A question that we often get is “Why are my employees underperforming?”. They have the skills they need, we have good managers, but they are not reaching our expectations, they have no initiative or new ideas.

Employees underperform for many different reasons, but a key reason for employees to underperform is they are not focused or directed towards a goal.

Most organisations have their objectives, vision and mission statements and they may even pay yearly bonuses. However, all too often bonuses have no relationship to the organisation’s objectives.

Maxumise resolves these issues in a variety of ways through its outcome-based performance management system.

What is an outcome-based performance management system?

Well its simple, you start with the organisation’s strategic objectives and determine what outcomes you want to achieve and how the organisation will measure success against these objectives. This forms the CEO’s performance measures. These are then cascaded down to the next level. The CEO needs to achieve this outcomes at the required standards and this is delegated down through executives, departments, teams and the individuals to help achieve these outcomes.

Driving employee’s performance and talent management through defined outcomes will drive employees to perform in the organisation. If employees understand what is required of them in output terms and the standards required, they should be able to devise the best method to achive the outcomes; encouraging innovation and continuous improvement.

Maxumise facilitates this performance management through a software process of breaking down company outcomes through the organisation, which quantifies how different areas of the business are performing against expectations.

The system empowers employees to control their own destiny. The performance system is objective, allowing both the manager and employee to monitor the status and progress of employees throughout the year.

The targets are set along with an upper [high stretch] and lower [danger point] measure, which provides immediate feedback on whether an employee is meeting, exceeding or falling below the target. The danger zone is when an employee is underperforming in a specific measure. Any underperformance provides managers an opportunity to rectify the issues early, and ensures the correct action should be taken. More importantly it provides continual feedback to the employee on performance and empowers them to take remedial action or to seek advice from the manager, before the manager, the employee can proactively manage their own performance. In most cases, underperformance will be due to a lack of knowledge, inability to apply that knowledge in a specific circumstance or an attitude issue. Knowledge gaps can be addressed through training, application through mentoring. Attitude is harder to change and is more likely to be reflected in all performance areas rather than one or two specific areas.

Having an objective, outcome-based performance management system in place ensures a clear direction, focus and defined performance targets and empowers employees to manage their own perform.

Where to go now?

Other HR problems

- Hiring wrong Employee

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