Maximize Employee Adoption

Do you love your performance review process? Was it a super quick, painless process? Do your employees find your annual reviews inspiring? Probably not.

If you’ve been in HR/People Operations for more than a few years, you likely know that traditional reviews are just simply ineffective at developing and retaining employees. 

So now what? Maybe you are thinking about implementing a new continuous performance management tool to help solve your problem. However, this alone isn’t a silver bullet either. 

Many HR/People Operations professionals have spent countless hours and resources setting up their new performance management tools, only to find out that their employees hate it. More often than not, just implementing a continuous performance management tool doesn’t actually create a culture of feedback and accountability that develops, motivates, and retains employees. 

We understand this challenge very closely - we are that sexy, new performance management tool. So… how do you create this elusive culture of feedback and accountability? More specifically, how do you get your employees to love it and adopt it? 

In our experience, tools that are implemented without the right support and processes will not transform organizations. Here are three drivers that we need to think about if we actually want to create change: sponsorship, education, and process.

Sponsorship: You must have buy-in and role-modeling behaviors from leaders across your organization. Get them involved from the get-go and hold them accountable for the processes that you have put in place. Leaders need to lead by example (“walk the talk”).

Education: You must educate your employees on why it’s important to foster this culture of feedback and accountability, as well as how they should act on it. For example, you need to educate your employees on how to share feedback in an effective way. 

Process: You must have the processes in place to reinforce the right behaviors, which will turn into habits, and over time, a part of your culture. 

Having an easy-to-use tool is only one piece of the puzzle. While it makes managing employees’ performance easier (especially in a remote or hybrid environment), these three drivers are what will make a real difference in your team’s performance, development, and retention. 

Harrison Kim is the CEO of Pavestep - an employee feedback and performance management solution. He founded Pavestep to help organizations develop their people faster and retain them longer. He is obsessed with feedback, performance, and culture. He is a former McKinsey consultant and a former private equity investor specializing in the human capital management sector. Connect Harrison Kim