A recent Full Circle Feedback survey revealed that the actions your managers and supervisors (People Leaders) make in your business can directly affect your HR functions and effectiveness.
If a leader within your company has inconsistent actions and communications you can bet that it will affect your business one way or another. This is why it is crucial that your people leaders be correctly trained and informed when it comes to performance management and feedback.
In the survey the strength of most People Leaders was employee relations and risk management, and it pointed out that People Leaders were lacking in the following two categories:
Survey results – People Leaders
1. Feedback and Performance Management
Leaders were often found to be inconsistent in offering feedback and performance management to employees.
2. Human Resource Strategy
Whilst respondents clearly recognised the importance of an effective HR strategy to a business’s success, many noted that often the HR Strategy was not actively put into place by their People Leader.
Although it may seem obvious that the actions of a People Leader could directly affect the HR activities in an organisation, it was surprising that a People Leader would not actively support HR Strategies to ensure constant feedback and performance management to staff.
When it comes to implementing HR Strategies, the Harvard Business Review, Gallup Organisation, Scores on the Board and Mercer raise some very good points that will help a People Leader to keep employees engaged by:
- Providing effective formal induction processes to staff that clearly define the organizational guidelines and performance measurements.
- Reinforcing communication between them and their staff by providing thoughtful feedback and managing measures.
- Supporting employee learning as well as their development needs, this opens the communication channel as well as giving staff a sense of value.
- Making sure that staff benefits and health and safety requirements meet the employee needs.
Communication by People Leaders to employees is critical to a business in managing performance as it enables an organisation to evaluate aspects of a business that need improving as well as ensuring employee engagement. Surveys show that communication is viewed as an ‘opportunity area’ for Australian HR teams to focus on in order to improve the communication with their People Leaders.
Another top opportunity area for HR teams to focus on is to get People Leaders to take a more active role in implementing the business’s HR strategy across all functional areas. People Leaders should follow a carefully planned HR strategy. High performing organisations have clear, comprehensive strategies, linking team and individual goals to their organisation outcomes – and that includes the HR strategy!
Employee engagement is also one of the most significant signs of organisational success. It is important that your People Leaders openly communicate with staff and offer regular reviews so you know if your employees are engaged or not. Once you have the relevant information you can review accordingly.
By ensuring that your People Leaders take note of the issues and areas they are lacking in and receive feedback in order to make active changes in striving to improve those areas, you will safeguard your HR functions and effectiveness, as well as maximising the potential for success in your business.
Full Circle Feedback.
