Planning and developing employees for performance

Only 3 things happen naturally in organisations; frictions, confusion and underperformance. Everything else requires effective planning and leadership.” Peter Drucker

Planning and developing employee performance is probably one of the most effective ways to ensure organisational performance and its ultimate success. It makes employees more capable and willing to assume more control over their jobs.

As simple as this sound, we are constantly amazed by the number of companies we come across where performance planning is not a conscious, deliberate and consistent practice. These same organisations then wonder why they are not achieving their desired results.

Performance Planning and Development is a MUST for any organisation seeking to thrive and sustain performance and it begins by providing a clear definition of expected outcomes for a given position and continues by identifying those behaviours (best practices) and/or competencies that will lead to those outcomes. It defines clearly the non-negotiable expectations for individual performance and serves to: Measure individual performance; Provide individual performance feedback; Develop personal improvement and progression plans and create and deliver Performance Management training/development programmes and coaching

5 Steps to Performance Planning and Development

Identify key result areas (KRSs) for a given position

KRAs are not metrics or behaviours but broad categories over which an individual has accountability and which are critical to his/her success. The identified KRAs should be between 4 and 6. Some examples of key result areas for a Business Manager may include: New business generation; Retention of existing customers and ensuring quality relationships with customers; Quality of the service or product; People Management and Development and Operational Efficiency and effectiveness

Identify model of Success

Conduct interviews and/or focus groups with star performers and their managers to identify “best practices” or core competencies related to each Key Result Area.

Once broad areas of accountability have been established, you identify sub-categories. For example, for the Key Result Area “new business generation”, sub-categories might include identifying and qualifying target prospects, developing sales and new business development collaterals, planning and executing sales activities.

Once sub-categories have been established, you then conduct interviews or focus groups to identify specific behavioural practices of the organisation’s top performers in each of these areas. If you are doing this for the sub-category of generating new business, the specific behaviours might include: Ability to effectively research and pre-qualify the right target customers; Ability to develop and successfully deploy effective sales materials/collaterals; Sales and closing skills; Ability to follow through on projects and commitments and Effective Time Management Skills; Knowing how to find a balance between the urgent and the important

Write and administer a 360 degree survey or competency audit based on these best practices to identify how well people are demonstrating the required behaviour for success

These practices, taken from your highest performers are very useful in determining the competency gaps that exists within the organisation. One approach to determining the magnitude of gaps is to conduct a competency based assessment.

Provide feedback and develop personal improvement plans for each person

Once survey results are tallied, a manager (and perhaps a HR professional) should sit down with each individual and provide them feedback as well as help these individuals identify areas that require improvement and then create a personal development plan.

Develop tailored training to meet specific developmental needs

Training and coaching can then be developed from the results of this feedback to help individuals improve in areas of weakness. This training is not “blanket” but pertains to the deficits of specific individuals or groups of individuals within specific roles.

Performance planning and development grounds good business practices in specific and measurable actions which can become a roadmap for helping employees know where they are, where they should be headed and how they will get there.

Implementing the steps described above will go a long way in significantly improving the probability of success for any organisation that is disciplined enough to be deliberate about planning and developing for Performance.

Bolaji Olagunju is the Lead Consultant and CEO of Workforce Group. He helps organisations with transformation and business improvement efforts via the design and deployment of service offerings in the areas of Strategy Planning and Execution, Organisational Design and Development, Corporate Universities/Academy Design and Implementation, Change Management, Performance Management Design and Implementation as well as Business Process Outsourcing.

Bolaji Olagunju