What Others Are Saying

Problem Solving Workshop Participant

Performance FeedBack, part III

Performance Accountability - How to Keep the Problem Performer On Track for Improved Performance

No one disputes that the productivity of employees is an essential element in the profitability of their business. A major factor in low productivity is the problem employee, whose work performance is below standard or whose actions have a negative impact on other employees.

Why are there problem performers in business today? Many supervisors either avoid confronting them or lack the skills to hold successful accountability discussions with them. Ultimately, the performance discussion becomes confrontational; the employee gains control of the discussion and the discussion is destined for failure.

As in Performance Coaching, the goal of the Performance Accountability process is for the Performer to take responsibility for his or her behaviors and develop solutions that stick. What makes the Performance Accountability process the "right" tool for addressing problem performers is that it enables the supervisor to maintain tighter control of the discussion and direct the employee’s energies toward one item only: improved performance.

Performance Accountability

The first step in Performance Accountability is called “Set the Stage." In “Set the Stage” the Supervisor must clearly know the specific behavior to be modified in the problem employee, and make that one behavior the topic of the discussion.

The next step in the Performance Accountability process is called “Facts & Reasons”. In this step the supervisor presents the facts that he or she has gathered relevant to the behavior he or she wishes to see modified in the problem employee. The supervisor then allows the problem employee to give reasons for the facts presented.

If the discussion is proceeding satisfactorily, the supervisor asks the employee if he or she sees the situation as something the employee will improve. This is the step called “Get Specifics and Summarize”. In this step, the supervisor supports the employee in identifying the specific things he or she will do differently to improve performance. The supervisor then summarizes the discussion, gets commitment to action from the employee and, with the employee, develops a follow-up plan.

Set the Stage

The first thing a supervisor does in a Performance Accountability discussion is to state the topic. When stating the topic, the supervisor has a Single, well-defined issue in mind. In addition, the topic should be based on Observed behavior. For example, a supervisor could start a Performance Accountability discussion by saying, “Joe, you have a bad attitude.” While this may be a single issue, it is clearly not based on observed behavior.

By “observed,” we mean that the performance issue in question must be detectable by one of the senses. That is, what does the behavior (or the output of the behavior) look like?...sound like?...or in some cases smell, feel or taste like? If I were to say to you, “Pat is an unsafe worker,” what would that mean? There are many different meanings for the word “unsafe” and many different ways to identify unsafe work behaviors.

In order to effectively deal with behavior or performance issues, you need to deal with behavior which can be documented and explained. For example, “Pat used a bench grinder and was not using safety glasses in the building 44 maintenance shop between 7:05 and 7:07 this morning.” This is an example of explainable, observable behavior. There is no question in anyone’s mind as to the exact nature of Pat’s “unsafe” behavior.

If the supervisor chooses to have a discussion of unsafe behavior, the behavior must first be quantified so it is not open to interpretation. The observed unsafe behavior must be stated in concrete terms. We need to rely on our five senses to help us describe unsafe behavior.

Once the supervisor knows the topic based on observed behavior, he or she should state the topic so that there is no question what the discussion is going to be about.

If the supervisor does not get a clear signal that the employee understands the topic of the discussion, he or she should check for understanding. That is, ask the employee something like, “What is your perception of the topic of this discussion?” If the supervisor gets a totally clear signal that the employee understands the topic of the discussion, then it is optional to check for understanding.

After the supervisor has “Stated the Topic” and “Checked for Understanding”, if necessary, the next step in Set the Stage is to State the Objective of the discussion. In Stating the Objective of the discussion, it is very important to include the words “you” and “differently." For example, if I am concerned about Sally’s high error rate on customer invoices, I would say something like, “Sally, the objective of this discussion is to see what you can do differently in the future to reduce the error rate on your customer invoices.” By doing this in the very beginning of the discussion, the supervisor has “Set the Stage” for the discussion. The employee knows the supervisor’s intent from the very beginning of the discussion.

At this point in the process it is important to check again for understanding. The supervisor should ask the employee, “What is the purpose of this discussion?” The only acceptable response must include agreement by the employee that he or she need to do things differently in the future. If this is not included in the employee’s understanding of the purpose of the discussion, re-visit the Set the Stage step until the employee does understand that it is his or her responsibility to do things differently.

Facts & Reasons

When moving into “Facts & Reasons”, the first thing the supervisor does is “State the Trend." By stating the trend the supervisor clearly shows that he or she has been tracking the situation. The supervisor does not overtly say, “I have been tracking you and here is the trend”, but rather states the facts about the trend.

For example, if Chris’s inventory reports have become increasingly late, a way to state the trend would be, “Chris, during the last four weeks your inventory reports have become increasingly late. Five of your last twelve inventory reports have been three or more days late.” By stating the trend in this factual way, you have presented a fact which, if your information is accurate, cannot be disputed effectively by the employee.

Once the supervisor has stated the trend, he or she gives a recent example of the undesirable behavior. In our example, the supervisor might say, “For example, your most recent inventory report, due on the twelfth, was five days late.”

Because the Performance Accountability discussion has moved into facts which the supervisor has gathered, it is important to now “Check for Agreement." The “agreement” which the supervisor is seeking is agreement on the accuracy of the facts. In other words, are the supervisor’s facts correct? Even if the supervisor has been very diligent in gathering the facts, there is a slight possibility that some or, in the worst case, all of the facts are inaccurate. It does not make sense to continue a Performance Accountability discussion based on these facts if they are inaccurate. If all the facts gathered to date are inaccurate, it DOES NOT mean that the performance issue is resolved. It just means that the supervisor needs to reassess the situation and adjust the next action accordingly.

Quite frequently, when dealing with a problem employee, the supervisor will encounter resistance to the facts. If the facts are accurate, the resistance will take the form of “reasons” why the facts are misleading. If this happens, the employee is moving into the next phase of “Facts & Reasons." Before there is a discussion about the reasons, it is important for the supervisor and the problem employee to “acknowledge” that the facts are accurate.

Once there is acknowledgment of the facts, then the supervisor should ask the employee for reasons. As the employee gives the reasons explaining each of the facts, the supervisor should write them down! Very frequently the employee will ask, “Why are you writing that down?”, or, “Will this go into my Personnel file?” If this happens, assure the employee that you are writing down their reasons so that you won’t lose track of them. If the notes are going to go into the employee’s file, be honest about it. One of the reasons you write the reasons down is to weed out the frivolous reasons. A creative problem employee will run off at the mouth with frivolous reason after frivolous reason after frivolous reason as long as the supervisor will listen. As soon as the problem employee sees that the frivolous reasons are being written down, he or she will stop giving them. Why? Because, in all likelihood, he or she knew they were frivolous in the first place. The problem employee realizes that having a written record of “all those frivolous reason” will make him or her look like a jerk!

While the employee is giving reasons, it is important for the supervisor to listen closely without comment. The intent here is to allow the employee an opportunity to respond to the facts. This must not become a debate. If the employee’s reasons are valid, the supervisor should assess the direction to take in the discussion.

After the employee has given his or her reasons, the supervisor should echo the reasons back to the employee. The way the supervisor does this would be to say something like the following: “Just to make sure that I understand your reasons, they are (say the reasons back to the employee).”

Next, the supervisor thoroughly examines each of the reasons given by the employee. Using the list developed while the employee was giving the reasons as a guide, ask open-ended questions to examine each reason. An advantage the supervisor has by not responding immediately to the reasons given by the problem employee is that the supervisor can deal with only the issues with which he or she wants to deal. Also, the supervisor can address the issues in the order he or she wants, not in the order the employee gave them.

After examining each reason thoroughly, it is the supervisor’s responsibility to accept or reject each reason. If the supervisor identifies up front that he or she is rejecting a reason, the employee will probably not listen to the supervisor’s rationale, but will try to justify his or her position. Therefore, it is important that the supervisor explain his or her rationale for the acceptance or rejection BEFORE accepting or rejecting each of the employee’s reasons.

After the supervisor has accepted or rejected each reason, he or she should ask the employee, “Do you see that this is something you will improve?” If the discussion has been proceeding satisfactorily, the employee will most likely say “yes”. When this happens, the supervisor continues by having the employee identify what he or she will do differently in the future to achieve the improvement.

Get Specifics & Summarize

When the employee sees that the situation is something which he or she will improve, then the supervisor immediately asks the question, “What will you do differently in the future to avoid the (state the topic of the discussion)?” When the supervisor asks the employee what he or she will do differently, the intent is to stimulate the employee to think about his or her behavior and those things which are under the employee’s control.

The supervisor needs to get the employee to be specific. Quite frequently, the employee will state generalities such as, “I won’t do that anymore.” If the employee does that, the supervisor asks questions such as the following:

• “What are you going to do first?”
• “What are you going to do next?
• “Why are you going to do that?”
• “When will you do that?”
• “How are you going to do that?”
• “What else will you do?”

It may be necessary for the supervisor to use silence and prompts in order to get the employee to think about what can be done differently. The questions above help stimulate the employee. However, if the supervisor is impatient and offers suggestions, as opposed to allowing the employee time to think, the commitment to do things differently, from the employee’s point of view, is virtually gone.

When drawing out specifics, it is very important to use open-ended questions. Open-ended questions stimulate thinking. Thinking is what the supervisor wishes the employee to do. If the employee can think of the things which he or she will do differently, there is a greater probability that the employee will modify his or her behavior in order to achieve the desired improvement.

After the employee has identified the things which will be done differently, the supervisor may ask the employee to write them down. By writing down what will be done differently, the employee’s commitment to change is physically demonstrated. The supervisor could say something such as, “The things which you have said you will do differently really sound as though they will help a lot. So that we can make sure that we don’t lose any of these good ideas, why don’t you write them down, so that we both will be sure to remember them.”

After the specifics have been written down, the supervisor should review them quickly with the employee, making sure that all of the things which will be done differently are stated as specifics and under the employee’s control. All of the steps covered so far in the Performance Accountability process are designed to get the employee to acknowledge that there are things which he or she will do differently, and to identify specifics.

If the discussion were to stop at this point, the probability that the employee would do things differently would be low. Therefore, the supervisor needs to get the employee to commit to the modifications in behavior. In order to accomplish this, the supervisor asks a question such as, “Do I have your support on what we are talking about? Will you do these things?” The intent here is to get a commitment from the employee to do the specific things which he or she identified.

At this point in the discussion, one of two things can happen:

1. First, which is the desired result, the employee will commit wholeheartedly to doing things differently. If this happens, move into Structuring Follow-up.
2. The second thing which can happen is that the employee may say something such as, “I’m not sure I can do these things.” (It should be noted at this point that the statement, “I’ll try” on the part of the employee is the equivalent of, “I don’t think I will.”)

If the employee says "I'm not sure" or "I'll try," the supervisor first should discuss with the employee the specific things which will help make sure the employee can do the things the employee identified.

The final step in the Performance Accountability process is to Structure Follow-up. Well structured follow-up is almost always the determining factor in performance improvement. If follow-up is not well structured and adhered to, the probability of long term change becomes almost zero. It is the follow-up which demonstrates to the employee, more than anything else, that the supervisor is really serious about a behavior modification. All too frequently, a supervisor will discuss a performance issue with the employee, the employee will make a commitment, and the supervisor will not follow through. It is the responsibility of the supervisor to devote the necessary time and energy to follow-up in order to make the performer successful.

Up to this step in the Performance Accountability process, the responsibility has been shifted from the supervisor to the employee. In the Structuring Follow-up step, the responsibility becomes equally shared by the employee and the supervisor. One could argue that the follow-up step places more responsibility on the supervisor than on the employee. Therefore, it is very important for the supervisor and the employee to discuss

1. what things the employee will do,
2. when the employee will give what specific information to the supervisor, and
3. in what format.

Depending on the nature of the Performance Accountability opportunity, the time for follow-up may be within hours or may be two or three months into the future. The rule of thumb the supervisor should use is that follow-up should take place at every key milepost within a task which the employee has committed to change, and at the completion of every task which the employee has committed to change. It cannot be stressed enough that inadequate follow-up will almost certainly result in a lack of performance modification by the employee. Lack of follow-up after a discussion as described in the Performance Accountability process could, in fact, make it more difficult to change an employee’s behavior in the future. If the employee perceives a lack of follow-up, he or she legitimately will become cynical about anything the supervisor does in the future.