Performance Management

Skill
Prof. Preeti Bhaskar
Symbiosis Centre for
Management Studies, NOIDA

Herman Aguinis, University of Colorado at

 Coaching: Definition
• Manager
– Interacts with employee and
– Takes active role and interest in performance
• Collaborative ongoing process
– Directing employee behavior
– Motivating employee behavior
– Rewarding employee behavior
• Concerned with long-term performance

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 Major Coaching Functions:
• Give advice
• Provide guidance
• Provide support
• Give confidence
• Promote greater competence

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 Key Coaching Behaviors
• Establish developmental objectives
• Communicate effectively
• Motivate employees
• Document performance
• Give feedback
• Diagnose performance problems
• Develop employees

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 The Good Coach Questionnaire
 Do you listen to your employees?
 Do you understand their individual
needs?
 Do you encourage employees to
express their feelings openly?
 Do you give tangible and intangible
support for development?
 Do your employees know your
expectations about their
performance?

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 The Good Coach Questionnaire (continued)
Do you encourage open and honest
discussions and problem solving?
Do you help your employees create
action plans that will
Solve problems?
Create changes?
Do you help your employees explore
potential areas of
Growth?
Development?

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 Coaching Styles

More Assertive Less assertive

Task & Fact

oriented Driver Analyzer

People oriented Persuader Amiable

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 Adaptive coaches use all styles
according to employee needs:

• Sometimes providing direction

• Sometimes persuading
• Sometimes showing empathy
• Sometimes paying close attention to
rules and established procedures

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 Coaching Process
Identify
Developmen
Set tal
Developme Resources
ntal Goals & Strategies
Implement
strategies

Give Feedback Observe and

Document
Developmental
Behavior
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 Coaching Process:
Steps covered in Chapter 8

• Set Developmental Goals

• Identify Resources and Strategies
Needed to Implement
Developmental Goals
• Implement Developmental Goals

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 Coaching Process:
Overview of remaining steps

• Observe and Document

Developmental Behavior and
Outcomes
• Give Feedback
– Praise
– Negative Feedback

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 Observe and Document Developmental Behavior
and Outcomes

Constraints:
• Time
• Situation
• Activity

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 Organizational Activities
to improve documentation of performance

• Good communication plan to get manager

buy-in
• Training programs
– Rater error training
– Frame-of-reference training
– Behavioral observation training
– Self-leadership training

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 Reasons to document performance
• Minimize cognitive load
• Create trust
• Plan for the future
• Legal protection

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 Recommendations for Documentation
• Be specific
• Use adjectives and adverbs sparingly
• Balance positives with negatives
• Focus on job-related information
• Be comprehensive
• Standardize procedures
• Describe observable behavior

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 Giving Feedback
• Main purposes:
– Help build confidence
– Develop competence
– Enhance involvement
– Improve future performance

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 Potential costs of failing to provide feedback:
• Employees are deprived of chance to
improve their own performance
• Chronic poor performance
• Employees have inaccurate
perceptions of how their performance
is regarded by others

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 To be effective, feedback should:
• Be timely
• Be frequent
• Be specific
• Be verifiable
• Be consistent (over time and across
employees)
• Be given privately
• Provide context and consequences
(continued next slide)

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 To be effective, feedback should: (continued)

• Describe first, evaluate second

• Cover the continuum of performance
• Identify patterns
• Demonstrate confidence in
employee
• Allow for both advice and idea
generation

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 Guidelines for Giving Praise
• Be sincere – only give praise when it is
deserved
• Give praise about specific behaviors or
results
• Take your time
• Be comfortable with act of praising
• Emphasize the positive

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 Giving Negative Feedback
Managers avoid giving negative
feedback due to:
• Negative reactions and consequences
• Negative experiences in the past
• Playing “god”
• Need for irrefutable and conclusive
evidence

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 Negative feedback is most useful when it:
• Identifies warning signs and
performance problem is still
manageable
• Clarifies unwanted behaviors and
consequences
• Focuses on behaviors that can be
changed
• Comes from a credible source
• Is supported by data

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 Feedback Sessions should always answer:
• How is your job going?
• What can be done to make it better?
– Job
– Product
– Services
• How can you better serve your
customers?
– Internal
– External

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Supervisory roles in managing performance

• Judge
– Evaluate performance
– Allocate rewards
• Coach
– Help employee solve performance
problems
– Identify performance weaknesses
– Design developmental plans

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 Performance Review Formal Meetings
Possible types of formal meetings:
1. System Inauguration
2. Self-Appraisal
3. Classical Performance Review
4. Merit/Salary Review
5. Developmental Plan
6. Objective Setting

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 Steps to take before meeting:
• Give at least 2-weeks notice
• Block sufficient time
• Arrange to meet in a private location
without interruptions

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 Merged Performance Review Meeting
Components
1. Explanation of meeting purpose
2. Employee self-appraisal
3. Supervisor & employee share rating and
rationale
4. Developmental discussion
5. Employee summary
6. Rewards discussion
7. Follow-up meeting arrangement
8. Approval and appeals process discussion
9. Final recap

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Possible defensive behaviors of employees
• Fight response
– Blaming others
– Staring at supervisor
• Flight response
– Raising voice
– Looking/turning away
– Other aggressive responses
– Speaking softly
– Continually changing the
subject
– Quickly agreeing without
basis
– Other passive responses

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 To prevent/reduce defensive behaviors
• Establish and maintain rapport
• Be empathetic
• Observe verbal and nonverbal cues
• Minimize threats
• Encourage participation

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 When defensiveness is unavoidable:

Recognize it
Allow its expression

If situation becomes intolerable

Reschedule the meeting for a later
time

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