Dear Overwhelmed:
Think about four main objectives as you undertake this process: pay, organization planning, training and career development, and identifying key and poor performers.
Few annual exercises are as important as performance management. Dialogues and relationships with managers are what drive results, not creating the perfect format. To ensure consistent results, keep documentation simple. This also makes it easier to train your workforce on the importance of performance management.
Here’s a tip: strictly limit the performance-management program to assess those goals that were met, and how they were met. By focusing on those two variables, you would be able to make pay and reward decisions based on key performance indicators, or KPIs.
Next, data gathered from competency scores drives your training and career-development programs. Combining competencies and KPI achievements segregates key performers from poor performers and aids organizational planning. Above all, this approach keeps the performance dialogue focused on two variables.
Combining different criteria may be too ambitious, especially if the whole idea of assessment is new in your organization. Instead, start with a simpler set of criteria. First, define competencies for each job, then augment the competencies as your organization gets familiar with standard assessment tools.
SOURCE: How to Develop Competency Models
LEARN MORE: Matthew Levin, vice president, global operations officer,Hudson Human Capital Solutions, Chicago, September 29, 2004.
The information contained in this article is intended to provide useful information on the topic covered, but should not be construed as legal advice or a legal opinion. Also remember that state laws may differ from the federal law.