Mary Clarke

Every private and public sector organization in the world faces risks which could jeopardize - or potentially jeopardize - the success of their operation. Human error is one of the biggest threats to successful business operations and performance. <br /><br />Over the past ten years, my company has implemented assessments to measure the performance of over 1.2 million employees at hundreds of companiesincluding 12 of the world's top 100 brands. The data we have gathered will shock many: on average 23 per cent of employees do not understand at least one crucial aspect of their job. If nearly a quarter of your staff are underperforming in their job, what impact is that having on your bottom line? The problem of how to mitigate business risk due to suboptimal employee performance is one that should keep CEOs and HR directors awake at night.<br /><br />An effective way to address this problem is to include employee assessments as an integral part of your company's talent management strategy. Even the most able senior level staff can make mistakes, however well trained for the job. They may actually misunderstand their roles and responsibilities, incorrectly applying what they think they know and need to do to get the job done correctly. Such misunderstanding can have serious consequences for the business, namely: safety failures, security breaches, shareholder mistrust, lost revenues and lost customers. Consider a finance manager not fully understanding the products they are selling, an emergency medical technician not mastering emergency medical procedures, or a sales manager incorrectly explaining the terms of a services agreement to a key customer.<br /><br />The importance of conducting regular employee assessments cannot be understated. Yet today, surprisingly few companies incorporate assessments into their talent management process. Without regular assessments, companies are ill equipped to identify the extent to which employees truly comprehend how to fulfill the requirements of their jobs, have the capability and confidence to perform their jobs and are likely to make big decisions on behalf of the company. <br /><br />Assessments that are useful to companies must provide access to vital but previously unattainable workplace data - objective measurements of employee understanding. That is, useful assessments need to identify levels of employee understanding, competence and confidence, while at the same time help businesses see the strategic and financial impact of suboptimal employee performance. Corporate assessment systems typically rely on management to make a subjective assessment about an employee's performance, drawing from a personal development plan. Worse still, some companies rely on employees themselves making these judgments about how well they understand crucial aspects of their job. Subjective methods fall short because they cannot be sustained over the long term, nor provide concrete data for both management and employees to measure improvement over time after each new assessment phase.<br /><br />Companies looking to get more from their talent management systems can commission customized assessments, designed by subject matter experts to highlight where knowledge gaps lie in a specific topic area or vertical market. With such assessments, companies can analyze performance by course, individual, group, team, geography, office location, service, product line or enterprise wide basis. They may also choose to issue assessments in conjunction with a psychometric test, giving them for the first time a complete, highly detailed summary of the precise skills and competencies of their workforce. <br /><br />Companies can opt to integrate employee assessments within an existing corporate development and learning framework as tools to test whether individuals can qualify for exemption from certain requirements relating to training. For example, for a global bank that wants to improve customer service across several regional markets, a well-crafted assessment gives them access to a complete, highly detailed database of the precise skills and competencies of its entire associate structurefrom Tellers to Banking Center Managers.<br /><br />Assessments can also be used to identify those employees who do understand their jobs, but lack the confidence to make the right decisions in tough business situations. By drawing out this data, management can empower employees to gain the confidence needed to do the right thing. Conducting regular assessments allows individuals to reach their true potential so that employers can in turn continuously improve business performance.<br /><br />Today's most successful companies know where the risksactual and potentialare and have systems in place to mitigate against those risks before the worst should happen. Employee assessments should be a key tool in the arsenal to ensure top performance at all levels of the organization.