I was working through some performance management issues with a client the other day. We took the company’s key service offerings, broken those down into tasks, and then looked at the individual position involved in each task. A single individual completed some tasks. People in many different roles completed most tasks.Efficiency is doing things right; effectiveness is doing the right things.Peter Drucker
As we were discussing this, my client commented that it was not enough just to perform the task; the task had to be done correctly. That got us to thinking about the processes involved in task management. To put things more simply, we wanted to look at how to manage both the how and the what!
Defining Outcomes
Several years I was doing a management seminar and I
commented that the best way to think of performance management was to start
with the outcome and then work backwards.
The fellow who was hosting the program, a human resources veteran, told
me that that was a unique way of looking at things…the traditional HR
performance management approach was to look at each step and manage the
process.
We need to manage outcomes.
Define the five results needed for each position in your organization
and manage the hell out of them.
A manufacturing client just implemented a system that creates a
bi-weekly report including productivity (planned times vs. actual times) and
quality management. At the departmental
level, the departments know in real time if they are ahead of time targets or
if they are behind time targets. He has
taken outcome management to the shop floor.
Managing Method
It is not enough to manage outcome…we must also manage and
provide guidelines for methods. If we
learned anything at all from the financial crisis is that, the way we achieve results has consequences! The values of your company must permeate down
to the methods of delivery. Sometimes,
method is very prescriptive and other times it is more philosophical. Here is an example from watchmaker
Rolex. It defines the corporate characteristics
they call The Rolex Way.
The Rolex Way
1. A way of doing things unlike any
other.2. The way we make watches, the only thing we will ever make.
3. ‘Precise’ is too imprecise for our attention to detail.
4. ‘Tradition’ is too conventional for the innovation we undertake.
5. We sculpt, paint and explore. But sculptors, painters and explorers we are not.
6. There is no word for what we do.
7. There is only a way.
8. The Rolex Way.
There are other examples of this. Hewlett Packard (HP) had the HP way. Different companies define themselves in
terms of customers, employees, innovation, product and a myriad of other
aspects of their enterprise.
Outcome is like a script.
Anybody can say, May I help you when a customer
enters the store. Process and attitude
determine if the greeting is sincere and welcoming. If you want to develop a
complete performance management system, begin with the outcome, and then
determine the how and why each task is completed. This helps both performance management and
employee development.