Dealing with poor performance

Dealing with poor performance

”For every hundred men hacking away at the branches of a diseased tree,

only one will stoop to inspect the roots."

– Chinese proverb

Poor performance is a topic we have discussed a lot in MDP group 3. Looking outside what we have discussed there are alternative theories on the subject. Mindtools is a company who actually sells toolkits for managers and have an interesting approach to dealing with poor performance:

Performance = Ability x Motivation

Improving motivation and enhancing ability are, according to mindtools the key points into identifying and dealing with poor performance.

“You need to understand the root of a performance problem before you can fully address it. Ability and motivation go together to impact performance, and the most successful performance improvement efforts combine strategies for improving each.”

Their main article on the topic can be found here

“When you confront poor performers, one of 2 things will happen: They improve or they move”

- Joanne Sujansky CEO Key group

Joanne Sujansky has some ground rules for how to approach poor performance. In the article below you can find her key approaches

Article

Another interesting approach is a theory an Australian company called leading performance in Australia has developed. According to them, it is very often the manager that is responsible for your team members poor performance by

1) Being uncomfortable with the conversation that needs to be had with the team member

2)Hoping that the situation will resolve itself

3) Justifying no-action because of budget restraints

4) Do you fear that you might make things worse by talking about it?

The video finalizes by telling you how you, as a manager should be stepping to action. The video can be found here:

Dealing With A Poor Performing Team Member

http://leadingperformance.com.au/resources/bulletins.html Not quickly dealing with a poor performing team member has damaging repercussions that can't be quarantined!