If you are in a managerial position, one of the most important tasks you have is to coach to your employees. Your must do whatever is necessary to ensure you have a team made up of players who have the skills, training, and motivation to be the best they can be.
An important part of coaching includes reviewing your employees’ performance. To achieve this, you must know what duties your employees are responsible for and how well they are performing. Everyone needs benchmarks, both personally and professionally. It serves as a road map: They are here at Point A, and you, as their superior, eventually want them at Point B.
It is critical that, as a manager, you identify where your employees are and give them a road map to get them to where you want them to be. Just as athletic coaches must observe their players in action to better understand what areas need improvement, you must assess and critique your employees on a regular basis. Then you must use that information to develop a plan that will drive them to improve their performance.
Here are seven steps to performing a proper and effective assessment that not only assists you in the process, but also provides your employees with the valuable feedback and a realistic blueprint for professional growth and development.
1. Take Your Time
Set aside a specific amount of time on your calendar for the review process and share it with your employees. Avoid creating scheduling conflicts. Make sure an individual’s allotted review time is not only convenient for both of you, but also does not conflict with their other daily or weekly duties. Also, let them know well in advance that you will be discussing performance-related topics, so they have time to adequately prepare.
2. Complete An Assessment
A performance assessment will lead you through the evaluation and help you to grade employees’ actions and levels of improvement. Provide the assessment to employees before the meeting so they will be familiar with the process and the questions you will be asking them.
3. Generate Feedback
Ask employees to assess their own performances. Have them deliver their self-assessments to you in advance of the meeting so you have time to go over them. Ask them to examine their interactions with your customers, their coworkers, and other members of the organization and to identify where they think they excel and where they can improve.
4. Do Due Diligence
Connect with employees in advance of their meetings. Send an email reminding them of the specific time and date for the assessment, as well as what any materials you expect them to bring with them. Also, provide some thought points for them to consider for discussion.
5. Turn Off The Outside World
Avoid distractions during the meeting. Turn off your cell phone, and let other employees and colleagues know you will be busy for the next hour. It is important that you focus on employees and let them know they have your full attention—that they are your priority for the next 60 minutes.
6. Utilize Documentation
Review employees’ files or refer to notes you have taken in the past regarding their performance, expectations met, specific achievements, or incidents—positive and negative—during the assessment period. Use that documentation to gauge the success of past goals while creating a plan for improved or continued performance.
7. Be Clear and Concise
Clearly communicate your plan with each employee. Work with employees to create a plan and to get a buy-in for implementing it over the course of the next year or review period. This requires that you have an open dialogue where you offer feedback and reinforce best practices while asking employees for their input and suggestions on ways they can learn and increase success.
Just as good coaches will assess each player’s strengths and weaknesses to develop a plan to improve their abilities, you must take information from your employee assessments to provide them with the tools they need to improve their performance. Assessments offer you and your workers the opportunity to have an open and honest dialogue that will be the foundation for improved employee performance.
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