‘ASSERTIVE BEHAVIOUR’

 1. Demonstrates the ability to clearly explain their thoughts and opinions

2. Expresses thoughts and opinions using ‘first person’ language

3. Verbally distinguishes between fact and opinion

4. Articulates the reasoning behind their thoughts and opinions

5. Seeks to understand the thoughts and opinions of others by asking open questions, using probing questions to achieve clarity

6. Demonstrates understanding of the other persons thoughts and opinions by reflecting back their understanding and summarising

7. Identifies and expresses what they see as differences of opinion and checks that others agree

8. Seeks ideas for solutions from others

9. Offers solutions

Would you like to see more descriptions of behavioural performance objectives? Then take a look at ‘The Managers Toolkit – 176 Behavioural Performance Objectives’ http://www.10mmt.com/e-books/ A gold mine of information and a quick and easy way to describe what you want from your staff so that you can get what you need from your staff

Joan Henshaw is the author and presenter of the video management training series ‘The 10 Minute Management Toolkit’ – the flexible, cost effective and time effective way to help managers learn how to motivate their staff to high performance. Want to learn more about how to motivate staff to high performance? Watch videos and claim your free e-book at http://www.10mmt.com

A start point is to give your staff member time and support in preparing for the meeting. How?

Take a look at this checklist that you could use with your staff member to help them prepare:

PERFORMANCE REVIEW / APPRAISAL CHECKLIST – STAFF MEMBER

In order to prepare for our performance review/appraisal meeting I’d like you to consider the following:

1. Your performance against the agreed objectives

Please bring examples of work which demonstrates your achievement of the objectives:

• Identifying achievements and successes
• Identifying areas for improvement
• Highlighting any barriers to performance
• Including examples of special projects or work done ‘above and beyond’ the objectives

2. Review of performance objectives

Please consider:

• Any changes facing the team or business that will require new performance objectives
• Any performance objectives that are no longer appropriate or need amending

3. Areas for development

Please consider any development needs you might have. These might relate to:

• Building on your strengths
• Addressing any areas requiring improvement
• Meeting future challenges

4. Your job satisfaction

Please consider the following questions:

• What gives you the most satisfaction in your work?
• How could we ensure you maintain or improve your satisfaction?
• Are there any other ways you and I could improve your job satisfaction?
• Is there anything I could do; more of, less of, or differently in order to improve your job satisfaction?

Proudfoot Consulting‘s Productivity Survey for 2007 (PDF, 3.1MB) shows that in the UK 33.3% of the time spent in work is unproductive. Taking into account that they estimate that the optimum ‘labour utilisation’ time is considered to be 85% this means that UK businesses are wasting just over 18% of working hours.

Here’s what they say about the reason:

“Whatever business you’re in, pay particular attention to the calibre and capabilities of those who directly supervise frontline workers. Poor worker supervision has always been a prominent reason for wasted working time in our Business Reviews and in the last two years has risen to become the dominant factor.”

That’s just short of a day a week, then, lost to poor supervision. Not good practice in any circumstance but in the current economic climate, potentially disastrous.

Before we explore this issue further I should point out that this report is based on research of large businesses (with turnover in excess of £100m). Clearly, managing staff in a smaller business can be very different. For example, there’s less likelihood of there being a long ‘chain of command’ and it’s clearly more difficult for staff members in a small enterprise to be unproductive, at least intentionally.

However, I’d say it’s worth all businesses, whatever the size, periodically taking a critical look at how they manage their staff.

Here are a few questions you can use to assess your people management practices (based on my model of effective people management):

1. Are your staff crystal clear on what’s expected of them? Have you described and agreed what good performance looks like for their job? Are these agreed descriptions written as performance standards or objectives?
2. Do you monitor your staff’s actual performance against the standards or objectives on an ongoing basis? Are your staff involved in monitoring their own performance?
3. Do you and your staff review together their performance on a regular basis (every three months is standard good practice)? Do you give them objective, evidence- based feedback? Do you agree on areas of outstanding performance and how these can be built upon? Do you identify and agree any areas of improvement?
4. Do you discuss your staff’s job satisfaction with them so that you can, together, develop ways to maintain or enhance their satisfaction?

Do you now feel like having a lie down?

I do know this all sounds like an awful lot of work and it certainly does take some time commitment to manage your staff effectively. However, research does demonstrate again and again that not only does effective people management positively impact productivity and business performance but it also positively impacts your staff’s job satisfaction.

A win for the business, a win for your staff and not nearly as hard as it sounds with the right tools and techniques.