Poor Performance Or Poor Communication? Know The Difference

One of the most common complaints I hear from employers is that one of their team isn't performing in one way or another: not pulling their weight, not getting it, or simply not delivering what’s been asked of them.

Sometimes (often) we are all quick to judge the performance of others, before first considering our own part to play in our team’s performance. But communication is everything when it comes to performance and so follow the tips below before jumping right in there and hauling someone over the coals (or worse…).

There is no one single way to get great performance every time, but there are some simple steps you can take to make the path clearer for your team:

1. Set Expectations From The Outset: From up to date job descriptions to quality time during the interview process and discussing what success in the role looks like. This stage is critical.
2. Support Them When They Do Join: Don’t just leave it to chance that they'll ‘pick it up’. Spend time with your new recruit on a regular basis outlining what you expect from them and when. Like to be updated on a weekly basis on how the product is progressing? Tell them. Show them. Share with them how you do it. Try it all.
3. Focus On WIIFT: For you it's probably very clear what you get out of their high performance, but What's In It For Them? Learn what motivates them and push those buttons to get the most of out of your team.
4. Return The Favour: Give them feedback on how their doing. Do it immediately and make it real. A well-timed comment along the lines of “That campaign you ran totally hit the mark in terms of coverage but the signups we were after didn’t materialise. Let’s analyse it together and see how we can do it differently next time” is far more supportive and constructive than leaving it a few months to the end of the probation to tell them they didn’t get the results you were after. You'll have missed valuable time for them to improve and will look as though you were too incompetent to raise it beforehand.
5. Keep Talking: Few people like to work in a vacuum, so keep the conversation flowing. It builds relationships. Makes giving feedback (good and bad) much easier. And makes people feel involved.

Conclusion

You know what you mean. You might think everyone understood what you said, but when you play it back in your head did you really summarise everything clearly? Did you involve them in how they might deliver what was being asked? Did you check to see that they understood what you had asked? And, crucially, did you do this in a way that works best for the whole team? Because each team member is likely to hear different things. Your role here is as a coach, helping them to see how they can achieve the goal in hand, providing the support (and environment) so they can deliver with aplomb and inspiring them to want to do it.