Achieving Goals_ Define and Surpass Your High Performance Goals - Kathleen Schienle [25]
Some employees who are at a professional crossroads hire a career coach or a “life coach” on their own, to help them work through roadblocks. Others develop a buddy system, partnering with a colleague at work or elsewhere to listen to and support each other and brainstorm ways to solve problems as they work toward goals.
Hold the review. Begin by sharing your general appreciation of the employee’s progress toward achieving their goals, as well as their professional and personal development. Then discuss the specifics of the individual’s performance. Acknowledge the completion of action plans and important tasks and the achievement of goals. Also discuss areas in which the employee’s performance fell short and address any behavioral issues that get in the way of achieving your mutual goals.
Be honest and straightforward with your staff members. Treat them with respect and show that you are genuinely invested in their success, not just how it reflects on your own performance. Temper criticism with concrete, positive examples of how the employee can improve their performance. You want to encourage optimism about future success, even if things haven’t gone exactly as planned during the previous performance period. Don’t forget to give employees a chance to share their self-evaluations.
The performance review is also a chance to emphasize your organization’s expectations and values. Discuss key business objectives and reinforce the individual’s contribution to meeting the overall corporate goals. With candor and clarity, communicate what you—and the rest of the company—expect from the employee. In addition, if your organization will be reassigning teams or individuals, the review meeting is an opportunity to discuss how the employee’s ambitions and capabilities might best be used in the reorganized team.
Address goals. At the end of the review, develop goals and objectives for the next evaluation period. Goal-setting at the start of a new evaluation period may be as simple as adjusting and expanding the most recent goals to boost performance in the new cycle. If an employee has accomplished everything on the list, it may be time to set new goals and create a supporting action plan.
Make sure new and revised goals align with the organization’s current strategy and parallel the individual’s career path. For example, if your employee wants to learn how to run meetings, set goals that will require the employee to use that skill frequently or set a specific competency goal designed to develop that skill through coaching or formal training.
All your employees should leave the review meeting with clear, attainable goals and a shared understanding of how those goals will be measured. They should also have an action plan for each goal to guide them throughout the next evaluation period.
Set follow-up discussion. After the initial meeting, participants should consider the evaluation and comments on their own. Have any further discussion or clarification within a few days, while the original conversation is still fresh.
Submit review. Documentation is an integral part of the evaluation and goal-setting process. You should always provide a written evaluation—even if it is not required by your company—for each of your employees. Not only do written evaluations help track performance over time, they also provide a record of the employees’ achievements that may help to justify recognition, reward, or promotion. This documentation also creates a paper trail in case an employee makes a complaint against you or it’s necessary to terminate the employee.
For your written evaluation, complete your company’s standard evaluation form—if there is one—or create your own. Regardless of the form you use, make sure you record