Performance Evaluations

Michele Harmon

The New Year that is 2021 can bring with it your opportunity to improve your employees’ performance, improve your bottom line, and improve the tone of your ongoing discourse. You can achieve all of these with well-administered Performance Evaluations.

Most of us have just a little more than some respect for West Texas native Matthew McConaughey. He has published his memoir at the ripe old age of 50 years old and called it Greenlights. I cannot wait to read it, but after reading an interview with him that was published in the November 2020 issue of the University of Texas’ Alcalde Magazine, I think McConaughey touched on a topic that is exactly what I want to write about this month. In pure McConaughey fashion, he relates his unique perspective on 2020 and 2021. “This is a red-light year, but we may look back at it as a banner year. This is when the work, the work that needs to be done, got started. We may look back at 2020 and go: ‘You know, I lost loved ones, but me and my family got closer, I got to know myself better. I got more spiritual. I became a better person because I was forced to look.’ There’s going to be a green light for us.”

I opened the Midland Reporter-Telegram this morning to read an article from one of my favorite people, Dr. Summer Merritt. Yes, she was talking about COVID, but she was writing about the spirit of West Texans. How do we end some of the polarization? Instead of highlighting differences, “either/or” or “us/them,” we can instead change West Texans back to a “yes/and” community again. I remember exactly where I was standing in Houston when I heard about Jessica McClure, trapped in the well. Dr. Merritt’s analogies included track meets in 40 mph winds, low oil prices, the mass shooting, and other incidents that called out the best in us. Despite the stresses and strains of 2020, the Food Bank is well supported. And the hospitals, so lately packed to capacity, have answered the challenges. We know from experience that we will take care of each other in very stressful times.

So how do we make 2021 a green light year and West Texas a “yes/and” community for your organization and employees? I suggest you have real and sincere conversations with your employees. Spend the time you have not spent in the past, and apply that time in quality, not quantity, conversations and meetings. Your employees’ performance will improve as well as your bottom line. The more you converse with your employees about their accomplishments, challenges, and professional growth, the easier it will be to discuss their overall performance and improve your results.

Here are five ways to improve an employee’s performance and attitude. (Betterworks Blog, September 1, 2016). What was true in 2016 still makes good sense for 2021. Develop your

system, and it will become part of the foundation of your organization. Here are the points identified in the blog.

1. “Feedback should be more frequent.” Provide feedback on goals quarterly.
2. “Conversations should be lightweight.” “Our conversations could use a diet.” Amen sister. Meetings that are too long or too frequent are destructive to productivity.
3. “Leveraging data inputs drive high performance.” Use real quantitative and qualitative data to increase your employees’ performance. Discuss the goals set at the beginning of each quarter, the progress made, and feedback from peers (360 Evaluations).
4. “Focus on impact and meaning to increase engagement.” Connect business results and the employee’s personal development, tying the company goals to the employee’s contributions. How does the individual contributor, as well as each team, affect the bottom line?
5. “Conversations should be balanced.” Feedback at meetings should be upward and downward and focused on the employee’s current and future goals. “Two-way feedback creates more balanced opportunities, which in turn increases operational excellence for the entire company.”

In Smarter with Gartner‘s December 20, 2019 blog, Mary Baker emphasizes three ways to improve performance management conversations, make them more effective, incorporate team-based feedback, and keep them forward-looking. If you are not familiar with Gartner, they are an excellent source of data in many areas for employers. Team-based feedback is the additional piece that is overlooked in performance evaluations. Here are Gartner and Baker’s points on performance evaluation conversations.

1. “Incorporate team-based feedback into performance conversations.” What is the norm is a manager’s evaluation and an employee’s self-rating? Adding the team’s feedback for each other adds how the employee contributed to the overall team’s performance and how the employee may need to change to improve the team’s results. Adding the third method of feedback for each employee adds a little time. It enhances the organization’s performance and outcomes to meet the strategic plan and improve your bottom line.
2. “Create a two-way dialogue and shared responsibility.” Managers should gather as much data as possible so that the conversation focuses on aligning the next steps for the employee to guide their talent management.
3. “Make reviews forward-looking.” Focus evaluations on looking forward. Identify the future expertise the organization will need, and tie that need to the employee’s interests for growth. Here is where you match the employees’ current capabilities with their capacity to develop their skills and expertise. Highlight the employee’s strengths. Identify what the employee’s career interests are, and identify whether they align with the organization. What might the future career path be for that employee? Lastly, identify what networks of peers, organizations, and leaders they identify with as mentors and coaches for their future growth.

All that said, this sounds as simple as telling your administrative assistant that she needs to learn how to do pivot tables and to pay for the class. However, it cannot be comfortable in the beginning for you and your leadership team. No organization will make longitudinal growth without a strategic plan and without goals that each division, group, and the individual can align with their own performance goals.

I want to conclude by reviewing a few points from Connect First by Melanie Katzman. Her book expresses her hopes to help the reader “develop the confidence to cut through the organizational clutter and conduct conversations that dispel conflict and set shared goals.” Here are a few of the author’s points that could have value for you in your conversations, in your employee performance evaluations, in your communications of your organization’s results, and in your efforts in getting 2021 to be a “green light” year:

• Organizational change starts with the individual and operates from the inside out.
• Impossible situations are often solved when people speak directly to each other.
• Quality person-to-person moments shift group dynamics and transform organizations.
• You can create the community you want to be a part of.

In February, we are going to review the Warren Act as mergers and acquisitions increase.

“Your employees are the heart of your organization.” Dr. Michele Harmon is a Human Resource professional, supporting clients in Texas and New Mexico that range in size from five to more than 3,000 employees. Email: micheleharmon1@gmail.com