Managing underperformance

Managing underperformance in your organization is a critical and strategic responsibility. It can lead to significant business outcomes if it is properly addressed. There are five steps to managing underperformance in a business: identification, assessment, management, corrective, and advancement. There is also a check list to help best practice managers best practices in performance monitoring. This article illustrates the best practices in handling underperformance by focusing on three areas: reporting, leadership, and performance management. For more information about your individual minimum legal duties, contact the organizations listed at the end of the article. Identifying the problem is the first step toward managing underperformance. This step begins with establishing an understanding of your organization's expectations, which will allow you to determine the potential for performance problems, as well as the reasons why the company may expect performance problems to happen. You can do this through an extensive survey that focuses on aspects such as job fit, leadership abilities, technical skills, communication skills, sales skills, and work ethics. These aspects are important because they are thought of as part of an employee's job match - both a relevant and concrete aspect of the job (the job fit inside the functional structure of your company, as well as the skills and behaviours which make an employee effective in their position) and applicable to direction (what makes a person, effective as a leader). When you've identified the issues that may be causing the underperformance, it's time to concentrate on managing underperformance according to your company's specific needs. One of the most common performance problems in companies today is poor performance across the board, including absenteeism, tardiness, on-time performance, on-the-job performance, on-page or off-page test results, on-the-job training, and on-the-job use of time. In addition to these common performance issues, companies need to address problems on varied aspects such as: Among the most important ways to manage underperformance is to get proper performance improvement plans. In order to make certain that you have a plan, create a formal process for the identification and assessment of your problem areas. This includes creating a warning letter, a job list, and developing action plans. Implementing a warning letter is an excellent way of managing underperformance difficulties. This letter should be sent to the employee in question, often detailing why the worker is performing below expectations. A fantastic warning letter should also set out what the manager plans to do to fix the issue, in addition to what steps will be taken to ensure that poor performance does not occur again. If the letter doesn't address these issues, then the manager should consider creating separate targets and programs for improving specific areas, rather than relying on overall targets for improvement. Creating separate targets ensures that the manager has detailed information about each goal that they are hoping to achieve over a specified time period. The next step is to develop a task and tester list. It is often very hard for managers to just remove poor performing employees and replace them with better performing people. Therefore, by creating a separate list for each task, the supervisor can identify exactly which employees need better supervision and what actions are essential to achieve improvements. Some companies use performance management systems to track and monitor their employees, however this might not be the best practice for managing underperformance issues. A task and tester list are used in conjunction with a warning and show cause letter. This sends a clear message to the employee that they are being monitored and that poor performance isn't acceptable. It also reveals cause for the manager to do it. Finally, it permits the employee to see exactly where their problems lie and gives them a chance to rectify their behaviour before there's a large negative effect on the company. Most managers will implement performance improvement plans by themselves, but with a task and show cause letter and performance evaluation system to provide extra value to the direction. These programs can then be followed up by a supervisor who has full authority to make adjustments if required. Managers need to know their legal responsibilities. It is important that managers know that they are legally required to make an impartial decision about any unjust dismissal. They're also required to give a justification for any decision that's made. If a company uses a system of strict liability or fair and reasonable employer liability, it is more probable that the company will gain from it as it increases protection for the worker by ensuring that employers aren't guilty of unjustified dismissals.