AND just like that, we are already in the middle of the year. I was talking to my manager a few days back and we realized there were so many things that have happened in the past six months, and even the recent election has invariably influenced our activities. But despite the uncertain circumstances, organizations need to find a way to adapt and thrive in the face of these changes.
One of the ways you can manage your team and how they react to these changes is to do a midyear performance evaluation. While targets are set during the first weeks of the year, the midyear performance review ensures that everyone is still aligned with the organization’s goals, and that issues and risks are mitigated. If your team member is doing poorly, this would be a good opportunity to develop action plans so they can take corrective action before the annual performance review which is the basis for performance bonuses and promotions.
To ensure you maximize the benefits of the midyear review, set an agenda with your team so they can prepare prior to the mid-year evaluation. Meet with them individually and ask them to prepare a list of their accomplishments from the start of the year to the present. If you have a team tracker, it will be easier for them to list their achievements and they have time to reflect on what they did right and what could be improved. Midyear reviews are meant to follow-up on what was set at the start of the performance evaluation period. It would be good for your team to look at how they are faring and the help they need for the rest of the year.
But make sure to make your own list of your team’s notable accomplishments and use this as an opportunity to build your team’s confidence in their own abilities. Looking at what your team has accomplished and identifying how each of them has contributed to the team’s success will make it easier for you to motivate them for the second half of the year. Do not forget to do a list of areas for improvement also, so that they can work on their professional development.
Meet with your team members individually and set a venue where the two of you can have privacy. This will help both of you discuss freely and provide the freedom to talk about their areas of improvement, or even failures. You can even use the midyear review as a warning for erring employees who do not perform as expected, and use that as an opportunity to lay out a performance improvement program if needed. Depending on your organization’s performance management program, the presence of a Human Resource representative might be advised.
During the review, set the tone by asking engaging questions like what part of their work they enjoy the most, what they want to develop for themselves, or what they need from you to achieve their goal this year. These will make your team members focus on what they can do rather than get stuck in what has happened in the first part of the year.
Remember that you are doing the performance review to help your team realize their full potential, and to motivate them that it is possible to achieve performance targets. It is not a checklist where you rank your team against everyone else and tell them what they need to work on. Some managers reduce it to a checklist of accomplishments and stack ranking which is counterproductive and creates unhealthy competition. Rather, think of the midyear review as a way for you to help every team member become the best version of themselves.
To look into how each of your team members deals with roadblocks, ask them what they had difficulty with during the last half of the year and what they did to overcome it. This will help you uncover underlying issues with the way you lead, or how they deal with other team members. People have an easier time telling stories rather than reporting numbers and figures. It is when you listen to their stories and read between the lines that you truly understand your team member’s motivations. You can discover a lot more when they talk about their achievements.
You also need to discuss specific feedback from people your team works with, so they can work on those during the year. Your team needs to understand that there are certain expectations which cannot be specifically listed in their job descriptions, but are necessary to ensure that smooth working relationships are maintained. But if the feedback is unjustified and unfair, you need to assure your team members that they did the right thing and commit to support them in their decisions. As their leader, it is true that you should be the first to correct them if they are wrong, but you should also be the first to defend them if they are right.
After the review, follow through on commitments. If needed, set weekly or monthly check-ins so both of you do not lose track of performance targets, and areas of improvements are addressed. This shows you are committed to helping them improve, and the necessary support is given to them. As their leader, it will also help in your own evaluation because your manager will see that you did everything you could to help them. Your own evaluation will depend on how your team performs so it would be in your best interest to ensure they deliver as expected, or even surpass targets.
Being a people manager is tricky because your evaluation rests on how you handle your team so that they significantly contribute to the organization’s goals. A substantial portion of that is managing people of different temperaments and abilities. Your team needs to understand that you are willing and ready to invest in them, and one of the best ways to do that is to plan their future with them.