Feedback Fury: Not getting what you want out of an employee?

Do you need to address performance issues with your staff?  Do you worry that you’re just not getting the message across to your employee?

If you wish to have a productive performance meeting with your employee, then it’s important to script and plan your discussion beforehand.  Here are some basic steps to plan your meeting to ensure that your feedback is effective and drives results.

1. Describe the behavior in objective terms.

Be specific, objective and state the facts!   In this step, everything you state should be based off of observations of what was said or done.   Avoid generalities and make sure to provide the employee’s behavior specifically and concretely.

e.g. “I see on your timesheet that you have been arriving to work over 30 minutes late 4 times last week and 3 times this week.   I did not receive any notice from you on these events.   We have discussed your tardiness 2 months ago and you stated that you would improve on arriving to work early and contact me the morning of if you are having any issues.”

2. Don’t jump to conclusions and check your facts.

Give the benefit of the doubt and ASK your employee if you are missing any facts before moving on to the next step of the conversation.  Most likely you can proceed, but it is important to give the employee a chance to express any concerns (a.k.a. excuses which may or may not affect your conversation).   Also, it may uncover a blind spot or an important fact which you have missed.

3. Express the impact of this behavior or problem.

What effect does their behavior have?   Why should they even care?   In this step, describe how their behavior affected team performance, productivity, timelines, budget, quality, and most importantly, customer satisfaction.

e.g. “Your tardiness has caused our staff to cover your opening shift duties and delayed the opening of our store by 15 minutes.  Customers have been unhappy and have expressed concerns with the integrity of our business.”

4. Specify the behavioral change.

You have stated the behavioral issue and what effect it has on performance.  Now this is your moment to state clearly what you would like to change and the expectations you are setting for that employee.  Now, this can be tough and there is a good balance between authority and agreement.   Ask for agreement and make sure that the employee is able to clearly repeat back the specific behavioral change that you are expecting.

e.g. “I also expect that you are not late more than 4 days a month.  On the days that you cannot make it to work on time, I expect that you call me on my mobile number immediately, preferably the day before.”

5. Stipulate the consequences.

After agreement on expectations of change, it is important that you stipulate positive or negative consequences for change in behavior or no change in behavior.

e.g. “If you do not meet the expectations that I specify above, you will receive a written warning that will be put permanently on your record, therefore impacting your end of the year performance review.  If this behavior continues, corrective action will be taken further than written warning up to and including termination.”

6. Follow up.

Hold them accountable.  Set a date when you meet again to re-evaluate their performance.   Express your support and state that you want them to be successful.

Conclusion.

Plan your discussion using the steps above and it will ensure that you have a much more effective performance feedback meeting with your employee.   Stay objective, specific, firm and clear with your verbiage.  Make sure that the employee understands you and be open to understanding them.   Ask them to repeat your expectations back to you and ask them to sign a written agreement, if needed.  Show that you are interested in their success on your team.

What other thoughts do you have on this?  What steps do you use to provide effective feedback to your employees?

“Great Meeting!” …a quote you rarely hear.

I am confident that we all have attended a meeting at some point in our lives where the facilitator had no agenda, the discussions jumps from one end to another, and you’re left wondering what the whole point of the meeting was.

A little thought and preparation into the meeting is all it takes to lead an effective meeting!   Below are some simple concepts to make the best out of your meetings.

Make sure the meeting is necessary

Why should others care?  Is this topic really important?   Don’t meet just to have another meeting!   Make sure that there’s an actual reason to meet.  Usually this is indicated by asking yourself:

“Why do we need to meet?”
“Do we need to accomplish a goal?”
“What is that goal?”
“Can we accomplish the goal without having to meet?”

After you ask yourself these questions, then start off your meeting with “We are meeting today because….”

Develop an agenda ahead of time

I’ve seen all sorts of agendas, including ones on fancy paper in the structured outline format.  All of that is not required!  Keep it simple.  You can use a napkin to write down your agenda! (Probably not the best advice in the professional setting.)

But all jokes aside, the point is that having an agenda gives you the opportunity to think ahead of time. Do you ever leave a meeting realizing that you forgot to bring up a major point?   Also, by creating an agenda, you are left with a structured checklist to follow, which makes running the meeting much easier for you as the leader and easier to follow as an attendant.    It takes 5 minutes before the meeting to think about the things you want to bring up and the approach you will take.

Develop/point out ground rules

We’re not in 2nd grade, so what does this really mean?  This means to simply clarify your procedure and approach to your meeting.   For example, you can start off your meeting by saying “We’re going to allow John to speak about the Widgets Software, then we’ll go around the room counterclockwise to provide feedback.” Simple ground rules set your attendees’ expectations and helps others understand and promote the flow of the meeting.

Listen and participate!

You want to gain something from this meeting too, right?   If you are facilitating and are vested in the issue being discussed, take off your facilitator’s hat so you can fully participate in the discussion.

Just remember, keep the conversation focused and on track with the agenda.  If extended discussion is needed on a particular topic, suggest that it is brought offline or in another meeting so that you can move on to the next item of the agenda.

Clarify decisions and action items that are made at each meeting

Typically in good discussions, the underlying verdict tends to get buried.   As a facilitator, clarify and restate what decisions have been made. For example, this is simple as stating “… before moving on to the next topic, do we agree that John will work with Mary on developing the extra components for the Widgets software due at the end of the month?”

For action items, take notes and go over the list at the end of the meeting.  Reviewing the action items list at the very end of the meeting gives your participants the opportunity to write them down and leave the meeting with the to-do’s fresh on their minds.

Put out minutes within one week after the meeting (best right away)

Why take the extra time to type your notes and send out?  Well how many times have your colleagues been confused or disagreed with you on what happened in the meeting?   Having meeting minutes sent out clarifies to all those who attended and that missed it the key points touched on and action items the group left with.

Make sure to review your notes and clarify what you didn’t understand right after the meeting.    Focus on action items and not discussions.  Get straight to the point – define decisions made and record actions items to be taken by whom and when (be specific).  Accountability is key.

Ask for a 2nd set of eyes to look over your notes to make sure that you didn’t miss anything.  It’s easy to miss an idea or thought during a meeting.

Take note of group dynamics and address them

Do you ever notice silence or patterns of late arrivals from particular group members?  Take note of this and work on addressing those issues after the meeting.   In regards to those that arrive late, it is not only unfair to those that are on-time but the value of the meeting is degraded and you can (and will) be perceived as having a lack of leadership and control.

Do you have any tips to share?   Please add your comments below!