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THIS WEEK
Executive Performance Reviews - Why the "Boss" needs a Review
ALSO IN THIS EDITION
Executive Performance Reviews - Why the "Boss" Needs a Review
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Performance reviews are only for employees and not the boss – right? Wrong?
The biggest mistake business owners and CEOs make is thinking they don't need a performance review, that they know what they need to do and they just need to be left alone to get on and do it.
The challenge is that most business owners or CEOs don't take the time to plan, they don't regularly review their progress, and as a result, they are less successful than they could be.
What I have found over the years is that leaders or managers when left alone tend to create companies and work teams in their own image. They hire people they like (and who are like them) and dismiss people who don't think like them or have diverse viewpoints to them.
Unwittingly they create strength in the areas they are strong in and weakness in their areas of personal weakness. Take for example an entrepreneurial CEO with a scattered and creative mind, who tends to have 4 million ideas running through their head, without taking any to completion. Their organisation is one that faces constant change, with no organisational change process completing before the next one starts.
 They have lots of ideas people, but not as many people who implement them. Any implementers in the team tend to burn out as they are not sure when it is safe to start to implement, because the CEO is still tweaking their thinking.
On the other hand, a CEO who is highly structured and risk averse may find it difficult to accept new ideas, which means that their team adopts the "this is the way that it always has been done" approach in their work, not willing to take risks.
If you want to work out a business, always look first to the CEO. Find out what they are like, and their strengths and weaknesses and you will know where to look to find problems in their business.
That is why executive performance reviews are such a critical tool. They create a system to allow regular looking at the data, checking assumptions, and recalibrating directions. They help to challenge the "we've always done it that way" and "business as usual" approaches, and stretch CEOs to build on their strengths while shoring up their weaknesses.
Executive performance reviews can be done on a "bottom up" approach – where the team provide confidential pooled feedback to the CEO. The Board of Directors can conduct the review based on their experience of the CEO and the data they have before them, or more commonly, CEO's take matters into their own hands by hiring a business mentor or Executive Coach. In effect, all that business mentors or Executive Coaches do is help hold a CEO accountable and help them review their own performance.
A CEO undergoing regular coaching, mentoring, and reviews sends an extremely powerful message to their employees on the importance of continuous performance improvement. Data from the CEOs performance reviews can also be fed into the reviews of their management team, and from there the rest of the organisation.
In my experience, the first and most important person to get into a regular routine of reviews is the CEO. Like many employees, they may put up blocks and barriers to this approach, but the sooner they adopt a regular review cycle, the sooner the business will improve and grow.
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| Business Tip of the Week: The Power of Mentoring |
It doesn't matter who you are in business, having a mentor will get you where you need to go much faster than alone. A mentor can act as a sounding board, someone to bounce ideas off, someone to highlight potential problems and pitfalls and someone to act as wise counsel when you have a "down" day.
When you choose a mentor, try and find someone with different skill sets to yourself - someone who thinks differently and who is not afraid to challenge you.
A formal mentoring program is invaluable in any larger organisation, but even in smaller companies or solopreneurs you can seek mentors.
Mentors many change over the years. The trick is to keep learning and growing. If you are stuck on something, ask yourself - who can mentor me to help me through this?
If you need to do peformance reviews, our Employee Performance Reviews: Tips, Templates & Tactics is a lifesaver.
- Simple, easy to follow, step by step instructions on what to do at each stage of the process.
- Help on the "hard bits" - dealing with employees who cry or get angry during a review.
- Things to do before the review to get the best results.
- How to deal with poor performers
 Comes complete with 8 bonus MP3 recordings of training sessions I conducted with managers to help them work through the nitty gritty of giving feedback, the legal stuff, probabtion reviews and a whole lot more.
Employee Peformance Reviews: Tips, Templates & Tactics
is comprehensive but still User Friendly
John Filewood
Easy to understand and in an easy format
Michelle McKenna
It was clear and easy to use. The recorded training sessions were a bonus and easy to listen to, Ingrid’s voice is not grating and it was good to have an Australian accent as well. It reduced my workload considerably.
The package was pretty comprehensive, the difficult areas of non performance and change management advice was very good. It was particularly helpful to me as we were encountering problems with one of our staff and the advice on acting promptly especially in diligence really made us review management practices and how we could improve them by setting clear performance objectives, identify performance gaps and how to coach staff on improving.
It will save managers time and money, it is good value for money and if the advice is applied will probably save expensive HR mistakes being made. The practical advice on change management and difficult reviews will help those with minimal HR resources and help them recognise potential problems before they happen. It helps produce a professional sound framework in HR which is easy to follow and use.
Suzanne Kuzio Check out Employee Performance Reviews: Tips Templates & Tactics today!
Does your business guard it's knowledge closer than a gold mine guards it's gold? One of the least understood ways to make money in a business is by selling your system. In this post I look at a historical example of someone who sold their system and became one of the best known names in the world.
exuberantly yours
Ingrid
Heart Harmony
PS: This week's Small Business Tips blog included a post about "In unless you are out - out unless you are in.
Legal stuff: This newsletter is intended only a general guideline for Australian businesses. You should seek specific advice for your situation rather than relying only on this newsletter
Earnings disclaimer. Some of the content may include advertorial information, which means I may receive financial compensation for the products I recommend. But - unless I know and trust the product, I will not recommend it.
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