone skills or negotiation techniques might be in order.
  • How do I know when results have been achieved?

Here’s a template to help you implement KRAs for performance management.

Employee Engagement: Alignment with Goals

Below are a couple of questions that an employee would be asked about how they fit in the big picture:

The biggest way a leader misses the mark is tying the individual into the overall mission and goals for the organization’s success.

For mission and goals, as a leader, if we can’t explain how an employee fits into the big picture, we can’t expect them to!

Ditto on values… if we can’t succinctly say our values, we can’t our people to!

If you don’t have values firmly defined, Google “Jim Collins Martian Exercise” and use that as a plan to define your organization’s values.

For values to work, they need to be integrated into the fabric of the firm. Here are a few ideas we implement at Intertech to weave values into our day-to-day operations:

How do you get everyone on the same page with a goal for the company? Consider a theme! A theme is something company-wide. It could be around hiring, creating content, or whatever is needed to move the organization forward. Below are some thoughts on creating a theme:

Learning from Leaders by Steve Schmidt

Guest Post

By Steve Schmidt, President, AbeTech Bar Code & RFID Solutions

When Tom Salonek wrote his book, The 100: Building Blocks for Business Leadership, I was eager to read it. I’ve long admired Tom’s company and the many awards it has received, not to mention Intertech’s consistent growth and profitability. I run a small business of my own and thought Tom’s book might give me some new ideas.

Oh boy, did it ever!

If you haven’t read The 100, I highly recommend it. This little book is crammed with practical management strategies that Tom has tested and proven at his company. Not only does the book provide 100 practical mini chapters (Tom calls them “takeaways”), it is sprinkled with fun quotes and Tom’s trademark humor. It’s the perfect book for a short business flight.

I should confess that Tom is my cousin, but please don’t think for a minute that this is a gushing “puff piece” based more on familial connections than merit. I’ve known the guy a long time and he’s always been highly motivated, focused and eager to learn and grow, both personally and professionally. He’s a, well, natural born leader. I’ve watched his company (and his family!) expand over time, and seen first-hand the productive and healthy workplace he and his partners have cultivated.

The word “mindfulness” is trendy now, but it’s a perfect description of Tom’s approach to business and life. By thinking and acting in deliberate mindful ways based on hard science and life experience, he has built a thriving organization on a solid foundation of values, like delivering beyond what is expected, treating people kindly and fairly, and keeping things in perspective. His book generously shares that experience and practical knowledge in an easy to digest format. It also comes with dozens of downloadable forms and other tools that I’m guessing are worth much more than the modest book price.

Now a confession.

When I first read The 100 it was still in the galley (pre-print) stage. Like the leader he is, Tom reaches out to others for input and alternative perspectives. I was happy to read the manuscript and give him my honest feedback. And, to be honest, I found it all to be a bit much. There are so many great ideas and recommendations; frankly, I wasn’t sure where to begin or how to implement them at my firm without losing a lot of time in the process.

I shared this reaction with Tom and he responded by explaining that following the ideas in The 100 actually save time by reducing surprises and increasing employee retention. Then he created a calendar showing how to implement his leadership program in the most efficient way possible. I reviewed the revised manuscript a second time and was pleased to give it my highest endorsement:

The 100 “artfully captures Salonek’s decades of leadership achievements and details repeatable steps that we all can take to improve our business results. Read the book, learn the secrets and enjoy the fruits of winning in the marketplace.”

30 Free Life and Business Tools

We’ve all been seduced by those that magic word “FREE.” It’s right up there with “life hacks” and “ageless” in its power to reel in even sophisticated consumers. Often, of course, we often find “free” comes with strings attached or the freebee is so lame you’d just as soon wished you’d passed.

I hope you’ll put aside all that valuable consumer experience and consider that I have something free to offer and valuable.  I’m talking about the couple of dozen free resource downloads that come with my book “The 100: Building Blocks for Business Leadership.”

The free downloads you’ll find associated with my book include templates and checklists. These are free, don’t require sharing your information, and don’t require a book purchase.

These tools are my go-to resources for:

Self Management:

Business Management:

Recruiting

Employee Management:

As you work through the takeaways in my book or the associated free resources, please feel free to reach out to me with any questions.

Building a Winning Business – Checking in with New Employees

Building-a-Winning-Business-BookSuccessfully launching a new employee means checking in on regular intervals to see how things are going. I recommend checking in after the person has been on the job for 30, 60, and 90 days.

  • These are informal opportunities to ask how things are going and whether the employee has clear direction on what he should be doing. We also ask whether he needs any tools or training and, most important, whether there is anything else we should be aware of or anything he would like to discuss.
  • Check-ins provide a one-on-one opportunity for employees to share thoughts and concerns. They also continue to communicate to employees that they’re important and you want them to succeed.

Tom’s Takeaway:  “Regular, informal check-ins with new employees let them know you are committed to their success. They also allow you to fix early problems before they fester into major issues.”

Download Available — D8:   www.Intertech.com/Winning-Business

Thoughts Since the Book

  •  Most check-ins result in a “all things are well” conversation.  While it may seem like overkill, the purpose of the check-ins is for those few occasions where all is not well and this dedicated, focused one-on-one provides an opportunity to fix an issue and keep an employee