MightyRecruiterYour Guide to Leading Pain Free Performance Reviews
When you manage employees, it’s crucial to give them constructive feedback. You need to let them know how they’re doing on the job currently and how they can grow in the future. You may opt to give your team members annual or quarterly reviews to praise them for what they are doing right, correct any problems, and discuss their future with your organization. Here are some tips for giving pain free performance reviews.
Give Regular Feedback
In addition to the formally scheduled reviews, it’s important that you give your workers informal feedback regularly. Whether the critique is positive or negative, it’s important to let your employees know how they’re doing so they can continue on a good path, or correct issues before things get worse. You can also make a note of minor incidents as they come up and add the details to the formal report.
Write Comprehensive Reports
It’s important that you give all-inclusive written reports to your employees, along with their verbal reviews. Comprehensive and professionally worded documents lead to pain free performance reviews. Some of the areas to give feedback on are attitude, quality of work, interpersonal skills, leadership ability, ethics, job expertise, and self-development. Having everything in writing is not only helpful for your employees, but it is a necessary part of human-resources documentation.
Keep It Constructive
Pain free performance reviews should always be phrased constructively. This means that any criticisms or suggestions for improvement should be written up with an aim toward the positive. Instead of pointing out what individuals are doing wrong, specify what you want them to do in the future. It’s also helpful to begin each review with a positive comment, such as, ïYou are well liked by your coworkers, but need to work on your report accuracy.ï A person will be much more receptive if he or she isn’t put on the defensive from the first word.
Focus on Behavior
When it’s time to have a difficult conversation with an employee about problems that are occurring, be sure to focus on their behavior rather than their attitude. Before you meet with the individual, clarify the behavior you want the person to change. For example, instead of saying, ïYou don’t seem to care as much about your job lately,ï say, ïYour weekly reports contained 20 percent more mistakes during the past month.ï When you stick to the facts, even challenging discussions can be handled painlessly.
Skip the Labels
It’s important that you not label workers if you want to have pain free performance reviews. Labeling can feel like an attack on a person’s character and value as a human, which can cause a breakdown in communication. Not only that, but your assumptions might be wrong. You might think a person is lazy, when really he or she is battling a personal problem or health challenge. Again, stick to the facts about behaviors and sidestep labeling at all costs.
Create Improvement Plans
If you’ve called a problem to a team member’s attention, the next step is to give him or her a performance-improvement plan. This document should clearly detail what your expectations and goals for the future are, which gives your employee a chance to correct his or her subpar behavior. The improvement plan should also specify what steps will be taken if the problems aren’t corrected. For example, let the worker know that failure to fix the difficulties can result in suspension, demotion, or termination.
Have a Discussion
During pain free performance reviews, it’s always best to encourage discussion. Don’t just deliver a review as a monologue. Pose open-ended questions and ask for feedback in response to the evaluation. For example, ask queries such as, ïHow do you view this situationï or ïWhat are your thoughts on this reviewï You’re not trying to start an argument, but you do want to encourage an honest conversation while you’re sitting face to face.
Wrap It Up Positively
End your evaluation meetings on a positive note. No matter whether an employee has received high marks or has much to improve upon, you want to encourage the individual toward a brighter future. Keep your language upbeat and focus on lifting the worker’s spirits so that he or she move toward doing his or her best work down the line.
Pain free performance reviews communicate to your team members about their strengths and weaknesses in a productive manner. By following these tips, your workforce can move toward success. For more suggestions and helpful hints for effectively managing your staff, take a look at the resources on Mighty Recruiter.