A Simple Performance System
I’m not happy. 
We’ve had the pleasure of working with a medium-size, privately held company in the energy sector for the last two years; in that time, we’ve provided two phases of customized leadership skills training to their 80 or so managers and have recently begun delivering a scaled-down (in terms of time) version of the same training to their shop foremen. Our training has been greeted with universal acclaim by the participants, from the President on down.
Different company/different training: We recently completed a series of Trouble Shooting Logic (TSL) training sessions, in which we train employees in rigorous problem solving methods, provide ample practice, then coach use of the TSL tools to solve ongoing, in-plant problems. Again, the participants were thoroughly pleased and,
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[The second in a series of email tips that we provide as part of our follow up / ongoing support for clients who have completed our Performance Coaching workshop. See the first Performance Coaching tip here.]
Remember that the primary goal of any performance conversation is that the associate takes full responsibility for his or her actions and results. Everything we as supervisors do or say in a performance conversation should support that assumption of responsibility.
Most supervisors have been trained to “tell” the associate what’s wrong and how it “needs to be fixed.” We agree, partially …
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[The following is the first in a series of email "reminders" that we provide as part of our follow up / ongoing support for clients who have completed our Performance Coaching & FeedBack workshop. Hope that you enjoy. -- Rob]
Congratulations on successful completion of the Performance Coaching & FeedBack workshop. We know that the skills you have learned will be a huge benefit to you and to your employees to the degree that you step out and use them. I encourage you to make good on your commitment to deliberately employ the process to the performance issues you are addressing. Deliberate use will make you more proficient and more confident, both of which translate into more effective conversations.
As we discussed during the workshop, there are five steps to the Performance Coaching process:
The first step of the Performance Coaching process is “Praise Performance.” Praising Performance “works” in that it reinforces positive behaviors and achievements that you want to see repeated; it affirms the associate’s good work; it shows your attentiveness; and it expresses your appreciation.
Praising Performance also works because it prepares the associate to receive constructive criticism … ONLY IF you regularly recognize an associate’s good work and make it a regular part of your performance conversations with him or her.
This Week’s Reminder: Praise Regularly. When you see good work, recognize it. All the time, every time you see it. Then, when you need to have a conversation to raise performance, your associate will be ready to hear your FeedBack.
“Rob, we need to talk. She’s not a team player, and she’s not getting with the program!”
My friend is the Assistant Director of a nonprofit with a heavy summer workload. She had been meeting with program staff, feverishly finishing planning for the upcoming sessions. Afterwards, she approached me about one of her senior staff.
I know this staff person – she has been a participant in our Train-the-Trainer on three separate occasions and has run various aspects of their summer program. This year, she is over the whole youth program.
She is very talented. She knows her stuff … and she knows that she knows her stuff. All good.
But she is not showing the willingness to “get with the program.”
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I saw it again yesterday evening: a presentation on leadership that made much hay (and took several slides) to explain the difference between leadership and management.
Just my two cents, but I am curious as to how the outcome of this discussion matters. I don’t mean to disparage others who have gone before by this comment, as I have pondered this question in the past as well. Don’t we all want our managers to exercise (within their field of decision rights) those characteristics which are usually associated with leadership? Don’t most leaders have to exercise some function(s) associated with management? Rather than encouraging managers to focus on “management duties” and leaders to focus on “visioning,” why not have them both focus on whatever knowledge and skill sets are needed in their particular situations to guide their organizations to superior performance? I think that we would find the resulting competencies to be a mixture of both “pure” leadership and “pure” management, whatever the individual’s rank in the corporate hierarchy.
