Retain Top Talent

I have to agree with the author in this article on measuring talent = the number one trait is high self-motivation. We could use lots of different words to describe what that means - including drive, initiative, proactivity, passion, focus on self-improvement, anticipatory behavior, striving to constantly get better.

Measuring these elements are easy. The best have an abundance of them = and can share specific examples to illustrate them. The weak ones will struggle to come up with anything of substance around self-motivation with specific examples.

There are many factors that go into measuring someone's ability to achieve your expectations - the issue of self-motivation is number 1.

First point in the article - the traditional employee performance appraisal should be proclaimed as DEAD!

Instead we should be using a dynamic process of setting goals, effective communication and feedback (such as a regularly scheudled one-to-one at least on monthly basis), and frequent discussions around matterness - showing and demonstrating how your teammembers matter and are aligned with the purpose of the organization.

You'll be in shock over the increased productivity and impact if you just do these simple steps in performance management and coaching.

Some good tips on managing performance - particularly when performance falls below your expectations. NOTE the importance of setting clear and specific goals/outcomes.

Good reminders on the basics of effective performance management. Notice number one on the list is map out expectations.

This is the central theme of our consulting, workshops, and executive search practice - define success. NOT defining success is the number one reason for hiring failure, ineffective performance management, and poor employee engagement (and subsequently employee productivity).

Most studies show that at best 50 percent of your workforce knows what their immediate boss expects of them. In entrepreneurial and small businesses, that number is more likely to be in the 80 percent range of employees, candidates, new hires not understanding what's expected of them.

Huge problem in most companies. How are you fixing it?

Some interesting statistics on retention and engagement in this article.

"55% of workers say annual reviews don’t improve their performance. Employees would rather – and expect – to have a continuous level of engagement and feedback from their managers on how they are doing in their role."

Almost half of your employees want a different approach to feedback on their performance than the traditional sadistic approach of doing an annual performance review.

You've probably heard me say over and over that one-to-ones are the most important managerial tool you have for coaching and retaining high performers. This article shares some specifics around creating a culture of doing one-to-ones. It's especially important if you're now managing remotely.

In this interesting article on the new normal of working from home, the author talks about a few elements of improving that process.

I particularly liked "if individuals and teams are clear on the results, then they can choose the most effective and efficient means to achieve measurable outcomes. Let your employees know what is needed and when so they can work efficiently and effectively."

As you know, this idea of defining success through the organization - whether it's the business objectives for key executives of a key executive or the KPIs for a field tech - this is something that gets amplified in a work at home environment.

I'm recommending as the NUMBER ONE best practice in having people work from home in my Managing Remotely in a Crisis Webinar that companies focus on defining and communicating expectations clearly and precisely (in written form), and then structure their entire management process around it for feedback, recognition, learning, and coaching.

If you can move the needle on defining success in the next 3 months, you'll go a long way toward improving productivity, efficiency, effectiveness, and flawless execution.

I like the idea proposed by the article on linking performance management and engagement. There is no question performance goes up as engagement goes up. Although the article cites the HBR on this subject, and makes a number of key points, it lacks specific recommendations on how to link them together.

I had the opportunity to present our Vistage workshop "You're NOT the Person I Hired" today to a group of CEOs in the LA area. We did a role play around defining success for the team on product development. As we got deeper into the role-play it was obvious not everyone was on the same page for the results needed by the company. This article I just read makes that same point using different words - the need to align everyone on the team on what are the outcomes - this is probably the greatest failure in execution by most companies. How good a job does your company do in aligning expectations around business goals?

Most of the goal setting done in entrepreneurial businesses is at best weak and superficial. This article serves as a good reminder around the steps of setting goals for people. We can our process SOAR which is a variation on the older model of SMART outcomes.

Very scary statistic: almost 1/3 of employees leave their job within 6 months due to weak employee engagement - number one is a lack of clear specific outcomes/goals. Are you forcing good employees to leave by not defining success for their jobs, and not implementing initatives in areas like recognition?

Good reminders of accountability and performance management. One of the key points is about having regular feedback sessions, a point I've been stressing on doing 1-to-1s in my Managing Remotely in a Crisis Workshop.

Are all your managers conducting regular 1-to-1s with their direct reports on a weekly basis. See my LinkedIn articles on the rationale of conducting 1-to-1s and an efficient model to do them in a 20-30 minute timeframe every week.

I keep seeing articles showing a trend for companies to be monitoring how much and where employees are spending their time - NSA type monitoring.

Something doesn't seem right about these attempts? I've always been a big proponent of not measuring screen time, but rather setting mutually agreeable outcomes, deliverables, metrics, and KPIs.

The problem is when managers don't want to invest the time to define success, then we are left with the fallback position of measuring hours and screen time.

What's going on in your organization?

Although this article is pointed at the PR sector, it could be extended to any business. Productivity is down. How do we still get stuff done? What are the right tools, tactics, and methodologies to ensure you can still hit your business goals, outcomes, deliverables, expectations, and KPIs?

Self-Evaluations by employees of their performance should be one of the pillars of your performance management process. Here are some ideas from a recent article on how to build self-evaluations into the process. Even if this is already part of your process, it might serve as a great review/assessment.

Would you rate your organization as being "feedback-rich?" If not, are you running the risk of losing good people, low engagement scores, a lack of productivity, and difficulty in attracting rockstars?

I've been recommending this idea for over a decade now. Let's kill the traditional sadistic exercise of annual performance reviews and move to Continuous Peformance Management of monthly one-to-ones and regular feedback. Not only will see performance soar, but you'll also see motivation and employee engagement explode.

Out with the outdated sadistic approach to annual performance reviews. This article talks about how progressive companies are rethinking their approach to performance management and ensuring flawless execution among their employees.