Don’t Let Bias Backfire – Avoiding Common Employee Appraisal Biases
Performance Reviews August 15, 2011 0

Don’t Let Bias Backfire – Avoiding Common Employee Appraisal Biases

Companies rely on the data provided by performance evaluations for a myriad of business decisions. Succession planning, compensation decisions, recruiting and retention strategies, development initiatives, and engagement plans are just a few decisions and processes whose execution and success depends on accurate and fair performance appraisal data.

When so much rests on the validity of this data, it seems clear that eliminating bias and error in performance appraisals is a critical responsibility for supervisors, managers and human resources staff.

What type of biases should leaders be aware of? Tyler Lacoma, an author for eHow, explains:

Horns and Halos Effect

The horns and halos effect is a common phenomenon noted in many business situations. Essentially, it refers to the habit that managers have of assuming that a particular employee is naturally good or bad at his job. This perspective is usually based in personality clashes and other factors that do not actually indicate job performance. Once the manager has decided on a certain viewpoint of an Read More

Webinar: Using SMAART Goals to Painlessly Manage Employee Performance
Other Blogs... August 3, 2011 0

Webinar: Using SMAART Goals to Painlessly Manage Employee Performance

emperform menYou asked – we listened. In our last Webinar, CRG emPerform presented a framework for Conducting Painless Performance Evaluation Meetings. During the webinar Q&A, we noticed that many of you had questions related to effective employee goal setting. Because effective goal setting drives success at every level within an organization, we decided to devote an entire session to presenting best practice goal setting insights and advice.

When: Tuesday, August 30th, 2011 2PM EDT

Where: HR.com IHR Virtual Conference

Register: click here to register*

Are you and your employees really SMAART? Specific, measurable, and attainable performance goals are the most effective tool managers can use to help employees achieve outcomes that support the organization’s goals. Yet, very few managers are able to craft goals that are motivating to employees and are clearly aligned with the organization’s objectives.

One of the most frustrating parts of being a manager is seeing employee performance fall short of expectations and not knowing why or how to fix it. Likewise, employees often say that they are unclear of what their manager really expects in terms of performance.

Marnie GreenJoin emPerform and host Marnie Green, in this one-hour webinar where we will explore why there is often a difference between what managers expect and what employees deliver. Tools for writing clear performance goals with employee input will be offered. In addition, other practical tools for involving employees in the expectation-setting process will be presented.

If you manage the work of others you won’t want to miss this practical and tool-driven session.

What will participants learn?

1) Why there is often a gap between manager expectations and employee performance

2) Tools for writing clear performance goals

3) Four kinds of performance goals

4) How to effectively involve employees in the goal setting process

5) Practical examples of best-practice performance goals

*This webinar has been archived and is available for free download here.

Countdown to SHRM 2011
Other Blogs... June 22, 2011 0

Countdown to SHRM 2011

Move over Celine – emPerform is headed to Las Vegas

Over 14,000 professionals will be in in Las Vegas June 26-29 for this year’s SHRM Annual Conference and Exhibition – the world’s largest exposition dedicated to the advancement of the H.R. profession.

emPerform will be in Booth #1354 and we plan to make a splash at the event by debuting our major 4.0 release which is slated for commercial availability in late July 2011. Attendees at SHRM 2011 will get a first-hand look at the this exciting release.

What’s new in emPerform 4.0?

emperform-4.0emPerform 4.0 contains significant enhancements such as a new, easier to navigate user interface and improved functionality such as multi-user administration and compensation management roll-up. The enhancements are aimed at transforming the user experience by making the solution as easy-to-use as possible for administrators and employees.

In-Booth Presentations:

emPerform will be providing attendees with personalized demos of emPerform 4.0 and plans to conduct in-booth presentations offering best-practice talent management advice.

blog vegas

Monday, June 27th:

10:00 AM – Building a case for automated talent management

1:00 PM – Reporting & Analytics

Tuesday, June 28th:

10:00 AM – LMS & Compliance

1:00 PM – Succession & The Nine-Box

Fantastic Prizes:

We are giving away a FREE BlackBerry® PlayBook™ to one lucky booth visitor.

To learn more about SHRM 2011, visit: www.employee-performance.com/events.html

Not attending: contact us to get a custom demo of emPerform 4.0 or click here to request a free trial.

SEE YOU AT SHRM!

Spring Cleaning – Time to Go Paperless
Performance Reviews May 13, 2011 0

Spring Cleaning – Time to Go Paperless

go paperlessExcept for allergy sufferers, who doesn’t love this time of year? Everything is fresh and in bloom, the temperatures are finally above freezing, and the sun is still out when you get home at night! Spring is a great time to refresh, regroup, and revamp – starting with a little cleaning to de-clutter and rejuvenate your surroundings at home and at work.

For most people, spring cleaning starts by shedding the winter bulk. Wipe the layers of dust off of the shelves, rake the blanket of leaves off the lawn, remove and store the heavy winter-wear and welcome the resulting cardio for beach season.

While tackling the accumulations at work, it might be helpful to consider ways to upgrade any processes that still rely on mounds of paper and files – specifically employee appraisals. Think about it – if a company has 250 employees and each employee submits 1-2 revisions of an appraisal, that’s 500 appraisals! At 5 pages apiece, that would result in 2500 pages of outdated appraisals that have to be tended to. Fun times! The entire paper-based appraisal process is a heartache for the environment and a headache for HR and managers.

Thankfully employee performance management technologies have emerged and provide web-based software solutions for shedding paper nightmares and streamlining the entire appraisal and talent management process. Technology exists to make life easier and automated, web-based appraisals do just that. Imagine a spring where you DON’T have to sort and clean appraisal forms because they are already sorted, filed, organized, and up-to-date online.

I think we should all take a cue from spring cleaning-time. Get rid of stale and stagnant appraisal processes and replace them with breezy, modern solutions that make life easier – giving you more time to enjoy the great weather.

If you would like to go paperless, visit www.employee-performance.com and request a free trial of CRG emPerform™, a leading solution for automating appraisals.

The Do’s and Don’ts of Executing Engagement Surveys: Part 1- DO
Engagement + Culture March 24, 2011 0

The Do’s and Don’ts of Executing Engagement Surveys: Part 1- DO

Do's and Don'ts of employee engagement surveys thumbs up and down

In a  recently blog post, we spoke about the importance of employee engagement and how a lack thereof can snowball into serious financial losses for an organization (or serious opportunity costs – depending on how you want to look at it).

Employee engagement is an employee’s passion for their job which influences their willingness to learn & perform at work. Because it has been shown that there is a direct correlation between employee engagement and business profitability, it is no wonder that engagement has been a hot topic for quite some time and that organizations are seeking to increase engagement as much as possible.

One of the tips that I offered to help boost employee engagement is to ‘ask’. Since informal polling of staff through casual dialogue is not always feasible or effective, conducting employee engagement surveys is a great way to gauge overall engagement and to ‘ask’ staff about engagement issues.

I just finished reading ‘One Page Talent Management’ written by Mark Effron and Miriam Ort. In the book, the authors serve up clear and simple suggestions for crafting and executing employee engagement surveys.

DO:

Ask as few questions as possible:

If this is the first time that you are creating and executing an engagement survey, it might be difficult to hone in on the exact data that you  should aim to capture  but time spent prioritizing items will be worth it. Employees are more likely to complete surveys if they are relatively shorter and survey results are easier to compile and share if they are concise.

Ask Questions that are Actionable:

You might have tons of questions that can gauge engagement; however, unless management can act on the results, they are useless and will not help to increase engagement. A good practice is to run the potential questions by managers and ask them to provide two action items should the answers be ‘low’. If the managers cannot name any items, then the question should be left out, or reworded.

Share the Results with as Many Levels as Possible:

If a properly formatted engagement survey indicates low engagement AND provides the action items necessary to remedy it, then the results should be shared with as many levels of management as possible. Sharing the results is the only way to improve the situation across the entire organization. If the survey process itself is fully automated, then this should not be a problem at all and would make sharing the results as easy as clicking a button. *

Conduct Engagement Surveys Annually:

If an engagement survey is formatted properly, offers a clear degree of engagement and offers actionable items for increasing engagement, then it just makes sense that management has timely versions to refer to. Some companies even find it beneficial to conduct very short engagement surveys semi-annually in order to have timely data and to gauge the effects of engagement initiatives.

Set Engagement Improvement Goals:

After you have conducted your first engagement survey, you should have a handle on the status of employee engagement across each department and the organization as a whole. Use these results to set measurable engagement goals that managers and the organization are expected to reach. Accountability will help to ensure that a company’s leaders at every level are committed to improving engagement.

* Included within emPerform is an eSurvey module that allows organizations to quickly create, distribute, and analyze web-based surveys. Also available with emPerform is a library of best-practice survey questions for all surveys types.

The Power of Reporting: How to get BETTER Employee Performance Analytics
Uncategorised March 14, 2011 0

The Power of Reporting: How to get BETTER Employee Performance Analytics

The Power of ReportingBy: Natalie Trudel

A lot of focus is placed on streamlining and automating employee performance management processes. There are many reasons why this is the case –  reduced administrative costs, decreased human error, effective archiving of past reviews, automated succession plans and compensation management ; however, one of the ultimate goals of automating talent management is the ability to report and analyze performance data. After all, analytics display results and are crucial for decision making.

Reporting and analysis can help you determine (among many other things):

• Which managers have a tendency to rate either too high or too low
• Who your top performers and high potentials are
• How many people are contributing to the overall goals of the organization
• What they’re doing as individuals to support those goals
• Who is above and below average in terms of performance
• Results between divisions, departments and positions
• Year over year employee performance trends and rating changes

 

Overall, there is a great power in the ability to efficiently generate accurate and timely reports and share them with different levels within the organization.

Proper employee performance reporting and analytics should be the backbone of many HR and company goals. It is no longer enough to rely on traditional, administrative HR reports to express the health of a company’s employee performance. In order to remain competitive, an organization must have clear insight into the status of their biggest investment – their talent. It might, however, be overwhelming to begin planning an effective employee performance and analytics strategy that will make the most of your automated system.

emPerform boasts one of the most powerful and flexible reporting tools on the talent management market. As such, we have a wealth of knowledge related to best-practice Employee Performance reporting and analytics.

Which reports to pull – See examples of which reports should be of interest to each level within your organization: HR, Executives, Management, Employees, and Company-wide.

Report frequency – Learn how often certain reports should be run and analyzed.

Sharing Reports – Learn how to properly present and deliver the reports to relevant parties.

Report Data – Learn tips for ensuring that your report data is accurate.

This webinar will be hosted by John Smith, Director of Enterprise Business Solutions at Corporate Renaissance Group – a global consulting firm. John has dabbled in every area of business from finance to HR and analytics technology. In this webinar, John will share his experiences with every level and department within an organization and show you which reports and analytics are of interest to each party.

Is your workforce engaged? Tips for engaging employees
Uncategorised February 15, 2011 0

Is your workforce engaged? Tips for engaging employees

Is your workforce engaged? Tips for engaging employeesBy: Natalie Trudel

Simply stated: low employee engagement costs organizations money. Instead of explaining how, I thought I would let the numbers tell you. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but these are worth millions in business costs.

– An estimated 23% of payroll cost is un-productive because of low engagement.

– Only two out of every ten people are fully engaged in their job.

– Only 14% of the workforce is in a role that draws on their strengths.Source: HiringSmart

To further these numbers, a Gallup research poll indicates that 54% of U.S. employees are not at all engaged at work and only 29% are truly motivated and engaged. Imagine only half of employees being fully passionate and driven to accomplish company goals – there seems to be a lot of room for improvement.

Let’s go over briefly what ‘employee-engagement’ is. According to Scarlette Surveys International, employee engagement is defined as the measureable degree of an employee’s positive or negative emotional attachment to their job, colleagues and organization which influences their willingness to learn & perform at work. Overall, an engaged employee is passionate about their job and is dedicated to achieving business goals.

As you can infer, employee engagement is an important factor in business success. In fact, “Engagement is the single most reliable indicator of business performance. The more engaged a group of people is, the more committed they are to generating results” ( Jan van der Hoop, Vice President of HiringSmart Canada). Thus one can assume that an increase in employee engagement should result in a subsequent increase in employee performance. It is this increase in performance that will set off a chain of events that will result in organizational success on many levels including; employee satisfaction, customer retention, increased revenues, decreased costs, and most importantly, a move toward a potent talent-base.

–          The top 16% of employees generate 60% of revenues.

–          The bottom 16% of employees cost the company 20% in revenues.

Source: HiringSmart

So how can you realize the benefits of increased performance by catapulting your organization into the realm of improved employee-engagement? Below are some great tips:

Ask:

It is the employees who often know why engagement is low and will most likely have good suggestions to remedy the problems. Make sure you are constantly gathering and analyzing employee feedback and most importantly – that you are visibly acting on it. If your organization’s workforce is reluctant to share their paint points, then conduct anonymous surveys or have an outside party conduct the analysis – anything that will give you a window into any discontent. If employees see that their feedback is prompting change, then you’ve killed two birds with one stone because not only does the feedback process count toward engagement, but the suggestions and insight obtained by the process can also spark improvement.

 

Involve:

Make sure that employees are involved in as many processes as possible that relate to their career and development. The two-way flow of communication gives employees a sense of control over their future in the organization and provides a preview of possibilities and a roadmap of how to realize them. Involvement also includes providing regular feedback. Be sure to thank them for jobs well done and express their importance in the overall business plan. Employees who are involved and rewarded are more likely to feel a sense of accountability and recognition, which have been shown to be key factors in promoting engagement.

 

Challenge:

Employees should be given the opportunity to take risks. Employees that have the freedom to dream up innovative and fresh ideas often drive business results. In a world where conformity and having a ‘play it safe’ mentality has been rewarded, many managers might be reluctant to grant the necessary freedom to employees; however, one should note that ‘risks’ can be as simple as allowing employees to suggest and comment on ideas to improve upon the status quo. Giving employees an open-door policy for sharing ideas and innovation is a great way to foster engagement.

 

Place:

One reason why some employees aren’t engaged at work could be that they do not have passion for their current role. It is in both the company’s and the employee’s best interest to ensure that employees are performing tasks and executing goals that are in line with their current skills and development. Clear and concise employee goals and development plans that are monitored on a regular basis and include input from the employee is a great way to ensure that employees are satisfied in their role and are engaged to produce results.

 

An automated Performance Management solution, such as emPerform, can give you a window into the performance status of your entire talent base – allowing you to identify and address shortcomings such as low employee engagement. By automating engagement tools such as surveys, feedback processes, development plans, and goal management, increasing employee engagement can be simple and cost effective. To learn more, visit www.employee-performance.com

Canadian HR Industry is Quickly Getting on Board with Automating HR Processes
Uncategorised February 7, 2011 0

Canadian HR Industry is Quickly Getting on Board with Automating HR Processes

The emPerform Team has returned from a wonderful week in Toronto where we participated in the 2011 HRPA Conference and Expo.

I would like to thank all the attendees who stopped by the shiny new emPerform booth as well as the many customers and partners who we had the chance to see.  A special thanks also goes out to HRPA for organizing a very successful event and for hosting several expo hall functions which gave us the opportunity to mingle with the conference attendees.

We have recently welcomed several fellow Canadian firms such as Dalsa and Forensic Technology to the emPerform customer list and based on our interactions at HRPA I must say that it seems as though more and more of the Canadian HR industry is getting on board with automating vital HR processes.  We were fortunate enough to meet many event attendees and I presented live demos in the booth to crowds of interested parties. I was happy to see that automation isn’t just a want; it is rapidly becoming a need for many Canadian companies. This is good news for Canada as it means that businesses are striving to maintain a competitive edge by focusing on properly managing their talent base.

We believe that our product was of interest at the HRPA event because companies can’t afford to waste any more time and money with paper-based systems that don’t offer any metrics. We are happy that we can solve these problems quickly and affordably.

I was also impressed with the initiative shown by the many students that we met. Despite a snow day, many of them braved the Toronto storm in order to browse the expo floor.  It seems as though they are actively seeking to learn about the tools that they will be using once they enter the workforce and as such took a keen interest in forward-thinking technologies such as emPerform. We would like to wish all of the attending students the best of luck in their studies and future career endeavors.

Overall, congrats to all for a successful event. This was the perfect kick off for a busy year of shows. We look forward to following up with our fellow Canadians and hope to see you all again soon!

As promised, you can register for a Live emPerform webinar here: https://employee-performance.com/webinars.html

And don’t forget to visit us again at these upcoming events: https://employee-performance.com/events.html

7 Commandments for World Class Performance and Talent Management
Uncategorised October 21, 2010 0

7 Commandments for World Class Performance and Talent Management

If your organization is currently shopping around for a talent management solution or looking for ways to tighten up your existing one, you’ve come to the right place! This week I come bearing gifts in the form of wisdom; seven fruitful tips (to be exact) on what to hope, dream and look for in a talent management platform.

1. Adaptable and flexible – A performance management system must be able to change as the needs of the business change. Content (such as forms, reports, etc.) should be customizable and easy to modify.

2. Easy to administer and manage – Managers don’t want to use software that’s complicated or difficult to oversee. Enough said.

3. Simple and intuitive to use – The goal of an automated solution is to reduce the headaches paper-based systems often create. It should not be seen as an automated chore for managers and employees. To make life easier for everyone, choose a solution that’s simple and user-friendly, and that doesn’t require a technical background to operate.

4. Link to corporate goals and objectives – Being able to tie employee goals and objectives to those of the company will help give focus and direction. Not to mention, knowing how one’s goals fit into the big picture will help motivate employees and give them a sense of purpose and place within the organization.

5. All inclusive – A world class platform should be a complete solution; a one-stop shop, so to speak, that provides the ability to perform collaborative appraisals goal management, 360 multi-rater reviews, online surveys, succession planning, compensation and reporting. All your talent management needs should all be rolled into one convenient system.

6. Great reporting and analytics – What’s the point of having data and not being able to get anything out of it? A high-quality system should have the means to ‘slice and dice’ data, and provide access to robust reporting and analytics.

7. Cost effective and high ROI – A good performance management platform doesn’t need to cost a fortune to get the job done. A solution that comes with a lot of expensive bells and whistles doesn’t always mean it will be efficient. Make sure you select a platform that will meet the needs of your business and deliver high ROI.

End note: If there’s one thing you should always bear in mind it’s that talent management software doesn’t have to be overly sophisticated or complex. Swear by these clear-cut tips and you won’t be disappointed!

The Power of Simplicity: A New Era in Performance and Talent Management
Other Blogs... October 1, 2010 0

The Power of Simplicity: A New Era in Performance and Talent Management

A New Era in Performance and Talent Management

Dr. Vijay Jog, Founder and President of Corporate Renaissance Group and John Smith, Director of Enterprise Business Solutions at CRG, recently teamed up with HR.com to talk about the importance of simplicity in performance and talent management.

The webinar presents a plethora of valuable information for HR professionals who are interested in learning about simple, yet effective talent management.

According to Dr. Vijay Jog, the key to talent management boils down to this: establishing a clear vision, core values and reason for existence. It’s about valuing your employees and their overall contribution to the organization.

But is it possible to bring such simplicity to performance and talent management?

The short answer is yes! It’s possible! But the harsh reality is that not all organizations recognize talent management as an essential piece of the overall puzzle. Talent management is often misunderstood, implemented incorrectly or in some cases, not at all. Current misconceptions and ways of thinking can stifle the true potential of talent management. Some view employee evaluations as more of a chore than a fundamental activity. Others may not understand or believe in the ROI that performance management can deliver. Or perhaps recent global cost pressure has led to treating employees as “cost” and not as an “investment.” The list goes on.

The truth is, if kept simple talent management can be a worthy and rewarding venture. The most expensive and complex software systems do not always deliver the best results. When it comes to a talent management solution, simplicity and clarity trumps complexity, every time.

 

The Performance Value Circle

The performance value circle was developed by emPerform as a practical and straightforward approach to talent management.

 

The performance value circle is broken down into 8 components:
  1. Building brand awareness
  2. Recruitment and on boarding of employees
  3. Monitoring, mentoring and improving talent
  4. Embedding culture and loyalty
  5. Measuring (competencies, skills, engagement, 360s) and reporting
  6. Talent management and succession planning/promotion
  7. Measuring value and embracing analytics
  8. ESAT/feedback and linkages

 

If HR follows all of the steps in this process, then building brand awareness, attracting and retaining employees to the organization will happen all on its own, making talent management a natural course of action.