Sounds simple enough…After hiring talent to produce results for the organization, you let them loose to perform! Business results are achieved and everyone is happy (both the organization leadership and the new hire). All the leader has to do to get the return on his/her investment is leverage the employee’s expertise to ensure that the business results are achieved. To do this, requires that the leader execute performance management. Performance management involves the following three steps: 1) set goals/objectives (establish the target) for the employee, 2) manage the employee’s day/day performance through direction, coaching, feedback (keep their focus on the target and redirect their behavior as necessary) and 3) evaluate their performance (tell them if they hit the target and if not, explain what they could do differently next time). While these steps seem fundamental and most leaders are aware of them, many do not execute them because it takes time or they don’t feel comfortable doing it. There in lies the opportunity. Business results are achieved by not only knowing what to do but also executing all three steps in a clear and consistent manner with your people at all levels in the organization. This article uses a case example to illustrate what happens when well meaning leaders hire the experts and then do not execute performance management. As a result, they leave their return on their talent investment to chance.
The Case
A new employee, Todd, was hired for his twenty years experience in a real estate management company. He is located in the new regional office in the East coast; the corporate office is located on the West coast. At the East coast office, there are several managers with expertise to support the business model. However, no one person is accountable for the region’s success and communication flow from corporate. Therefore, communication flows to everyone, after all, corporate wants to keep everyone informed. Meanwhile, Todd has yet to meet the President of the company. He receives a barrage of emails with questions about the various real estate day-day activities and a weekly conference call that challenges the events of the prior week. While the environment is not hostile, it lends itself to a lot confusion re roles and excessive emails to avoid the proverbial finger pointing. Todd does not have a position description to date. He asked for a position description during the interview process, and did not receive one. He was assured that his experience would be valued and leveraged. So Todd continues to perform doing what has always worked well for him in past companies, after all, that is why he was hired, right?
After a couple of weeks on the job, Todd’s expertise was leveraged. Corporate adds more projects to his portfolio. Now he has conflicting priorities re what he thought he was hired to do and the new duties assigned. He has requested clarification many times from the corporate office and has yet to receive a clear and consistent response. Meanwhile the work mounts along with Todd’s frustration. Todd continues doing what he knows best with very little feedback, except when one of his decisions is being questioned or challenged by corporate. Others in the region office have experienced the same thing, where they requested clarification and have received a conflicting or vague response. Now their approach is heads down, do not ask do not tell. They feel that if they do not ruffle feathers, corporate will leave them alone to do their job. Meanwhile, success for the East coast region has yet to be defined, other than to make it profitable.
Observations
Clear performance expectations have not been set and communicated. (Step 1 in Performance Management process is missing.) “Goals direct attention, increase persistence, and motivate development of strategies or plans to attain those goals” (Findley and Amsler, 2003). Without goals/objectives, Todd’s likelihood of hitting the target is left to chance. Being an expert, he performs doing what he thinks is best for the portfolio, only to find that others in the regional office may have other priorities based on their roles, and they do not necessarily align with his. Without the Region’s key goals and objectives, each team member continues to perform individually, not as a team that can leverage their expertise towards a common goal and company mission. This individual effort, a common spray and pray approach, results in a lot of wheel spinning, rework, miscommunication and finger pointing when things go wrong. Clearly identified and communicated goals/objectives that align with the company’s vision, mission and strategy will create a focus for individuals and the East coast office so their expertise can translate into results for the company. Without Step 1, Setting Goals/Objectives, Step 2 and 3 are very difficult to do. For example, Step 2, (day-day coaching/feedback) …while coaching and feedback can be given based on observation (even from a distance), it is not purposeful towards a common goal. Remember the childhood game, pin the tail on the donkey. Partial feedback is like telling the blindfolded participant that he/she missed the donkey but not telling them how to focus their aim towards the appropriate spot on the donkey’s body. Eventually the tail may land on the donkey, but the chance of it landing at the appropriate end is unlikely, unless specific feedback is given along the way.
Again, in Todd’s case, he has received feedback when his actions are off target but has yet to receive feedback or coaching on how to redirect his actions that can assist him in being successful and increase his productivity in the process. In addition, when he thinks he is performing well, no feedback is given, leaving the positive behavior to chance, and possibly not repeated. As a result, Todd’s job satisfaction is low, and he begins to question why he joined this company. Job satisfaction is one of the key factors in determining whether an employee chooses to stay with a company (Lockwood). As for the rest of the team, they quit asking and use the heads down approach to avoid the fear of looking bad. Their saving grace in the East coast office is that most of team members are seasoned professionals. Unfortunately, conflict arises when the well-meaning professionals, trying to perform their job, create unintended obstacles for others who are trying to get their job done. To add to the complexity, you have a remote location with the leaders of the company at corporate who are having trouble letting go of the day/day activities. From the leaders’ perspective, I suspect they are not sure what results they are getting from their East office. To maintain a sense of control, they flow misdirected communication in a barrage of emails; this leads to frustration on both ends.
Step 3, Evaluating performance, if done without Steps 1 and 2, it is subjective at best. Evaluating performance when the success criteria is not well defined and not clearly communicated (step 1) and feedback given (step 2) is likely to lead to a disconnect in performance expectations and a disappointed leader and employee.
Last, the new talent is working from a remote location. Leaders and employees do not communicate face-face on a frequent basis. Because of this, they have not had the opportunity to establish a relationship of trust and mutual respect. Many people work from remote locations successfully but the priority for the leadership team is that your people know where you are coming from, understand where you are going and trust you (Derven, 2007). “Leaders who treat remote employees as valuable assets will be rewarded with higher performance and productivity and more enjoyable working relationships” (Derven, 2007).
The Conclusion:
Unfortunately, this scenario happens all too often. Many well-meaning business leaders hire expert employees to produce business results. They pay top dollar to acquire key talent, get them in the door and set them loose to perform, only to wonder what happened when the results are not achieved as they expected. Re the case above, among organization structure and process issues, they are missing all three steps of the performance management process. In addition, the remote location exacerbates the problems and as a result, puts the success (profitability) of the East coast office at risk.
Leaders, help to ensure a return on your talent investment by having your leadership team clearly and consistently executing performance management with all employees. The returns on productivity, employee satisfaction, retention and business results will be worth it.
Please refer all questions/comments re the article to Karen Tracy, trac1005@yahoo.com.
References
Findley, H.M. and Amsler, G. (March 2003). Setting Performance Expectations: Return To The Basics. SHRM Whitepaper
Lockwood, N. Finding and Keeping the Right Talent: A Strategic View
SHRM Survey
Derven, M. (March 2007). The Remote Connection: Leading Others From A Distance Requires Expectations, Trust and Unique Methods of Evaluation.
HR Magazine, 111-115.
