As managers, we’re all taught that to improve our employees’ performance, we need to identify and address performance or skill gaps with feedback, coaching, training, etc.

While this is sage advice, what it tends to do is get us focused on the negatives.

Our role as a manager can become focused on “fixing” our employees to make them better. This negative approach to performance management is one of the things that make employees dread their performance appraisals.

It can also cause tension between you and your staff; almost everyone gets defensive when they feel they are being criticized.

3 ways to accentuate the positive

So what if we changed the focus of our performance management from “fixing” problems to helping our employees make the most of their strengths and use them to support their weaknesses?

How would you do that practically?

Use Root Cause Analysis to Identify Factors That Lead to Success

Work with each employee to identify the conditions under which they excel. What are their strengths? What things are they passionate about? Do they work best in teams or alone? What kinds of people do they work best with? What kinds of projects or tasks do they excel at? Are they detail oriented or big picture thinkers? Do they tend to be motivated intrinsically or extrinsically? Do they need clear direction and parameters, or prefer some ambiguity and freedom?

By identifying the things that support an employee’s high performance, you can help them better understand their strengths. You can also then help replicate the conditions that bring out their best, and where possible, manage work assignments to take advantage of their strengths. Think of it as finding ways to get the maximum value out of your most strategic asset – your workforce.

For example, it you have an employee who works best alone and independently, try to assign them goals and tasks where they have to work independently, or at least team assignments where they have sole responsibility for a portion of the work. If you have an employee who is organized and has strong social skills, but is not detail oriented, try assigning them to projects where they manage people and activities, rather than data or details. Or, pair them up with a detail oriented employee for deliverables that require that skill.

Broaden and Deepen Knowledge/Skills/Experience with Development

In a similar way, you can put a positive focus on employee development. Rather than treat development as remedial, use it to expand your employees’ knowledge, skills and abilities. You’ll still need to address performance or skill gaps, but the primary focus of employee development should be growth. So look for opportunities to provide ongoing feedback, coaching and training that help your employees grow and expand on their current abilities and interests.

Reap the Rewards by Focusing on the Positives

But by focusing on the positives – on our employees’ innate strengths and interests – we build on their strengths, set them up for success, and grow their confidence.

It’s a way we can help our employees “get their big on”.

The end results tend to be a more engaged, productive and loyal workforce, not to mention a more positive and supportive work culture.

And that’s always good leadership.

—

Today’s guest post is from Sean Conrad, a Certified Human Capital Strategist and Senior Product Analyst at Halogen Software.

Image source:  morgueFile