by Yahya, S
Performance management aims to ensure that goals are consistently being met in an effective and efficient manner. Performance management can focus on performance of individuals, groups, processes and organizations. Its main objective is to deliver results and optimize performance of human and capital assets.
Although the term ‘performance management’ is a relatively new idea in the field of management, managers and supervisors have conducted performance appraisals with their staff and departments for years. Employees have been trained for centuries, and people have worked long, hard hours for many years. Processes such as planning, budgeting, sales and billings have also been carried out for many years in organizations. But all too often, these activities are done for the sake of doing them, not for contributing directly to the desired results of the organization.
Being busy is not the same as producing results and adding value to the business. Participating in training, or exhibiting strong commitment and working for long hours do not necessarily lead to results. Performance management focuses on attaining results and adding value; for example, realizing a profit target, securing new deals, delivering new products and services to customers, or retaining customers. Performance management channels human capital towards effectiveness.
In recent years, businesses have faced significant challenges, including increased competition from businesses across the world, scarcity of talents, and environmental challenges. These challenges have meant that businesses must be much more careful about the choice of strategies they take to remain competitive. Everyone and every resource within the organization must be aligned to the business objectives.
This places more focus on ensuring that systems and processes in an organization are properly applied to achieve desired results in the most effective way. Management must ensure that all results across the organization continue to be aligned to the overall organizational objectives. This enables long-term survival and sustained profitability.
Performance in organizations is not limited to the effectiveness of employees; performance management can also be applied to departments, processes, programmes, products or services, and teams or groups. It is right to assume that performance management of every aspect of the business is heavily dependent on the human capital responsible for them.
For optimum performance management, managers and employees must keep the end results in mind, and such results must be in total alignment with business objectives. This is easier say than done, due to the absence of practical and effective tools.
A daily goal-orientated tool that offers employees and management a platform to communicate company strategies and objectives on a daily basis would be greatly welcome by the business community, where employees and managers set their targets for the year and break them down into monthly objectives. Users can then set daily and weekly incremental actions that are required to deliver results.
Such a tool makes it easy to focus on the end results and execute actions that add value to the target goals, whilst discarding non-relevant, time-wasting activities. Such a tool also enables the user to reflect on his/her performance on daily basis and keep track of what works and what does not. With the adoption of such a tool, employees will be able to overcome procrastination and develop new habits of progress and achievement, which are proved to be the best motivator for employees.
Such a goal-achieving tool enables management to keep track of their employees’ performance, help them appreciate the challenges employees are facing and identify the required support they need to accomplish target goals. The diary itself serves as a logbook for employee performance and can be instrumental for performance review appraisals.
Performance management is a critical constituent of business management, and for optimum performance the focus should be placed on utilizing the human and capital assets deployed by a business, with the focus on the end results. The need for a practical tool to enable compliance can not therefore be overemphasized. A daily success organizer or a planner can be a practical tool that enables communication of company goals and strategies, alignment of employee actions with business priorities, and eliminates wastage.
For more information or to purchase The Success Diary visit: [http://www.universalsuccess.com] or The Success Diary website at [http://www.thesuccessdiary.com].
About the author
Yahya, S. is a PhD holder from Imperial College, London, UK, with more than 20 years international professional experience at a senior executive level. His main interests are personal development, business management and strategic Planning. He can be contacted on [email protected].
