Managing Employee Performance Blog

What to Say When Addressing a Performance Issue

The traditional method of providing constructive criticism/feedback would sound something like this:

"John, we need to talk about how things are going. You made some careless errors on the last several reports you handed in. You factored in the production labor costs incorrectly. I had to get other staff to rerun the numbers and as a result Tammy had to drop her own work to fix the mistakes you made. Now I feel I need to go through your month end reports with a fine tooth comb before I pass them onto the CFO, etc....".

Or

"Ann, we need to have a discussion to clarify your role and responsibilities. I've noticed the following issues: You are missing deadlines, not keeping people in the loop when deadlines are not going to be met and not demonstrating a sense of urgency to get the press releases out on time. From my perspective it appears that you don't have good time management skills based on not accomplishing key tasks within specified timeframes. On top of all this your attitude seems really lax when you do miss deadlines. What is going on with you?..."

What the manager has said in the examples above seems accurate. Most managers have been taught to create a bullet-proof case revolving around a list of the employee's shortcomings. After all, you have to prove to the employee that they are underperforming. Is it any wonder that most feedback recipients get defensive and feedback providers find difficultly in achieving anything remotely resembling a productive outcome, never mind gaining agreement on what needs to change?

THROUGH THE EYES OF THE EMPLOYEE
Can you think back to a time when a manager talked to you about a performance issue and did so without any finesse at all? From the employee's perspective when their manager does initiate a performance discussion it can come across as finger pointing, fault finding and disciplinary. Poorly crafted and delivered messages can trigger feelings of self-doubt and worthlessness for the employee. This is particularly true if this is the first time the employee is hearing the information. The traditional approach to giving feedback often comes across in a harsh, "this is what is wrong with you" tone.

Expect a Defensive Reaction
Once employees are confronted with this type of information the natural response is to blame others, fixate on the details, make excuses, try to explain why the feedback is incorrect, etc. All of this adds up to an uncomfortable and often confrontational exchange between the manager and employee. Once a manager has been through this process once or twice it becomes easier to just avoid addressing employee performance issues altogether. Let's just say there is no real mystery for why managers tend to steer clear of giving feedback and why employees don't like being on the receiving end! The fact of the matter is that there is a better way to introduce feedback to employees.

The key is to use words to describe what you want to have happen. 
I'm not sure where this quote originates so I cannot provide the proper credit, but I thought it was impactful: "A good leader can describe what successful performance looks like".  If you are familiar with Marshall Goldsmith's work you're likely familiar with the term "feedforward", which means describing what you want to see for future.  See this short video, How to Begin a Performance Conversation (and how not to), for specific language to introduce feedback in a helpful coaching type style. 

Two Important Questions to Ask During Your Performance Review

I continually hear from employees who have just had their performance evaluation that it wasn't a valuable developmental experience. I then ask, "Did you learn what you do well and should continue doing and find out at least one thing you could be doing that would help you be more effective"? About 10% will answer yes to that question.

Formal Reviews Don't Always Surface the Most Important Information
Part of the problem is that most managers will avoid discussing performance issues that are related to behavior. It's more comfortable to talk about tangible job responsibilities, skills and goals. There may be a critical issue that is never brought up because the manager is afraid of your reaction or may lack the ability to translate it into a the right words.

When it comes right down to it you should be walking away with at least one clearly defined key developmental area needing additional focus.

An All Too Common Story
An employee approached me after one of my all employee workshops on how to ask for feedback to tell me this story. He had a rough time with his 2009 performance review. There were many things he needed to work on. About 4 months into the new performance cycle and diligently working to improve he asked his boss, "So, have you seen any progress, how do you think I'm doing?" His boss said, "You're doing better". End of conversation. Fast forward to 8 months later; time for the 2010 review. The employee said he was worried about another bad review. Of course he is. He received zero valuable feedback from his boss about what he was on track with and what needed additional focus.

If You Really Want to Know
If you really want to know where you stand here is my advice for how to get the most out of your performance evaluation.

Ask two key questions:
I'm really interested in what I should keep doing and that one thing that will help me be more effective in my role:

1. "Tell me one thing I'm doing well and should continue with."

2. "Tell me one thing that I could do that will help me be more effective."

What you are doing when you ask the "tell me the one thing that will help me be more effective" question is giving the feedback provider your permission to share what they otherwise might not feel comfortable talking about. Notice I didn't ask, "tell me about my greatest weakness". Why; because I don't want to hear about my deficiencies. I want to know what I can be doing for future. Phrasing the question to be future focused makes it more comfortable for your boss to be honest about what he/she really wants from you.

Final Point  
Ask these two questions more than just once per year.  Ask monthly or quarterly or whenever you feel you need the information.  That way you have time to work on any areas for development well in advance of a formal review.  Equally important, you will know what you are doing well and build greater confidence.  

Don't Make Employees Mad with a Poorly Delivered Message

Many managers are adept at the objective parts of performance discussion performance, but nearly all of them dread initiating conversations about personal issues such as behaviors and attitudes. The traditional method by which they are taught to provide performance feedback to employees, sometimes referred to as "constructive criticism," is often the very reason they avoid, water down or delay giving feedback in the first place.

That kind of feedback typically sounds like "here's the problem, here are the examples of your shortcomings and this is the negative impact." Inherent limitations with this kind of communication frequently manifest as follow:

• From the employee's perspective performance discussions often come across as finger pointing, fault finding and disciplinary.
• Nearly all managers dread initiating performance conversations, particularly if the issue relates to an unproductive or disruptive behavior.
• Performance issues are ignored or handled poorly, so the resulting issues usually land on the doorstep of HR.

So what can managers do about it? How can they create talking points that are honest, not watered down yet hearable and sayable? 

Understanding Uncensored Perceptions is they key. These are the real feelings about a person or circumstance, which would be inappropriate to share in their raw form. "He's so high-maintenance", "She's a slacker" and "I can't stand it when they do that" are examples of feelings managers might have but are appropriately unwilling to share.

That's probably a good thing, yet most often the manager simply won't say anything at all so the person who should be receiving feedback misses out on the opportunity to gain some awareness around a key issue. 

Negative to Positive..

If you are a manager experiencing this sort of problem, try taking your negative thought and translating it into language that describes the exact opposite.  The result should be that you are thinking and talking in terms of what you want to have happen as opposed to talking about the problem behavior or performance (a surefire way to get the person on the receiving end to react defensively). 

Here are some examples of negative thoughts translated into "develop the ability to" statements:

• Excuse Expert
  Put your energy into identifying solutions
  Or
  Be accountable for overcoming roadblocks
• Doesn't take responsibility
  Take Full Responsibility for......(fill in the blank) Or
  Take Ownership of... ...(fill in the blank)
• Lack of confidence
  Develop the confidence to...(fill in the blank)
• Ends justifies the means
  Means is just as important as the end
• Rude and nasty to co-workers
  Interact respectfully with co-workers
• Lacks willingness to adapt
  Readily adapt when it comes to (fill in the blank)...
  Or
  Focus your energies on adapting to......(fill in the blank)
• Tattle tale
  Overlook issues that are outside of your control
• Interruptive (cuts other people off mid-sentence)
  Allow others to finish expressing their thoughts
• No desire to learn on their own
  Take the initiative to add to your job knowledge
• Over promises
  Promise what you know you can deliver
• My way or the highway
  Be open to considering other approaches
• When the going gets tough they get going Stick with and deal with difficult problems
• Makes assumptions
  Make conclusions based on facts
• Sweats the small stuff
  Put things into perspective by sorting through the big things and setting the smaller things aside
• Liar / Dishonest
  Communicate information that is based on fact
• Condescending to those who are less experienced
  Use your experience and knowledge to mentor those with less experience

This Works With ANY Issue

The lesson here is that anything we don't like or have a problem with can be translated into a future-focused thought that describes what the performance could and should be.  Realize that the statements above are just the beginning of the conversation because we'll then need to explain in detail what we mean by "Use your experience and knowledge to mentor those with less experience."  We will need to reach agreement with the employee on what the associated actions will be in order to meet the performance objective. 

So for example you would then want to follow with something like, "can we talk about what that would look like?" or I'm thinking of a few ways that this could be done, can we put our heads together and talk about some of those ideas together?"