Managing and running a business day to day is not only extremely rewarding and satisfying, but it also presents challenges to be dealt with. One such issue would be when you have an under performer among your team – any aspect of poor performance has to be addressed immediately, however instead of ruthlessly culling employees left, right and centre, it’s important to find out the reasons why colleagues may be under performing and what can be done to improve their work standards. Ideally, you want to transform these employees into high achieving contributors to your workforce, so don’t give up on them. Read on for my advice on how to turn your teammates around and get them working at optimum levels of success.
Top four ways to boost employee performance
1) Regular review meetings
This is absolutely vital when beginning to assess why your employee may not be contributing as expected to the team. A one-to-one review enables you to provide valuable and insightful feedback to your staff member, giving you the opportunity to explain in detail what is expected of them in their current role, relating it to relevant recent tasks. You will also have the chance for some open discussion, so that you can discover the root problems of their work performance – it could be completely unrelated to the office for example, with stress at home.
A structured review system lets you routinely keep tabs on how the employee in question is doing, with one way of doing this using Key Performance Indicators or KPI’s. These are targets or goals that the employee should strive to hit before the next review meeting. A good idea here is to base the KPI’s on activity instead of money, for example, ‘you should try to make X amount of phone calls in one week’ , instead of you ‘should be making X amount of money per week’. If you can up the activity, then the monetary results should follow soon after.
2) Training
Another key component that is often overlooked by some businesses. In the review meeting, both you and the employee can brainstorm which areas need to be worked on and improved, and this can naturally be bolstered by training. It gives them the opportunity to brush up on skills that they maybe don’t feel confident about and it also enables you to check they are receiving the help they need to utilise their skills and gain maximum performance. Create an action plan and make sure it gets stuck to. Here at Total Assist Group, we have an extensive Learning and Development department, headed up by an experienced manager. Everyone from trainee recruitment consultants to managers receive training of some kind, as we know a continuous process of improvement is important for career progression.
3) Boosting confidence
Review meetings and one-to-one situations can feel rather threatening and intense to some quieter colleagues, so make sure you don’t go in all guns blazing. If an employee is under performing then they just need some nurturing to realise their full potential. One way you can do this is by making sure they are confident of their place within the business – check they understand that you are on their side and that providing feedback is not picking on them but is a useful part of growing and developing. We’ve all been there after all and you don’t want them to feel overwhelmed – it’s all about offering support. At Total Assist Group we work extremely hard to generate a real family environment, so that our employees always feel part of the bigger picture and can see how their efforts slot in to help Total Assist Group achieve.
4) Performance mentors
Having a colleague in the office to relate to who isn’t management could be extremely useful for an under performing employee. The mentor can act as a role model, showcasing the skills your under performing employee needs to fine tune and hone. Make sure your mentor is approachable, willing to take on the responsibility of being a mentor and has good communication skills. Your under performing colleague will be learning from this individual, so make sure they fully appreciate this and that they have the right skill set. This is something we use at Total Assist Group when our trainee recruitment consultants hit the sales floor for the first time – they are paired with a mentor within the same team as them so they have someone they can directly turn to with questions and queries. We find it really aids the learning process and helps the trainees come on in leaps and bounds.
[testimonial name=”By Grant Finn” who=”CEO of Total Assist Group” imagelinks=”https://totalassist.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Grant125.jpg” vertical=”no”]”I have worked tirelessly at Total Assist Group for over 10 years now. I have overall responsibility for executing the continuous growth strategy of the company.”[/testimonial]
